The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
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Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#2Analyzing outlying statistics across all the available variables would be an interesting technique to try to predict other potential rules violations. This could apply to many different types of sporting events.
I wonder if anyone is working on this problem?
Despite a few nit picky issues I have with this particular analysis of the Patriots fumble data it's probably the strongest evidence I've seen so far that there has likely been a persistent rules violation.
Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#3Wouldn't pass completion ratio be a better metric?
Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#4If you watch Patriots games, you'll see that if Patriots running backs fumble, they get benched. If they do it again they get released. Belichick is maniacal about getting on his players about fumbling. That is a simple explanation. The team has been well-coached for a long time. If you think the Patriots' success is all from deflated balls, you need to explain how they out-scored the Colts 28-0 in the second half (and didn't fumble in horrible conditions).
Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#5plays per fumble is not a very good metric - as fumbles go down it increases exponentially. If you look at the total fumbles, the patriots are #1 but only 7 ahead of #2. The two worst teams are 10 behind the next two teams. I didn't run the numbers, but eyeballing it, it seems like the Patriots are pretty easily within a couple standard deviations there.
Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#6plays per fumble is not a very good metric - as fumbles go down it increases exponentially. If you look at the total fumbles, the patriots are #1 but only 7 ahead of #2. The two worst teams are 10 behind the next two teams. I didn't run the numbers, but eyeballing it, it seems like the Patriots are pretty easily within a couple standard deviations there.
I think Brian Burke did a more thorough take on it.
http://advancednflstats.com/index.php/home/research/general/...
It's not as damning for the Patriots. But very interesting that it suddenly started in 2007, the same year the NFL changed the rules to allow visiting teams to use their own balls.
Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#7If you watch Patriots games, you'll see that if Patriots running backs fumble, they get benched. If they do it again they get released. Belichick is maniacal about getting on his players about fumbling. That is a simple explanation. The team has been well-coached for a long time. If you think the Patriots' success is all from deflated balls, you need to explain how they out-scored the Colts 28-0 in the second half (a…
Over the past two seasons there have been 9 total fumbles by Patriot running backs - only 1 all this year. All of those backs are still employed by the Patriots. Over those two seasons, the majority of fumbles came from Brady and Edelman.
Of the backs that fumbled in 2012, only Woodhead is gone. He fumbled only once.
Two backs fumbled in 2011, once each. Woodhead (who is gone) and Ridley, who is still a Patriot.
Patriot backs simply don't fumble. Brady and Edelman do, and Welker did a bit. Your explanation isn't supported by the data.
Source. http://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/nwe/2014.htm
EDIT - I'm not sure my source differentiates fumbles from lost fumbles, although that doesn't seem to impact the conclusion regarding parent's comment.
Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#8As someone who doesn't follow the NFL I am surprised that they allow the teams to supply their own balls. Seems it would be less complicated and achieve an even playing field if everyone had to use the same balls supplied by the league.
Does this happen in baseball/ basketball as well? From an Australian perspective it seems unusual.
Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#9If you watch Patriots games, you'll see that if Patriots running backs fumble, they get benched. If they do it again they get released. Belichick is maniacal about getting on his players about fumbling. That is a simple explanation. The team has been well-coached for a long time. If you think the Patriots' success is all from deflated balls, you need to explain how they out-scored the Colts 28-0 in the second half (a…
Fumbling players being treated harshly by their coaches is true of every team as far as I know. That said, I still think it's more likely that the Patriots have some unique practice/drilling regimen that results in less fumbles than they are regularly using deflated balls to their advantage. This is interesting in and of itself, so no matter what, I think this is an interesting analysis. But it's hard for me to believe that they were regularly using under-inflated balls for FOUR YEARS before being detected (or perhaps I should say reported).
Of course, giving the context of its publication, we know what it's trying to imply.
Re: The New England Patriots’ prevention of fumbles is nearly impossible
#10Analyzing outlying statistics across all the available variables would be an interesting technique to try to predict other potential rules violations. This could apply to many different types of sporting events. I wonder if anyone is working on this problem? Despite a few nit picky issues I have with this particular analysis of the Patriots fumble data it's probably the strongest evidence I've seen so far that there…
Not sure if anyone's working on that yet, but I agree it would be incredibly interesting.