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Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

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Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#11

Post by weixiyen »

burntsushi wrote: post #5

If you're willing to limit yourself to the last five years, you can avoid the pain of parsing those free-form text descriptions with nflgame[1] or nfldb[2]. Disclaimer: I am the author of those tools. We've been slowly building up a small community of people using it. In fact, I'm currently in a small fantasy playoff league that's running off nflgame. They also include live updates while games are playing. I'd be cur…

Wow, is this being updated each year to account for any changes to json/xml schema by NFL.com?

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#12

Post by burntsushi »

weixiyen wrote: post #11
burntsushi wrote: post #5

If you're willing to limit yourself to the last five years, you can avoid the pain of parsing those free-form text descriptions with nflgame[1] or nfldb[2]. Disclaimer: I am the author of those tools. We've been slowly building up a small community of people using it. In fact, I'm currently in a small fantasy playoff league that's running off nflgame. They also include live updates while games are playing. I'd be cur…

Wow, is this being updated each year to account for any changes to json/xml schema by NFL.com?

It's JSON. I've been an active maintainer since I released it two years ago. Proof is in the issue tracker and the wiki. :-)

(But there haven't been much---if any---changes to the JSON feed's structure. At most, they add some statistical categories.)

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#13

Post by burntsushi »

jmduke wrote: post #10
burntsushi wrote: post #5

If you're willing to limit yourself to the last five years, you can avoid the pain of parsing those free-form text descriptions with nflgame[1] or nfldb[2]. Disclaimer: I am the author of those tools. We've been slowly building up a small community of people using it. In fact, I'm currently in a small fantasy playoff league that's running off nflgame. They also include live updates while games are playing. I'd be cur…

Oh man, this is just the best -- I can't wait to play around with this.

Come on IRC/FreeNode on #nflgame if you have any questions or need help.

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#14

Post by gojomo »

jib wrote: post #7

The 4th and 2 on the 2 argument bothers me every time someone brings it up. To me it feels like its an incorrect use of statistics. EV isn't the end all - kicking the field goal has way lower variance. If your goal is winning consistently then giving up high variance high EV plays for low variance slightly lower EV plays is often the right choice, as a football season is made up of a very low number of discrete event…

Indeed, the pure point-differential EV isn't enough. And beyond variance, there are mental factors involved: cascading micro-rewards from scoring, thinkability of a win or loss, social dominance.

I believe the NYTimes "4th Down Bot" actually performs a likelihood-of-winning analysis, as well.

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#15

Post by petersalas »

burntsushi wrote: post #5

If you're willing to limit yourself to the last five years, you can avoid the pain of parsing those free-form text descriptions with nflgame[1] or nfldb[2]. Disclaimer: I am the author of those tools. We've been slowly building up a small community of people using it. In fact, I'm currently in a small fantasy playoff league that's running off nflgame. They also include live updates while games are playing. I'd be cur…

Another option for some of these types of queries is an app I made called Yards Gained:

http://www.yardsgained.com/

The data is from play-by-play text parsing going back to 2000.

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#16

Post by weixiyen »

burntsushi wrote: post #12
weixiyen wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, is this being updated each year to account for any changes to json/xml schema by NFL.com?

It's JSON. I've been an active maintainer since I released it two years ago. Proof is in the issue tracker and the wiki. :-) (But there haven't been much---if any---changes to the JSON feed's structure. At most, they add some statistical categories.)

please have my babies

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#17

Post by hansy »

glaugh wrote: post #4
cubecul wrote: post #2

"You got 2 out of 5 answers correct. When you try this quiz with a sorry quiz-taker like you, that’s the result you’re going to get." Sassy. Jesus Christ.

OP here Made the message a bit friendlier for future folks, thanks for the feedback :)

"You got 4 out of 5 answers correct. When you try this quiz with a sorry quiz-taker like you, that’s the result you’re going to get. [That's a joke, we think you did fine :)]"

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#18

Post by m_myers »

jib wrote: post #7

The 4th and 2 on the 2 argument bothers me every time someone brings it up. To me it feels like its an incorrect use of statistics. EV isn't the end all - kicking the field goal has way lower variance. If your goal is winning consistently then giving up high variance high EV plays for low variance slightly lower EV plays is often the right choice, as a football season is made up of a very low number of discrete event…

The question specifies "early in the game"; the correct call can and will vary in a late game or late first half situation (and of course depends on the strengths and weaknesses of the teams involved).

As Bill Barnwell of Grantland is fond of saying, in the first half, your only goal is to maximize your expected points. You don't know exactly how many points you're going to need in the game until the end.

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#19

Post by loganfrederick »

m_myers wrote: post #18
jib wrote: post #7

The 4th and 2 on the 2 argument bothers me every time someone brings it up. To me it feels like its an incorrect use of statistics. EV isn't the end all - kicking the field goal has way lower variance. If your goal is winning consistently then giving up high variance high EV plays for low variance slightly lower EV plays is often the right choice, as a football season is made up of a very low number of discrete event…

The question specifies "early in the game"; the correct call can and will vary in a late game or late first half situation (and of course depends on the strengths and weaknesses of the teams involved). As Bill Barnwell of Grantland is fond of saying, in the first half, your only goal is to maximize your expected points. You don't know exactly how many points you're going to need in the game until the end.

The Bill Barnwell aphorism reads pretty empty to me. You could just as easily flip it to: "In the first half, your only goal is to minimize your opponent's expected points. You don't know exactly how many points they will need until the end."

His phrase doesn't really have any impact on the argument being made here unless you really dissect the relative importance of offense versus defense in the game, which requires a lot more evidence to make a case one way or the other.

Re: Dataset: Ten Years of NFL Plays Analyzed, Visualized, Quizzified

#20

Post by jamesaguilar »

loganfrederick wrote: post #19
m_myers wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question specifies "early in the game"; the correct call can and will vary in a late game or late first half situation (and of course depends on the strengths and weaknesses of the teams involved). As Bill Barnwell of Grantland is fond of saying, in the first half, your only goal is to maximize your expected points. You don't know exactly how many points you're going to need in the game until the end.

The Bill Barnwell aphorism reads pretty empty to me. You could just as easily flip it to: "In the first half, your only goal is to minimize your opponent's expected points. You don't know exactly how many points they will need until the end." His phrase doesn't really have any impact on the argument being made here unless you really dissect the relative importance of offense versus defense in the game, which requires…

You have missed the point of what Barnwell is saying. He is saying that tactical calling of plays to trade expected point value against variance do not make sense in the first half, because you don't know how close it's going to be.

To illustrate: in an infinitely long game, you always pick whatever gives you the highest expected value. In a game with one play left, you always pick the play with the highest probability to put you over the amount of points the opponent has, even if has a lower expected value than other plays.

The quote is saying that the first half is more similar to playing an infinitely long game than a game with one play left.

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