Thorman’s Snaps and Pace: Week 3

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Up In Pace | Slow-Paced Slogs | No-Huddle Notes

Welcome to the Week 3 edition of Snaps & Pace — back-to-back winner of the FSWA’s Best Football Series — where we examine trends in play volume and game pace. It is meant to be a 30,000-foot view of upcoming contests, while identifying main-slate matchups that will — and will not — be played on fertile fantasy soil. For a primer on why this is important, click here.

The kickoff scoring sugar high wore off faster than Phish-show nitrous. With the 49.4-point Week 1 balloon quickly popping and squeaking out only 40.4 points per game for the encore, we were dealt a lower average than every non-Week-18 result from last season.

Plays per game are also down, again — and signs of a rebound are ominous. Offenses are moving slower by choice, with tempo down drastically.

Last year, the league-wide no-huddle rate after two weeks was 9.5%. Now it’s 6.3%. Teams usually start out using less tempo than they eventually deploy. Yet, there hasn’t been a single week, let alone two combined, with a no-huddle rate below 6.3% since Week 18 of 2022 (6.1%).

For now, forecasting game states remains more unsettled than it will, hopefully, become as we gather more data. The bright side is contrarian stances can more easily find solid ground, and predictions for high-pace matchups won’t align as closely with high projected totals as late in the season.

Often a smaller main slate can tie our hands for Up In Pace options. Sometimes, like this week, a couple of lower-totaled matchups on the meatiest main slate of the year look like faster-paced games. Giddyup! These chances are more fleeting than MarShawn Lloyd’s dynasty value — so let’s dive right in.

“Situation neutral” is meant to provide context and refers to plays while the game is within seven points during the first three quarters (minus the final two minutes of the first half). Neutral Pace (average play-clock seconds used), Neutral Pace Over Expected (POE), and Pass Rate Over Expected (PROE) are based on neutral game script and are provided by our data science team.

Up In Pace

Carolina Panthers at Cleveland Browns

Two weeks ago, Panthers-Browns would have been a comical up-pace matchup candidate. Things change quickly around here, and Carolina delivering on offseason rhetoric for the first time in the Bryce Young era is among the most consequential early-season shifts. Talk of a quicker operation and more downfield passing has manifested into the league’s fastest neutral pace and highest PROE (+11%). Through 15 weeks last year, the Panthers ranked 31st in neutral pass rate. In the six games since then, including playoffs, they have a 63% rate — which would have finished first a year ago. Now the backfield is thinner with Jonathon Brooks again sidelined. Bryce Young is also legitimately balling out and turned in his first back-to-back double-digit aDOT games in nearly two years.

Carolina’s contests rank third in combined plays (129.5) and second in total points (66.5). Browns games aren’t quite that much fun — or much fun at all if you’re from Cleveland. Still, after Week 2’s performance in Tampa, there is a sliver of hope. Deshaun Watson posted his best game as a Brown with two touchdowns and no disgusting turnovers, that we know of. Cleveland scored more than 18 points in a Watson start for the first time in nearly three years. At least for now, he has the passing game ranked eighth in success rate (versus 24th in rushing success), has exciting young passing-game weapons at his disposal, and has beaten off the benching threat. With a pair of uninspiring defenses queued up, and the Browns surprisingly not far behind the Panthers in neutral pace (fourth), we should smash this paltry projected total (41.5).

Las Vegas Raiders at New Orleans Saints