The Best and Worst of 2008

This is a simple post.  Really simple.  The list should pretty much speak for itself.  The best and worst of 2008.  I use the same criteria I've been using the past few posts.  CMI, and, more specifically, standard deviation of a player's CMI relative to the mean.  30 players attempted enough passes in 2008 to make the list.  

The Best 3:

3.  Jeff Garcia, Tampa Bay Buccaneers - Why no team has picked him up is a complete mystery to me - the man can still play, even though his durability is certainly a question.  Completed nearly 65% of his passes, and less than 1.6% of his passes were intercepted.

2.  Peyton Manning, Indianapolis Colts - Do we even need to say anything? Coming off off-season knee surgery, Mr. Consistency now holds the highest current active streak of games started consecutively - 176 games. He completed almost 67% of his passes.

1.  Chad Pennington, Miami Dolphins - Let go by the Jets so that they could welcome Brett Favre (that worked out well for the Jets, didn't it?) and subsequently picked up by the Dolphins. Had a terrific season, completing more than 67% of his passes, and less than 1.5% of his passes were intercepted.

In previous posts on my blog, I have spent time discussing each of the above 3 players.

The Worst 3:

28.  Tyler Thigpen, Kansas City Chiefs - Won't show up at the bottom of the list in 2009.  Why?  Matt Cassel (#10 in 2008).  The Chiefs made a deal with the New England Patriots to get Cassel (and Mike Vrabel) for a 2nd round pick in the upcoming draft.  In 2008, Thigpen, replacing Damon Huard, completed fewer than 55% of his passes.

29.  Gus Frerotte, Minnesota Vikings - Replaced an ineffective Tarvaris Jackson in the 3rd game of the season, started 11 games, and then was himself replaced by Jackson against the Lions.  Completed less than 60% of his passes, and at almost 5.0%, was one of only three quarterbacks whose interception percentage exceeded 3.0% - the other two being Ben Roethlisberger of the Steelers (3.2%), and Brett Favre of the Jets (4.2%).

30.  Derek Anderson, Cleveland Browns - Barely completed 50% of his passes, then got hurt.  Was replaced by Brady Quinn.  Is it Quinn's time in 2009?

Here's the entire list.

My next post - a pre-season ranking for 2009

Jets-Dolphins - You Could See it Coming

I wanted to post this the day before the Jets-Dolphins season ending game.  However, I was not able to, but, the analysis still has merit.  Going into the game, looking at the way the 2008 NFL season had progressed for both the New York Jets and Miami Dolphins, you could see this coming.  The actual result was not much of a shocker as you might otherwise had been led to believe.  Take a look at the table below - in particular, look at both Brett Favre's and Chad Pennington's last 4 games, and then look at the projected performance.  I really wasn't too far off.  There's no projection that would have suggested that Favre was going to throw 3 picks.  However, you could see at least 2 picks fairly easily, given that in 80% of the games this season he had thrown at least 1 pick, and in those games, he was about 50-50 to throw more than 1 pick.

Happy New Year!

Happy 2009 Everyone!

It's been awhile since I last posted.  I was on vacation.  It made me realize how much I missed my computer, and my EXCEL database.  Anyways, I'm back, and I'll have a post tonight.  I was going to post something before the Jets-Dolphins game the last week of the season, showing how I had 'projected' a bad game for Brett Favre and a good game for Chad Pennington.  Well, my 'prediction' did come true, although my posting tonight on the subject will seem a bit hollow.  That's ok, it's the analysis that matters anyway.

Cheers.

50 Best Seasons in the NFL - Interceptions Thrown

In my previous post, I was discussing the merits of who got voted into the 2009 Pro Bowl versus who should be in. In doing so, I discovered an important fact. Jeff Garcia, Jason Campbell and Chad Pennington are having exceptional seasons, in terms of infrequency of interceptions thrown. So I decided to look back in history.


[Note: As I write this post, Pennington has thrown an interception against the Chiefs, and Garcia has thrown two against the Chargers.]


The table below shows the 50 best seasons in the NFL, as far as interceptions thrown. I have also included the component calculation that goes into the NFL passer rating formula.


Steve DeBerg's 1990 season ranks as the all-time near perfect season. His season, as well as David Garrard's 2007 season ranks as the only two seasons in NFL history, where less than 1.0% of a quarterback's pass attempts were intercepted. I have previously shown that the average interception rate in the NFL has continually decreased (or, that the interceptions component in the current NFL passer rating formula has increased). To be fair then, this list below is biased towards the more recent players. To make a true apples-to-apples comparison, one really needs to relate each of these seasons relative to the average rate in that season, something I hope to do in a future posting.


According to this table, in absolute terms (in other words, not relating each season to that season's average), the seasons that Campbell, Garcia, and Pennington are having in 2008 all rank in the Top 30, with Campbell's season ranking 11th-best all-time. Notice that both Garcia and Pennington have had seasons previously that are also in the Top 30.


I also want to point out two of the phenomenal seasons of Hall-of-Fame member Bart Starr. His 1966 season ranks 6th all-time in absolute terms (perhaps moving him up in the top 5 in relative terms), and his 1964 season ranks 19th all-time in absolute terms (in relative terms, it is most likely a Top-15 season, perhaps even a Top-10).

Highest Career CMI

The two tables below show the Top 100 quarterbacks in terms of their career CMI. Surprising? Well, it should be. It doesn't meet with your expectations. Chad Pennington the best quarterback in history, terms of CMI. Well yes. And no. Keep in mind that Chad Pennington is no slouch - he has the 8th best all-time career QB Rating. As a matter of fact, the quarterbacks who have top 10 highest QB Ratings in history, are in the Top 10 in terms of CMI.


I have shown before, that CMI has been steadily increasing over time. So obviously, QBs in more recent years have had higher CMIs than earlier quarterbacks. But the list below does give us a different picture of the top quarterbacks in history compared to a similar list ranked by QB Rating.


CMI does not reward quarterbacks that throw a lot of touchdowns per se (see Dan Marino). It does reward quarterbacks that do not throw a lot of interceptions (see Troy Aikman). Think about the teams that these two quarterbacks played on. Dan Marino never had a quality running back for an extended period of time. Troy Aikman had, well, Emmitt Smith, he of the NFL-record 164 career rushing touchdowns. CMI doesn't penalize a quarterback for sharing the backfield with a good running back.


My goal is to eventually identify the best passers in history, using CMI. The way to do it (in order to account for the ever increasing average CMI), is to relate each quarterback to his peers. I am currently working on methodology that can do this "properly".

Crazy, Debatable and Lucky

Today, the Green Bay Packers lost at home to the Houston Texans, 24-21 on a last-second field goal.  This dropped the Packers to 5-8 for the season, and, for all practical purposes, knocked them out of the playoffs.  I'm sure the Packer faithful will start to think what might have been....

The Packers were coming off a 13-3 season, having won their division handily, and were one win away from the Super Bowl, a loss to the eventual winner, the New York Giants at home.  

Then the soap opera started.  First, Brett Favre, the Packers QB for the past 16 seasons, decided it was time to retire.  The Packers, who had drafted Aaron Rodgers in 2005, were prepared.  During the offseason, the Packers named Aaron Rodgers the starting QB for the 2008 season.  Second, Brett Favre decided he wanted to play in 2008.  Nothing wrong with that.  Only that he had "lost" his starting job to Aaron Rodgers.  No way a future hall of famer is going to be carrying a clipboard for an untested, essentially rookie QB.  Not after the season Favre just had had.  After much ballyhoo, the Packers traded Favre to the New York Jets.  In return, the Packers received a conditional draft pick.  For now, it's a fairly safe bet that it will be at least a second rounder.  The Jets, who finished a lousy 4-12 season, now having found their "saviour", then released Chad Pennington.  Of course, the woeful Miami Dolphins, having just completed a miserable 1-15 season, and desperately needing some talent, promptly picked him up.

So there we have it.  The Packers make a "crazy" move, going with untested Aaron Rodgers, over Hall of Famer Favre.  The Jets, in need of a new direction, trade for Favre and release Pennington in a debatable move.  And the Dolphins, well, got lucky.  Pennington is a dramatic improvement over any Dolphin QB.

Ok, so that's how we all thought about it back in the beginning of the season.  So, let's take a look at how the decisions panned out, in terms of their actual performances.

The table at the top of this article shows each player's stats for the 2008 season, the 2007 season, and their career #s.

First, let's start with Rodgers.

He is having a very good year, despite the team's troubles.  His QB Rating is a robust 92.1 (league average is 85.3), and his CMI is 0.560, about 0.4 standard deviations above the mean of 0.538.  Not bad for being a first-year starter.  Compare him to three other first-year starters here.

Now, let's take a look at Favre.

He had a career year in 2007.  His QB Rating of 95.7 was only exceeded in his MVP years of 1995 (99.5) and 1996 (95.8).  His third MVP year, 1997, his QB rating was 92.6.  Favre's career QB Rating (leading up to the 2007 season) was 85.0.  It has since improved to 85.9 through 13 games of the 2008 season.  In terms of his CMI, 2007 was by far and away, his best year (0.581), eclipsing his previous best of 0.561 in 1995.  Given that it had been a long time since he had put up that kind of #s, it would be reasonable to assume that it wouldn't necessarily continue into 2008.  Well, he's having a (surprisingly) outstanding year in 2008.  His QB Rating is a healthy 88.2, and his CMI is 0.577 (almost as good as last year).  Is he why the Jets have improved?  Hard to say.  Especially, when you take a look at what Pennington has done this year.

Pennington's #s:

Chad is easily having his best year since his first full year in the league, in 1992.  Back then, he produced a QB Rating of 104.2 and a CMI of 0.644.  Only Tom Brady in 2007 (0.647), and Hall of Famer Troy Aikman, back in 2003 (0.645), have had better seasons.  This year, Chad's #s are a QB Rating of 93.7, and a CMI of 0.618.  Compare these to his career #s of 89.7 and 0.578.  By the way, Pennington's career CMI of 0.578 is the all-time career NFL mark.  Next is Steve Young at 0.565.  Pennington's #s are also, needless to say, a dramatic improvement compared to those of the 2007 Dolphins (QB Rating of 67.4, and CMI of 0.484).

So, what does this all mean?  It means that the Packers weren't crazy when they decided to put their faith in Rodgers, the Jets decision is debatable in giving up a 2nd round pick in 2009, and exchanging a QB who, while having an outstanding year, is not doing as well as the QB they gave up on, and the Dolphins got awfully lucky to end up with Pennington.