Collinsworth annoys me for some reason - but that was funny.
I concur.
Along these lines, isn’t football overdue for some changes analogous to what has happened in baseball? I’m thinking of “Sabermetrics” - the analysis and implementation of what actually works, as opposed to conventional wisdom.
For example, it seems to be the case that analysis says teams would benefit from attempting 4th-and-short substantially more often than they do. But coaches are averse to the criticism they’d get if this didn’t work, so they go with the duller, more conventional option.
What MOIDALIZE said.
Oh, and :D.
Craziness The Redux!
Bengals turn around their season and go 8-1 the rest of the way…
I am fearful the Giants read their press reviews and overlook the Cowboys next week.
Overall the Giants really are looking very good of late. I thought they would go 10-6 this year but now think 12 wins is quite possible. Remaining schedule is:
Cowboys
@ Eagles
Jaguars
Redskins
@ Vikings
Eagles
@Packers
@ Redskins
Its a sad comment on the Dallas season when Wade might not even outlast Chilly this season.
Color me unimpressed. Their wins have come against teams with a combined 17-31 record, and they lost convincingly to the two good teams they’ve played thus far.
They’re winning the games they’re supposed to, and there’s nothing wrong with that, but I’m not buying into their dominance of a soft schedule as evidence of their greatness just yet.
I’ve gotta give Daboll and Mangini credit. I’m still not totally sold on them (if they ever run a play-action pass in the red zone, I’ll pass out), but I like that they’re taking smart gambles, not to mention that every trick play they’ve run has been executed to perfection.
There was a good article in the paper about Mangini, when he was an intern with the Browns, and how he vowed never to have a player like Andre Rison on his team if he were ever a head coach. All the moves last year were about getting rid of the prima donnas and bringing in character guys willing to play hard within the system, and they’re doing that now. The front office had a fantastic offseason, and the defense seems like it’s finally jelling. For the first time since they’ve come back, I feel like they’re a competently run organization.
Oh, and how about that block by Cribbs on McCoy’s TD run? Yes.
I think Stafford is getting shut down for the season. I can only hope he comes back strong next season; the kid is freaking awesome when he’s “on”.
He’s Glass Joe.
Glass-shouldered Joe, at any rate. By my count, he’s missed 11 out of 24 games so far in his career, and appears to be about to miss a bunch more.
Shaun Hill probably just earned 3 or 4 million bucks.
If anything, Calvin Johnson and the offensive line did. Whoever starts at QB seems to do pretty well.
It’s like the Raiders- no matter who they line up at wideout, running back* and even quarterback, their offense has been pretty effective this year. That says to me that their O-line is very good.
*I mean, seriously - who the fuck is Marcel Reese?
While I agree with said analysis, sadly the edge you would gain wouldn’t be that significant, and as you say the number of times you try, and fail, will outweigh, in the media’s eyes, the times you make it and score later in the drive.
In any event, there’s been a number of sabermetric football books (or saformetrics, rather?) put out over the years, starting with Ignatin and Barra and proceeding down to Football Prospectus/Outsiders.
I can’t argue but they look better than I thought they were before game 1 and the Packers and Vikings both look more vulnerable than I expected. 5 of the 8 games are divisional and Jaguars are not a great team. Believe me I have not deceived myself into thinking Superbowl champs, just into have a chance to go deep into the playoffs and hope good things happen.
Actually, the edge would be quite significant:
One issue never raised in TMQs rants is that when using computer simulations such as Accuscore’s is that the results suffer from a lack of real world data. The simulations compile the results of all plays and predict the outcomes by averaging the results of each teams plays. This is fine for games played within the same set of rules and trends. Fundamentally changing a tactic like punts makes all the simulation data suspect and the predictions inherently flawed. It’s difficult to predict what will happen on the various 4th down situations because there are so few of them actually played, the sample size of 4th down plays relative to all other plays are essentially negligible. The few 4th down plays that are run are done in very specific situations that would be quite different from the situations represented by the simulations. Defenses and offenses play very differently in 4th down situations.
If Accuscore reran the simulations and treated every 4th down opportunity as if it were a 3rd and goal or 4th and goal try, because that’s essentially how coaches would treat them, I suspect the results would be very different, especially for the good to poor range of teams.
Why would they be very different?
[Quote of the week from Jerry Jones]
(Dallas Cowboys Owner Jerry Jones Calls for Blood: What Took Him So Long? | News, Scores, Highlights, Stats, and Rumors | Bleacher Report): “I can’t put my finger on [the problem] because I don’t have enough fingers.”
The statistical approach glosses over the unique attributes of particular teams in particular situations.
For example, when NE went for it on 4th down against the Chargers a couple of weeks ago. Defensible decision, but bad play call. They’re not a good running team. So if you evaluate the decision by their decision to run a vanilla running play, their actual likelihood of success was lower than the statistical likelihood.
Rumors are that Wade Philips didn’t show up at the practice facility today. He’s probably out. I’m not sure it’s really his fault, although I can’t say I know what the problem actually is.