This is an excerpt from Warren Sharp's Super Bowl 60 Report, a 50+ page analysis of Patriots vs. Seahawks that looks at the big game from every angle. Warren breaks down all the key matchups to give you an edge betting sides, totals, and props. The full report is available to subscribers, and you can get our Super Bowl Package for $50 off using promo code SB60
Click here to learn more about our Super Bowl Package!
The Seahawks are the favorites in Super Bowl 60, but they cannot rest on their laurels.
Let's look at the three keys to the Seahawks taking home the trophy on Super Bowl Sunday.
Contents
The Importance of Early Down Success Rate
If you’ve followed me for any amount of time, you know EDSR stands for Early Down Success Rate, an efficiency metric I created.
It isn’t simply success rate of first and second downs, but it does look at efficiency on the early downs.
What you may remember from prior Super Bowl write-ups is that it is the single MOST CORRELATED STATISTIC TO WINNING IN THE POSTSEASON that exists over the last 10 years.
The first thing we do is strip out the huge favorites/dogs, and stipulate that games must be lined within 7 points of pick.
That will give a more level playing field to evaluate the teams, and that’s also what we have in this game.
Next, teams with a 2+ turnover edge cover 81% of their postseason games.
So, to determine the efficiency of a stat, it’s best to strip them out.
Let's focus only on games where one team doesn't have a 2+ turnover advantage:
Teams with the better EDSR in these games have covered 73% of their games in the postseason since 2007 (49-18 ATS).
Sharp Football Analysis has every angle of Patriots vs. Seahawks covered in our Super Bowl 60 Hub.
Seahawks Early Down Success Rate:
Offensively, the Seahawks ranked #8.
- They played 5 games vs. top-10 EDSR defenses
- #3 Texans, #4 Rams twice, #5 Vikings, #10 Jaguars
- They played 7 games vs. bottom-10 EDSR defenses
- #31 Commanders, #27 Colts, #26 Cardinals twice, #25 49ers twice, #24 Titans
Defensively, the Seahawks ranked #1.
- They played 7 games vs. top-10 EDSR offenses
- #1 Rams twice, #2 49ers twice, #4 Colts, #7 Falcons, #10 Jaguars
- They played 5 games vs. bottom-10 EDSR offenses
- #29 Titans, #26 Bucs, #25 Steelers, #24 Texans, #23 Vikings
Click here for the Patriots' three keys to winning Super Bowl 60
Three Keys to Seahawks Winning Super Bowl 60
- Early Down Success
- Sam Darnold Under Pressure
- Throwing to Running Backs
Early Down Success
In the Klint Kubiak offense with Sam Darnold at quarterback, it’s absolutely no secret that the Seahawks’ goal is to run the ball often and generate shots from play action.
This is not a pass-first team by any stretch.
Seattle has the #1 highest run rate (49%) over the course of the entire game.
In non-reactionary play calls, aka offensive intent from the play caller, on first half early downs, the Seahawks’ 51% run rate ranks #4 highest in the NFL.
This seems like it could set up a problem for the Seahawks.
They are the #4 highest run rate team (51%) on first half early downs, and they are facing a Patriots run defense that ranks #1 in the NFL with Milton Williams.
Other teams have tried running the ball against the Patriots on first half early downs, and it obviously hasn’t worked out for them.
So, will the Seahawks “do what we do” and run the ball at a high rate in the first quarter and into the entire first half?
Or, could Kubiak pivot into a far more balanced approach out of the gate in an attempt to avoid first down runs that fail and set up the Seahawks in second and obvious pass situations?
It’s hard to guess.
But I did parse out the three strongest run defenses the Seahawks played this year aside from the Rams, a very familiar opponent:
- The Texans
- The Jaguars
- The Colts
All three ranked in the top 10 against the run this year.
In the first half of those three games, all of which were Seahawks wins by between 2 and 8 points, Seattle had a 58% pass rate on early downs in the first half.
That’s vastly higher than their 49% first half early down run rate over the course of the entire season, which ranked #4 highest in the NFL.
In fact, a 58% pass rate on first half early downs would have ranked #11 in the NFL this year.
Kubiak has shown his ability to adapt.
If he does and finds success on early downs against the formidable Patriots run defense, the Seahawks should be in good shape to win this game.
This is an excerpt from Warren Sharp's Super Bowl 60 Report. The full 50+ page report is available to subscribers, and you can get our Super Bowl Package for $50 off using promo code SB60
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Sam Darnold Under Pressure
How Sam Darnold handles the blitz and pressure that New England is looking to bring surely will go a long way to determining the outcome of this game, particularly if the Seahawks aren’t able to run the ball as efficiently as they would like.
The Seahawks have not played very many defenses this year that blitz at an above average rate.
The NFL average blitz rate is 26%, and the Seahawks played only five games out of 19 total against teams that blitzed at a 27% rate or higher for the season:
#1 Vikings (48%)
#2 Falcons (35%)
#5 Bucs (31%)
#7 Steelers (30%)
#12 Colts (28%)
Minnesota, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, and Indianapolis all blitzed Darnold at above average rates, while the Bucs went the opposite direction and blitzed at below average rates (24%).
Darnold in those five games when blitzed:
36 of 60 (60%), 8.1 Y/A, 5:4 TD:INT, -0.01 EPA/attempt, 52% success, 44% pressure rate, 9% sack rate
Darnold in those five games when the defenses decided not to blitz:
70 of 99 (71%), 8.1 Y/A, 4:0 TD:INT, +0.27 EPA/attempt, 52% success, 25% pressure rate, 3% sack rate
Patriots de facto DC Zak Kuhr recently stated his blitz rates are on a matchup basis.
As a result, he is trying not to tip his hand as to how he will approach this game with his blitz rate.
Will it be #1 of all teams like it’s been thus far in the postseason?
Or will it be #23, as it was the first eight weeks of the season?
My guess is he will try to get pressure with four, and if that doesn’t work, he’ll go right back to blitzing in order to get pressure on Darnold.
After all, Sam Darnold has some of the largest splits in the NFL with vs. without pressure of any quarterback.
Throwing to Running Backs
On the surface, like the rest of the Patriots defense, New England is solid against passes to running backs.
On designed offense to RBs (early downs, first three quarters), the Patriots RB-pass defense ranks:
#7 in Y/A
#13 in success rate
#6 in EPA
This is VERY similar to what they rank against WRs on these same downs:
#10 in Y/A
#13 in success
#8 in EPA
The difficulty in evaluating the Patriots pass defense is that they have played, by far, the #1 easiest schedule of passing attacks.
In terms of RB-passing offenses, the Patriots played:
#32 Bengals
#30 Dolphins twice
#29 Browns
#28 Raiders
#25 Saints
#24 Titans
#23 Ravens
That’s five games against bottom-five RB pass offenses and eight of 17 total games against bottom-10 RB pass offenses.
New England played a few top-eight RB pass offenses:
Falcons
Steelers
Bucs
Against Bijan Robinson, they gave up 50 yards on 8 catches.
Against Jaylen Warren, they gave up 34 yards on 5 catches and another 10 yards on 1 catch to Kenneth Gainwell.
So, like many other Patriots defensive passing stats, it’s hard to really know what we’re going to get here from the Seahawks RB passing game.
We know the Patriots haven’t played many good RB passing attacks, and against the only good ones they played with their RB1s, they gave up 50 and 44 receiving yards to the Falcons and Steelers RBs.
I believe it is in the Seahawks’ best interest to attack frequently with Kenneth Walker out of the backfield.
That will be a better use of Walker as a ball carrier than running into the Patriots defensive line.
This is an excerpt from Warren Sharp's Super Bowl 60 Report, a 50+ page analysis of Patriots vs. Seahawks that looks at the big game from every angle. Warren breaks down all the key matchups to give you an edge betting sides, totals, and props. The full report is available to subscribers, and you can get our Super Bowl Package for $50 off using promo code SB60
Click here to learn more about our Super Bowl Package!
