Does This One Stat Explain Why The Bills Have Had Success This Year?

Stats are a funny thing. They can really be manipulated to shine light on something or keep it in the dark. This one, looks really good on the surface, but might not show the whole story.

Without looking, can you name the Buffalo Bills punter?

Bills fans don't really see their punter that much. Do you think you could name him without looking him up? This stat shows that the Buffalo Bills haven't really had to use their punter much this season at all:

It comes from Warren Sharp, and he put up every team's percentage of drives that have ended in a punt so far this season. Without even clicking on the tweet, you can see that the Titans lead the NFL with the most punts at 53.2% of the time. I'll save you a click if you want. The Bills are all the way at the bottom of the list with just 18.9% of their drives ending in punts.

That's an incredible stat, right?

Yes, the Bills are scoring a lot

Joe Brady said that he wants to score every time the Bills get a chance. He says, "Just put the ball down" and let us cook. And they have been scoring a lot. They're tied with the Detroit Lions for the highest-scoring offense in the league at 32.8 points per game (164 total points).

So this stat seems to make sense. They're not punting because they're scoring, right?

The one stat that people forget when looking at punting stats

It's easy to look at that stat and say the Bills don't punt a lot because they're scoring a lot. And that's true, but there's another factor missing here. Not every drive ends with a punt or a score. Some end with a turnover, which the Bills have struggled with a bit over the past couple of weeks. They gave the ball away 5 times against the Los Angeles Chargers. They've got 9 turnovers so far this year (4 interceptions and 5 fumbles).

Is it a huge issue right now? No, it's not. Mostly because they have been able to score so much. If you add in those turnovers with the amount of punts, the Bills are still close to the top of the league. When you change that stat to "drives ending in points," the Bills are still in the top 3 behind Dallas and Detroit, respectively.

However, it does make you wonder how much more dominant they would be over some of these teams if they could knock that turnover number down. Would that punting percentage go up? Or would the scoring number go up? We will have to see what the rest of the season brings.

Oh, yeah, the punter's name is Tommy Doman Jr. It's nice to have him, but it's even better when we don't have to use him.