The 20 Best Offensive Players From Week 10
Week 10 games aren't over yet, so maybe the title of this article is a little misleading. It should read something like The 20 Best Offensive Players From the Thursday and Sunday Games in Week 10.
That just doesn't flow all that well.
As you know, we like math here at numberFire. Our algorithms help tell a better story about sports -- they're able to dig through the nonsense, helping us look at things that matter on the court, field or rink.
With football, we love our Net Expected Points (NEP) metric, which measures the number of points a player adds (or loses) to his team versus what he's expected to add. Rather than counting statistics like yards, touchdowns and receptions, NEP looks at down-and-distance situations and field position and relates these instances to history. When a player outperforms what's happened in the past, he sees a positive expected points value on the play. When he doesn't, his expected points gained on the play is negative. All of these little instances add up, then, to be a player's Net Expected Points total.
You can read more about NEP in our glossary.
Using a formula that compares individual single-game performance to history, the numberFire Live platform takes this Net Expected Points formula and assigns a rating to a player's performance. Each week, that's what we'll show here -- the 20 best ratings from the Thursday and Sunday games.
Here are Week 10's results:
| Player | Position | Rating |
|---|---|---|
| Adam Thielen | WR | 99 |
| Mark Ingram | RB | 99 |
| Alvin Kamara | RB | 98 |
| Robert Woods | WR | 97 |
| Emmanuel Sanders | WR | 94 |
| Austin Ekeler | RB | 93 |
| CJ Beathard | QB | 91 |
| Case Keenum | QB | 88 |
| Samaje Perine | RB | 87 |
| Larry Fitzgerald | WR | 87 |
| Rex Burkhead | RB | 86 |
| DeMarco Murray | RB | 86 |
| Ty Montgomery | RB | 84 |
| Michael Thomas | WR | 83 |
| Elijah McGuire | RB | 81 |
| Chester Rogers | WR | 81 |
| Sterling Shepard | WR | 80 |
| JuJu Smith-Schuster | WR | 80 |
| Matt Ryan | QB | 79 |
| Isaiah Crowell | RB | 78 |
- Adam Thielen hauled in 8 of 12 targets for 166 yards and a touchdown against Washington, adding 15.46 Reception NEP in the process. That single-game mark ranks seventh-highest on the season.
- Mark Ingram and Alvin Kamara had enough to go around this week as the New Orleans Saints demolished the Buffalo Bills on the road. Ingram totaled 21 carries for 131 yards and 3 touchdowns (10.30 Rushing NEP). That Rushing NEP total ranked second-best on the full season. Kamara's 12 carries led to 106 yards and a touchdown (8.79 Rushing NEP, fourth-highest on the year). Kamara also reeled in all 5 targets for 32 yards.
- Robert Woods turned 10 targets into 8 catches, 171 yards, and 2 touchdowns against the Houston Texans. Woods tallied 13.49 Reception NEP in the process, 11th-highest in a single game this season.
- Emmanuel Sanders accounted for 137 of the Broncos' 221 passing yards (62%) on Sunday Night Football against the New England Patriots. Sanders' 12.23 Reception NEP and 137 yards were both season highs for him.
