COLLEGE FOOTBALL THOR+ RATINGS SINCE 2000: OFFENSE

Ah, offense. A touchy subject for us Big Ten fans. Our conference constantly faces ridicule for "playing slow, plodding football." Of course, historically, that characterization hasn't been all that incorrect. The Big Ten has placed an emphasis on solid, fundamental defense over the years. And, as Iowa fans, I think we have all developed an appreciation for good old fashioned, smash mouth defense. I mean, who doesn't enjoy a nice 6-4 slugfest every now and then?

But we can wax poetic on the beauty of a low-scoring slobberknocker next time. This time we are going to talk about offense because I made a chart about offense. In the same manner as the last chart I made, this one plots each FBS offense since 2000 by their Offense+ rating.

College Football Offense+ Ratings Since 2000

Like last time, the chart is interactive. If you hover over a particular team, information on that particular team will pop up. If you click on that team, it will highlight each variation of that team from 2000-2013 in order to give an idea of that team's offensive trend. And remember, when reading the ratings: 100 = FBS average for that given year, greater than 100 = above average for that given year, and lower than 100 = below average for that given year.

Per usual, before I go off into the data, let me give a short overview of what the numbers are measuring. First, the overall offensive rating (Offense+) is a measure of offensive points per possession. It used to include field goals, but now that I've started measuring special teams, field goals are included in the special teams' measurement. I did this for two reasons: 1) I don't think it's fair include field goals on offense if that unit is good at moving the ball into their opponent's portion of the field, but their kicker is terrible. 2) And, similarly, I don't want to reward an offense that frequently stalls once they cross the 35 yard line and still manages to score because they have a future NFL kicker on the roster. I think it makes more sense to judge the best offenses by the amount of touchdown points they score per play. That includes extra points because they are essentially chip shots that are rarely missed, and two point conversions because, well, that is the offense doing the scoring.

Similar to basketball, the other four things I like to look at are measures that attempt to show how the offense accomplished what it accomplished. The four things I look at for offense and defense are: 1) Passing; 2) Rushing; 3) Blocking/Pressure; and 4) Turnovers. Passing is measured by using adjusted net yards per passing attempt. I've used passer rating in the past, but I like this stat better because it shows how well the offense moved the ball through the air, while also taking things into account like how often the quarterback threw an interception. This number is also adjusted to include sacks from 2005 on (I'll explain why in a minute).

The next concept is rushing, which I measure using the simple yards per carry statistic. It is also adjusted so that sacks and sack yards are not included in the rushing totals from 2005 on. Third, I like to measure an offense's ability to block by measuring their tackles for loss per play allowed. This number only goes back to 2005 because tackles for loss and sacks are not easily available for me to aggregate from 2000-2004*. This makes me very sad, as I would really like to know what 2002 Iowa's offensive line would grade out at. And, finally, turnovers are measured by looking at how many turnovers per play an offense allows.

*As far as I know. Let me know if these stats are readily available somewhere that I'm not aware of.

I think these four measures can give us pretty good insight on why a team did or did not score many points on the season. Remember, however, all of these numbers are raw, and not adjusted for strength of schedule. Only the final offense rating with a "+" sign is adjusted.

Now, let's talk about Iowa.

Rank	Team	Year	Season Rank	Passing	Rushing	Turnovers	Blocking	Offense	Offense+
1	Iowa	2001	#5	118	109	101	N/A	144	153
2	Iowa	2002	#9	152	126	138	N/A	133	139
3	Iowa	2005	#22	128	114	120	120	114	124
4	Iowa	2008	#28	101	111	93	104	118	118
5	Iowa	2003	#41	95	105	112	N/A	105	112
6	Iowa	2010	#37	139	98	147	103	108	112
7	Iowa	2011	#42	109	97	117	117	105	108
8	Iowa	2006	#57	100	104	73	124	97	102
9	Iowa	2004	#66	105	50	111	N/A	84	90
10	Iowa	2013	#71	91	88	99	122	83	88
11	Iowa	2009	#86	85	83	72	90	82	85
12	Iowa	2007	#99	84	96	139	88	73	71
13	Iowa	2000	#89	96	69	112	N/A	63	71
14	Iowa	2012	#119	72	86	143	102	58	61

Right away we see the 2001 outlier that I talked about in the previous post. This time, though, with the other descriptive ratings included, we can visually see that something is a little funky here. The descriptive numbers look good, but probably not good enough to warrant such a high Offense+ rating in the 150s. I mean, both passing and rushing were above average. So were turnovers. And while we don't have a blocking rating, I highly doubt the blocking on that team was so good that it would make an above average offense jump to fifth best in the country. Rather, this team really took it upon themselves to score points when they came across a weak defense. They scored 217 of their 343 offensive points that season against Kent State, Miami of Ohio, Indiana, Northwestern, and Minnesota. The highest Defense+ ranking for any of those teams was #55 for Kent State. In those games they averaged 0.63 points per possession on offense, while only averaging 0.27 against the rest of their opponents. So, again, that 2001 team really inflated their Offense+ rating by racking up points when they came across weak defenses. And with those offensive descriptors, we can see that something fishy is up, which allows us to investigate.

That then, brings us to 2002, which should be the top offense of the Kirk Ferentz era. That team more fits the billing for a team that was legitimately one of the best offenses in the nation, which you can see by the fact that green highlighting is much darker for this team than the 2001 team. Before adjusting for strength of schedule -- which would be adjusted upward -- the 2002 Hawkeyes rated out at 52% above the average 2002 team in passing, 26% above average in rushing, and 38% above average at not turning the ball over. That was good enough for 33% above average when it came to scoring points, and 39% above average when you adjust for their schedule. The Offense+ rating of 139 was good for 9^th best in the country that year. It really is too bad there is no offensive line rating for this team.

The next best offense of what is essentially the Kirk Ferentz era (sans the juggernaut 1999 team, of course) was the 2005 offense. Drew Tate's junior year saw a Hawkeye offense that could pass, run, block, and rarely turned the ball over. This is also the final team on this list that grades out above average in all four offensive categories before adjusting for strength of schedule. I think that kind of speaks for itself.

The rest of best of this period had some kind of weakness. The 2008 team thankfully had Shonn Greene to make up for inexperienced quarterback play, a developing offensive line, and a little bit of a turnover problem. The 2003 offense had Fred Russell, what I'm sure would rate out as a good offensive line, and was good at hanging onto the ball. All of which made up for the fact that Nathan Chandler was not the second coming of Brad Banks.

At #6, we finally get to the 2010 team. How this offensive unit doesn't rank higher on the list, I have no idea. The passing game with Ricky Stanzi, Derrell Johnson-Koulianos, and Marvin McNutt, and Allen Reisner was very potent. The run game and the blocking were fairly mediocre, but not terrible. And this unit didn't turn the ball over. So how did they not score more points?

2011 and 2006 round out the list of above average offenses, and 2006's raw numbers needed a strength of schedule adjustment to bump it up over that threshold.

Now, for the worst Iowa offenses since 2000 (going from the bottom of the table up), I present to you the 2012 team; also known as the beginning of the Greg Davis era. That offense didn't turn the ball over and had a decent offensive line, but holy crap the pass game and run game were terrible. Of course, we should cut a little bit of slack here, because this was the transition to a new offensive system. That being said, though, it this was still a massively ugly offensive performance. I still feel bad for James Vandenberg.

The second worst offense of this period was the 2000 team. The passing game wasn't bad, but the running game definitely was. The exact opposite was true for 2007, which just happens to be the third worst offense of this time period. That was a year with a terrible quarterback and a terrible offensive line. And, honestly, I don't know if I feel worse for James Vandenberg having Greg Davis' scheme thrown upon him his senior year, or for a senior Albert Young trying to run behind that 2007 offensive line. Yikes.

2009 was a fun year, but let's not forget that offense struggled quite a bit after Shonn Greene decided to make the jump to the NFL. And last year's offense, while better than Greg Davis' inaugural season, was still not very good. Like 12% below average not very good. Let's hope for a big jump this season. Lastly, 2004 was the year of the exploding ACL.

All in all, there's a whole lot of meh in those numbers. Of course, I'm not really telling you anything you didn't already know.

Bonus AIRBHG visual:

Team	Year	Rushing
Iowa	2000	69
Iowa	2001	109
Iowa	2002	126
Iowa	2003	105
Iowa	2004	50
Iowa	2005	114
Iowa	2006	104
Iowa	2007	96
Iowa	2008	111
Iowa	2009	83
Iowa	2010	98
Iowa	2011	97
Iowa	2012	86
Iowa	2013	88

2008 was Shonn Greene. How often do guys make it back to Iowa City and become a success story like that? My theory: Kirk Ferentz sold his soul to AIRBHG for 2008.

To put this into a little bit of context, let's look at the top 15 Big Ten offenses since 2000, according to THOR+.

Rank	Team	Year	Coach	Season Rank	Passing	Rushing	Turnovers	Blocking	Offense	Offense+
1	Wisconsin	2011	Bret Bielema	#1	163	122	157	117	183	188
2	Ohio State	2013	Urban Meyer	#3	127	144	119	120	170	174
3	Ohio State	2006	Jim Tressel	#4	145	109	123	116	156	163
4	Wisconsin	2010	Bret Bielema	#5	147	117	159	118	157	158
5	Iowa	2001	Kirk Ferentz	#5	118	109	101	N/A	144	153
6	Northwestern	2000	Randy Walker	#9	116	128	154	N/A	139	148
7	Penn State	2008	Joe Paterno	#10	143	116	133	125	144	147
8	Indiana	2013	Kevin Wilson	#16	121	114	108	102	134	145
9	Minnesota	2003	Glen Mason	#9	145	137	137	N/A	148	145
10	Michigan	2000	Lloyd Carr	#11	146	124	133	N/A	138	143
11	Minnesota	2005	Glen Mason	#8	142	116	138	143	128	142
12	Penn State	2002	Joe Paterno	#7	107	141	133	N/A	133	141
13	Wisconsin	2005	Barry Alvarez	#9	131	97	141	87	134	141
14	Penn State	2005	Joe Paterno	#10	120	116	104	113	128	140
15	Iowa	2002	Kirk Ferentz	#9	152	126	138	N/A	133	139

2011 Wisconsin tops the list here by quite a margin. As you all probably remember, that was the year that Wisconsin signed Russell Wilson to a one year free agent deal. #2 is last year's Ohio State Buckeyes, which is really annoying considering this was only Urban Meyer's second year on the job. If you go click through the chart, his 2004 Utah team owns the highest Offense+ rating during this period for the Mountain West Conference. In addition, if you check out the SEC, his 2008 and 2007 Florida Gators were the highest rated offenses in the SEC from 2000-2013. In a conference like the Big Ten, where high-powered offenses haven't historically been as common, don't be surprised if Urban Meyer cranks it up to a level that we haven't seen all that often in this conference.

As for Iowa, two teams make the list. The outlier 2001 team comes in at #5 and then the 2002 team at #15. If we acknowledge that 2001 is inflated, that means Iowa only has one offense that falls within the top 15. That's not necessarily a mark against them, since that list is fairly diverse and only Wisconsin shows up on it more than twice. Instead, the more concerning thing to note is the fact that all of the Iowa teams toward the top of the list are quite a ways removed from where we sit today. If we arbitrarily set the cut off at the top 50, then the most recent team to be within the top 50 Big Ten offenses since 2000 is the 2008 offense. 2010 comes in at #54 and 2011 comes in at #66, but this is a sample of 157 teams, so average is right around #78. Again, the numbers aren't really saying anything we didn't already know: Iowa hasn't had a great offense in quite a while. And, in general, Iowa's offense is usually pretty meh under Kirk Ferentz.

Moving on to the worst offenses of this period, the Hawkeyes unfortunately make more appearances here than they do in the previous list.

Rank	Team	Year	Coach	Season Rank	Passing	Rushing	Turnovers	Blocking	Offense	Offense+
1	Indiana	2003	Gerry DiNardo	#115	75	84	127	N/A	49	51
2	Illinois	2003	Ron Turner	#107	80	88	90	N/A	57	61
3	Iowa	2012	Kirk Ferentz	#119	72	86	143	102	58	61
4	Purdue	2001	Joe Tiller	#107	72	71	93	N/A	57	62
5	Michigan State	2012	Mark Dantonio	#117	78	90	123	112	58	63
6	Purdue	2013	Darrell Hazell	#115	71	76	74	73	58	64
7	Illinois	2012	Tim Beckman	#116	55	89	45	60	60	64
8	Illinois	2005	Ron Zook	#107	69	102	109	91	58	65
9	Purdue	2010	Danny Hope	#105	54	97	68	108	66	67
10	Indiana	2011	Kevin Wilson	#107	75	95	117	75	68	69
11	Penn State	2011	Joe Paterno	#105	77	93	88	133	66	70
12	Iowa	2000	Kirk Ferentz	#89	96	69	112	N/A	63	71
13	Iowa	2007	Kirk Ferentz	#99	84	96	139	88	73	71
14	Minnesota	2011	Jerry Kill	#98	80	92	109	102	67	73
15	Penn State	2006	Joe Paterno	#92	88	105	103	86	71	75

2012 is the gift that just keeps on giving. And by giving, I mean a kick straight between the legs. According to THOR+, the only two Big Ten offenses that were worse than the 2012 Iowa offense were the 2003 versions of Indiana and Illinois. 2000 and 2007 Iowa come in at #12 and #13, which means Iowa joins some... interesting company with the likes of Illinois and Purdue as the only other teams to have three offenses make this bottom 15 list.

Finally, I shall end this post like I did the last one. First, the top 15 FBS offenses since 2000:

Rank	Team	Year	Coach	Conference	Season Rank	Passing	Rushing	Turnovers	Blocking	Offense	Offense+
1	Texas	2005	Mack Brown	Big 12	#1	153	133	123	118	192	212
2	USC	2005	Pete Carroll	Pac-10	#2	150	147	137	128	187	210
3	Florida	2008	Urban Meyer	SEC	#1	166	132	144	115	185	205
4	Florida	2007	Urban Meyer	SEC	#1	169	119	133	120	182	205
5	Oklahoma	2008	Bob Stoops	Big 12	#2	176	104	163	133	185	204
6	Hawai'i	2006	June Jones	WAC	#1	183	142	94	126	206	192
7	Wisconsin	2011	Bret Bielema	Big Ten	#1	163	122	157	117	183	188
8	Florida State	2013	Jimbo Fisher	ACC	#1	151	129	119	93	185	186
9	Louisville	2004	Bobby Petrino	CUSA	#1	162	139	134	N/A	191	186
10	West Virginia	2006	Rich Rodriguez	Big East	#2	137	149	129	102	176	184
11	Florida	2001	Steve Spurrier	SEC	#1	158	104	82	N/A	169	184
12	Oklahoma State	2011	Mike Gundy	Big 12	#2	137	120	107	135	162	183
13	Utah	2004	Urban Meyer	MWC	#2	161	133	138	N/A	183	183
14	Baylor	2011	Art Briles	Big 12	#3	175	122	104	126	161	182
15	Nebraska	2000	Frank Solich	Big 12	#1	103	155	129	N/A	164	178

Hey, it's Urban Meyer again. This isn't getting old at all!

And the worst 15 FBS offenses since 2000:

Rank	Team	Year	Coach	Conference	Season Rank	Passing	Rushing	Turnovers	Blocking	Offense	Offense+
1	Florida International	2006	Don Strock	Sun Belt	#119	51	72	70	79	31	29
2	Louisiana-Monroe	2000	Bobby Keasler	Independent	#114	60	50	58	N/A	33	29
3	Florida International	2013	Ron Turner	CUSA	#124	50	66	84	42	36	33
4	South Florida	2013	Willie Taggart	American	#122	51	76	33	85	33	33
5	Miami (Ohio)	2013	Mike Bath	MAC	#125	40	76	78	63	36	33
6	Rutgers	2001	Greg Schiano	Big East	#116	41	64	0	N/A	35	34
7	Massachusetts	2013	Charley Molnar	MAC	#123	54	72	59	94	36	34
8	SMU	2003	Phil Bennett	WAC	#117	53	77	80	N/A	36	35
9	Buffalo	2005	Jim Hofher	MAC	#119	48	87	62	66	40	37
10	Massachusetts	2012	Charley Molnar	MAC	#124	45	69	65	64	40	38
11	Kent State	2000	Dean Pees	MAC	#113	63	78	108	N/A	44	40
12	New Mexico State	2009	DeWayne Walker	WAC	#120	16	86	60	93	44	41
13	New Mexico State	2010	DeWayne Walker	WAC	#120	70	79	115	101	43	41
14	North Texas	2006	Darrell Dickey	Sun Belt	#118	34	81	55	65	47	42
15	Buffalo	2010	Jeff Quinn	MAC	#119	50	77	49	86	49	44

Interestingly, there are four offenses from last season on this list.

Next time we shall discuss defense. I promise you, fellow Hawkeye fans, it will be more cheerful than discussing offense. But for any of you Indiana fans who may be lost and have found your way here, I can't exactly make you that same promise.