Checkdowns: Elo-Ratings for NFL teams

by Chase Stuart on December 14, 2012

So we're going to pretend all my losses were by 1 point?

Just a quick Friday night checkdown post. By now, you’re very familiar with the Simple Rating System. I used the SRS to create college football ratings every week this season and used the SRS to grade NFL teams earlier this year. Pro-Football-Reference.com calculates SRS ratings every week and they are always available on their Standings page.

The first S in SRS stands for Simple because the SRS is simply the sum of two variables: a team’s average margin of victory (or points differential) and a team’s strength of schedule.

But what if we only care about wins and losses? Even in that case, we still care about strength of schedule. The BCS mandates that the computer systems used to provide the official BCS ratings ignore margin of victory. Essentially, that’s what I’m doing here. To provide Elo-style ratings for NFL teams, I made each win a one-point win, each loss a one-point loss, and each tie worth 0 points. Therefore, a team’s MOV perfectly matches its record, leaving just the SOS to shuffle the deck.

Is this useful for anything? No. That’s why it’s a Friday night checkdown.

Rk	Team	G	MOV	SOS	SRS	Record
1	Houston Texans	13	0.692	0.011	0.704	11-2-0
2	New England Patriots	13	0.538	0.116	0.654	10-3-0
3	San Francisco 49ers	13	0.462	0.081	0.543	9-3-1
4	Green Bay Packers	13	0.385	0.107	0.492	9-4-0
5	Atlanta Falcons	13	0.692	-0.273	0.42	11-2-0
6	Denver Broncos	13	0.538	-0.166	0.373	10-3-0
7	Chicago Bears	13	0.231	0.121	0.352	8-5-0
8	Seattle Seahawks	13	0.231	0.114	0.345	8-5-0
9	Indianapolis Colts	13	0.385	-0.053	0.332	9-4-0
10	Baltimore Ravens	13	0.385	-0.135	0.249	9-4-0
11	New York Giants	13	0.231	-0.04	0.191	8-5-0
12	St. Louis Rams	13	0	0.175	0.175	6-6-1
13	Minnesota Vikings	13	0.077	0.067	0.144	7-6-0
14	New York Jets	13	-0.077	0.172	0.095	6-7-0
15	Washington Redskins	13	0.077	-0.003	0.074	7-6-0
16	Dallas Cowboys	13	0.077	-0.012	0.065	7-6-0
17	Cincinnati Bengals	14	0.143	-0.203	-0.06	8-6-0
18	Pittsburgh Steelers	13	0.077	-0.138	-0.061	7-6-0
19	Miami Dolphins	13	-0.231	0.126	-0.105	5-8-0
20	Buffalo Bills	13	-0.231	0.067	-0.164	5-8-0
21	Arizona Cardinals	13	-0.385	0.203	-0.181	4-9-0
22	Detroit Lions	13	-0.385	0.188	-0.197	4-9-0
23	Tampa Bay Buccaneers	13	-0.077	-0.162	-0.239	6-7-0
24	Tennessee Titans	13	-0.385	0.134	-0.25	4-9-0
25	New Orleans Saints	13	-0.231	-0.035	-0.266	5-8-0
26	Cleveland Browns	13	-0.231	-0.125	-0.356	5-8-0
27	Carolina Panthers	13	-0.385	0.014	-0.371	4-9-0
28	San Diego Chargers	13	-0.231	-0.165	-0.396	5-8-0
29	Philadelphia Eagles	14	-0.429	-0.048	-0.476	4-10-0
30	Jacksonville Jaguars	13	-0.692	0.141	-0.551	2-11-0
31	Oakland Raiders	13	-0.538	-0.112	-0.651	3-10-0
32	Kansas City Chiefs	13	-0.692	-0.148	-0.84	2-11-0

Tagged as: Elo

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