2015 NCAA Football Thread

[downtown]

Points per game shows how good a defense is at stopping their opponents from scoring. It also doesn't need to be adjusted for quality of opponent either. If your defense knows how to keep an offense from scoring and is actually good at it, then nobody will score a lot of points against you, no matter how good or bad they are.

I think that's a pretty outdated way of looking at the sport, just like looking at Wins and ERA as the primary way of evaluating a pitcher is a pretty outdated.

Points is just so context dependent. If a team holds another without a first down all game, but the offense fumbles inside their own 10 yard line and then the defense gives up a score, should they really be penalized? A defense that plays against BYU or Texas Tech might face 25 more plays than they would if they were playing Arkansas. Should they be penalized? What about field position?

The variance between style of play, and quality of players, is so vast in college football, that data like total yards, points, etc is just really limited. We have the tools to give us more context, and efficiency statistics are, right now, the best way to do that. They aren't perfect, but they tell us so much more than just "who scored?". Since stopping somebody from scoring is very complicated and relies on a bunch of different variables itself.

today: edsall, grier, sarkisian, spurrier, tunsil, ull academic scandal.

kinda crazy that the last two things are just getting smothered by the first four.

Yeah, didn't sleep much on Monday haha.

What job do you think is better, Maryland, or South Carolina?

 

[madviking]

it's got to be south carolina? despite being a historical also-ran, it's in a much better recruiting area than maryland, another historical also-ran. college park also isn't the kindliest of places.

 

[ummmm........]

If a team holds another without a first down all game, but the offense fumbles inside their own 10 yard line and then the defense gives up a score, should they really be penalized?

If the team that fumbled goes on to lose by less than a touchdown, does it still count as a loss? I get what you're saying and I agree you, but I also think it's possible to lose the forest a little bit by delving too deeply into stats. It's the same reason devaluing regular season losses bothers me. The better team doesn't win every game but at bottom it's still the actual results, the winning and losing, that counts. In the same way, it's great if a team has super efficiency stats but it's still the scoring and preventing scoring that actually matters, no matter how you get there . . .

What job do you think is better, Maryland, or South Carolina?

SCAR, bc it's in the SEC. Or Maryland, bc it's not in the SEC. One of those is def my answer . . .

it's got to be south carolina? despite being a historical also-ran, it's in a much better recruiting area than maryland, another historical also-ran. college park also isn't the kindliest of places.

Maryland's not exactly a recruiting desert though . . .

 

[madviking]

baltimore/pg county aren't a desert, but those recruits usually go out of state.

 

[ummmm........]

Well, you gotta build that fence, see. Use all that UA money . . .

 

[downtown]

If the team that fumbled goes on to lose by less than a touchdown, does it still count as a loss? I get what you're saying and I agree you, but I also think it's possible to lose the forest a little bit by delving too deeply into stats. It's the same reason devaluing regular season losses bothers me.

Of course, but the question we try to answer with stats isn't "did a team win?" but "is this defense good?" This is a random sport, and the best team doesn't always win...but if we're trying to get the more accurate picture of what happened, we should use more sophisticated stats.

baltimore/pg county aren't a desert, but those recruits usually go out of state.

One of the best high school football programs in the country is just outside of College Park, and the DMV area might actually have better D1 talent than South Carolina/Charlotte. I don't know if I' say Maryland is the better gig though....

 

[ummmm........]

It makes no sense, but I'm more interested in Auburn/Kentucky than UCLA/Stanford tonight. I can't help myself . . .

UCLA/Stanford is an elimination game though, so it's got that going for it. And they don't overlap that much anyway . . .

 

[Commodore]

It makes no sense, but I'm more interested in Auburn/Kentucky than UCLA/Stanford tonight. I can't help myself . . .

UCLA/Stanford is an elimination game though, so it's got that going for it. And they don't overlap that much anyway . . .

Because you want to see if Auburn continues their downward spiral by losing to an in-conference opponent they would normally beat the snot out of. Auburn is your rival and you want to laugh at their failures, just like I get great enjoyment out of every sub-par opponent Michigan loses to.

 

[ummmm........]

No, I like Auburn. I went to both Auburn and Alabama and I'd say I had a better experience at Auburn. The town was definitely a superior place to live regardless. This was decades ago now ofc. Could be different now . . .

I just like to watch 'my teams' no matter how they're doing. Same reason I watched Alabama from '92 to '09 . . .

I guess what I'm saying is I see UCLA/Stanford as the better game, obviously, but I won't have a rooting interest in that one. Auburn/Kentucky I'll at least care about the outcome a little bit . . .

And while I'm not above a little schadenfreude, for the record I am pulling for Auburn, at least a little . . .

EDIT: Here's an ESPN bit about how everyone Alabama has played since Saban arrived has been coming off a bye week. I'm not a true believer in this particular conspiracy theory, but once you get past the first couple of paragraphs there is a lot of neat data about the effects extra rest can have on a team . . .

 

[Commodore]

I guess what I'm saying is I see UCLA/Stanford as the better game, obviously, but I won't have a rooting interest in that one. Auburn/Kentucky I'll at least care about the outcome a little bit . . .

That's why you have to create a rooting interest in the games. My Yahoo College Pick 'em league is still open...

 

[ummmm........]

If only they hadn't lost to NW . . .

 

[downtown]

I think "how the hell did Northwestern beat Stanford" is going to be this year's "how the hell did Virginia Tech beat Ohio State?"

 

[Commodore]

I think "how the hell did Northwestern beat Stanford" is going to be this year's "how the hell did Virginia Tech beat Ohio State?"

Why? Northwestern losing to a very good Michigan team as their sole loss doesn't all of a sudden make them a bad or overrated team. Also, Stanford was greatly overrated going into this season and I think their time in the sun is just about over and they will soon fade back into the mediocrity from whence they came. Stanford losing to Northwestern is just the harbinger of the future to come for the Stanford faithful.

Also, I watched the Stanford/Northwestern game and I can tell you exactly how Northwestern beat them: defense.

 

[Light Cleric]

There's losing and then there's being completely and utterly dismantled.

 

[Commodore]

There's losing and then there's being completely and utterly dismantled.

Which Michigan has been doing to everyone except Utah so there's no reason to think that game is, in any way, indicative of how good Northwestern really is.

 

[ummmm........]

I think "how the hell did Northwestern beat Stanford" is going to be this year's "how the hell did Virginia Tech beat Ohio State?"

Possibly, if Stanford keeps winning. But NW will probably finish better than 6-6

 

[Commodore]

Possibly, if Stanford keeps winning. But NW will probably finish better than 6-6

Exactly. Hell, if Northwestern beats Iowa tomorrow they'll probably be representing the Big 10 West in the title game.

 

[ummmm........]

Well, we haven't seen a post from MacAttack in almost three weeks, but I'd still like to say that it's always fun to see Alabama go up against another traditional power. May the best team win.

Or at least the team that plays better today

EDIT: For the love of Pete, do y'all have a live scoreboard that shows more than seven games at a time over there at SBN DT? With ESPN and CBS both dropping the ball, there's money to be made here . . .

All I want is score by quarter, possession, down and distance and preferably fit enough games on the screen that I can see everything involving a top 25 team in each time slot, but ideally where I can see most of the FBS games in each slot. Sounds crazy, but ESPN did it last year . . .

The ability to drag and drop boards around the screen, or just delete boards altogether, would be perfect . . .

 

[Commodore]

So far the Big 12 is proving me right that they have no defense. I'm watching Baylor/WV and there is no defense being played.

 

[ummmm........]

Memphis has twenty-four unanswered points to go up by ten at halftime . . .

Toledo took a while to get going by they look to be cruising to another comfortable win . . .