Football Funhouse Rookie Thread - 1st Downies

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No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Just be ready for crushing depression when the Texans go 1-5 in their division again.

While I'm at it, might as well write up a quick post on one thing I do understand.

The NFL Scheduling Formula
Now that the NFL has a neat and tidy 32 teams split into 2 conferences with 4 divisions of 4 teams each, scheduling is done by a nice, balanced, predictable formula.

Wikipedia has a pretty good write up on it but I'll go over most of it here so we have more info in the thread.

Each team plays 16 games in the regular season, and they break down like this:

6 divisional games against their 3 divisional opponents, one home and one away each = 3 home games, 3 away games
4 intra-conference games against the teams from a pre-determined division (other than their own) in the same conference, and which division this is rotates every year (eg, AFC South rotates from the AFC West (2010) to the AFC North (2011) to the AFC East (2012) and then back again to the AFC West in 2013), these are split home and away between the four opponents = 2 home games, 2 away games
4 inter-conference games against the teams from a pre-determined division in the other conference, and this also rotates ever year but takes four years to cycle through because you don't have to worry about your own division (eg, AFC South plays NFC East (2010), NFC South (2011), NFC North (2012), NFC West (2013), and back to the NFC East in 2014), these are split home and away between the four opponents = 2 home games, 2 away games
2 intra-conference games against teams finishing the same place in their division - so if you finished 1st in your division, you would play all three of the other division winners but since one of those is already accounted for in the second bullet point, that only leaves two other opponents. These are also split home and away = 1 home game, 1 away game

All that together adds up to 8 home games, and 8 away games. How they determine who is home and who is away is a little trickier, though they tend to basically alternate home/away based on the last time you played those opponents but there is a bit of leeway taken in order to reduce East-to-West Coast (and vice-versa) travel to make sure teams aren't getting worn out from travel during the season.

# ¿ Jul 6, 2010 21:14

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# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 22:44

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

color posted:

wow that's completely my fault my mistake who was the MLB who had a monster '02 season when you won it all?

Shelton Quarles?

http://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/tam/2002.htm

Didn't have a monster season though. Are you thinking of Simeon Rice (DE) who had 15.5 sacks, a pick, and a safety that season?

# ¿ Jul 6, 2010 21:17

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Doppelganger posted:

I like making dumb lists, so I've broken down the league into a few categories for someone who wants to pick a team to root for.

<generally cool lists>

5. Everyone else

All the teams not included :v:

I guess? Or did you accidentally leave some off?

# ¿ Jul 6, 2010 22:31

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Technowrite posted:

Anyone got a good write-up on fantasy football. I'm gonna dive in this season and would really like something to keep handy.

Last page: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3324645&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=3#post379326433

# ¿ Jul 8, 2010 16:34

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Captain Satire posted:

I thought the picking up of Ben Tate signals Slaton's end in Houston.

It was more of an insurance policy than anything else. Plus, running back by committee is the wave of the future didn't you know? :v:

# ¿ Jul 11, 2010 01:10

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Can someone who understands the salary cap/floor and other stuff from the CBA better than I do perhaps write something up on it? Maybe even talk about the rookie salary pool and slotting scale for the draft?

# ¿ Jul 14, 2010 14:53

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

HeroOfTheRevolution posted:

We don't really have a frame of reference right now because there isn't a CBA and the rookie salary pool and slotting scale may not even happen. I certainly think they will but we should probably hold off until a new CBA is signed. Soon, with any luck.

I meant more just what the concepts are, not necessarily the actual numbers. I can't imagine the whole floor/cap structure going away, and even if it did it might be good to at least understand why there have been no Yankees-like clubs that have tons of high priced free agents. Also if there have been instances of cap violations that are notable, that'd be cool.

edit: perhaps just a post on the player's union and what it means to the league and how they operate under the CBA and what the CBA does for the league and the players might be good

# ¿ Jul 14, 2010 16:18

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Bashez posted:

4th best quarterback to ever play the game: http://www.pro-football-reference.com/leaders/pass_rating_career.htm

They have 3 very solid running backs and a great WR group. Dez Bryant is going to light the league up. Get ready for it. Their linemen are also in a band.

Ah yes, the measure that makes Aaron Rodgers and Matt Schaub better than Dan Marino. Truly the stat of kings.

# ¿ Jul 30, 2010 15:00

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Neil O'Donnell
Bernie Kosar
Dave Krieg

all better than

Warren Moon
Fran Tarkenton
John Elway
Johnny Unitas

# ¿ Jul 30, 2010 16:05

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

DO YALL WANT A HAM posted:

God, Ryan Clark's really an awful player

Yeah but he played through whatever condition he had that meant he could have died any second on the field in Denver

except when he didn't

# ¿ Aug 12, 2010 00:49

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Oodles of Wootles posted:

Usually it's in a goal line situation with the tackle lined up as a TE

That's how you get Mike Vrabel, stud TE

I still don't get why people don't cover him more on those goalline situations where he comes in. 10-for-10, 10 TDs

# ¿ Dec 7, 2010 08:41

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Private Snowball posted:

I went to my first NFL game yesterday which was Vikings-Lions and I was a little disappointed. I don't want to have one experience taint my feelings on this league so I wanted to ask some questions.

1.) I found the fans to be lacking. I always assumed that an NFL game would be loud and fans crazy like what I see on tv, but they seemed pretty calm. I was sitting behind the Vikings bench because my friend who got the tickets is a fan of them so I may have been too removed from the Lions fans. He also said it probably was because the game was meaningless and neither team was going to the playoffs. Was this game more quiet than usual or are Lions fans just not that hyper? Is every game a sellout? I could see some empty seats though not sure if they were part of the boxes.

Lions at home, week 17. Very unsurprising that the fans were lacking.

# ¿ Jan 4, 2011 02:41

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

McKracken posted:

Division 3 is non-scholarship and the least competitive, although there are some schools like Mount Union that are annual powerhouses and could probably compete with some D-2 programs. Many D-3 schools are small liberal arts colleges.

To clarify, D3 schools can still give scholarships, they're just :airquote:

academic scholarships :airquote:

, and I'm not sure how tightly monitored they are or how strict of standards they have to adhere to.

# ¿ Apr 15, 2011 01:21

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

SteelAngel2000 posted:

I don't know if this is actually a Real Thing or not, but I have heard over the last few years, that Peyton Manning really really struggles against 3-4 defenses. I've heard that (especially during Pats/Colts and Chargers/Colts games), but I've never really understood why. Peyton is as good at surveying a defense and identifying where the pressure is coming from better than anyone I've ever seen. Why is it that he struggles against 3-4 base defenses?

Houston ran a 3-4 for the first several years and he was like 8-0 during those years.

Just as a counterpoint.

# ¿ May 5, 2011 01:27

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Can someone explain the differences between using a fullback and using an H-back? I found this FO article that sort of goes into it but I'm curious if these plays/formations are used a lot now or if defenses have schemed against that.

The reason I even thought about it was I saw the Colts depth chart today and saw no fullbacks, and only H-backs. New England is the same way. Now, at this point, they could just be scrounging for one, or they could have none in their plans for this year. So, someone tell me about the H-back in current NFL systems.

# ¿ Sep 6, 2011 19:52

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

tk posted:

They took him out on a stretcher, but by the end of the game he ended up walking back out on the sidelines.

In college, you can play for four years, but you have five years to use it. So you get one "redshirt" year that you get to be on the team/in school, but don't actually get to participate in contents.

When they are referring to a "true freshman" they mean a player that is in his first year of school. A "redshirt freshman" is a sophomore academically, but redshirted his first year, so he still has four years of eligibility left.

Additionally you can get conditional extra years for things like medical reasons (injured and miss [almost] the whole season, for example) - see Case Keenum, heir to Kevin Kolb at UH and 6th year senior :v:

# ¿ Sep 19, 2011 14:55

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Strange Matter posted:

What's up with this QBR thing everyone in the N/V thread is railing over every week?

It's ESPN's new quarterback rating system that is percentile-based (0-100) instead of just numbers based (QB rating maxes at the arbitrary number of 158.3). It's supposed to take into account the individual plays they were involved in and what the game situation was at the time (yes, there's a component called "clutch" in it), thus being better than the purely stat-line based traditional QB rating system.

But, it's backed by Trent Dilfer so it's probably dumb.

Seriously, it's produced more believable ratings than passer rating that I can see, but without the formula being revealed it's still just black voodoo magic and nobody really likes that.

# ¿ Sep 19, 2011 15:31

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Ladainian Tomlinson should never have been called LT, he was LdT or LDT. LT means two possible things in football and neither of them is Ladainian Tomlinson and only one is a person.

# ¿ Oct 31, 2011 20:41

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Ladainian Tomlinson called Daniel Thomas the next Ladainian Tomlinson?

# ¿ Oct 31, 2011 23:43

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Grittybeard posted:

Haha, I'll let one of the Green Bay guys write an essay on that one. The short version is he was really good for a really long time, rewriting all of the NFL passing records. Then every year since about 2007 (?--maybe earlier) became a "well he might retire" thing that ended with him coming back after a long drawn out media storm. We think he's finally actually retired now but with all the quarterbacks being hurt his name still gets brought up.

This is basically it. He was drafted into a bad situation in Atlanta with Jerry Glanville torpedoing him from the get-go. The Packers traded for him and then unsurprisingly Don Majikowski was benched for him and he has done really well since.

He's known for playing somewhat recklessly (throws a lot of interceptions as well as TDs) but generally with a lot of success, and he pretty much always showed genuine love for the game ("he's like a kid out there"). The Packers had generally been mediocre-to-bad since the heydays of the late 60s under Lombardi, but since Favre took the helm, they've had even more success than that (okay they only won 1 Super Bowl under him and not two, but they had a lot of good/great seasons and lots of playoff appearances in a much larger league).

Then he got all weird and did this retire/not retire thing and Aaron Rodgers was ready to go, so they shipped him to New York to play for the Jets. Then he did it again there and eventually went to play for the Packers' division rivals the Vikings. Add in pain killer addiction drama and dick pics and he kind of went nuclear on his own image in a lot of ways.

Basically, a decade-plus of "amazing player on a dynasty" ruined by "three or four years of literal and figurative dick-waving and stringing teams along".

# ¿ Nov 29, 2011 16:40

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Detective Thompson posted:

Alright, that's what I thought. It's cute to see Indianapolis' -177.

And with quick math that means they've been losing by an average of 16 points per game.

Which puts their -20 point spread this week into perspective.

# ¿ Dec 2, 2011 18:41

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Detective Thompson posted:

So how do they pick which stadium the SB will be played in? Luck of the draw, or something more calculated than that?

Cities/teams put together Super Bowl committees that then present their case to the owners who then vote on it. There's more to it than that I think, but the basic idea is that cities/teams vie for the votes of the rest of the league's owners.

# ¿ Dec 31, 2011 12:05

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Blackula69 posted:

There is a team that wins playoff games
A team with a great coach, a great quarterback, and a defense that is Lights Out
A team that doesn't disappoint

This describes no team in the NFL currently

# ¿ Feb 5, 2012 02:48

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

e: wrong thread

# ¿ Sep 16, 2012 18:31

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

JetsGuy posted:

Honestly, if I were an official, I'd have to tell them to keep me the gently caress away from Pats games.

Yeah I was gonna say "does it include teams you want to gently caress over as well? I'd hope so"

Because if I were reffing a Titans game...

# ¿ Sep 28, 2012 23:30

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

pasaluki posted:

The safety caused by the defense collapsing the pocket or running lanes and driving the QB or RB into his own endzone is as beautiful as it is brutal.

# ¿ Oct 19, 2012 14:45

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Just answering the bits I know;

Yes PATs are dead if unsuccessful and cannot be returned in the NFL.

and yes field goal attempts that remain in the field of play can be returned for touchdowns. Devin Hester did so a few years back I believe

# ¿ Oct 20, 2012 03:19

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Was at a HS game this past week where they had it with 4th and goal on the 4 yard line and opted to go for it (they were stopped at the 1). HS kickers are bad. Getting extra points is a bonus, not an assumption.

# ¿ Oct 31, 2012 22:49

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

SaxMaverick posted:

Hey Trin:

Isn't this technically grounding?

The first word of the penalty is "intentional" so probably not.

# ¿ Nov 20, 2012 18:08

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Detective Thompson posted:

When they made up the divisions, how did they decide where to put which teams? Some teams, in terms of geographic location, are way out of the cardinal direction of the division, like the Colts being in the AFC South or the Cowboys in the NFC East. Most make sense for what division they're in, but a number kind of stand out.

It's kind of grown organically, with it originally being somewhat related to geography. But the reason the Cowboys are in the NFC East is to preserve rivalries like Cowboys and Redskins. The AFC South is basically the leftovers of the AFC after they did everyone else.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2012 14:47

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Kiwi Bigtree posted:

On that note. What would happen if the Jaguars went to LA? Would there just be one REALLY weird division, or would they shift everything over?

I would assume they'd shift the Chiefs to the AFC South and the Jags to the AFC West, though I don't know how many feathers that might ruffle in KC. But geographically speaking it'd make the most sense. Which is precisely why the NFL won't actually do that.

# ¿ Dec 3, 2012 22:36

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Also Tebow has a rib injury right now, so it might even actually be in his best interest not to play for the rest of the season as well.

# ¿ Dec 11, 2012 05:29

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

SpclKen posted:

This may not be the thread for this, but I keep wondering what "replacement level" is. I see posts claiming that so and so is "below replacement level" is this some correlation to an advanced statistic, or just a new way of saying that the player is bad and needs to be replaced?

Seems such a weird saying since every RB would be replacement level against AP right now. Who sets the benchmark?

It's defined by looking at what players who would be considered "replacement level" in the past would perform at and then using that as a general baseline: http://www.fangraphs.com/library/index.php/misc/war/replacement-level/

Basically, it's like 20 runs below league average for 600 PA, and you kind of go from there. It's not rigorously defined though, I don't think.

# ¿ Dec 19, 2012 17:00

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Kiwi Bigtree posted:

It can also mean getting credit for turning a team around.

Aikman and Robo Manning were both no. 1 picks.

Both younger Mannings were no. 1 picks!

e: and dad was a #2 overall pick, how about being the #2 overall pick and being outclassed by BOTH of your sons

# ¿ Jan 8, 2013 22:16

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Barudak posted:

Only two of his sons. Granted Cooper had medical issues and played b-ball and is now an absurdly rich man in energy in New Orleans but whatever ONLY TWO.

Saw your pre-edit and was like :drat:

But yeah, the only two football-capable sons :v:

# ¿ Jan 8, 2013 22:36

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Arschlochkind posted:

I had to scan that three times to find Houston. Using HTX or HST as an abbreviation for Houston sports teams frightens and confuses me.

dokmo posted:

Hey don't blame me. Just using pro-footbal-ref's abbreviations.

In this case it makes sense because "HOU" would have been the Oilers in their datasets. Similarly other teams that moved/renamed are that way because of the same thing.

# ¿ Oct 1, 2013 20:24

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

axeil posted:

Houston Texans: Bad passing offense with a really good defense. JJ Watt is one of the best linebackers ever.

He might be if he played linebacker, but he doesn't.

# ¿ Dec 2, 2014 18:39

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

quote:

Chris Henry: Slipped off of his home planet and got fatal road rash

# ¿ Aug 12, 2015 20:00

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Hijo Del Helmsley posted:

Falcons started this season 6-0 and looked like they finally turned a corner...then lost all but one of the rest of their games. The only team they beat were the Panthers, who are now likely to win the Super Bowl.

Saying that out loud makes me realize how loving WEIRD the Falcons are in terms of ability.

Let me demystify it for you:

2015 Falcons against:
AFC South: 3-1
NFC East: 4-0
Everyone else: 1-7

They creamed the two shittiest divisions in football and then were terrible against everyone else.

# ¿ Feb 10, 2016 02:55

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# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 22:44

No Safe Word: Feb 26, 2005

Volkerball posted:

Yet the record for longest field goal is like a yard further than it was 40 years ago.

A large part of that is because the risk/reward usually says "just punt it". It's not that they couldn't make 65+ yarders given multiple tries, it's just that it's generally a terrible coaching decision to actually attempt it.

# ¿ Mar 27, 2017 20:31

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