One of the main narratives that has emerged with the rise of the up-tempo offense is the notion that is makes things hard for the defenses that have to keep up with it.
Even if the offense is scoring, the thinking goes, it’s doing so on drives of only around a minute or two, which doesn’t give the defense much time to rest up from its last drive. Extend that over a game, and the defense is out there 60 percent of the time, or 12 minutes longer than the offense.
Over a 12-game season, that’s a difference of more than two hours of game possession.