The New England Patriots Prevention of Fumbles is Nearly Impossible

[zulater]

http://www.sharpfootballanalysis.com/blog/?p=2932

Yesterday I investigated whether or not the New England Patriots outperform expectations in bad weather. I had several recommendations to look at home and road data, as opposed to just home data. Mulling whether or not to undertake that further (time consuming) analysis, I watched this video:


I immediately noticed something that cannot be overlooked: the issue with ball security and fumbles. Then I remembered this remarkable fact:

The 2014 Patriots were just the 3rd team in the last 25 years to never have lost a fumble at home! The biggest difference between the Patriots and the other 2 teams who did it was that New England ran between 150 and 200 MORE plays this year than those teams did in the years they had zero home fumbles, making the Patriots stand alone in this unique statistic.

Based on the desire to incorporate full season data (not just home games, as a team theoretically bring “doctored footballs” with them on the road) I performed the following analysis:

I looked at the last 5 years of data (since 2010) and examined TOTAL FUMBLES in all games (as well as fumbles/game) but more importantly, TOTAL OFFENSIVE PLAYS RUN. Thus, we can to determine average PLAYS per FUMBLE, a much more valuable statistic. The results are displayed in the chart below. Keep in mind, this is for all games since 2010, regardless of indoors, outdoors, weather, site, etc. EVERYTHING.

Please click the link. Read the entire article. Look at the graphs. Then this all starts to make sense.

[Steelman]

http://www.sharpfootballanalysis.com/blog/?p=2932

Yesterday I investigated whether or not the New England Patriots outperform expectations in bad weather. I had several recommendations to look at home and road data, as opposed to just home data. Mulling whether or not to undertake that further (time consuming) analysis, I watched this video:


I immediately noticed something that cannot be overlooked: the issue with ball security and fumbles. Then I remembered this remarkable fact:

The 2014 Patriots were just the 3rd team in the last 25 years to never have lost a fumble at home! The biggest difference between the Patriots and the other 2 teams who did it was that New England ran between 150 and 200 MORE plays this year than those teams did in the years they had zero home fumbles, making the Patriots stand alone in this unique statistic.

Based on the desire to incorporate full season data (not just home games, as a team theoretically bring “doctored footballs” with them on the road) I performed the following analysis:

I looked at the last 5 years of data (since 2010) and examined TOTAL FUMBLES in all games (as well as fumbles/game) but more importantly, TOTAL OFFENSIVE PLAYS RUN. Thus, we can to determine average PLAYS per FUMBLE, a much more valuable statistic. The results are displayed in the chart below. Keep in mind, this is for all games since 2010, regardless of indoors, outdoors, weather, site, etc. EVERYTHING.

Please click the link. Read the entire article. Look at the graphs. Then this all starts to make sense.

Wow, quite a bit of information there. Very interesting.

Sidenote, all the Pats fans crying for defamation lawsuits on his comment section.

[zulater]

Wow, quite a bit of information there. Very interesting.

Sidenote, all the Pats fans crying for defamation lawsuits on his comment section.

By definition data isn't defamation.

[86WARD]

Pretty amazing that guy broke that down like that.

[smokin3000gt]

Bottom line - where there is smoke there's fire.

[ALLD]

Bottom line - where there is smoke there's fire.

Brady smokes the meat pole.

[zulater]

http://www.sbnation.com/nfl/2015/1/2...bill-belichick

The search for circumstantial evidence about DeflateGate has turned up a new tidbit that will leave a skeptical public with something else to question about how the New England Patriots handle their footballs. The Wall Street Journal took a deeper look at fumble rates around the NFL, finding that the Patriots fumble less than other teams that play their home games outside -- a lot less.

Since 2010, the Patriots have fumbled the ball once every 73 touches from scrimmage. That's 52 percent better than the league average. The team with the second-lowest fumble rate since 2010 is the Baltimore Ravens, who fumbled once every 55 touches.

And that's not all.

Individual players have fumbled less while playing for the Patriots compared to other teams. Current Patriots players Danny Amendola, Brandon LaFell and LeGarrette Blount as well as former Patriots players BenJarvus Green-Ellis, Danny Woodhead, and Wes Welker, fumbled eight times in 1,482 touches since 2010, once every 185.3 touches. When those players were wearing another team's jersey, they fumbled 22 times 1,701 touches, once every 77.3 touches......
....


More of the same. But this is something that you should factor into your opinion of "deflategate".