Roundup 10/1/11

This edition of the Roundup is long overdue, and may contain some older, yet still relevant links. Some of these may have appeared in the site twitter feed.

The science and psychology behind college football helmet stickers.

The marathon record was broken a couple weeks ago. Here is the math behind the fastest possible marathon.

Do NFL teams discriminate against black coaching candidates? Part II.

Rex Ryan believes rushing attempts are more important than rushing yards. At first this seems ridiculous, but it makes sense if you subscribe to my theory of running like a boxing jab. Keep in mind rushing 'attempts' will only have the desired affect on the defense if they're usually successful.

Weekly Game Probabilities

Weekly game probabilities are available now at the nytimes.com Fifth Down. This week I review how the prediction model works, and how the results are best understood.

WP: DeAngelo Hall's Silence

Today's post at the Washington Post's Insider looks at how the Redskins can take pressure off Rex Grossman. Plus:

• DeAngelo Hall does a lot of talking, but his play has been silent.
• Dallas' LB Sean Lee had a huge game, as I warned.
• One of the reasons the Skins are off to a good start is a very low penalty rate.
• Washington's run defense suddenly went from one of the best to one of the worst.
• Of the 10 FG attempts in Monday night's game, 4 were significant mistakes, particularly Dallas' kick on 4th and 1 from the WAS 9.
• Jason Campbell, the former Skins QB jettisoned in favor of Donovan McNabb and  Grossman, has started off hot.
• Next week, WAS faces STL QB Sam Bradford, who has regressed in his second season. This doesn't speak well of STL's new OC, Josh McDaniels, the man who replaced Mike Shanahan in Denver.

Team Rankings Week 4

Next week you can expect Zach Sanders (not pictured at left) to take over the weekly rankings digest. But this week I’m going to get the ball rolling with a discussion of the model and how it has changed for 2011.

The rankings and prediction model has been redone for 2011. Just like always, it's a team-efficiency logistic regression model. It's based on passing, running, turnover, and penalty efficiency. But now, running is represented by Success Rate (SR) rather than Yards Per Carry (YPC). SR correlates far better than YPC with winning games. YPC is too susceptible to a handful of relatively rare break-away runs. I think of running as a ‘jab’ and passing as a ‘cross’ or ‘uppercut’. The jab is a low-risk punch that doesn't expose your defenses, keeps your opponent off balance and guessing, and keeps him from purely defending against your cross. A good jab is a prerequisite, but the cross is what scores points and wins bouts. SR captures this aspect of the running game.

Running is more than that, of course. It’s essential in short yardage and inside the red zone, and when team has a lead, it burns clock and helps keep the ball out of their opponent’s hands in the 4th quarter. I believe the revised model better reflects the true inner workings of the sport.

Selected Game Recaps: Notable Stories From Week Three

Welcome to Week Three's edition of selected game recaps, where we take an objective look at the subjective best of the week's games, including:

• New England at Buffalo, in which the Bills make their presence as contenders official.

And

• Detroit at Minnesota, in which the Vikings prove allergic to leads again.

QB Rating and Context

One of the biggest storylines of this early 2011 season is the obvious offensive explosion that has occurred, especially when it comes to quarterback play. Three QBs have already thrown for over 1000 yards, and nine quarterbacks are averaging over 300 yards per game through the air, and it doesn’t stop there. Of the 32 quarterbacks considered to be “qualified,” 23 of them have a standard QB Rating over 80. Eight signal callers currently sit above the 100 mark, and almost half of the leagues field generals come in over 90.

When QBs are universally playing out of their minds, how do we tell who’s really standing out and taking hold of the league? When league averages shift and context changes, we have to account for it in the way we evaluate players. If it’s easier to find a QB who can post a 90 rating then ever before, than those passers with ratings in the eighties aren’t so special any more. If you’re not convinced that we need to start comparing players to each other instead of just to the QB Rating metric, here is a chart that should change your mind.

Shootout In The Superdome: Brees' Go-Ahead Drive

The Texans and Saints went at it Sunday; two high-flying offenses combined for over 700 passing yards.  After falling behind 26-17, the Saints went on three consecutive touchdown-scoring drives, totaling 23 points in the 4th quarter.  The first two of these drives started in Houston territory following a short punt and interception, but the third began at the New Orleans 7.  Down 33-32 with just over 4:00 remaining in the game, Brees and the Saints go marching down the field for the go-ahead touchdown.  Using our Markov model, we look the progress of the drive:

Atlanta's 4th Down Decision Vs. Tampa

The Falcons trailed the Buccaneers by 6 with 4:11 left in the 4th. They faced a seemingly impossible 4th and goal from the Tampa 15. Head coach Mike Smith elected for the field goal attempt. Was this the right call?

4th and goals from the 15 might seem impossible, but they're not. The success rate is low but not zero. In fact it's about 14%. That's not a welcome prospect, but neither is handing the ball to an opponent who's up by 3 points with 4 minutes to play. And even if the conversion attempt fails, it's far from fatal. The calculus merely changes from needing a FG to tie, to needing a TD to win. Notice I said needing a FG to tie. Sure, TDs are harder to come by than FGs, but tying is not the object of the game. Put simply, TDs are more than half as likely as FGs in that situation, which makes the gamble for a tying FG a sucker's bet.