How often does a preseason prediction from a reputable source actually shock? When last did Sports Illustrated, say, pick Vanderbilt to win the SEC football title? Most forecasts tend to be about what we expect. Which is why Football Outsiders’ assessment of the Atlanta Falcons … well, it shocked me.
In its 2013 Almanac – available on its web site for $22.95 as a print product and $12.50 as a download – Football Outsiders sets the Falcons’ “mean projection” at 7.6 wins, their postseason odds at 26 percent and their odds of reaching the Super Bowl at 2.6 percent. It sees them as three times more likely to be a “mediocrity” (winning between five and seven games) than a “Super Bowl contender” (winning 11 or more).
Think about that. Since Thomas Dimitroff and Mike Smith arrived in January 2008, the Falcons have never failed to win at least nine games; three times they’ve won 11 or more. That would seem a solid baseline. But Football Outsiders sifts through its data and makes this analytic leap: The 2013 Falcons are apt to win fewer games than any team in the NFC South.
The Carolina Panthers – Football Outsiders’ surprise Super Bowl contender – are given a mean projection of 9.5 wins. (That’s only slightly behind the 9.7 for the San Francisco 49ers.) The New Orleans Saints are tabbed at 8.5 wins, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at 8.3. The Falcons’ win projection is 10th-best in the NFC.
About here, some of you are saying: “Isn’t it obvious these stat geeks know nothing about Real Football? Why even cite this pencil-necked garbage?” Because these numbers aren’t plucked from thin air, and it’s not as if this outlet has a bias against the Birds: The 2012 Almanac levied the Falcons’ mean projection at 9.9 wins — best in the NFC South.
(As for the the inevitable stereotype, Football Outsiders assistant editor Rivers McCown told me in January: “We’re not living in our mother’s basement. We have our own houses.”)
Writes Robert Weintraub, who authored the Falcons’ chapter in the 2013 Almanac: “We don’t forecast the Falcons to be one of the top Super Bowl contenders of 2013 because when you look at the numbers underlying their 13-3 record, the Falcons really shouldn’t have been one of the top Super Bowl contenders of 2012, either. The 2012 Falcons resembled the 2010 Falcons, who were also 13-3 and clearly not the best team in the NFC … By our numbers, the Falcons have actually declined since 2010.”
Noting that the Falcons played the 27th-toughest schedule in 2012 , Weintraub offers: “The Falcons weren’t just beating bad teams. They were barely beating bad teams.” Football Outsiders projects their 2013 schedule as the NFL’s toughest.
Football Outsiders swears by Defensive-Adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA). Writes Weintraub: “Our projections have the Falcons around the bottom third of the league in defensive DVOA.” What of new cornerbacks Desmond Trufant and Robert Alford? “As we pointed out at length in the Dallas chapter of Almanac 2012, even the most talented rookie cornerbacks usually struggle.”
Weintraub believes that coming so close last season “seems to have deluded the team with false hope. The entire ‘(10) yards from the Super Bowl’ mantra … is a meaningless construct that has somehow convinced the brain trust to go for the gusto in full defiance of the laws of regression and providence.”
Would a team bent only on winning now have cut Tyson Clabo and reshuffled its offensive line? Would it have dumped John Abraham, its best-if-not-only pass rusher? But the intent today isn’t to offer a point/counterpoint. The intent is to shed light on what many around here will see as a contrarian opinion. And Weintraub, to his credit, doesn’t just identify flaws. He also offers this solution:
“The best bet for the Falcons to defy regression and actually win it all might be to undergo a personality transplant and concentrate on simply outgunning opponents. The new paradigm in the league holds that defense does not necessarily win championships – the Ravens were just 19th in defensive DVOA last season.”
Makes sense to me. I doubt it sways Mike Smith.
I don’t see the Falcons finishing last in the NFC South. (For one thing, Carolina’s Ron Rivera – Weintraub concedes this – is a lousy coach.) But, owing to personnel changes and a much harder schedule, I’m not sure they’ll win their division. I think they’ll make the playoffs, but I liked their Super Bowl chances more last season than I do this. In sum, Football Outsiders has a point.
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