s Every week www.indianapoliscoltsteamonline.com , I will present a summary of some basic and advanced stats for the Colts performance relative to the league. Thanks to Pro Football Reference, NFL.com and the nflSCrapR project as the sources of weekly data.If I could only have one stat to measure a team by, it would be the highly under-rated Drive Success rate (DSR). DSR is basically the percentage of a team’s down series that are converted to a first down or a TD.DSR = (First Downs + TDs) / (# of Drives + First Downs)It is one of the best stats there is to both explain how an offense performed as well as predict performance in future games, but unfortunately it is not an intuitive stat. In week 2, the Colts put up a 70.8% DSR but that probably doesn’t mean anything to most football fans. Therefore, I have built a drive detail graphic to help flesh the number out visually.OK tell me that graphic isn’t awesome.There is a lot of detail, but let’s walk through a bit of the Colts week 2.Each bar represents the team’s drives in top-down order, with the starting field position on the left and the ending field position on the right. Therefore, the length of the bar represents the drives net yards, which is the numbers in white.Just looking at the relative length of the bars, you can get a feel for the success of each drive.Drive 1: awesome. Drive 2: not so much.DSR basically measures the relative length of drives.The Colts had three 75 yard TD drives and one 58 yard drive that ended with a fluky pick.That is what good offenses do (not the pick). They also had 5 drives in a row without a first down. That is what bad offenses do. The mixed bag of results is why the Colts 70.8% DSR is just a bit above league average (68%) and not as good as the previous week’s 72%.TEAM TOTALSThese are the numbers for week 2 only (I’m hoping to have season totals added by next week).I have added a few metrics since last time that I think help builds out the narrative of the game.At 2.1 adjusted points per drive (drives with QB kneels removed), the offense did better than league average but just barely (just like DSR!). An above average DSR and a below average yards per play (4.7), means that the Colts did not get their points with big plays. And that is backed up by the first down conversion metrics. The % of non-penalty first downs per play (25%) is below what other teams are doing. That could be a sign of a bad team or it could point to a team that runs shorter plays and pushes it’s conversions to 3rd downs. Well, what do you know, the third down conversion rate of 56.3% was 2nd best this week. Combine that with last week’s league best 64% and either the Colts are getting very lucky on 3rd downs or they are putting themselves in an easier position to convert. Average 3rd Down Yards to GainTeamWeek 1Week 2TotalTeamWeek 1Week 2TotalThe Colts have the 3rd lowest 3rd down yardage situations in the league.That’s a dink and dunk offense.Combined with a high 3rd down conversion rate, it’s a dink and dunk offense executing well. PASSINGSorted by ANY/A, Luck has a very poor mark this week, finishing 29th of all QBs.That is primarily driven by the 2 picks and the short yardage play calls. His completion rate of 67.7% is pretty high, but it’s completely due to a near league low 4.3 average depth of target. That is very low and probably can’t sustain a successful game unless your defense steps up . . . hmmmmm.As low as Luck’s aDot is, his air yards per completion is even lower at 2.7. That is a big red flag in my book as it implies that you aren’t connecting on the longer passes you do throw.Luckily the above average 5.9 YAC helps make up for that a little bit.But even combined his Yards per Attempt was only 5.8. That is . . . bad. Like lose a lot of games bad. I don’t see this offense scoring a lot of points unless they can get a little more depth out of the passing game.RUSHINGI have sorted this table by weighted Rush Success Rate as that is the most correlated to and predictive of wins than any of the other run stats presented.Indy’s week 2 is about average Indianapolis Colts T-Shirt , with a 29% wRSR. The unweighted RSR show that about 39% of all runs were “successful”: defined as a TD, first down, 45% of yards to gain on 1st down or 60% of yards to gain on 2nd down.Since the weighted stat is lower that means that a lot of that success came from 1st and 2nd down gains (which are weighted lower).Excluding QB kneels, 24 of the Colts 26 carriescame on 1st or 2nd down.That’s neither good nor bad but it is encouraging that we are at least average in some running measure.CONCLUSIONThe DSR points to an offense that is working in aggregate, but the extremely low yardage plays are concerning. Basically, the Colts margin for error is much thinner than other teams.If 3rd down conversions start to dip, we haven’t shown that we have the explosive play ability to make up for it.It will look a lot like the middle of the Washington game, where there were 5 successive drives without a first down. But it’s only week 2 and there is a lot of offense we haven’t seen yet.Thoughts? Suggestions? Comments? Leave it below. METRIC DEFINITIONSOffensePts:All team pointsAdj PPD: Points per drive with defensive and special team scores removed from team points and drives ending in QB kneels excluded from drive countsNet PPD: Adj PPD with adjusted points reduced interception and fumble TD returnsStrt Fld: Average starting field position (all drives)DSR: Drive Success rate calculated as FD + TD / (Drives + FD). Typically TDs are included in FD counts and so DSR = FD / (Drives + FD - TDs).Drives ending in kneel downs are typically excluded. 1st%:The number of non-penalty first downs divided by plays.3DC:The % of third downs converted to firsts. Pass1st%:The number of non-penalty passing first downs divided by attempts + sacks.aDOT : The average depth of passes thrown relative to the line of scrimmage (completed or not)aYd:Air Yards for completed passes20+ : Pass plays for more than 20 yardsANY/A :Adjusted Net Yards per Attempt = (Yds - Sack yds + 20 * TD - 45 * Int) / (Att + Sacks) Rush1st% :The number of non-penalty rushing first downs divided by carries.10+ Yds : Rush plays for more than 10 yardsRSR: Rushing Success rate is the % of carries that result in success defined as a TD, First Down, 45% of ytg on 1st down and 60% of ytg on 2nd down.4th quarter adjustments are included for time remaining and point differntialwRSR: Weighted RSR is RSR with a weighted value attached to each success type. TD = 2, FD = 0.9, 45% of ytg on 1sts = 0.65 and 60% of ytg on 2nd = 0.55. EPA/c:Expected Points Added per carry. This uses EPA data as calculated by the nflscrapR project. After an exciting start to the season for Thursday Night Football, Week 8 kicks off with a Brock Osweiler revenge game against the Houston Texans. After starting 3-0 and 0-3 to start the year, Miami and Houston both come in at 4-3.Things do pick up on Sunday however with the third and final London game of the season — pitting two desperate teams in the Philadelphia Eagles and Jacksonville Jaguars against one another. Blake Bortles was benched last week after a string of horrendous play, a slight glimpse that Doug Marrone may be looking to move on from his starting signal caller should his poor play continue. For the defending Super Bowl champions, Philadelphia has had trouble closing out games this season and finding consistency within its play, making this matchup against a good Jacksonville D very intriguing.A Panthers/Ravens matchup and a rematch of a previous Monday Night Football game between the Chiefs and Broncos highlight the 1 p.m. slate. A sneaky game to keep an eye on, with potential to be the game of the week, falls in Detroit as the Seahawks face the Lions. The Seahawks seem to have finally found a ground and pound run game, and the Lions just traded for Damian Harrison to improve their subpar run defense. Two of the better quarterbacks in football should only create a bigger fixture for the early games.Indianapolis travels out to Oakland to take on the empty Raiders’ roster. Andrew Luck and the Indy offense have faced some of the better defenses in football this season Indianapolis Colts Hats , so taking on a Raiders defense with minimal talent should be easily exposable for all 60 minutes. A banged-up Aaron Rodgers faces his greatest test of the season, and the pressure up the middle from Aaron Donald and Ndamukong Suh should add a poignant threat to the most talented slinger of the football.Sunday Night Football is a rematch of the divisional-round thriller from a year ago, as New Orleans returns to the same stadium where their postseason ended on a walk-off touchdown from Stefon Diggs. Everything seems to be going the right way for Drew Brees and the Saints this season, so exacting their revenge and removing the haunting demon of last year’s loss will be pivotal for them moving forward.Week 8 starts with a snore-fest, why not end with one? New England visits Derek Anderson and the Buffalo Bills. After losing to the Colts by 32 points, a team that lost to the Patriots by 14, don’t expect for your Monday night to live up to it’s primetime slot.With all that said, here are this week’s standings in Stampede Blue’s staff picks for the season and their predictions for Week 8 in the NFL.Chris Shepherd: 56-35 / Brett Mock: 56-35 / Stephen Reed: 53-38 / Andrew Aziz: 52-39 / Chris Blystone: 52-39 / Elliot Denton: 52-39 / Jared Malott: 49-42 / Matt Danely: 33-29 / Zachary Hicks: 29-31 / Blake Pace: 9-5Thursday 8:20 pm ETDolphins (6) @ Texans | Contrarians: Blake Pace, Jared Malott, Andrew Aziz, Brett MockSunday 9:30 am ETEagles @ Jaguars (London)Sunday 1:00 pm ETRavens (7) @ Panthers | Contrarians: Chris Shepherd, Stephen Reed, Chris BlystoneBroncos @ ChiefsBrowns @ Steelers (8) | Contrarian: Zachary Hicks, Elliot DentonSeahawks @ Lions (7) | Contrarians: Pace, Malott, MockBuccaneers @ Bengals (9) | Contrarian: PaceJets @ BearsRedskins (8) @ Giants | Contrarians: Pace, MockSunday 4:05 pm ETColts @ RaidersSunday 4:25 pm ET49ers (9) @ Cardinals | Contrarian: MalottPackers @ Rams (9) | Contrarian: MalottSunday 8:20 pm ETSaints (7) @ Vikings | Contrarians: Blystone, Reed, DentonMonday 8:15 pm ETPatriots @ BillsWhat are your picks for Week 8?