Since 2000

[Brutius]

(and I only use 2000 because thats as far back as the easily sortable stats go on ncaa.com), the two teams playing in the BCS championship averaged:

Total Defense: 10.0625
Total Offense: 20.125

Last year the two teams playing in the BCS Championship were 26th and 62nd respectively in total offense and 1st and 3rd respectively in total defense. Only one year in the past 8 have the two teams in the BCS championship been ranked higher in offense than in defense.

So you can talk about winning records or losing records all you want, but the teams playing for the championship each year average 10 slots better in the defensive rankings than they do in the offensive rankings. A 62nd ranked offense can play in the championship game, but no defense lower than 48th has (and other than that anomoly no team under a defensive ranking of 25 has played in the championship).

Your friend,
Brutius

 

[Brutius]

(and I only use 2000 because thats as far back as the easily sortable stats go on ncaa.com), the two teams playing in the BCS championship averaged:

Total Defense: 10.0625
Total Offense: 20.125

Last year the two teams playing in the BCS Championship were 26th and 62nd respectively in total offense and 1st and 3rd respectively in total defense. Only one year in the past 8 have the two teams in the BCS championship been ranked higher in offense than in defense.

So you can talk about winning records or losing records all you want, but the teams playing for the championship each year average 10 slots better in the defensive rankings than they do in the offensive rankings. A 62nd ranked offense can play in the championship game, but no defense lower than 48th has (and other than that anomoly no team under a defensive ranking of 25 has played in the championship).

Your friend,
Brutius

 

[Brutius]

(and I only use 2000 because thats as far back as the easily sortable stats go on ncaa.com), the two teams playing in the BCS championship averaged:

Total Defense: 10.0625
Total Offense: 20.125

Last year the two teams playing in the BCS Championship were 26th and 62nd respectively in total offense and 1st and 3rd respectively in total defense. Only one year in the past 8 have the two teams in the BCS championship been ranked higher in offense than in defense.

So you can talk about winning records or losing records all you want, but the teams playing for the championship each year average 10 slots better in the defensive rankings than they do in the offensive rankings. A 62nd ranked offense can play in the championship game, but no defense lower than 48th has (and other than that anomoly no team under a defensive ranking of 25 has played in the championship).

Your friend,
Brutius

 

[Optimus Prime 4]

i'm more concerned about record in general, getting to a bowl game, etc.

 

[DowntownDawg]

....the end.

On average, you may end up with roughly the same number of wins, even though the statistics show that defense wins slightly more, but if you get in the big game/championship game, bet on the team with the better defense, and these statistics bear that out.

 

[MSUCE99]

but if you get in the big game/championship game, bet on the team with the better defense <span style="font-weight: bold;">(unless your defensive coordinator wears no socks and is prone to giving up the big play by sending the house)</span>, and these statistics bear that out.

There, that ought to do it.

 

[ArrowDawg]

nm

 

[ArrowDawg]

....your offense ranks in the #110 or lower range every year, chances are that you'll still be a consistent loser regardless of how good your defense is.

 

[patdog]

And that is it's better to have a good defense than a good offense. Bruiser showed that the top 10 defensive teams won 75% of the time last year, while the top 10 offensive teams won only 69% of the time. This also holds true for the top 20 of each (top 20 defenses win 72% of the time, while top 20 offenses win only 68% of the time). Now Brutius shows that BCS championship game teams consistently have better defenses than offenses. Bottom line is, if you have to choose one or the other, you're better off going with the good defense.

The only stat that's been brought up that showed differently was subsequently proven not to be accurate.

 

[AzzurriDawg4]

morph into Texas Tech's offense overnight, we just need to be respectable on offense. I think that is all anyone is asking for - I think the "defense wins championships" cliche is true but I dont think you will find "Defenses with ridculously shatty offenses wins championships" anywere in a football quotes book.

 

[Coach34]

we are talking about winning games...

"On average, you may end up with roughly the same number of wins"

exactly

 

[DowntownDawg]

....I'm not arguing that point or defending our offense. I am just arguing that if I have to choose, give me a good defense every day.

 

[Coach34]

since both teams in the championship game this past year were top defenses, which team won? The 26th rated offense or the 62nd rated offense? Yep, you guessed it, the 26th rated offense...that great Ohio St defense did nothing to slow down LSU as they put up 38 points on them..</p>

If you are going to win, your *** better have a good offense</p>

 

[ArrowDawg]

nm

 

[Brutius]

won 15 more games than the top 20 offensive teams has nothing to do with winning games?

The teams in the championship each year are better defensively than offensively. Teams ranked in the top 20 (or 30, or 50, or whatever random number you pick) in total defense win more games than the corresponding teams ranked in total offense.

So, teams with better defenses win more games and more championships than teams with better offenses.

Simply put, you are wrong. They are not the same. Good defensive teams win more games than good offensive teams. Great defensive teams win more (and more championships) than Great offensive teams. Last year a team ranked 62nd in offense played for the national championship. Last year a team ranked 113th in offense won 8 games. Defense > offense to everyone but you.

 

[Brutius]

you only pick out stats that support your argument and ignore others. When LSU won the 2003 national championships, the team they beat was ranked 12 slots higher in total offense than they were. USC lost to Texas as the number 1 overall team in total offense. When it comes down to the final game many things can happen but in general the two teams playing are ranked much higher in total defense than total offense. In those games I listed, the team with the lower ranked offense has won half the time.

 

[patdog]

than you do with a good offense. There's no arguing that. It's been proven time and time again. But if you want to keep arguing it, you need to show us something to back your point up.

I don't have any problem at all with Croom being a defense-first coach. The problem I have is that his offenses are so bad it makes it hard to win even with a good defense.

 

[Coach34]

even Bruiser answered it for me when Ronny's stupidass asked me...I always say you have to have both.BOTH....if you want to be a good team...

Now when the question is posed, what would I personally prefer? I'm going to say offense...because thats what I loved playing and coaching...At the end of the game, i'd rather have the ball in my hands needing to score...i like having that control...I cant imagine how awful it was for Brady to watch the Giants go right down the field and score on the defense to screw their perfect season.

19 of the top 20 scoring teams had winning records...if you score points...you will win

 

[DowntownDawg]

...after all, that's what we play sports for, coach. And the same applies to big games, too. You know, the type of games that put you in a position to win the division or something like that.

 

[Brutius]

Because as has been shown ad nauseum, defensive teams win more than offensive teams.

There is no single stat you've said that shows in any way shape or form that a good offensive team wins more games or championships than a good defensive team. You keep saying that 19 or the top 20 offensive teams had winning records, 18 of the top 20 defenses did too. When you extrapolate further you have teams in the top 50 in offense that finished 1-11 and 2-10. Surely that doesn't qualify for a winning team.

Conversely at the bottom levels (which I think more strongly proves the point of which is more important), it's shown that you can win with a terrible offense and good defense (5 teams with winning record ranked 100+ in offense) but that you can't win with a terrible defense and good offense (only one team in the 100+ in defense with a winning record).

I know I am expecting a little too much, but seriously how many times can you be proven wrong before you shut up?

 

[Coach34]

even Bruiser answered it for me when Ronny's stupidass asked me...I always say you have to have both.BOTH....if you want to be a good team...

Now when the question is posed, what would I personally prefer? I'm going to say offense...because thats what I loved playing and coaching...At the end of the game, i'd rather have the ball in my hands needing to score...i like having that control...I cant imagine how awful it was for Brady to watch the Giants go right down the field and score on the defense to screw their perfect season.

19 of the top 20 scoring teams had winning records...if you score points...you will win

 

[OEMDawg]

I don't have any problem at all with Croom being a defense-first coach

I damn sure do. He was "supposedly" hired because he was an 17'n NFL OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR.

 

[Brutius]

the thing that gives you less wins. Got it.

 

[DowntownDawg]

the option that is statistically and historically proven to be not as good as the other option. Fine. Quit whipping the board's *** with it and trying to justify your stance. You would rather have less wins and championships. That's your prerogative. The rest of the world would rather have more wins and championships, and we're not the insane ones.

 

[cowbell9]

nm

 

[Coach34]

aGAIN I say, you have to have both. Other than the Ravens, you arent going to win a championship with a ****** offense. aGAIN, I repeat, you have to have both to win a championship.

Ohio St had the best defense in the nation last year, but didnt win the championship. Why? Because their offense was 62nd. Defense obviously didnt win the championship. The team that had both did.

If I have to choose one though, I want the offense. Why? Its alot easier to bring in recruits when you have an exciting offense than it is to get them here with that pile of **** we got. Get exciting on offense, and people will come. Ask Mike Leach, Steve Spurrier, and June Jones

 

[patdog]

Ask Mike Leach, Steve Spurrier, and June Jones

Mike Leach - 4-4 in a weaker Big 12
Steve Spurrier - 3-5 in the SEC. No bowl game
June Jones - We saw how well his offense did against an SEC team.

Sly Croom - 4-4 in the SEC. Bowl win. Even with no offense.

You know that I agree with you just about completely about our offense. There's no damn excuse for it to suck so bad. And Croom deserves every bit of blame for it. BUT, on the argument of whether it's better to have a good offense or a good defense, I'm going to go with defense. Not because I like defense better. Like most people, I like offense better. But from looking at the facts, it's pretty clear that good defenses win more often than good offenses.</p>

 

[RonnyAtmosphere]

... Brutius when you attempt to prove a reality-based fact to certain segment of the MSU fanbase.

Meaning everybody knows defense wins games; everybody reading this saw the evidence with the 1999 team. Yet you can post all the statistical evidence you want, and you can have all the real life evidence you want, but there is a certain segment of the MSU fanbase that wants nothing to do with reality.

That defense trumps offense when it comes to winning football games can be proved:

a) Statistically (like Brutius has done).

b) By witnessing it first hand (MSU's 1999 squad).

When you choose to be constantly at odds with reality, it creates annoying little cyber-pests like coach34.

 

[Brutius]

I'd rather win 6-3 than lose 52-49. I think everyone except coach34 agrees.

 

[ArrowDawg]

..........before anything if you want to succeed, but that you can't do without a decent offense if you want to win on a "consistent" basis. And when I say "consistent," I don't mean just game to game but also season to season.

MSU had a successful season by almost anyone's standards in 2007, but we all know it was mostly due to an outstanding defense making timely plays, including turnovers they turned into points. So that begs the question, can a defense turn in that kind of performance every year? Or, will it be more likely that the defense will remain solid, but not produce as many turnovers or score as many points most years? I lean toward the latter. That's why we must get a lot better on offense.

Also, while you guys are all discussing what the statistics say about who wins championships and so forth, all I'm talking about is having a decent football program that wins 7 games on average for the majority of seasons every decade. Anything above and beyond that at MSU is a pipe dream, and we should all learn to cope with that reality. It's going to take a hell of a lot more than what we have, including at least $30 mil more in annual budget, if we want to ever realistically consider what it's going to take for us to compete regularly for overall SEC championship titles or national titles.

 

[Coach34]

"Mike Leach - 4-4 in a weaker Big 12"

Also the same Mike Leach that has Texas Tech ranked each year, as opposed to rarely before he got there

"Steve Spurrier - 3-5 in the SEC. No bowl game"

Actually, its his wide-open offense that moved Florida from the middle of the pack of the SEC to the top..not to mention he changed the SEC forever

"June Jones - We saw how well his offense did against an SEC team"

or do you mean the June Jones that actually got Hawaii into a BCS game? Do you think they have the recruiting base that even we have?</p>

"Sly Croom - 4-4 in the SEC. Bowl win. Even with no offense"

over the pride of the freaking Sun Belt</p>

</p>

 

[Todd4State]

teams in general, but let's talk about MSU for a second. When Croom took over our team, we were not very good on both offense and defense, as well as special teams. Aside from a few players- Norwood, Conner, for example, Croom didn't have a whole lot to work with. Right or wrong, Croom obviously felt like the best way for us to build a respectable program was to build the defense first while making sure that we had a decent running game to hold the lead. That is exactly what he has done, and to be honest it's hard to argue with the results from last year. In case someone has missed it, or refuses to look at posts by Peaches, our offense was not very good last year, BUT our defense was pretty solid and was able to make a LOT of big plays for us. For people to say that was luck is simply a copout. You don't get lucky time after time after time. For example, Auburn had a first and goal inside the 10 and stood tall, after Pegues got a BS personal foul call, our defense stepped up and help UK to a FG try, Titus sacking John Parker Wilson to end the game when it looked like Bama was threatening to go down the field and score, and of course the fateful 4th down call in the Egg Bowl. Plus how many times did Ole Miss have a sure 1st down by throwing the ball in the 4th quarter only to have the ball ripped out or knocked loose by a hard hit. It was at least four times. Notice I didn't even mention any of the plays that we scored a TD on defense.

All that said, I think that Croom is now really going to start to focus on the offense a lot more. And I really do think that in the near future we will start to open it up a little bit more. The fact is, if we tried to be really aggressive on offense with the personnel that we had, it would have very likely been devastating and probably would have negated many of our big plays on defense.

Sometimes I disagree with things that Croom does, but I actually agree with much of his plan for MSU football. Hopefully last year was the first of many where we begin to see the fruits of his work.

 

[patdog]

if we played in the WAC. I know a couple of Sherrill's teams could have gone through that schedule undefeated. As for Leach, I'm not all that impressed. He's done a good job in a relatively weak conference, but he's failed consistently against good teams. Spurrier, you're right. Except that he had good defenses to go with those great offenses. And his 11-13 SEC record at USC sure isn't because he had great offenses with no defense. If anything, his defenses have been better than his offenses there.

Bottom line. I agree with you about our offense. It sucks and there's no excuse for it. There's no reason we couldn't have an offense ranked in the 80s without sacrificing anything from our defense. But if I have to choose one unit to be ranked below #100, I'm going to choose offense every time. A good defense can keep you in games and win some even with a terrible offense. If you've got a terrible defense, you're screwed. See our 2003 season for an example.

 

[Coach34]

"Right or wrong, Croom obviously felt like the best way for us to build a respectable program was to build the defense first while making sure that we had a decent running game to hold the lead."

Were we only allowed to recruit good defensive players?
Is it a rule that if you want to build a good defense, you have to recruit ****** QB's and WR's?
Do good teams constantly have players talking about how complicated the system is?

you dont have to build any side first...you bring in the best players you can, and put them in positions that they fit...

 

[RebelBruiser]

As I showed in another thread, in 2007, the teams in the top 20 defenses averaged a record that was half a game better than the top 20 offensive teams.

That's only one season though, and if anything I think it proves that the difference in record between having a great defense and having a great offense is negligible. I haven't run the stats, but I'd be curious to see what the average defensive ranking was for the top 20 offenses was and what the average offensive ranking was for the top 20 defenses.

Based purely on the stats, I'd guess that the top 20 defensive teams averaged having a better offense. I'll check on that and get back with those stats.

Now, looking at the NFL from 2007, here were the top 5 offensive teams:

1. New England
2. Green Bay
3. Dallas
4. New Orleans
5. Indianapolis

Here were the top 5 defensive teams:

1. Pittsburgh
2. Tampa Bay
3. New England
4. Indianapolis
5. Tennessee

Just posting that for discussion. Again, I'll get back with the other side of those stats I gave earlier.

Edited to add: Just ran the numbers. The top 20 defensive teams had an average offensive ranking of 58.6. The top 20 offenses had an average defensive ranking of 55.65. So, the teams with the best defenses did manage to win on average half a game more over the course of the season, and they did so with offenses that were on average ranked about 3 spots less than the top 20 offensive teams. This lends a little bit of credence to the defense argument. However, I still believe it shows that you have to be respectable in both to have a chance to win big. If you have a top 20 defense or offense and the other unit ranks in the mid-50s, there is a good chance you'll end up with about a 9-4 record.

 

[RebelBruiser]

"
you dont have to build any side first...you bring in the best players you can, and put them in positions that they fit...

</p>

I agree with that, especially with college football. You better be building up both sides at the same time because you don't get to keep players for long enough to build one and then the other.

In the pros you can build a solid defense or offense, and then go out and try to shore up the other side of the ball. If you do that in college, by the time you get your offense built, your good defense will have graduated.

 

[RobertF50]

" You win with offense, you keep from losing with defense".

 

[RebelBruiser]

All of those quotes are a load of BS for all sports if you ask me. The best teams do both. That's it, plain and simple. You don't win a championship, with rare exception, if you suck at one or the other.

If you suck at defense, your offense can only take you so far. If you suck at offense, your defense can only take you so far. I really don't think there is much of a difference if any between which one is better or worse. They're both pretty much equally important.

People say that if you don't allow the other team to score, you can't lose. Well, at the same time, if you score every time you touch the ball, you can't lose either.

 

[DowntownDawg]

all I'm talking about is having a decent football program that wins 7 games on average for the majority of seasons every decade. Anything above and beyond that at MSU is a pipe dream, and we should all learn to cope with that reality. It's going to take a hell of a lot more than what we have, including at least $30 mil more in annual budget, if we want to ever realistically consider what it's going to take for us to compete regularly for overall SEC championship titles or national titles.

And here is where we might disagree. You are right in that we will never be an LSU or Florida or Tennessee. We'll never have their budget, and therefore, we'll never be competing for a division championship year in and year out. But we can be a consistent 6-8 win team that every once in a while rises up and challenges for the division or even wins it once in a blue moon. And of course, of course everybody would love to have a good defense and good offense, but the reality is, at a place like Mississippi State, it's hard to have both, because the sheer numbers of top athletes and premium players that are going to come to your school are going to be less than the big boys. And if we have to emphasize one, I'd rather be a strong defensive team, year in and year out. Why? Because when we do get to the SEC championship game, we're likely not going to have the athletes that Florida or Georgia or UT has. But if we have a great defense, we've got a chance to win it. There is no doubt that you have to at least be an adequate offensive team, which we are not right now, but you've got a better chance to win the big games you find yourself in with a strong defense.

 

[DowntownDawg]

Do you think we tried to recruit ****** QB's? I'm sure Croom could've had Colt McCoy if he'd wanted him. Remember Ryan Perriloux? Hell, we got who we could get. Those were bleak days, man. They weren't exactly beating down our door.