tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post7771237027997316573..comments2023-11-05T04:16:44.937-05:00Comments on Advanced Football Analytics (formerly Advanced NFL Stats): 2010 Team Efficiency Rankings - FinalUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger98125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-5796279796438918102011-08-16T13:50:41.146-04:002011-08-16T13:50:41.146-04:00In preparation for fantasy, I had the bright idea ...In preparation for fantasy, I had the bright idea of plotting each of the top RB's weekly points against the defensive efficiency stat for the defense they faced that week. I did this for all of 2010 in the hope that if the relationship was strong, it could lead to a more effective matchup strategy in which I focused more on getting the best decent back against the worst run defense efficiency stat I could. Unfortunately, the R^2 was only 0.066, so it wont work. First, does anyone have any ideas (beyond "get a life nerd")? Second, I feel a little dejected, but possibly a similar analysis with QBs will be more fruitful. I'll let you know. I think its just more fuel to the whole "its all luck anyway dude" argument.jditorohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07836618836509204410noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-77574430279549187222011-01-16T12:43:17.973-05:002011-01-16T12:43:17.973-05:00"It would expect them to get blown out by Gre..."It would expect them to get blown out by Green Bay, Pittsburgh, and Baltimore."<br /><br />Say it ain't so, David, say it ain't so.Tarrhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14368810359650066790noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-54778259584046002952011-01-07T12:26:34.732-05:002011-01-07T12:26:34.732-05:00So what? This model wouldn't expect them to be...So what? This model wouldn't expect them to beat the teams ranked 25th or lower in efficiency by more than 7 points. It also would expect them to get blown out by Green Bay, Pittsburgh, and Baltimore.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16811989812393513991noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-28198153161722936332011-01-07T12:19:17.815-05:002011-01-07T12:19:17.815-05:00Brian, if you added your subjective judgment to th...Brian, if you added your subjective judgment to the wholly statistical efficiency rankings, where would you rank the Falcons?Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16811989812393513991noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-45465254749430320472011-01-07T12:01:23.070-05:002011-01-07T12:01:23.070-05:00Excluding teams ranked 25th or lower in efficiency...Excluding teams ranked 25th or lower in efficiency...they didn't win a game by more than 7 points.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-14351059175543880812011-01-07T11:33:49.476-05:002011-01-07T11:33:49.476-05:00I agree with you completely that they could easily...I agree with you completely that they could easily be 11-5 or 10-6. Obviously that's true. <br /><br />However, it's not "probably" true that Atlanta is better than the 21st best team in the NFL. It's definitely true. The close games thing isn't an argument against that. The Falcons have blown out plenty of teams. <br /><br />Did you go to the link I posted? The Falcons have a great football team. Just ask any football analyst, coach, scout, player, or fan in the world who doesn't use this site. <br /><br />I'm fine if you say the answer probably lies in the middle, as most of your post did say, but everybody needs to stop pretending it might be true that the Bills and Bengals are better than the Falcons.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16811989812393513991noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-14813197713974994282011-01-07T11:30:51.632-05:002011-01-07T11:30:51.632-05:00David-Very interesting. I'm going to link to t...David-Very interesting. I'm going to link to this in the Roundup. Thanks.<br /><br />But, the overall talent ranking seems to follow team W-L records too closely for my taste. A bit too 'ex-post-facto,' in other words, which is what I think you were getting at yourself.<br /><br />Just for the sake of debate, imagine NO had not missed that OT chip shot FG against ATL early in the season. Theoretically, all else being equal, this does not change ATL's performance one bit. There was nothing they did to make that FG go wide. ATL would now be a wildcard behind NO, and all the pundits and experts would have them 'power-ranked' much lower...all for absolutely no other reason than outcome bias. Instead of being thought of as #2 in the league by everyone, they'd be ranked 6th or 8th or possibly lower. <br /><br />And in defense of those of us who would doubt Atlanta's top ranking, I'd say that it's not surprising for a perfectly average team to end up 13-3, particularly if they don't have a tough strength of schedule. Statistical anomalies do happen, and I'll make a very strong case below that ATL qualifies as one.<br /><br />No one here (at least me) is saying ATL is the 21st best team in the league. They are, however, apparently the 21st most efficient team accounting for opponent. And that suggests their 13-3 record is a reflection of quite a bit of good fortune. <br /><br />I'll give everyone 5 numbers. Ready? 5.9, 3.8, 6.1, and 4.6. That's their offensive passing efficiency, offensive rushing eff, defensive pass eff, and defensive rushing eff. Only one of those three is better than average, and only by a hair. (Until they just played horrid CAR in week 17, they were below average in def pass eff all year.) The fifth number is 24. That's their rank in terms of strength of schedule. They are below average in (virtually) all four core efficiency stats against a weak slate of opponents.<br /><br />It's no mystery (to me) how ATL is winning. #1 really good turnover differential, which is quite random (according to research by many others), and only partially predictive. #2 is clutch QB play, where Ryan has over-performed his overall average play when he happens to be in very high-leverage situations. #3 Very, fortunate penalty calls against opponents in critical situations, one miraculous fumble recovery off an interception, and a missed chip shot FG. #4 And lastly, a slightly weak strength of schedule.<br /><br />So the defense of ATL's low rankings is not to shrug our shoulders and say "Sometimes anomalies happen." The defense is, "Anomalies do happen. And there are very, very good reasons to believe ATL is one of them this season."Brian Burkehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12371470711365236987noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-62633122976830626082011-01-07T11:04:17.623-05:002011-01-07T11:04:17.623-05:00I don't recall anyone saying the model is perf...I don't recall anyone saying the model is perfect. Anyone who does think that is clearly deluded. It's probably true that Atlanta is better than the 21st most efficient team in the NFL. It's also probably true (and much more likely) that Atlanta is not the 2nd best team in the NFL, as their record would indicate.<br /><br />That being said, the fact is that Atlanta has been involved in a lot of close games this year. As great as it sounds to talk about a team with a knack for "winning" close games, there's no empirical or scientific basis that conclusively proves teams are particularly good at winning close games. All the historical evidence has pointed to the fact that teams who win close games were fortunate to come out on top, and should be expected to regress to the mean. If one or two highly variable, highly unpredictable, highly fortunate things didn't happen for the Falcons, then you're looking at an 11-5 record, Saints win the division, and almost NO ONE is talking about the Falcons being the best team in the NFC.<br /><br />Look, they're a good team. They're probably top 6 in the NFC. They could easily be 11-5 or 10-6 though.<br /><br />And as for statistical anomalies, it would be more of an anomaly if there were NO statistical anomalies at the end of the season. Expect the unexpected.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-1781227321563538312011-01-07T10:46:31.811-05:002011-01-07T10:46:31.811-05:00Also, Adam, you weren't lying when you said yo...Also, Adam, you weren't lying when you said you haven't looked at the lines all season long for the Falcons. They have actually been favored in 14 of their 16 games.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16811989812393513991noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-74363340487894346402011-01-07T10:28:56.455-05:002011-01-07T10:28:56.455-05:00http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/playoffs/2010/news/s...http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/playoffs/2010/news/story?id=5988263<br /><br />It's not a Super Bowl prediction but it's perhaps even more relevant to the quality of the teams and these rankings. When Scouts Inc. rated all the playoff teams on each position the Falcons came out as the best overall. <br /><br />Of course I realize this is one exercise that is to some extent pointless, but it does raise a point I wanted to make. It's not like the Falcons are a team that you look at on the field and wonder how they're winning. If this was the 2008 Falcons that came out of nowhere and had several glaring holes then the #21 ranking would make more sense, but it's not. This is a team that many were picking before the season to win the division over the Super Bowl champion, and their 13-3 record comes as a shock to noone other than some commenters on this website.<br /><br />All that said, the model seems to work very well overall. Brian, you record against Vegas shows that on the whole the model holds strong predictive value. I want to say though that the model can be good overall but still be very wrong about some teams. Brian has had a post and I have talked at length in other comments about reasons Atlanta might be underrated through this model. I suspect San Diego has underperformed for years because of the "luck" elements that could also be called "coaching". What's true for most as far as predictive value might not be true for all. <br /><br />Some of the people on here, and I am only talking to some, should stop trying to defend the model by saying statistical anomalies happen and start recognizing that it doesn't have to be perfect to be good. It just might be wrong about the Chargers and Falcons.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16811989812393513991noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-19305673895376518682011-01-06T17:53:17.496-05:002011-01-06T17:53:17.496-05:00Whoops, it also looked like you already tried runn...Whoops, it also looked like you already tried running a success rate regression and it was worse than the efficiency model. <br /><br />I need to improve my post searching before making recommendations.Davenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-85579154600552725012011-01-06T13:38:51.709-05:002011-01-06T13:38:51.709-05:0080+ comments is too exhausting so this a general p...80+ comments is too exhausting so this a general post.<br /><br />Considering that 7 of the top 10 teams are in the playoffs, that randomness and luck is rampant in the NFL, and that points, wins, media attention etc. have nothing to do with this rating system, it's pretty f'n good.Bruce D.http://i60200nfl.clanteam.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-91038643338520305852011-01-06T10:53:13.610-05:002011-01-06T10:53:13.610-05:00I just ran a simulation of 50,000 seasons - 145 ti...I just ran a simulation of 50,000 seasons - 145 times a team was top 5 for five years in a row, or .0029<br /><br />And just as a fun excercise in variance, Team "19" was WAY better than Teams "4", "10", and "13" in my simulation. In fact, they're 11 times better since they were in the top 5 for five straight years a whopping ELEVEN times, and the other three were only there once.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-30660336653524000612011-01-06T02:49:11.787-05:002011-01-06T02:49:11.787-05:00Excel. I just set up a 32 x 5 grid (to represent e...Excel. I just set up a 32 x 5 grid (to represent each team and season), filled that with randoms and checked to see whether any of them were in the top 5 five seasons in a row. Then it's just a case of writing a macro that recalcualtes random numbers and totals the number of 'successes'.Ian Simcoxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01518825067469269377noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-63012031338783068472011-01-05T16:50:54.085-05:002011-01-05T16:50:54.085-05:00Just curious, what program did you use to run the ...Just curious, what program did you use to run the simulation?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-52754099592423558402011-01-05T16:47:30.342-05:002011-01-05T16:47:30.342-05:00:) no problem, it was actually lazy stats from me....:) no problem, it was actually lazy stats from me. Proper statisticians report probabilities from 0 to 1 rather than 0% to 100%.Ian Simcoxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01518825067469269377noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-81267442814480510962011-01-05T15:26:17.900-05:002011-01-05T15:26:17.900-05:00ah, sorry, missed the percent sign in your post!ah, sorry, missed the percent sign in your post!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-10573961083295861482011-01-05T15:23:51.701-05:002011-01-05T15:23:51.701-05:00Yes, indeed - 0.298% = 0.00298 (I did realise afte...Yes, indeed - 0.298% = 0.00298 (I did realise after I posted that you'd got to the same number first).Ian Simcoxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01518825067469269377noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-16768069105275370832011-01-05T15:21:54.909-05:002011-01-05T15:21:54.909-05:00Other Anon re: Green Bay. It could still be, it...Other Anon re: Green Bay. It could still be, it's only the ranks. Nothing saying they're on the same scale, so a 6th placed defense could well be better than a 4th placed offense. After all, the PFR SRS has the Packers with the best Defensive SRS.Ian Simcoxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01518825067469269377noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-43038448554199758362011-01-05T15:21:52.618-05:002011-01-05T15:21:52.618-05:00I think you mean .00298? In which case it's th...I think you mean .00298? In which case it's the number I arrived at in the second post.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-29226493140157445502011-01-05T15:15:25.487-05:002011-01-05T15:15:25.487-05:00Anon - I think it's actually around 0.3%. I ra...Anon - I think it's actually around 0.3%. I ran a large simulation (100,000 sims) and the answer came to around that. It also makes sense because the probability of any one team being in the top 5 five seasons in a row is 0.0093%, so the probability of at least one of the 32 teams being in the top 5 five seasons in a row is 32 * (5/32)^5 = 0.298%Ian Simcoxhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01518825067469269377noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-67274397403020546472011-01-05T14:54:49.517-05:002011-01-05T14:54:49.517-05:00Orrrr you can take the (5/32)^5 caluclation (which...Orrrr you can take the (5/32)^5 caluclation (which is the odds one specific team will do it throughout 5 years), and subtract that from 1 for the odds a team WON'T do it. In other words, 1-.000093....<br /><br />Then, raise that to the 32nd power since there are 32 teams. Then, subtract that from 1 for the odds that a team DOES do it 5 years in a row. I end up with .0029759, fairly close to the .00218 figureAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-72898773647424978422011-01-05T14:40:55.837-05:002011-01-05T14:40:55.837-05:00@makewayhomer
actually, the odds of of any one te...@makewayhomer<br /><br />actually, the odds of of any one team finishing in the top 5 in ST for 5 years in a row in a 100% "luck" league is closer to .00218%<br /><br />Even this number is probably slightly off, but it's much closer to the real probability than (5/32)^5, which is actually .000093, not .0093.<br /><br />All you need to do is calculate the odds that at least 1 of the top 5 teams from any season are in the top 5 for the next 4 seasons. So the odds for season 1 is 100%...you will always have 5 teams in the top 5. The odds for at least 1 of those teams in the top 5 next season is roughly 57%, which is 1-(27/32)^5<br /><br />Then to eliminate the difficulty of calculation, assume only 1 team has made it in the top 5 for two seasons. Now you can just multiply the (non-rounded) 57% by (5/32)^3, which gets you roughly .00218<br /><br />The actual odds are probably slightly higher since I eliminated the possibility of having 2 or more of the 5 teams in the top 5 in year 2 and thus thereafter. Anyone care to take a shot at the full calculation?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-23533632930793659632011-01-05T13:54:55.928-05:002011-01-05T13:54:55.928-05:00I'm A little shocked how low Green Bay's D...I'm A little shocked how low Green Bay's Defensive rank is. Their D has been better IMO than their O.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38600807.post-65982060135108003402011-01-05T13:51:11.546-05:002011-01-05T13:51:11.546-05:00also @ Adam
at least some parts of Special Teams ...also @ Adam<br /><br />at least some parts of Special Teams are both explanatory and predictable. Brian certainly agrees with the former, as his Billy Cundiff post says, and other studies have already shown that certain factors like kickoff distance are predictable.TBDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15039327932041273177noreply@blogger.com