BOSTON SPORTS CHICK
  • BLOG
  • DEFLATEGATE
  • GUEST BLOGS
  • GENERAL SPORTS/HOT TOPICS

WHAT IS THE ACTUAL NUMBER OF WINS NEEDED TO WIN YOUR DIVISION IN THE NFL?

11/25/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
What is up with people manipulating data to try and prove a point. There's enough of that crappy data analysis by sponsored researchers in medicine and government, do we really need it in sports? After seeing some Brady hater make a ridiculous post on Twitter, I decided to check the numbers. Here they are:
HOW NUMBERS WERE DETERMINED- Instead of just throwing some averages at you, I oh so kindly included the raw data. These numbers reflect a combination of actual number of wins a team earned to win the division and an adjusted number for times the winner was more than one win above the nearest team. In other words, if a team won their division by tie-breaker or had one more win than the second place team that's the win total I used. In situations where a team was way ahead of the second place team I assumed one more win would be needed to win the division. The chart below shows all of these numbers and 15 year averages at the bottom.
Picture
QUARTERBACK COMPARISON- Next up are the numbers for the five quarterbacks who were being compared. The numbers come from the true years which the quarterback played a majority of the games for his team. Once again the player's average wins needed to win division is at the bottom. Somehow my numbers are a little more even than that viral tweet from yesterday.
Picture
CONCLUSION AND QUESTIONS- It appears to me that when you just look at the number of wins needed to win a division over the past 15 seasons, the numbers are pretty close. Of course just considering the number of wins needed to win a division in a vacuum isn't super useful as it doesn't take into consideration that if a team drops their winning total so they squeak by with the division, some other team will get a win. If it's a division team then the win total needed may rise. Was it to a last place finisher? Not knowing that makes the data a bit sketchy. For that reason it is also pretty dumb to try and use this as some sort of measuring stick.

BRADY AND PATRIOTS-For those who are interested, Tom Brady averaged 12.42 wins per season during this timeframe. If we throw in the 2008 season, the Patriots have averaged 12.3 wins per season.

11 WINS NOT ENOUGH WITHOUT TIEBREAKERS- Now that was cherry picking at its finest. Since the AFC East is the one division which consistently needed the required win total to get adjusted, they were the one division that didn't have tiebreakers year after year. If we just look at 11 wins as the cutoff, the quarterbacks are pretty even once again.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Prime Video is the home of Thursday Night Football
    Picture
    Picture

    ARCHIVES

    September 2022
    March 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    June 2021
    April 2021
    February 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    April 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013

    OTHER BLOGS YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT

    New England Sports Talk
    Kap Lifestyle

    RSS Feed

    Picture
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
Photo used under Creative Commons from Eric Kilby