Woz Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 @skibrett15 wrote an article for Football's Outsiders (direct link: https://www.footballoutsiders.com/index.php?q=stat-analysis/2018/2017-adjusted-pythagorean-wins ), wherein he adjusted teams' Pythagorean Win totals by removing garbage time scores (any scores where a team was leading by 17+ with 9 minutes to go, or 9+ points with four minutes to go). Last year, the Redskins had 8 wins. They're Pythagorean projection said they should have won 8.34 games, and their adjusted Pythagorean win projection said they should have won 8.16 games. The delta of 0.16 from their actual win total was the smallest in 2016. Likewise, in 2017, the Redskins won 7 games, and had a Pythagorean projection of 6.75 wins and an adjusted projection of 6.93 wins. The 0.07 delta was the third smallest in the league. Unlike other teams, who had massive projection deltas might expect a change in fortunes, it basically says the Redskins are who we thought they were. They played at their talent level, even adjusting for the injury woes (which is probably worth a round of applause to the coaching staff for managing to keep the team competitive while putting together the gameday roster with baling wire and twine). Teams that are projected to have a worse 2018 season than 2017 (outperformed Pythagorean win total by 1.5+ games): Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Carolina, Arizona and Tennessee Teams that are projected to have a better 2018 season than 2017 (underperformed Pythagorean win total by 1.5+ games): Cleveland, Jacksonville, Houston, Baltimore, and Tampa Bay One caveat (as I recall from a conversation with @e16bball from years ago): because the NFL season is so short, it's harder for the Pythagorean system to be as predictive as it might be in other sports such as baseball where it came from. Anyway, I wanted to flag this because A) I like FootballOutsiders and I thought the fact that skibrett15 wrote for them was cool, and B) my inner math geek required me to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eric Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 My math says we were 7-9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
e16bball Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 One thing I wish they would do, if they’re really going to do an “adjusted” Pythag win formula, is adjust it for strength of schedule. Or at least have a version of it where it’s adjusted for SoS. The NFL is not like MLB, which for those who don’t know is where the original Pythag win formula was developed. In MLB, everyone plays all the other teams and all else being generally equal (meaning you don’t play in the AL East, basically) everyone’s schedule will be pretty close in terms of overall difficulty. But in the NFL, you only play a very limited cross-section of the league. And that often times creates pretty serious inequity in schedule difficulty. You can have two teams like the Redskins and Ravens, separated by like 25 Miles, who will play entirely different slates in the same season. The Redskins played a schedule that came out to a .539 opponent win percentage (138-118), whereas the Ravens’ schedule came out to a .441 (113-143). Might not seem like a lot, but think about what an additional 25 wins means in the NFL. Substitute MIN for MIA, NO for OAK, DAL for CIN (x2), ARI for IND, and NYG for CLE (x2) and that’s about 25 extra wins of schedule difficulty. That’s how much tougher our competition was than theirs this year. And the reason why I think it matters, in terms of having predictive value, is that the formula is just based on how many points you score and give up. So the Ravens’ Pythag win total from 2017 is much higher than the Redskins’. But how much does that really tell you about how much better the Ravens are than the Redskins? The Redskins would have scored more points and given up fewer against that schedule too. So how much of the difference in the Pythag win total is due to the Ravens being a better team moving forward — and how much is just due to them playing a really weak schedule? I think it’s critical to know that if you’re trying to isolate (and the maximize) the predictive value of the formula. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
skibrett15 Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 1 hour ago, e16bball said: One thing I wish they would do, if they’re really going to do an “adjusted” Pythag win formula, is adjust it for strength of schedule. Or at least have a version of it where it’s adjusted for SoS. All good points. Once the FO people integrate the adjusted pythagorean into their DVOA and normal offseason projections, (Defense adjusted value over average) then you'll see how the predictions are adjusted for a number of factors. Those projections usually come out in their annual publication, the Football Outsiders Almanac. Strength of schedule is usually a huge adjustment, and can make a team like Washington look a lot worse than they are. Simple 16 game schedule variance makes NFL stats look really sloppy year to year, as you mentioned. @Woz, thanks for the shout out. Sorry the Redskins aren't a more interesting case. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
taylor made Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 Right now, we are a 4 or 5 win team. Depending on what we do in FA that might bump it up some. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MikeT14 Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 8 hours ago, skibrett15 said: Sorry the Redskins aren't a more interesting case. That's not your fault, the team does that to themselves Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Draper Posted March 7, 2018 Share Posted March 7, 2018 I love this data driven discussion. I have wondered for a while if the league will go to: 1. three tiers of players based on value- A. QB, WR, RB, LT, NT, pass rusher, CB, B. Center, RG, TE, Punter, Kicker, C. every other position 2. higher picks have a much greater chance of being quality starters. So should a team basically concentrate on the first 3 rounds of the draft getting picks there right and not trading all of those other later picks and using middle of the road NFL free agents to fill in the gaps on a team. You get your stars in the draft and your solid guys in tier A and B positions and then use bargains in nfl free agency to fill in the C's. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woz Posted March 7, 2018 Author Share Posted March 7, 2018 3 hours ago, Doc Draper said: I love this data driven discussion. I have wondered for a while if the league will go to: 1. three tiers of players based on value- A. QB, WR, RB, LT, NT, pass rusher, CB, B. Center, RG, TE, Punter, Kicker, C. every other position 2. higher picks have a much greater chance of being quality starters. So should a team basically concentrate on the first 3 rounds of the draft getting picks there right and not trading all of those other later picks and using middle of the road NFL free agents to fill in the gaps on a team. You get your stars in the draft and your solid guys in tier A and B positions and then use bargains in nfl free agency to fill in the C's. I'd argue that there's a variant of point #1 in the general aphorism: "If you don't have a quarterback, get the quarterback. If you have the quarterback, get the guy to protect the quarterback. If you have the quarterback and the protector, get the guy to kill the other guy's quarterback." I definitely don't think RB and NT should be in tier one, and WR/CB could arguably be just below that primary tier. I am curious why you dropped left guard and right tackle to the "every other position" tier; also, no linebackers at all (beyond a pass rusher)? I would absolutely classify those positions as more important than punter and kicker, at a bare minimum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woz Posted March 7, 2018 Author Share Posted March 7, 2018 15 hours ago, skibrett15 said: @Woz, thanks for the shout out. Sorry the Redskins aren't a more interesting case. Not a problem. I think this gives an indirect view of where the team is right now: better than they used to be, but not in playoff contention. That irksome "meh" space. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thaiphoon Posted March 8, 2018 Share Posted March 8, 2018 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thaiphoon Posted March 8, 2018 Share Posted March 8, 2018 On 3/7/2018 at 3:38 PM, Woz said: Not a problem. I think this gives an indirect view of where the team is right now: better than they used to be, but not in playoff contention. That irksome "meh" space. Perfect Snyder. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woz Posted March 8, 2018 Author Share Posted March 8, 2018 12 minutes ago, Thaiphoon said: The best part of this is the dickbutt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Draper Posted March 8, 2018 Share Posted March 8, 2018 On 3/7/2018 at 3:37 PM, Woz said: I'd argue that there's a variant of point #1 in the general aphorism: "If you don't have a quarterback, get the quarterback. If you have the quarterback, get the guy to protect the quarterback. If you have the quarterback and the protector, get the guy to kill the other guy's quarterback." I definitely don't think RB and NT should be in tier one, and WR/CB could arguably be just below that primary tier. I am curious why you dropped left guard and right tackle to the "every other position" tier; also, no linebackers at all (beyond a pass rusher)? I would absolutely classify those positions as more important than punter and kicker, at a bare minimum. Good points. Not sure if a RT or LG loses you games whereas a Kick does. I remember watching Ray Guy punt and he was a huge weapon for his team and helped his defense Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dashing202 Posted March 9, 2018 Share Posted March 9, 2018 We are better than 7-9 when healthy , that's all I know . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Doc Draper Posted March 9, 2018 Share Posted March 9, 2018 I remember year after year after year for over two decades where we weren’t talking about “ if everything goes right for us we might break even at .500.” We were talking how far we would go in the playoffs and thinking if we should book our reservations early to the Super Bowl. We the fan base deserve highly competent management and coaching because without that we will be in this situation for years to come. Brice and Dumbo hired by Lil Danny are Washington’s updated version of Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.