The Dixon Effect - What the Steelers Lose Without Big Ben

 I have the Steelers projected to win a boat load of games this year, 12 to be exact, which is the highest
projected total on my list. It has been suggested that I am nuts to have the rates so highly with Big Ben sitting out the first four games of the season and Byron Leftwich out with an injury. This has left Dennis Dixon as the starter and Charlie Batch as the primary alternative (just a note, they probably could have added Leinart to the mix here, yet by all indications no serious thought  was given to this option).

So what exactly will the Dixon Effect be and how significant will it be on the Steelers' prospecting for winning in the first four weeks. The real problem with trying to make this determination is that Dixon has essentially no NFL experience, so nothing to concretely gauge what we should expect from him. With no real data to work from, I went to the facts that we do know: he was a 5th round pick, he is 25, he will be starting the season and likely playing 4 games and going back to the bench and he has almost no prior experience. This information actually describes a reasonable number of NFl QBs that can help put some parameters on Dixon's likely performance. Since 1980 20 QBs have fit this rough description and while some will give the Steeler faithful hope (Marc Bulger, ok maybe Bulger is the only serious hope on the list) most are in the Koy Detmer/Rusty Hilger model.

Player	Year	Cmp	Att	Cmp%
Eric Hipple	1982	36	86	0.419
Paul McDonald	1983	32	68	0.471
Mark Herrmann	1984	29	56	0.518
Steve Bono	1987	34	74	0.459
Steve Pelluer	1987	55	101	0.545
Rusty Hilger	1987	55	106	0.519
Kevin Sweeney	1988	33	78	0.423
Mark Vlasic	1988	25	52	0.481
Stan Humphries	1990	91	156	0.583
Scott Zolak	1992	52	100	0.52
Scott Mitchell	1993	133	233	0.571
Cary Conklin	1993	46	87	0.529
Rob Johnson	1998	67	107	0.626
Koy Detmer	1998	97	181	0.536
Moses Moreno	2000	27	53	0.509
Marc Bulger	2002	138	214	0.645
A.J. Feeley	2002	86	154	0.558
Jesse Palmer	2003	60	116	0.517
Cody Pickett	2005	14	35	0.4
Dan Orlovsky	2008	143	255	0.561

What this means for the Steelers is that they can reasonable expect Dixon to complete about 54% of his passes (Big Ben has a career average of 63%), turn 3.6% of his attempts into TDs (5.3% for Big Ben) and be intercepted on 3.9% of his attempts (3.4% for Big Ben) with an average of 6.3 yards per attempt (8 Y/Att for Big Ben).

The yards per attempt difference is large and is likely directly connected to the difference in TD%. As the int% is roughly equal, the biggest impact then will be on the offense's ability to score points. Assuming the Steelers throw on 35 to 40 plays against their week one opponent (Falcons), they will probably score about 4 fewer points due to Big Ben's suspension. As I have the Steelers winning that game rather decisively (26 to 14 with nearly 90% confidence) a drop in offensive output of even 5 points still has them winning by a touchdown, even if Dixon turns out to be Moses Moreno or Cody Pickett.