Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

NFL player IQ by position

benfry.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 100 posts

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#31

Post by mattmaroon »

I can't say I agree with his conclusion. Lineman are there mainly to be big and collide with other lineman, whereas receivers have a much more skill-intensive job. They have to try to run in pattern while still breaking free of defenseman, but doing so in such a way that the quarterback still knows where to throw the ball. They have to then catch the ball (requiring them to predict its flight path and adjust their path accordingly, an exercise in physics) then run with it and avoid tackle.

I would think 10 extra IQ points would benefit a receiver or a running back far more than a lineman.

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#32

Post by mattmaroon »

dpapathanasiou wrote: post #10
DaniFong wrote: post #4

Interesting. Yet in this study the Wonderlic is keyed to position, not performance in that position. We know that people largely stay within their positions, and we know that metrics like the Wonderlic and the drafting Combine strongly influence both draft decisions, and fielding decisions. We know that such metrics are designed to correspond with existing ideas: in this case, that quarterbacks were smart and tailbac…

I didn't like Gladwell's talk because he ignored baseball: teams like Oakland and Boston have started to understand what metrics do work in assessing player performance (Michael Lewis wrote about this in detail in " Moneyball "). By ignoring something because it doesn't fit in his neat theory, Gladwell loses credibility on this topic.

And every topic he writes about.

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#33

Post by mattmaroon »

mynameishere wrote: post #14

They should compare staff positions instead, as coaches and water boys probably display regular IQ patterns.

I'm not sure what you mean here. Do you think the average NFL coach is not of above average intelligence? That job is far too competitive for that to be true.

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#34

Post by falsestprophet »

lexlibra wrote: post #20
pg wrote: post #6

It may not be anything so complicated as smarter people being closer to the ball. It looks to me as if there is an inverse correlation between IQ and the running speed necessary in a position. So the simplest explanation for this pattern is that running speed and intelligence aren't highly correlated, and you can't simultaneously optimize for both. E.g. you can pick a smart guy to be your center even if he's slow, be…

Here's an explanation for why foot speed and intelligence are inversely correlated: "Upper body strength is relatively equally distributed between the races, but footspeed most definitely is not. So, tailbacks, wide receivers, and defensive players have a need for speed, so they are disproportionately black. I haven't checked recently, but in most recent years since Jason Sehorn's retirement, none of the 64 NFL start…

(I noticed all of the comments you contributed to this community are effectively unsubstantiated racism. I suspect I am wasting my time replying, so I will keep this brief.)

"foot speed and intelligence are inversely correlated...'[black people are faster and dumber and white people are slower and smarter]'"

You are missing the point entirely. While there is an inverse correlation between footspeed and intelligence in this extremely limited dataset, this evidence does not suggest there is a general inverse correlation because there are many many too many confounding variables. Look all you want, you won't find data that supports your conclusion.

There is a fundamental biological reason for this fact; no data suggests there are fundamental genetic differences between the races that result in the expression of differences in intelligence or footspeed or any other significantly complex trait.

This is because behaviorally modern humans evolved only 50,000 years ago. Modern humans were crafty and mobile enough to inhabit most corners of the world. We have not been isolated for sufficient period of time to establish the differences you are looking for.

We all are effectively the same version. (However, there are some uncomfortable questions that could be asked about Indigenous Australians because of their early and extended isolation. But, I don't know enough to draw any conclusions.)

I will gamble there is a significant inverse correlation between education and racism.

edit: I don't think we ought to tolerate racism here simply because it is dumb.

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#35

Post by sfg »

akd wrote: post #30
DaniFong wrote: post #4

Interesting. Yet in this study the Wonderlic is keyed to position, not performance in that position. We know that people largely stay within their positions, and we know that metrics like the Wonderlic and the drafting Combine strongly influence both draft decisions, and fielding decisions. We know that such metrics are designed to correspond with existing ideas: in this case, that quarterbacks were smart and tailbac…

> Yet in this study the Wonderlic is keyed to position, not performance in that position. It's automatically keyed to performance in the position since it's based on NFL players, who are the people at the 99.99th or 99.999th percentile at that position.

I think he means that of the small proportion of people who are good enough to make the NFL the coaches will have picked those that conformed to their biases.

I.E. QB A and QB B are both on the edge of joining the NFL for team C. The coach cannot pick between them and so he goes for QB A who does better on the Wonderlic test.

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#37

Post by tyn »

falsestprophet wrote: post #34
lexlibra wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's an explanation for why foot speed and intelligence are inversely correlated: "Upper body strength is relatively equally distributed between the races, but footspeed most definitely is not. So, tailbacks, wide receivers, and defensive players have a need for speed, so they are disproportionately black. I haven't checked recently, but in most recent years since Jason Sehorn's retirement, none of the 64 NFL start…

(I noticed all of the comments you contributed to this community are effectively unsubstantiated racism. I suspect I am wasting my time replying, so I will keep this brief.) "foot speed and intelligence are inversely correlated...'[black people are faster and dumber and white people are slower and smarter]'" You are missing the point entirely. While there is an inverse correlation between footspeed and intelligence i…

The only comments I see from the parent's parent are the ones in this thread. So how come and you noticed what you say you noticed?

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#38

Post by bouncingsoul »

Don’t tell Tufte that I’ve used the radius, not the proportional area, of the circle as the value for each ellipse! A cardinal sin that I’m using in this case to improve proportion and clarify a point.

I don't understand why this is okay. I imagine he means it was hard to perceive the difference between correctly scaled circles, but that means the data is close, not that you should misrepresent it.

I can see he's written a book about this, so I should assume he has good reasons, but the ones he gave don't seem it.

The problem is that simply scaling the radius exaggerates the difference between numbers because:

    * 26 is 30% more than 20, but
    * a circle with radius 26 is 69% larger 
      than a circle with radius 20.
I just read an article criticizing this exact thing, but I can't find it again.

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#39

Post by jcl »

byrneseyeview wrote: post #15
demandred wrote: post #5

When asked about the balls he dropped in big spots, he responded, ‘What about the ball I caught?’” So while an exceptionally score on a standardized test might suggest dyslexia, the guy’s an egotistical bonehead even without mitigating factors. And that is why Manningham is in the NFL and OP is the one writing about him. Excuse someone for wanting to focus on their accomplishments and not their failures and for havin…

I don't know enough people in sports to be sure about this, but my guess is that the people who try to fix their mistakes rather than crow about their successes are the ones who improve over time.

I wouldn't be so sure. In sports, performance is dictated by reflex. Mistakes are eliminated by constant practice, not by ruminating over past errors. So I would expect that the players who are most optimistic would have the best performance, because they derive pleasure from their successes, quickly forget their failures, and are thus most likely to practice.

Re: NFL player IQ by position

#40

Post by logjam »

occam wrote: post #17

Hi, Occam here. This is just a map of the white/black ratio of each position. There is a 15 point difference between the mean IQ of European-descended (white) Americans and African-descended (black) Americans Please note this is something You Can't Say so don't speak publicly of it. The most interesting thing to note here is that white players score about half a standard deviation higher than the national white IQ, a…

Interesting that you simply term this a "white/black" ratio of each position. Why didn't you call it an "advantaged/disadvantaged" ratio? Why not a "beneficiary/victim" ratio?

If you are trying to chalk up these differences to some kind of genetic disparity, that in fact Has Been Said, repeatedly, for hundreds if not thousands of years, continues to be loudly parroted by certain segments, and has been repeatedly shown to be uninformed swill.

Why don't we see any discussion here about differences in IQ scores of people from different economic classes, in a nation where opportunity (and even access to healthcare) is so disparate between races?

Post reply on HN