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What can we learn from Game Scripts splits?

Christian Ponder actually played better in the worst Vikings games last year

Christian Ponder actually played better in the worst Vikings games last year.

When I ask a question in the title of a post, I usually have an answer. But not this time. From 2000 to 2012, 163 different quarterbacks started 16 games. I thought it might be interesting to check out their splits based on the Game Script of each game. I grouped each quarterback’s statistics in their team’s 8 highest Game Scripts and 8 worst Game Scripts in the table below. The statistics in blue are from the 8 best games, while the numbers in red are for the 8 worst games (as measured by average points margin in each game).

I don’t know if individual splits will tell us much, but Rex Grossman had the largest split. In 2006, the year the Bears went to the Super Bowl, he averaged 8.54 AY/A in Chicago’s best 8 games but just 3.24 AY/A in their worst games. Splicing out cause and effect is tricky: in games where a quarterback has lots of interceptions, his team is probably going to be losing and will have a negative game script for that game. In Chicago’s 8 best games that year (according to Game Scripts), Grossman threw 16 TDs and 4 INTs; in their 8 worst, he threw 7 TDs and 16 INTs.

Maybe there’s nothing to make of this. But it’s Sunday, so I’ll present the day and open the question to the crowd. What can we make of Game Scripts splits? Check out the table below.

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