the watchtower: lions at vikings

Before we delve into a very, very special Watchtower—the first to feature an opponent that has already been Watchtower’d—let’s take a look at last week’s installment: Regardless of talent, Gunther Cunningham defenses disproportionately depress the scoring of Greg Knapp offenses, despite allowing typical rushing and passing per-play effectiveness. Given a definite talent advantage and a mild systemic points-denial disadvantage, I expect the Seahawks to mildly overperform their season averages: 20-23 points, with 6.00-6.25 YpA, and 3.75-4.00 YpC. I have medium-high confidence in this prediction. It seems as though Jim L. Mora’s conservative 4-3 disproportionately depresses the per-play effectiveness of Linehan’s balanced offense—unless scoring can come from big plays that get behind the defense. If "Dr. Jekyll" shows up--the Lions offense that features Matt Stafford, Calvin Johnson, and Kevin Smith all healthy and effective--the Lions should be ab...