More Stats

OK, in no particular order:



Run/Pass Ratios



Pittsburgh hasn't changed much in their run/pass split. They were a marginal passing team in the regular season (52.3%); in the post season they're a marginal running team (53.8%). Basically, the Steelers run a balanced offense - even though that offense is not one of the best in the league.



Here's the interesting bit though. During the regular season, the Cardinals were what I'd call a strong passing team: the overall split was 64.95/35.05 in favour of the pass. This changed dramatically during the postseason. Arizona has bee a marginal run first team during the post season (52%) - that's a 17% swing.



Stomps, Dominations and Mutual Opponents



Coined by the Football Outsiders, the definition of a stomp: a win by more than 14 points against an opponent with an overall losing record. A 'domination' is the same thing against an opponent with a winning record.



The Cardinals are slightly ahead here with three stomps and two dominant wins. Two of the stomps came over the 2-14 St Louis Rams (the other was over the Buffalo Bills), the dominations were over Miami in Week 2 and Carolina on the road in the playoffs. Pittsburgh has one less domination, stomping Cincinnati twice and dominating the Patriots on the road.



Not much between them in that respect, but what may be more significant is that Pittsburgh is 3-2 versus mutual opponents with wins over Washington, Dallas and New England. Arizona is 2-4 with wins over Dallas and Philadelphia. Both teams lost to the New York Giants and both beat the Cowboys, which probably says more about the Cowboys than anything else.



The Better QB Doesn't Always Win



Well, the one with better regular season rating over the last decade anyway. 40% of the last ten games were won by the player with the better rating but that's been skewed recently with three of the last five (60%) Superbowls being won by the player with the better regular season passer rating. Intriguingly, both Warner and Roethlisberger are amongst the players with better passer ratings who won Superbowls (Warner over Steve McNair in 2000 and Roethlisberger over Matt Hasselbeck in 2006), when the Patriots beat Warner's Rams in 2001, Warner's rating was much better than Tom Brady's - as indeed Brady's was when Eli Manning caused a major upset last season. Warner has a rating that's 16.8 points better than Roethlisberger's going into tonight's game - similar to that when he lost to Brady in 2001, but also similar to when he beat McNair the season before.



So if defense wins championships (and the Pittsburgh defense performs as well as the billing), the Steelers win - although they are not facing an average offense, they may actually be facing the return of the Greatest Show On Turf . Conversely, if offense wins games, the Cardinals win.



The key: Ken Whisenhunt. Three seasons as Steelers offensive co-ordinator, two seasons as Cardinals head coach. If he can prepare his defense to take care of the Pittsburgh offense, then it's an Arizona win. He''ll have some help: I counted six assistants with the Cardinals who have some recent knowledge of the Steelers.



Pittsburgh is the favourite. See you tomorrow.