Football Outsiders: Bengals Historically Low by DVOA

Via Football Outsiders

(hard to copy in the charts they reference properly so use the link to see those more clearly)

NFL Conference Championship - As usual after the conference championship games, we're not going to bother with the full 32-team table of weighted DVOA ratings, since there are only two teams left and most teams haven't played for three weeks. We'll just take a quick look at both teams.

Cincinnati sat its starters in Week 18 so I'm going to show you ratings here for the Bengals both with and without that game included.

LAR weighted 32.2% 2 5.3% 11 -18.4% 3 8.4% 1
CIN weighted 10.9% 11 5.5% 10 1.5% 23 6.9% 3
CIN weighted (No Week 18) 15.0% 9 8.9% 9 0.7% 21 6.9% 3
LAR total 27.1% 3 11.5% 7 -12.2% 4 3.4% 5
CIN total 4.2% 15 1.7% 17 1.2% 18 3.7% 4
CIN total (No Week 18) 5.9% 13 3.1% 15 0.8% 17 3.6% 4

Yes, Dallas is still technically the No. 1 team in weighted DVOA for the season, even if we include the playoffs -- that's what happens when you have just one mediocre game and then two games off -- while Buffalo and Dallas are both higher than the Rams in total DVOA for the season including the playoffs.

Next, here are one-game ratings for the conference championships.

Whether on Twitter or in this morning's Audibles at the Line, you may have seen that Cincinnati has one of the lowest DVOA ratings ever for a Super Bowl team. Let's start with the list of the worst regular-season teams to make the Super Bowl according to DVOA, since 1983. Cincinnati is third on this list, although the Bengals would be fourth if we removed the Week 18 game where they sat starters. Remember that the 1987 Washington numbers do not include the strikebreaker games.

Lowest Regular-Season DVOA for Super Bowl Teams, 1983-2021
Year Team DVOA Rk W-L SB Result
2008 ARI -4.0% 21 9-7 Lost
2003 CAR -0.2% 16 11-5 Lost
2021 CIN 0.0% 17 10-7 --
2007 NYG 1.4% 15 10-6 Won
1987 WAS 6.7% 8 8-4 Won
2011 NYG 7.3% 12 9-7 Won
2001 NE 7.7% 11 11-5 Won
1993 BUF 7.8% 13 12-4 Lost
2000 NYG 8.4% 11 12-4 Lost
1996 NE 8.8% 10 11-5 Lost

That list demonstrates how the Bengals still have a good chance of winning the game despite having a lower rating than the Rams. Notice that the two lowest teams lost very close Super Bowls in the final minute, and the next four teams all won their games.

The Bengals look better if we use weighted DVOA instead of total DVOA and include their playoff games as well as the regular season. The Bengals were definitely better in the second half of the season, with their offense improving from -6.1% (23rd) in Weeks 1-9 to 9.3% (10th) in Weeks 10-18 while the defense improved from 5.3% (22nd) to 0.3% (20th). The Bengals also add on three positive playoff games, although none of their playoff wins had higher than this week's 33% DVOA for the single games.

Looking at weighted DVOA entering the Super Bowl, the Bengals are the seventh-lowest team since 1983 instead of third lowest. Again, the Bengals would look better if we removed the Week 18 game where they sat starters, but their overall rank wouldn't change because to be fair we would also want to remove the game and a half where the 2009 Colts (who rank eighth) sat starters as well. There are 10 teams since 1983 with weighted DVOA under 20% entering the Super Bowl. Here they are along with their regular-season ratings and Super Bowl results:

Lowest Weighted DVOA Entering Super Bowl, 1983-2021
Year Team Reg-Season
DVOA Rk W-L WEI DVOA
before SB Rk SB Result
2008 ARI -4.0% 21 9-7 0.5% 18 Lost
1994 SD 10.3% 7 11-5 5.7% 10 Lost
1986 DEN 19.0% 5 11-5 7.0% 11 Lost
1987 WAS 6.7% 8 8-4 7.6% 10 Won
1993 BUF 7.8% 13 12-4 9.0% 9 Lost
2006 CHI 24.0% 5 13-3 10.3% 11 Lost
2021 CIN 0.0% 17 10-7 10.9% 11 --
2009 IND 17.0% 8 14-2 13.1% 13 Lost
2003 CAR -0.2% 16 11-5 15.2% 9 Lost
2011 NYG 7.3% 12 9-7 17.1% 10 Won

A few notes on the teams that are even lower than the 2021 Bengals:

The 2008 Cardinals had a strong playoff run but had finished the regular season 2-4 in their final six games including losses of 35-14 to Minnesota, 48-20 to Philadelphia, and 47-7 to the Matt Cassel Patriots.
The 1994 Chargers started 6-0 and then finished 6-5. They also had negative DVOA for their 22-21 divisional victory over Miami.
The 1986 Broncos started 6-0 and lost four of their final seven games, including losses of 37-10 to the Chiefs and 41-16 to the Seahawks. Their two playoff wins came by a combined eight points.
The 2006 Bears also sat starters in their final regular-season game, like this year's Bengals and the 2009 Colts.

I had to spend this year jousting with a lot of Packers fans and Titans fans about how low those teams were in DVOA but I don't remember getting a lot of pushback from Cincinnati fans about the Bengals' low rating. And yet, they're the team that went on the postseason run. Football Outsiders was not alone in having the Bengals low this year in our ratings. Pro Football Reference's Simple Ratings System has them only 12th for this season. ESPN's FPI still has the Bengals only 13th.

The Rams are clear favorites for Super Bowl LVI, winning in 65.3% of our playoff odds simulations, but that still gives Cincinnati a 1-in-3 chance of taking home the Lombardi Trophy. The Super Bowl is far from a sure thing. Look for lots of preview content on Football Outsiders over the next two weeks.