Ian Allan

More on this online discussion I’ve had over the past few days with David Digregio. He’s the reader who pointed out that Dallas, Tennessee and Houston, while projecting to play difficult schedules (in terms of wins and losses) project to play easy schedules in terms of rushing and passing numbers.

I replied that I’ve looked in this in the past and found that there’s very little correlation between what you expect and what you get in terms of rushing and passing numbers. A team projecting to play the easy schedule against the run, it seems, is hardly any more likely to actually do so than teams projecting to play hard schedules in that category.

I looked into this extensively in the past.

Below see the numbers for the 2009 season.

For rushing (the first chart), you see the teams listed in their expect (pre-2009) order. With Baltimore, Minnesota and Washington projecting to play the three easiest schedules. But where did they turn up? Baltimore and Minnesota were bothe in the middle of the pack, while Washington played the third hardest schedule – the opposite of what you would expect.

The two teams projecting to play the hardest run schedules, on the other hand, both wound up ranking in the top 12 – Carolina and Atlanta. There seems to be very little correlation here.

DIFFICULTY OF SCHEDULE VERSUS RUN, 2009
Teams listed in order they were expected to finish (prior to the season). The figures show how they actually turned out, with yards per game, TDs per season and fantasy points (6 for TDs, 1 for every 10 yards) based on how opponents did in games against other teams:

  Run  TDR  FPG  Rnk  
  118  15.1  17.4  15  Baltimore
  120  14.7  17.5  14  Minnesota
  106  12.0  15.1  30  Washington
  115  14.1  16.8  20  Arizona
  123  16.9  18.6    7  San Diego
  101  12.4  14.8  32  San Francisco
  124  14.8  18.0  10  Pittsburgh
  124  16.9  18.7    5  Seattle
  114  15.5  17.2  18  Chicago
  104  13.5  15.5  28  Jacksonville
  119  16.4  18.1    9  Cincinnati
  116  16.3  17.8  13  Kansas City
  129  17.5  19.5    1  Denver
  121  15.6  17.9  11  Dallas
  124  17.7  19.0    3  Cleveland
  113  14.9  16.9  19  Philadelphia
  118  14.9  17.4  17  Oakland
  124  16.8  18.7    6  Houston
  125  16.7  18.7    4  Green Bay
  109  12.7  15.7  27  St. Louis
  110  13.9  16.2  24  NY Jets
  111  13.9  16.3  23  New Orleans
  125  17.9  19.2    2  Tennessee
  109  13.9  16.1  25  Indianapolis
  104  11.9  14.8  31  NY Giants
  108  11.9  15.2  29  Buffalo
  112  12.5  15.9  26  New England
  113  14.1  16.6  21  Tampa Bay
  119  14.8  17.4  16  Detroit
  114  13.7  16.5  22  Miami
  123  16.1  18.3    8  Atlanta
  118  16.1  17.9  12  Carolina



And here are the passing numbers. Same kind of results. St. Louis was supposed to have the easiest schedule against the pass; it wound up being 6th-worst. San Francisco was supposed to have the 2nd-easiest; it finished last in schedule difficulty. Again, very little correlation in the expected numbers, versus how things actually finished.

My recommendation, therefore, is to pay very little attention to strength-of-schedule numbers that are position specific or based on rushing or passing production. The win-loss figures (while also far from perfect) tend to be far more reliable.


DIFFICULTY OF SCHEDULE VERSUS PASS, 2009
Teams listed in order they were expected to finish (prior to the season). The figures show how they actually turned out, with yards per game, TDs per season and fantasy points (6 for TDs, 1 for every 10 yards) based on how opponents did in games against other teams:

  Run  TDR  FPG  Rnk  
  213  20.3  28.9  27  St. Louis
  208  17.1  27.3  32  San Francisco
  225  21.5  30.5  14  Indianapolis
  211  17.8  27.8  29  Arizona
  230  22.1  31.2    6  Seattle
  237  23.7  32.6    1  Minnesota
  227  20.9  30.5  13  Green Bay
  237  20.7  31.5    5  Tennessee
  216  19.9  29.1  25  Buffalo
  234  19.6  30.7  11  Chicago
  228  20.6  30.5  12  Detroit
  218  21.9  30.1  17  Tampa Bay
  223  19.7  29.7  20  Carolina
  227  20.7  30.5  15  Houston
  210  17.0  27.4  31  Washington
  224  18.6  29.4  23  Jacksonville
  229  21.4  30.9    8  Pittsburgh
  232  21.2  31.2    7  Oakland
  232  22.7  31.7    2  NY Giants
  219  16.9  28.2  28  Philadelphia
  229  21.3  30.9    9  Atlanta
  230  22.7  31.5    4  Dallas
  229  19.0  30.1  18  New Orleans
  219  20.9  29.8  19  Miami
  216  19.7  29.0  26  New England
  220  20.0  29.5  21  NY Jets
  232  19.3  30.5  16  Cincinnati
  227  21.6  30.8  10  Cleveland
  231  22.6  31.6    3  Baltimore
  216  16.5  27.8  30  Kansas City
  221  18.7  29.1  24  Denver
  222  19.5  29.5  22  San Diego

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