It’s been awhile, but time for another post in the Thought Experiments category. Assume the following:

• On May 1st, 2013, an average owner, average general manager and average coach are assigned an expansion team. They are randomly assigned 24 players: one from each of the seven rounds of the 2011, 2012, and 2013 drafts. So this expansion team has a 1-in-32 shot at getting Cam Newton from the 2011 first round and a 1-in-32 chance of getting Green Bay offensive lineman Derek Sherrod.  There’s a 1-in-32 chance the sixth round pick from the 2012 draft lands on the Alfred Morris pocket, but more likely than not Lady Luck will give them a generic sixth rounder. As for the final three players, the team is randomly assigned from each draft class one of the X number of undrafted players that ended up making an opening day roster that year. So while it is technically possible this team could get someone like Vontaze Burfict, it’s much more likely to be a Junior Hemingway, David Douglas or Martell Webb. Finally, assume in this magical world that while random, the 24 picks work out in this team’s favor as far as spreading the roster: they don’t end up with 6 quarterbacks and zero defensive lineman, and instead things are magically balanced.
• On May 2nd, this team is able to poach anyone on any roster provided that such player is making the veterans minimum. The team can also sign players currently not on any roster, but it must be of the veterans minimum variety. The team can sign anywhere from 29 to 50 of these minimum players, with the spread based on how many of the 24 players from above the team decides to roster (and they can roster more in training camp, but must be at 53 by the start of the season).

Suppose we simulate this process and play out the 2013 season 10,000 different times. On average, how many games does this mean win per season?

One thing that you might want to keep in mind. While some teams have gone 1-15 and the 2008 Detroit Lions went 0-16, those records do not represent the true winning percentages of those teams. If we simulated the 2008 Detroit Lions season 10,000 times, they wouldn’t go 0-160,000. When Neil talked about the Tangotiger Regression Model, he added 11 games of .500 football to get an estimate of a team’s true ability level. That would put the ’08 Lions at a .204 winning percentage, or 3.26 wins in a 16-game season. The Lions also has a Pythagorean record of 2.8-13.2, so perhaps we can say they were a 3-win team that was really unlucky. On the other hand, Brian Burke had those Lions at 1.8 wins and Football Outsiders had them at 2.1 wins.

Of course, there are many differences between the 2008 Lions and our mythical expansion team. Just food for thought.