A few years ago, I looked at Eli Manning and the HOF in the context of an ANY/A Gray Ink test. What do I mean by that? Here’s what I did:

• Step 1) Calculate each quarterback’s ANY/A for each season of his career where he had enough pass attempts to qualify for the passing title (14 attempts per team game). ANY/A, of course, is calculated as follows: (Passing Yards + PassTDs * 20 – INTs * 45 – Sack Yards Lost) / (Pass Attempts + Sacks).

• Step 2) For each quarterback, award him 10 points if he led the league in ANY/A, 9 points if he finished 2nd, 8 points if he finished 3rd, … and 1 point if he finished 10th. A quarterback receives 0 points if he does not finish in the top 10 in ANY/A or does not have enough pass attempts to qualify.

• Step 3) For each quarterback, add his “points” from each season to produce a career grade.

I decided to update that post (written in 2014) and make a few changes.

1) I have included the results from the last four seasons.

2) I included sack data from 1960 to 1968, using estimated individual sack data based on team sack data.

3) I have lumped together the AAFC/AFL with the NFL in each season as if it was all one big league.

4) I have pro-rated the values based on the number of qualifying passers in each season. So let’s say a player ranks 4th in ANY/A in 2017, where there were 32 qualifying passers. He gets the average of 7 points and 7 points * 32 divided by 32, which is of course just 7 points. Now, let’s say a player ranks 4th in ANY/A in a 10-team league. He gets the average of 7 points and 7 points * 10/32 (2.18), which is 4.6 points. This is not a special formula, but a “good enough” metric that helps discredit players in smaller leagues, but not overly so (hence the average idea).

Okay, enough words. Here are the results. I have also included the raw totals, so you can see what happens if I didn’t pro-rate the values. Finally, I subjectively included some HOF labels at the end: actually in the HOF (not very subjective), Future HOFer, Borderline, and then either Not Eligible or a No for the HOF.

The future HOFers rank 1-4-5-13-18 by this litmus test: there’s not much to debate there.

Among the actual HOFers, only George Blanda — who is probably the least qualified quarterback of the “modern” era to make the HOF — ranks outside of the top 50. Bob Waterfield and Ken Stabler are the next lowest quarterbacks, and that’s consistent with how I’d view them. As a litmus test, this does a decent job for being a (somewhat) quick and dirty way to measure HOF play.

Among the Not Eligible guys, only Carson Palmer is in the top 60. He ranks 37th, on the back of a #1 season in 2015 with the Cardinals (+10.3 points, since there were 34 qualifying passers that year), a #3 season with the Bengals in 2005 (+8.25, also 34), and a 6th and 7th rankings in ’06 and ’14 (+5, +4.06). That’s not really a HOF career by any stretch, but it’s a memorable career.

Among the pure no guys — those who have been passed over and didn’t receive my subjective borderline label — you have Charlie Conerly at 26, Trent Green at 27, Boomer Esiason at 29, John Hadl at 31, Tommy Thompson at 33, and Milt Plum at 35. All good quarterbacks, occasionally great ones, who are HOVG (at worst) type players.

And then we get to the borderline guys. I gave 10 players that label, including three guys who entered the league in the last ten years and who are probably too young to really evaluate. Among the other 7…

Philip Rivers, Ken Anderson, and Tony Romo all are in the top 25, and make sense to be discussed together. None of the three won a Super Bowl, all three had fantastic efficiency numbers, and all three are more favored by the analytics crowd than the non-analytics crowd. Statistically, based on regular season efficiency, all three are clear HOF players. But, of course, that’s not the HOF test.

Steve McNair, Donovan McNabb, and Randall Cunningham are all borderline guys, too, and are underrated by an analysis like this that ignores rushing. They rank 68th, 72nd, and 104th. McNair (2003) and Cunningham (1998) each have a first place finish in ANY/A, while McNabb has a 2nd (2006) and 3rd (2004) place spot. McNair also has a 5th (2001) and a 9th (1999), while Cunningham has a 10th (1990), but that’s it, and that’s the problem. McNabb and McNair each have three finishes at 11 or 12 (worth zero) and McNabb has three more at 13/14; this analysis ignores solid seasons and rushing, which is going to hurt these guys a lot.

And then, of course, we get to Eli Manning. He was the inspiration for this post three years ago, and not much has changed since.  Manning has a a 5th-place finish from 2011 (+6.1), and three 10th place finishes (2009, 2012, and 2015, each worth 1 point).  He also has a 12th (2014) and a 13th (2010) place finish, but those are his only other top-15 seasons.  Manning performs horribly in the ANY/A Gray Ink test for HOFers.  He’s far behind Blanda, let alone the Stabler/Waterfield floor of quarterbacks.

The graph below shows the data data but with color-coded labels: black for HOF or future HOFer,red for not in, orange for not eligible, and large green dots for the borderline guys.  The running quarterbacks (McNair, McNabb, Cunningham, and Newton) are at the back of the pack with Manning (the second farthest dot to the right); the three “stats stars” are to the left, and then you have Ryan who currently ranks just outside of the top 40 (the X-Axis is rank; the Y-Axis is prorated value).

What do you guys think?

If you squint, you can see it. New York lost Odell Beckham and Brandon Marshall for the season before the team even won its first game. Both players will be back, along with 24-year-old Sterling Shepard and not-yet-24-year-old Evan Engram. The Giants also signed Cody Latimer and added a quality left tackle in veteran Nate Solder. New York made the playoffs two years ago, and while Eli Manning had one of the worst seasons of his career in 2017, you can see a high-level functioning offense with new head coach Pat Shurmur, new OC Mike Shula, Manning, Beckham/Marshall/Shephard/Engram, and rookie RB Saquon Barkley.

But I’d be floored if the Giants took a RB with the second overall pick. In my opinion, New York is going to trade the second pick for a king’s ransom or draft a quarterback.  And it’s because the Giants have an aging, below-average quarterback as their QB1, and that’s true even though his name is Manning.

Even if you ignored 2017 due to all of the injuries the Giants offense experienced, it’s not like there would be a lot of reason for optimism about how well Manning would play into his late 30s.  Why’s that?

1) At age 35 in 2016, Manning was below-average, ranking 22nd out of 31 qualifying passers in ANY/A.

2) Manning was born on January 3rd, making him “old for his age” if you know what I mean. Had Manning been born four days earlier, he would have been considered 36 in 2016, 37 in 2017, and 38 this season.

3) Even if you give Manning the benefit of the doubt and ignore his 2017 performance and the fact that he’s old for his age, we wouldn’t expect a below-average QB at age 35 to be average at age 37, much less average at age 38 or 39. You would expect a QB to lose about 0.5 ANY/A from age 35 to age 37, and it’s not like Manning started from a very high porch.

Since Manning didn’t have much left to lose, the effects of age will likely hit him hard. The graph below shows Manning’s RANY/A — i.e., his Relative ANY/A, which is just ANY/A minus league average ANY/A — for each year of his career.  He had sustained regular season success for a five-year period from 2008 to 2012, and another mini-peak in 2014 and 2015, but the graph doesn’t pain the picture of a quarterback who will be a difference maker in 2018 or 2019 as his physical skills decline. [continue reading…]

The common argument for why Manning should make the Hall of Fame is that he and the Giants won two Super Bowls, knocking off the legendary Patriots both times. And in the modern era (i.e., ignoring Tobin Rote), only Jim Plunkett has won two Super Bowls and not made the Hall of Fame.  That’s true, but it’s also a wildly misleading way of looking at things.  If you want to argue that Manning should make the Hall of Fame, that’s a good way to frame your argument, but that’s thinking more like a defense attorney and less like a judge.

Here’s another way to think about it: every single quarterback in the Hall of Fame has been named a first-team All-Pro at least once in their career, except for one quarterback.  And that one quarterback was a no doubt Hall of Famer who also won an MVP trophy.

Two years ago, I wrote about how — statistically speaking — Eli Manning’s Hall of Fame case falls far short. Today, let’s look not at statistics, but at how sportswriters (i.e., those people who vote for things like the Hall of Fame) viewed these quarterbacks during their careers.  If you include Tom Brady, Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees and Peyton Manning, there are 29 Hall of Fame quarterbacks who entered the NFL in the last 70 years.

Of that group, 16 have been named an MVP by the Associated Press: Peyton Manning (5 times); Johnny Unitas (3); Brett Favre (3); Joe Montana (2); Steve Young (2); Tom Brady (2); Aaron Rodgers (2); Kurt Warner (2); Dan Marino (1); Fran Tarkenton (1); Y.A. Tittle (1); Ken Stabler (1); Bart Starr (1); John Elway (1); Norm Van Brocklin (1); and Terry Bradshaw (1). [continue reading…]

Let’s worry about axes and labels later. For now, take a look at the graph below. The red dots represent Hall of Fame quarterbacks (or players not yet eligible but very likely to wind up in Canton). The blue dots represent non-HOF quarterbacks. The black dot? That’s Eli Manning.

Okay, so what the heck is this chart? What it’s *not*, is the most sophisticated way to measure the value of a quarterback. Instead, it’s a quick-and-dirty method I calculated to measure quarterback dominance.

• Step 1) Calculate each quarterback’s ANY/A for each season of his career where he had enough pass attempts to qualify for the passing title (14 attempts per team game). ANY/A, of course, is calculated as follows: (Passing Yards + PassTDs * 20 – INTs * 45 – Sack Yards Lost) / (Pass Attempts + Sacks).

• Step 2) For each quarterback, award him 10 points if he led the league ^[1]For purposes of this post, I have excluded AAFC stats, but combined the AFL and NFL as one league. in ANY/A, 9 points if he finished 2nd, 8 points if he finished 3rd, … and 1 point if he finished 10th. A quarterback receives 0 points if he does not finish in the top 10 in ANY/A or does not have enough pass attempts to qualify.

• Step 3) For each quarterback, add his “points” from each season to produce a career grade.

[continue reading…]

This week at the New York Times, I examine the brothers Manning:

Twenty months ago, Eli Manning and the Giants won the Super Bowl at Lucas Oil Field in Indianapolis, the home stadium of his All-Pro brother, Peyton. This year, Peyton seems poised to return the favor. No team is hotter through four weeks than the Denver Broncos. Although five teams are undefeated, the Broncos’ scorched-earth pace makes them the front-runners for the Super Bowl at MetLife Stadium.

At least, that is how it appears. The Broncos have outscored opponents by an average of 22 points. The Patriots are 4-0, too, but New England has won by 8 points a game. As it turns out, that differential means the Broncos are much more likely to be the better team over the rest of the season.

Consider that from 1990 to 2012, 66 teams began the season 4-0; on average, those teams won a more modest 61 percent of their games over the final three-quarters of the season. In other words, a perfect start to the season does not guarantee much, to which the 2012 Arizona Cardinals can attest.

By looking at points allowed and points scored, we can get more precise estimates of how many wins we can expect from a team over the rest of the season. Using the 66 undefeated teams to start the season since 1990, a linear regression model — using points scored and points allowed as the two input variables — has the Broncos winning 13.5 games this season, well ahead of the Patriots. (Of course, the regression model does not know that the Patriots will be getting Rob Gronkowski and Danny Amendola back from injury.)

You can read the full article here.

In 2011, Eli Manning threw for 4,933 yards and won the Super Bowl. Last year, he threw for 3948 yards and missed the playoffs. It’s tempting to think that something was “wrong” with Manning last year. Another narrative would be that 2011 was a career year far out of line with anything else he’s done, which would make 2012 was the real Manning. I’m not sure I buy either of those explanations.

Let’s start by comparing Manning’s numbers in 2011 and 2012. Yes, his passing yards dropped, but that’s a meaningless metric on its own. He threw 53 fewer passes in 2012, a partial explanation for why his yards declined. And while his yards per attempt did drop from 8.4 to 7.4, about 20% of that dip was mitigated by the fact that he took fewer sacks (his Net Yards per Attempt dropped from 7.7 to 6.9). In addition to improving his sack rate, Manning’s touchdown and interception rates were virtually identical, which means his decline was limited to pass attempts and yards per attempt.

We can break down the numbers on why his yards per attempt declined thanks to some additional data courtesy of NFLGSIS. In 2011, Manning averaged 8.4 yards per attempt. That was a result of three things: a 61.0% completion rate, 5.82 yards after the catch (per completion), and 7.92 Air Yards per Completed Pass. In 2012, Manning averaged 7.4 yards per attempt, with a 59.9% completion rate, 4.33 average YAC, and 7.97 Air Yards per Completed Pass.

The tiny drop in completion percentage is more than offset by the better sack rate, and if Manning was throwing incomplete passes instead of taking sacks, that’s a good thing. As for what happens when he completed a pass, his entire decline was in the form of yards after the catch. In 2011, he ranked 3rd in Air Yards per Completed Pass and 6th in YAC per completion; in 2012, he ranked 2nd in AY/CP and 30th in YAC per completion.

Now there’s some evidence to indicate YAC might be more on the quarterback than Air Yards. Other studies, and what I think is popular opinion, is that YAC is more about the receiver than the quarterback. But let’s further investigate why the Giants dipped in YAC. The table below shows a more precise breakdown. For both 2011 (in blue) and 2012 (in red), you can see the number of Receptions, Air Yards per Reception, YAC per reception, and Yards per Reception. The rows show each of the Giants top three receivers, top tight end, and top running back, along with the other players at wide receiver, tight end, and running back.
[continue reading…]

In October 2009, Neil Paine wrote that Eli Manning had seemingly turned the corner, starting with the five-game stretch from week 17 of the 2007 season that ended in the Super Bowl. And since that post, Manning has been even better, with his 2011 season standing out as the best year of his career. I thought it would be fun to chart Eli’s career game-by-game according to ANY/A. Actually, since that chart would be incredibly volatile, I’m going to do it in five- and ten-game increments.

The chart below shows the average of Manning’s ANY/A in each of his last five games (playoffs included) beginning with the fifth game of his career in 2004. Of note: the black line represents the league average ANY/A (which, if we’re talking about the last 2 games of Year N and the first 3 games of Year N+1, is 40% of the Year N league average and 60% of the Year N+1 league average), and the two big purple dots show the two Super Bowl victories (or, more accurately, the Super Bowl win, the prior three playoff wins, and the week 17 game).

[continue reading…]

Eight years ago — almost to the day — our old PFR colleague Doug Drinen wrote a Sabernomics post about “The Manning Index”, a metric designed to roughly gauge the clutchness (or chokeitude) of a given quarterback by looking at how he did relative to expectations (he revived this concept in version two, six years ago). In a nutshell, Doug used the location of the game and the win differential of the two teams involved to establish an expected winning percentage for each quarterback in a given matchup. He then added those up across all of a quarterback’s playoff starts, and compared to the number of wins he actually had. Therefore, quarterbacks who frequently exceeded expectations in playoff games could be considered “clutch” while those who often fell short (like the Index’s namesake, Peyton Manning) might just be inveterate chokers.

Doug ran that study in the midst of the 2004-05 playoffs, so it shouldn’t be surprising that Tom Brady (who was at the time 8-0 as a playoff starter and would run it to 10-0 before ever suffering a loss) came out on top, winning 3.5 more games than you’d expect from the particulars of the games he started. Fast-forward eight years, though, and you get this list of quarterbacks who debuted after 1977:
[continue reading…]

Have you taken a look at a passing leaderboard lately? Here’s the PFR passing leaderboard sorted by ANY/A; as always, all columns are sortable.

Rk	QB	Tm	G	Cmp	Att	Cmp%	Yds	TD	TD%	Int	Int%	Y/A	AY/A	Y/C	Sk	Yds	NY/A	ANY/A	Sk%
1	Peyton Manning	DEN	6	154	227	67.8	1808	14	6.2	4	1.8	8	8.4	11.7	10	63	7.4	7.8	4.2
2	Josh Freeman	TAM	6	104	187	55.6	1538	11	5.9	5	2.7	8.2	8.2	14.8	9	65	7.5	7.5	4.6
3	Eli Manning	NYG	7	169	265	63.8	2109	12	4.5	7	2.6	8	7.7	12.5	5	40	7.7	7.4	1.9
4	Robert Griffin III	WAS	7	133	189	70.4	1601	7	3.7	3	1.6	8.5	8.5	12	15	106	7.3	7.4	7.4
5	Drew Brees	NOR	6	166	273	60.8	2097	18	6.6	7	2.6	7.7	7.8	12.6	12	86	7.1	7.2	4.2
6	Ben Roethlisberger	PIT	6	155	235	66	1765	11	4.7	3	1.3	7.5	7.9	11.4	13	72	6.8	7.2	5.2
7	Tom Brady	NWE	7	186	285	65.3	2104	12	4.2	3	1.1	7.4	7.8	11.3	14	96	6.7	7.1	4.7
8	Aaron Rodgers	GNB	7	183	262	69.8	1979	19	7.3	4	1.5	7.6	8.3	10.8	26	142	6.4	7.1	9
9	Matt Schaub	HOU	7	140	222	63.1	1650	10	4.5	4	1.8	7.4	7.5	11.8	8	59	6.9	7	3.5
10	Jake Locker	TEN	4	67	106	63.2	781	4	3.8	2	1.9	7.4	7.3	11.7	3	16	7	6.9	2.8
11	Matt Ryan	ATL	6	160	236	67.8	1756	14	5.9	6	2.5	7.4	7.5	11	13	107	6.6	6.7	5.2
12	Carson Palmer	OAK	6	148	241	61.4	1732	7	2.9	4	1.7	7.2	7	11.7	12	93	6.5	6.3	4.7
13	Alex Smith	SFO	7	127	190	66.8	1427	9	4.7	5	2.6	7.5	7.3	11.2	18	100	6.4	6.2	8.7
14	Joe Flacco	BAL	7	150	252	59.5	1837	9	3.6	6	2.4	7.3	6.9	12.2	18	110	6.4	6.1	6.7
15	Andy Dalton	CIN	7	156	243	64.2	1831	13	5.3	10	4.1	7.5	6.8	11.7	17	102	6.7	5.9	6.5
16	Cam Newton	CAR	6	101	173	58.4	1387	5	2.9	6	3.5	8	7	13.7	15	102	6.8	5.9	8
17	Tony Romo	DAL	6	150	221	67.9	1636	8	3.6	9	4.1	7.4	6.3	10.9	9	59	6.9	5.8	3.9
18	Ryan Fitzpatrick	BUF	7	133	218	61	1435	15	6.9	9	4.1	6.6	6.1	10.8	8	44	6.2	5.7	3.5
19	Christian Ponder	MIN	7	152	227	67	1492	9	4	6	2.6	6.6	6.2	9.8	16	68	5.9	5.5	6.6
20	Sam Bradford	STL	7	131	219	59.8	1592	7	3.2	6	2.7	7.3	6.7	12.2	21	131	6.1	5.5	8.8
21	Ryan Tannehill	MIA	6	118	198	59.6	1454	4	2	6	3	7.3	6.4	12.3	12	109	6.4	5.5	5.7
22	Matthew Stafford	DET	6	164	264	62.1	1754	5	1.9	6	2.3	6.6	6	10.7	12	86	6	5.4	4.3
23	Michael Vick	PHI	6	136	231	58.9	1632	8	3.5	8	3.5	7.1	6.2	12	17	90	6.2	5.4	6.9
24	Andrew Luck	IND	6	134	250	53.6	1674	7	2.8	7	2.8	6.7	6	12.5	16	99	5.9	5.3	6
25	Mark Sanchez	NYJ	7	116	218	53.2	1453	9	4.1	7	3.2	6.7	6	12.5	14	77	5.9	5.3	6
26	Jay Cutler	CHI	6	106	187	56.7	1359	8	4.3	7	3.7	7.3	6.4	12.8	19	121	6	5.3	9.2
27	Russell Wilson	SEA	7	104	175	59.4	1230	8	4.6	7	4	7	6.1	11.8	14	97	6	5.2	7.4
28	Brandon Weeden	CLE	7	154	272	56.6	1783	9	3.3	10	3.7	6.6	5.6	11.6	11	69	6.1	5.1	3.9
29	Philip Rivers	SDG	6	139	209	66.5	1492	10	4.8	9	4.3	7.1	6.2	10.7	18	118	6.1	5.1	7.9
30	Kevin Kolb	ARI	6	109	183	59.6	1169	8	4.4	3	1.6	6.4	6.5	10.7	27	159	4.8	4.9	12.9
31	Matt Hasselbeck	TEN	5	96	156	61.5	931	5	3.2	4	2.6	6	5.5	9.7	10	74	5.2	4.7	6
32	Blaine Gabbert	JAX	6	88	158	55.7	906	6	3.8	3	1.9	5.7	5.6	10.3	15	105	4.6	4.5	8.7
33	Matt Cassel	KAN	5	103	176	58.5	1150	5	2.8	9	5.1	6.5	4.8	11.2	13	74	5.7	4.1	6.9

[continue reading…]

There are few nights as precious as tonight, the official start of the 2012 regular season. Even after tonight, 255 regular season games remain for us to enjoy. As usual, the defending Super Bowl champion hosts the opening game, and it didn’t take the NFL schedule makers long to decide on an opponent. This will be the 6th time in 8 meetings that the Giants and Cowboys will meet on primetime television. And as usual, the media will turn this game into another referendum on Tony Romo and Eli Manning.

Public perception says that Manning is the better quarterback, based largely exclusively on his post-season success and reputation as a clutch quarterback. And there’s a good reason he has such a reputation: Manning has won 8 of his last 9 playoff games and tied NFL single-season records with seven 4th-quarter comebacks and eight game-winning drives in 2011. Romo has a reputation as the chokiest of chokers, is 1-3 in playoff games, and has been less stellar than Manning late in games. While Manning has 21 career 4th quarter comebacks and is 21-22 in games where he had an opportunity for a 4th quarter comeback, Romo is just 13-20 in 4th quarter comeback opportunities. But let’s leave that to the side for now.

Because based on their regular season statistics, Romo absolutely crushes Manning, at least statistically. The gap shrunk significantly in 2011, but Romo’s track record of production and efficiently is considerably more impressive. Manning entered the league in 2004 but struggled his first three years; Romo first started in 2006 and was above average immediately. But let’s just focus on the past five seasons. The table below displays the statistics each quarterback produced from 2007 to 2011. Note that since Romo has missed time due to injury, I have added a third row, which pro-rates Romo’s numbers to 80 starts:
[continue reading…]

In 2006, I took a stab at ranking every quarterback in NFL history. Two years later, I acquired more data and made enough improvements to merit publishing an updated and more accurate list of the best quarterbacks the league has ever seen. In 2009, I tweaked the formula again, and published a set of career rankings, along with a set of strength of schedule, era and weather adjustments, and finally career rankings which include those adjustments and playoff performances.

If nothing else, that was three years ago, so the series was due for an update. I’ve also acquired more data, enabling me to tweak the formula to better reflect player performance. But let’s start today with an explanation of the methodology I’m using. To rank a group of players, you need to decide which metric you’re ordering the list by. I’ll get to all of the criteria I’m not using in a little bit, but the formula does use each of the following: pass attempts, passing touchdowns, passing yards, interceptions, sacks, sack yards lost, fumbles, fumbles recovered, rush attempts, rushing yards and rushing touchdowns. Most importantly, the formula is adjusted for era and league.

So where do we begin? We start with plain old yards per attempt. I then incorporate sack data by removing sack yards from the numerator and adding sacks to the denominator ^[1]I have individual sack data for every quarterback since 1969. For seasons before then, I have team sack data going back to 1949. For seasons before 1950, I ignored sacks; for seasons between 1950 … Continue reading. To include touchdowns and pass attempts, I gave a quarterback 20 yards for each passing touchdown and subtracted 45 yards for each interception. This calculation — (Pass Yards + 20 * PTD – 45 * INT – Sack Yards Lost) / (Sacks + Pass Attempts) forms the basis for Adjusted Net Yards per Attempt, one of the key metrics I use to evaluate quarterbacks.

For purposes of this study, I did some further tweaking. I’m including rushing touchdowns, because our goal is to measure quarterbacks as players. There’s no reason to separate rushing and passing touchdowns from a value standpoint, so all passing and rushing touchdowns are worth 20 yards and are calculated in the numerator of Adjusted Net Yards per Attempt. To be consistent, I also include rushing touchdowns in the denominator of the equation. This won’t change anything for most quarterbacks, but feels right to me. A touchdown is a touchdown.
[continue reading…]

No, this article isn’t an article about quarterbacks squaring off against ancient Greek mathematicians. Today, we’re going to look at quarterback win-loss records and see how they compare to their Pythagorean win-loss records.

Over 30 years ago, Bill James wrote that, on average, baseball teams’ true strengths could be measured more accurately by looking at runs scored and runs allowed than by looking at wins and losses. Since then, sports statisticians have applied the same thinking to all sports. The formula to calculate a team’s Pythagorean winning percentage is always some variation of:

(Points Scored^2) / (Points Scored ^2 + Points Allowed^2)

With the exponent changing from 2 to whatever number best fits the data for the particular sport. In football, that number is 2.53. We can look, for example, at the Pythagorean records for each team in the league last season, and line it up against their actual record:

[continue reading…]

Happy 4th of July! Before you head to your barbecue, I’d recommend you take a look at the incredible document our founders signed 236 years ago.

As far as football goes, today’s a good time for a data dump. The table below shows the career passing leaders for each franchise, organized by when the current leader last played for that team.

[continue reading…]