Comments on Advanced NFL Stats: The Importance of Field Position

onside kick every time number of possessions are m...

2010-12-08T14:49:38.720-05:00

onside kick every time
number of possessions are more important than field position unless you are protecting a lead late in the game.

Going through some old comments. I thought I shoul...

2008-01-04T23:32:00.000-05:00

Going through some old comments. I thought I should address this one.

1. The N in Tarr's comment should be about 15-17 yds depending on how you count first downs. TDs are technically first downs, but they are truncated by the goal line, sometimes worth at most 1 yd. I agree with his analysis.

2. The Nov 23 anonymous comment confuses correlation and causation. Winning teams have good offenses and defenses, which themselves cause field position. For example, a good offense will move the ball into opponent territory even when the drive doesn't produce any points, leaving the weaker opponent with poor field position. Vice versa for defense.

What I'm trying to figure out is how the distance to the goal line affects the probability of scoring for an offense (or probability of stopping a score by a defense.)

Through the first 6 weeks of 2007, the teams that ...

2007-11-23T10:29:00.000-05:00

Through the first 6 weeks of 2007, the teams that were top 3 in average starting field position were a combined 15-1. The bottom 3 were a combined 4-12.

Do we really need a math equation to realize how huge field position is? I don't even need to argue, because the records prove it. It may only be 4 extra yards, but that team still wins.
But here's a stat for you: teams that have the highest average yards per pass win 60 percent of the time.

I agree with you. But in his defense, only 4 yards...

2007-09-13T20:23:00.000-04:00

I agree with you. But in his defense, only 4 yards separated the #2 and #32 teams in starting field position. Maybe one or two big kick returns might account for that difference. This might be one of those stats where median is more useful than mean.

I'm confused that he would consider the "statistic...

2007-09-13T20:11:00.000-04:00

I'm confused that he would consider the "statistic" as meaningless. I guess it depends on what you mean as "meaningful" - you can use average starting field position to correct points/drive to get it closer to a measure of defense independent of offense.

Doesn't work great, but it does work.

One way to think of those 4 extra yards is that...

2007-09-10T14:01:00.000-04:00
One way to think of those 4 extra yards is that they would typically require 0.4 more first downs to score.

This seems inaccurate to me. It would only be true if all first downs gained exactly 10 yards. It would be more accurate, I think, to say you need 4/N more first downs, where N is the average yards per first down.