The desire to stat bust

We start with two bits of news: -- Various news outlets have reported that the St. Louis Rams have hired Josh McDaniels as their new offensive coordinator. McDaniels was fired as the Broncos head coach during the 2010 season and will now oversee the further development of the Rams number one pick QB Sam Bradford, instead of his own first round pick in 2010, Tim Tebow. For all his perceived and/or actual failings as a Head Coach, McDaniels guided and molded the Broncos into a high scoring unit led by QB Kyle Orton. It was the defense that persistently gave the team trouble. The hope is that McDaniels can do the same for St. Louis and the chances are he'll at least take them up one notch from their 2010 showing. -- The Seattle Seahawks have a new Assistant Head Coach and offensive line coach all in one; Tom Cable, the former Head Coach of the Oakland Raiders. Cable has worked previously with famous line coach Alex Gibbs and thus should be able to bring the kind of zone blocking run attack that Pete Carroll was hoping for when he came to Seattle. I like Cable and I wish him all the best in his new role. Of course as a 49ers fan I now have to hope that the defense crashes and burns in spectacular fashion, but there you go. Finally today I have to have a moan. It's not right for me to go more than a few days without a moan, so here we go. Regular readers will know that I'm hardly enamoured with the idea of using statistics to try and break down football, in much the same way as Sabermetrics are used in Baseball. Phrases such as "Win Probability Added" and "Expected Points Added" etc just don't sit well in my vocabulary. There's a mixture of reasons for this, predominantly the fact that after years of study now and plenty of man hours poured into the research, the stats guys seem to have come up with precisely diddly squat when it comes to useful applications to football. The often cited champion of the stats heads, Bill Belichick, has been one of the more active at trying some of the theories espoused by stats heads, and has promptly suffered a series of rather embarrassing gaffs in recent seasons, all of which (naturally) seem to fly under the stats radar. But the biggest problem I've always had is the approach of trying to explain a game that is highly dependent on skill, physical abilities and psychological attitude into a contest of spreadsheets. We're always hearing about how xyz factor should cause certain teams to win more or make certain teams more successful because the numbers add up, and yet we never seem to see the end product of all this speculation, usually because the above factors of skill, physical ability and mental attitude are somehow neglected. The most recent example comes from an article on AdvancedNFL stats.com hosted and run by Brian Burke. Mr. Burke could be considered a leader in this field and has been asked to make various contributions to a number of high profile newspapers, magazines and websites. His articles have been cited by such sites as ProFootballTalk.com and he's been sought out for information and consultation by no less than the mighty ESPN. In other words he's been bloody successful and yes, I am just a little jealous of his success. But I take serious issue with the statements made in the article linked to above, which I shall highlight for you here, because I know how damn lazy some of you can be. Talking of the Green Bay/Atlanta game; "Well, their luck had to run out sometime. One game proves nothing, even a blow-out like this, but it was hilarious to watch ESPN's Sports Reporters Sunday and see the likes of Lupica and Albom struggle to comprehend such an upset. They threw up all the usual fallacious narrative nonsense: momentum, wanting it more, playing under the big lights. Frankly, I'm not sure what all the excuses were because none of it made sense." Basically what appears to be happening here is that Mr. Burke is laughing in the face of the possibility that psychological issues could somehow have an influence on the game. And while the reporters in question probably aren't adverse to the chance to work on their narrative building skills, probably in the hope that one day it will see them kindly in the future when they sit down to right a biography of some famous player/coach/executive, I also believe there is legitimate merit to what they're saying. Psychology plays a factor in sports. Momentum, wanting it more, playing under the big lights. These may sound like esoteric Eastern Martial Arts terms, but they have a genuine place in football. I can recall some fond (and some less fond) memories of my own experience in various team and individual sports over the years, including the impact that emotions and psychology played in those experiences. I remember in my early twenties when I was playing with a group of friends in a purely amateur 6-a-side soccer tournament. We were doing it primarily for fun and for the exercise, so you can imagine our shell shock when by the end of the first 15 minute half of game 1 we were down by 4. The game ended something like 9-0. It had a depressing effect on morale. We didn't score a single goal until the last game of the season, when we won a penalty which yours truly slotted home. Even though we lost that game, just like all the others, the feeling of elation at having finally scored lifted our team and encouraged us to come back for another season, brimming with sadly misplaced hope. Now, I understand that on the scale of importance our team basically represented a cockroach compared to the Leviathan that is the NFL, but that only serves to convince me more of the importance that emotions and psychology play in the league. If we were down in the dumps mid-way through the season having lost all our games up to that point, imagine how much worse it would be if every single loss was broadcast on national television, with the media hanging over you like a pack of wolves after each game just waiting for one sheep to break away from the flock and with the distinct prospect of a loss of employment should the poor run continue. This is why I believe that things like momentum are at times perfectly valid explanations of what we see on the field. As a fan, how many times have you watched your favorite team go down by two scores and suddenly had that sinking feeling. Now apply that feeling to the players on the field. Think of the range of emotions they're experiencing. Anxiety. Apprehension. Outright fear. Fear of losing the game. Fear of having their pride dented. Fear of being embarrassed. Fear of making another critical error that perhaps sinks the team. Are any of these things conducive to creating the required mental approach to play sports? What about wanting it more? Or to be a little more precise; determination and desire. These are powerful tools for a sportsman or sportswoman. One thing that is fairly common across all sports is that as time passes, competitors who are behind and are about to go into an outright downward spiral have an early tendency to display certain common body language, such as drooping of the head and dragging of the feet during breaks in play. Desire is a trait. We can't really measure it. But we can observe it. We see the players on the field who run that little bit harder, who fight and claw for every ball. It's the difference between a ball carrier who regularly steps out of bounds to avoid a hit versus the player who tends to cut back inside and take on a hit in the search for extra yards. We see it in the way some players chase down ball carriers from behind. We see the difference in a desire to make the tackle just by comparing someone like Ray Lewis to Peyton Manning. As for playing under the big lights? Again, I think that can be classed as a fairly legitimate factor worthy of consideration. There's a hell of a difference between a playoff game where it's a "lose and you go home" situation versus a regular season game where a single loss doesn't necessarily break a season. It's a lot of added pressure to cope with and unless you have experience of handling it, it could become a factor that ultimately effects performance on the field. So anyway, that's me done ranting. Hopefully if Mr. Burke takes the time to read this, then in future he'll give the "usual fallacious narrative nonsense" a little more consideration and credit, instead of trying to break everything down into a solvable equation.

Sharks in the water

Sparano is safe. For now at least it seems the Dolphins have decided to stick with Tony for another year. That leaves the door open for the 49ers to pounce uncontested on Jim Harbaugh. That is of course if they can convince Harbaugh to leave Stanford, which is something that his QB Andrew Luck is not quite ready to do just yet, returning for another year with the Cardinal (must... resist... temptation... to pluralise....). With Sparano returning, we've also now learned that Dan Henning, the offensive coordinator, won't. Henning oversaw a sketchy offense in Miami this year. Chad Henne seemed to regress as the season went along and there was almost no talk of running backs Ronnie Brown and Ricky Williams who faded into the dust it would seem. The Cowboys meanwhile have now officially promoted Jason Garrett to the position of permanent Head Coach (God help him), having conducted all the necessary token interviews of black coaches. The Vikings Head Coach for 2011, Leslie Frazier, is also quite busy. Reports from the press indicate that the Vikings have interviews lined up with former 49ers Head Coach Mike Singletary, possibly just to come in as a linebackers coach, along with an interview for former Broncos top man Josh McDaniels to be the offensive coordinator. Two hires that sound surprisingly wise for the Vikings. Wise is not the choice of words I would use though for the latest outburst from Chad Ochocinco. According to ProFootballTalk.com, Ochocinco went for the publicity jugular by saying that race is the determining reason why a guy like Favre would be paid $4 million to come back for another season, but why nobody would give Owens or Ochocinco $4 million. At first I was like "no way, no way did he say something that stupid!!". Then I watched the video..... What the hell Chad? The only thing I can think of was that he was going for the shock factor. In fact, this next video might suggest that's precisely what Ochocinco was going for. At least, I hope it was. On a side note, NFL.com really needs to get one of its web designer/engineer type people to check out Versus.com's site, with particular attention to the video. Look!! The videos load at a normal rate without constant lag! I can click anywhere along the time bar and the video instantly jumps to, and plays from, that point without having to reload the entire damn video! There are less adverts, and God knows the Versus network must need the revenue money more than the NFL. And I can embed the videos! That means I can show people their content which is more likely to drive pageviews back to their site! It's a miracle isn't it NFL.com? To provide a decent (and profitable) service for your fans/customers/potential customers without being assholes. You should try it sometime.

Happy Birthday to me

To start with today, technically it's my birthday now (January 5th) so Happy Birthday to me. Now to truly begin, it occurred to me that the other day I praised Michael Lombardi for the greatly improved quality of his articles on NFL.com, but I never mentioned who I thought was the best, most consistent writer over the course of the year. That award would go to Jason Whitlock of FOXsports.com. Whitlock may not be every body's cup of tea so to speak, but personally I find his articles and attitude very engaging. I like the fact that he doesn't pull any punches and unlike many who write for the major networks, he has no problem blowing up the leagues official line on various subjects, especially when they're trying to curry favour with the fans. So if Whitlock is the best and Lombardi is the most improved, who might be an upcoming face to look out for next year? That would fall to Albert Breer, also of NFL.com. For an example of his work, check out this recent article. Next, coaching news. To go along with the firing's of Mike Singletary, Wade Phillips, Brad Childress & Josh McDaniels, as well as the end of John Fox's tenure in Carolina, we now have the release of Eric Mangini by Cleveland and most recently the surprise (at least to me) firing of Tom Cable by the Raiders. Next in line could be Coach Tony Sporano of the Dolphins, with multiple news outlets suggesting that the Dolphins are extending feelers towards Stanford Head Coach Jim Harbaugh. Apparently Dolphins owner Stephen Ross was present at the Orange Bowl to watch Stanford put down Virginia Tech. If Sporano goes that would make eight teams with new Head Coaches for 2011. What was that we've told for the last month or more by the networks about a lack of coaching changes being made due to CBA uncertainty? Busted. Marvin Lewis of the Bengals will be keeping his spot though, with a two year extension apparently signed. To be honest, the Singletary, Childress and Philips firings I could see coming, but I'm not sure about some of the others. Josh McDaniels had his difficulties but he was putting together quite the offense I thought. Certainly no worse than the Texans under Gary Kubiak, and with more promise for the future in their roster. John Fox leaving was practically a gimme, but Eric Mangini? I know I'm not a huge Mangini fan, which makes this all the more surprising, but I kind of got the impression that in his second year Mangini was just starting to get his head around this whole head coaching thing. His demeanour, the way he spoke in interviews, the changes made to the team. I was shocked that Mangini wasn't allowed to come back for another crack of the whip in 2011. And I never thought I'd say this but.... I think Mangini might be a hot candidate for making a Super Bowl in the 20-teens. There, I said it. But now we really get down to it with Tom Cable. Are you kidding me? Tom Cable?! The same Tom Cable who looked to be turning the corner with the Raiders (finally)? The same Tom Cable who was just starting to figure out where his team was at on offense? The Tom Cable who was getting Jacoby Ford more and more involved? The same Tom Cable who was fashioning a strong ground game around Darren McFadden and Michael Bush? I feel sorry for Tom and I hope he gets a good gig for 2011. He, like Mangini, appeared to have finally found his feet and style as a Head Coach, which is the first step towards big things. Cable could be another hot shot for a Super Bowl coach in the coming 20-teens.

Thursday Night Football pick, plus a rant (or two).

Some stuff to get through today, so cracking on would seem the best course of action: -- The NFL has convened a meeting of it's Head, Neck and Spine committee. And no, I didn't know they had one either. I'll get into the details in a minute but first; why the simple and all encompassing name of "Player Safety Committee" couldn't be used is a mystery. Well not exactly. It seems an odd and beauracratic thing to do, because it is. The NFL is worried about its image in the public (and political) eye and wants to be seen to be doing everything it can to get safe. It also has to show the players that it "cares". If the league wants the players to agree to an 18-game schedule it has to prove it's trying to make the game safer. Now if all this sounds like me being rather cynical then that's because I am. You should try reading my info thingy to the right >>> What jumped off the cynicism scale for me though was the apparent schedule juggling by Commissioner Roger Goodell. We're told that he was very busy yesterday, but in the name of player safety and showing that he "cares", he put all that other stuff to one side so he could come and listen to the folks recommendations. What a nice guy huh? Bullshit. In a season where concussions are the hot topic, and fines and penalties are being dished out left, right and center, does anyway honestly believe that Goodell didn't have this date ringed on his calender in big red pen? I can't stand it when people like Goodell try and make it out like they went out of their way to drop a bunch of important meetings in order to find time for this. It just serves to further reinforce my belief that Goodell is the slimiest of the slimy, a true snake. All smiles and "we're clean as a whistle Governor, honest", when in fact Goodell is as dirty and rotten as anybody walking the halls of power in Washington. But I digress. The point of the meeting was to allow helmet manufacturers to come forward with new ideas and research that they'd come up with. Now what intrigued me the most were two designs. One was a helmet with a soft outer shell designed to absorb impact and the other was a helmet that appeared to contain a two-fold layer of concussive protection; a series of transparent cells that appear to be filled with air/water/some fluid, who knows. This was topped by a layer of soft, squashy foam (it's the second helmet shown in the clip I'm going to link to, the one where you can see inside). In fact, here is the link. I bring this up only because I'm an intolerably smug individual who suggested these ideas for helmets not so long ago. Thinking about it, I actually think the helmet with the hard exterior and the crush able foam interior padding might be the best choice. -- Jason Pierre-Paul, DE, New York Giants. I bloody knew I'd missed someone yesterday. Pierre Paul is another player that in hindsight should have been on the watch list but I missed completely. Why? Only a single year playing at the highest level of college football, coupled with a concern that his game was all about his physical skills and not about technique. Ooops! -- Tim Tebow. With the sacking of Josh McDaniels comes the speculation that Tebow will be following shortly, traded away or even cut by the new Head Coach. As a result, many are already labelling Tebow a bust, berating Daniels for drafting him and for not having a plan for his development. All of which I find laughable. I think Tebow, quite apart from his rushing skills, is just straight up a very good quarterback. Very good. I think a first round pick for Tebow was fine. And I believe his development was coming along nicely. The trouble is though we're in an age when everybody wants everything now. They want Tebow on the field, winning games single handedly, and they want it yesterday. But that's not how things work. McDaniels's use of Tebow in short yardage and goal line situations reminds me of the story of a another quarterback during his development phase; Joe Montana. Despite what some peoples glossy memories may recall, Montana started his career in San Fransisco as Mr. Fill In. He was brought in for the odd play here, a drive or two maybe towards the end of game etc, but for his first season he was nothing more than a situational quarterback. Montana subsequently went on to be a half decent quarterback (I have no smilies, so I'm literally going to have to type *wink*). Cast your mind back as well to last season. Remember the name Michael Vick. Remember that in Philadelphia he was worked back into the team largely through his use in short yardage and goal line situations. That story didn't turn out too bad now, did it? (*wink*. So far...). In fact, the parallels between Tebow and Montana are more than you'd think. You're going to have to trust me on this one but you need to go back and watch Joe Montana throwing. In a bit, I'm even gonna lay on a video for you. What you'll see is very much a Tebow-esque release (or is Tebow using a Montana-esque release?). Montana's dipping motion with the ball isn't quite as pronounced and he sometimes uses a much faster motion, but trust me it's there, on film, on game day. So all this utter nonsense about Tebow's motion being unacceptable in the NFL is ridiculous. It's analyst speak for "we need to cover our butts in case he doesn't pan out". Well I for one have no intention of covering on this. I think Tebow is someday going to be a great quarterback. There it is. In writing. If I'm wrong, then damn it, I'm wrong. But I vehemently believe that Tebow deserves a chance and I think people are wrong about bashing Josh McDaniels for having the courage and audacity to pick him and try to develop him. Now here's your film clip, part of a seven part series that I probably have already posted on here before. Ah well, it's definitely worth posting again. You'll have to nip over to YouTube yourself to watch the other six parts : Right, time to get my pick in for tonight's game. Indianapolis Colts @ Tennessee Titans: Colts win. Job done. Allow me though to explain. I know that Peyton Manning threw four picks in week 14. I get that, he's having a bad year. But even though he threw four interceptions, and even though two were returned for touchdowns, the fact remains that the Colts still took the Cowboys to overtime. Manning completed 36 of 48 passes for 365 yards and two touchdowns. Freeney and Mathis both had sacks. The Colts had a rushing touchdown, and they made a big play on special teams as well. But let's not forget the most convincing reason that they should win; They're playing the Titans. The Titans. And yeah, I know the Titans have Chris Johnson, but that doesn't matter. This is the Titans we're talking about. I've learned that just because I would cram the ball down Indy's throats with the running game until they started puking up stitches, doesn't mean that the Titans will actually do that. Last week against the Jaguars they handed the ball to Johnson just 13 times. That was it. Now do you think Kerry Collins is going to tear up the Colts secondary instead? I don't see it. The best hope the Titans have is if their D-line can get back to making big plays against the pass. Like the Chargers and Cowboys before them, they need to get to Manning. Anything less will not suffice. That could be a problem though given the Titans recent knack of leaking rushing yardage. The Colts may not exactly be the masters of the rush, but against a 6-man front they can block to a reasonable degree, enough at least to victimise the wobbly looking Titans defense. All in all, I just can't see the Titans offense being able to keep up. As the score mounts the Colts options on offense get more flexible while the Titans offense becomes more one dimensional. As a result, the Titans let the game slip away and give Colts fans some hope. At least for now. Colts win. Have a great day everyone.