Gators 4th in the SEC East? I don’t think so.

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It’s almost time for football, but as we head into the season, I think it’s instructive to look at what the media believes will happen when everything shakes out.

I have to admit that I find this list fascinating. It’s pretty obvious that Alabama and Georgia should be on top of their divisions. After all, the Bulldogs and Tide did play twice to end the season in 2021 and went 1-1 while wiping out just about everyone else in their wake.

But the thing I find fascinating is trying to understand how the media members decide who in the middle is going to rise and who is going to fall. I’m not sure they got it all that right.

For example, the Florida Gators fourth in the SEC East? I don’t think so.

Setting a baseline?

Expected Points Added, or EPA, is a metric that strips away everything and asks the question, “was the play successful?” The best example is that a 3-yard gain on third-and-2 is extremely successful while that same 3-yard gain on third-and-7 is not.

What that means is that we can strip away a ton of the noise about these teams by looking at EPA, and in particular, by understanding how each team did on each side of the ball and relative to what would have been expected.

For example, if we plot offensive EPA on the x-axis against defensive EPA on the y-axis (more negative is better), we can classify teams by what they do well and what they don’t do well.

The yellow line is the average of all Power-5 teams in 2021, which means that the upper right hand quadrant consists of teams that were better both offensively and defensively than average last year. Not surprisingly, the two teams who fit that bill are Georgia and Alabama.

It also likely isn’t a surprise that Arkansas just barely misses the quadrant (after all, the Razorbacks did go 9-4 last season). But perhaps you wouldn’t have predicted that Auburn was going to be above average defensively and average offensively and very nearly sneak into that quadrant.

The other interesting thing when looking at the data this way is that there is a cluster of teams that were good offensively but below average defensively (Kentucky, Florida, Mississippi State, Ole Miss and Tennessee). These are teams that only need to maintain on the offensive side of the ball and see an improvement in defense to really take a step forward.

That’s completely different than some of the teams to their left (South Carolina, LSU and Missouri). Those teams need to improve in both areas simultaneously to be really successful in 2022. Essentially, you can be a Spencer Rattler believer and still believe the Cock Commanders (search twitter if you don’t understand my reference to South Carolina in this way, now and forever) may not be all that much more successful in the win/loss column.

Finally, we have the Texas A&M conundrum. The Aggies had a fantastic defense in 2021 but were unable to sustain any sort of excellence on offense. Zach Calzada wasn’t the answer in College Station, but is Max Johnson going to be the answer now (apparently not)? The answer to the QB question in College Station will go a long way towards determining where A&M stands at the end of the year, because Jimbo Fisher is known for offense, but that unit wasn’t very good last year.

Who will rise – EPA Edition?

We can take this analysis a little bit further by plotting win percentage against the difference between the offensive and defensive EPAs. Essentially, this is measuring whether a team exceeded or didn’t meet expectations last season.

This is where the SEC media love for Kentucky over Florida and the SEC West over Auburn starts to elude me. Based on EPA differential, the Gators, Tigers, Vols, Rebels and Wildcats were all essentially at the same level last year.

So why the difference in records? Well, Kentucky and Ole Miss went 7-1 in one-score games (5-1 for Kentucky alone). The Gators, Tigers and Vols went a combined 3-11.

If you’ve read my stuff (or anyone else’s analytics articles on football) for any length of time, you know these typically end up as 50/50 propositions. That doesn’t mean that teams that went 3-11 last year will go 11-3. What it suggests is that they will likely go 7-7, and when they do, that will bring their records much more in-line with the teams that had more successful 2021 seasons.

Of course, there are changes coming into the 2022 season that impact things as well.

Who will rise – Yds/Att Edition?

If you plot Florida’s offense and defense from 2011-2021 and compare the Gators’ yards per play ranking to their points per game ranking, here’s what you find.

The Gators average yards per play allowed ranking was 27.5 over that time period and their points per game allowed ranking was 25.7. The Gators average yards per play gained ranking was 69.2 over the same time period (thanks Nussmeier) and their average points per game scored ranked 69.8.

The point is that there may be some year-to-year variation in these sorts of numbers, but that over time, scoring and allowing points correlates very strongly to yards per play.

Except that wasn’t the case for Florida last season.

We went into this more in-depth in our Florida Gators Preseason Magazine, but the above chart does a nice job of summarizing what we should expect. Essentially, the red values in the difference column indicate teams we’d expect to take a step back based on last year’s results, while lose in the green column are those we’d expect to take a step forward.

The two teams that immediately jump out are the Gators and the Vols, but for vastly different reasons.

The Vols defense was terrible in 2021, giving up 31.5 points per game, ranking 97th. But this was out of lockstep with their underlying defensive metrics. There the Vols ranked just 61st in yards per play allowed (5.4). If you prefer EPA as your advanced metric, the Vols were middle of the pack there too, ranking 36th out of 64 Power-5 teams.

The point is that we won’t likely see the Vols have an epiphany on defense this year. What is somewhat likely is to see a replicate of last year’s performance with better results in the scoring category. Considering their 1-3 record in one-score games, we shouldn’t be surprised to see Tennessee do much better than 7-6.

The Gators have the exact opposite test case. While Todd Grantham was terrible and had to go, it wasn’t the Gators defense that really held them back last season.

Of course, it wasn’t really their offense either if we look at advanced metrics. By way of yards per play, the Gators ranked 21st in FBS. If we look at EPA, the Gators ranked 27th out of 64 Power-5 teams (coincidently, one spot ahead of Kentucky).

But the Gators ranked 61st in points per game scored. That 40-point disconnect between points and yards per play is the largest in the SEC for any unit, and suggests that Florida’s 1-4 record in one-score games is likely to turn around this year.

On the negative side of the ledger, look at Kentucky. The Wildcats have been known for their defense under Mark Stoops, but they weren’t great last season. By EPA, they ranked 20th out of 64 Power-5 teams, just two spots in front of Florida. It’s even worse if we look at the difference between their points scored ranking (24th) and their yards per play allowed ranking (51st).

We should expect the Wildcats to take a step back in 2022, along with Mississippi State, Ole Miss and potentially South Carolina.

Additions and Subtractions

Of course, everything I’ve shown you thus far is last season. That means we need to look at who is new and/or coming into a role that is more substantial this season.

For example, I think just about every Gators fans believes that Anthony Richardson is going to be a significant upgrade over Emory Jones. The question on that side of the ball is how much, and whether Montrell Johnson, Lorenzo Lingard and Nay’Quan Wright can replicate what Florida’s backs were able to do last year.

So who are the additions or subtractions who might really make these numbers move?

• Josh Paschal, Kentucky (subtraction) – Paschal was a menace against the Gators in Lexington last year. The Wildcats used a 3-3-5 or even a 3-2-6 scheme last year to stop Emory Jones’ running and Paschal was a huge reason they were able to pull it off. I already stated above that Kentucky’s defense was worse than its results and losing a three-time captain to the NFL isn’t going to help.
• Spencer Rattler, South Carolina (addition) – Gators fans are quite familiar with the former Sooner’s QB. While Rattler was benched last year, he wasn’t terrible (QB rating of 155.5). Even if he just replicates last year’s performance, he’ll be a significant upgrade for the Cock Commanders. The issue is that South Carolina’s defense wasn’t good last year, either by EPA or yards per play.
• Jayden Daniels, LSU (addition) – Looking at Daniels’ QB Rating (136.2) doesn’t really scare you. But if you look at his Yards Above Replacement (YAR) of 0.79, you realize that he’s a true dual-threat QB. LSU is going from Max Johnson (QB Rating = 144.4, YAR = -0.85) to Daniels, which means an immediate upgrade on offense.
• Matt Corral, Ole Miss (subtraction) – Corral was Mr. Everything for South Carolina. His QB rating of 155.3 was well above average. His 4.0 yards per rush was also above average. And when he went down with an injury in the bowl game, you could see how much he meant to Ole Miss. The Rebels far outperformed their underlying metrics last season, in large part because of Corral. With him gone, the defense is going to be a liability and the Rebels are going to take a step back.

Takeaway and Predictions

If we go back and look at the SEC as a whole in that offensive vs. defensive EPA chart above, what we see is pretty clear.

To catch Alabama or Georgia, they’re going to have to come back to the pack significantly.

This is really unlikely to happen, not because these teams didn’t lose significant players, but because neither is replacing its QB. Alabama took a step back last year because Mac Jones was better than Bryce Young and they still damn near won the whole thing.

Kentucky, Florida, Arkansas, Ole Miss, Mississippi State and Tennessee were all basically equivalent based on underlying metrics.

This is undeniably true. You could argue that Arkansas was a little bit better but you’re really splitting hairs. The difference between a successful and unsuccessful season for these teams then was luck in close games. Had the Gators gone 4-1 instead of 1-4, Dan Mullen would still be in town. Had Kentucky gone 3-3 instead of 5-1, it would have been another nice season for Mark Stoops but nobody would think of his teams as elite.

Auburn is a lot closer than people think.

I get it. Based on the drama that went on this season with coach Bryan Harsin, it seems like Auburn is in disarray. But with all of that going on, it’s easy to forget that the Tigers almost kept Alabama out of the SEC Championship Game with a win in the Iron Bowl. That didn’t happen and close doesn’t get you very far in the SEC, but considering how down I’ve been on Bo Nix since he came to Auburn, I expect better offensive play. Combine that with a similar defensive performance to last season and they’re going to challenge A&M for second best in the West.

Jimbo Fisher needs to be a guru once again

With all of the talk about recruiting and NIL and the unprecedented recruiting class Jimbo Fisher just brought in, the reality is this: his offense is the reason the Aggies struggled last year, not the defense. Max Johnson isn’t going to be able to fix that, which means he’s going to have to rely on Haynes King or Conner Weigman to push them forward. King completed 57.7 percent of his throws for less than 10 yards per attempt his senior year of high school, so I suspect Fisher is going to have to go to Weigman fairly early, similarly to Dabo Swinney going to Trevor Lawrence over Kelly Bryant in 2018.

An Anthony Richardson Heisman campaign could put the Gators into the playoff.

I think it’s unlikely, but Richardson has had all year to stew about his performance against Georgia. It was unfair for Mullen to thrust him into that space for his first start, but he played about as badly as you could. Still, we all knew that Florida wasn’t beating Georgia with Emory Jones at QB. I can’t say the same thing with Richardson. He gives the Gators a shot to win just about any game because he can turn a pedestrian play into an explosive one. Given that the Gators were good offensively last year, Richardson could take them to the next level. And given that they were more defensively deficient in 2021 and that Todd Grantham is no longer around, that side of the ball should be better too.

What does this all mean for the SEC? Well, I don’t think there’s any way Kentucky ends up second in the east. If you asked me who I’m most scared of (non-Georgia edition), it’s Tennessee. If Auburn finishes last in the west as predicted, it’s because of a mutiny against Harsin, not because of the level of players that he has. With that said, here’s what I predicted in the preseason magazine, and I’m sticking to it heading into 2022.

It’s time for football. Game. On.