Bears and Colts: The Importance of Staying on and Getting off the Field

(Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)

There are plenty of reasons to link the Chicago Bears and Indianapolis Colts. 

Both teams are currently headed by Tony Dungy disciples, and both teams have been under the Dungy influence either directly or indirectly for the past several seasons. 

Both teams are located in the Northern Midwest region of the country. In fact, before the Colts rolled into town to give the state of Indiana a professional football team to call their own, many in the state rooted for the relatively close by Bears (and many still do). 

The Bears and Colts have even faced each other fairly recently in the Super Bowl at the end of the 2006 season; and it was the Bears who this past season gave the Colts their first loss in the month of September in four years.

However, the common thread that gives me reason to talk about the Bears and the Colts now is both teams having spent a peculiar amount of time on the field per drive, resulting in an abnormal number of drives in recent years for both teams.

The only difference really is that these two teams lie on completely opposite ends of the spectrum. To take a closer look, I will use the last three seasons (2006-2008).

The Colts have had the fewest offensive drives in the league for each of the past three seasons. That not only gave them the fewest offensive drives over the past three seasons, but it gave them the fewest offensive drives by a wide margin. 

The Colts had 52 fewer offensive drives than the team with the next fewest offensive drives over the past three seasons. That was the same difference between the team with the second fewest offensive drives and the teams tied for the 24th fewest offensive drives.

The Bears on the other hand have had the most defensive drives in the league for each of the past three seasons, which gave them the most defensive drives over the past three seasons by a similarly wide margin.

The Bears had 43 more defensive drives than the team with the next most defensive drives over the past three seasons. That was the same difference between the team with the second most defensive drives and the team with the 23rd most defensive drives.

To take a closer look at just how “out there” the Colts and Bears were, I will rely on cumulative normal distribution probability. Cumulative normal distribution probability can tell us, based on the assumption of a normal curve, the likelihood of another team having as many or fewer drives.

The Colts 450 offensive drives from 2006-2008, which varied from the league average (i.e. mean) of 537 by 3.4 standard deviations. 

Cumulative normal distribution probability tells us that there was only a 0.03 percent chance of a team having as few or fewer offensive drives over three seasons given a mean of 537 and a standard deviation of 25.5.

The Bears had 616 defensive drives from 2006-2008, which varied from the league average (i.e. mean) of 537 by 3.1 standard deviations.

Cumulative normal distribution probability tells us that there was only a 0.09 percent chance of a team having as many or more defensive drives over three seasons given a mean of 537 and a standard deviation of 25.2.

So how do we explain the oddities that are the drive totals of the Bears and Colts? 

It all comes down to how well offenses can stay on the field and how well defenses can get off the field.

Over the past three seasons, the Colts have averaged both longer offensive drives and longer defensive drives than any other team in the league.

Congratulations would be in order for the Colts, except that long drives are a bad thing for defenses. 

The more clock a defense allows an opposing offense to eat up, the fewer opportunities its own offense is going to have to score; and the better rested the opposing defense will be.

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