DVOA: The main statistic used on Football Outsiders, DVOA breaks down the entire season play-by-play, comparing success on each play to the league average based on a number of variables including down, distance, location on field, current score gap, quarter, and opponent quality. While it can be used as a measure of total team performance, it differs from other power ratings found throughout the Web because it can be broken down to analyze team effectiveness in any number of ways: down, quarter, rushing vs. receiving, location on field, passes to backs vs. passes to receivers, and so on. Read the article METHODS TO THE MADNESS for more information. DVOA stands for Defense-adjusted Value Over Average, although we use the same letters to refer to defensive rankings which are adjusted to take into account the quality of offensive opponents. When not adjusted for opponent, this stat is called VOA.