THE POWER RANK

NFL Rankings, Week 8

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This week I am going to take a page out of the Fox News playbook.

Hey?  Where are you going?  Don’t worry, I’m not going to try to sell you Food Insurance.  I just want to focus this week’s discussion on the key battleground divisions the way news networks look at swing states while ignoring the rest of the country.  So Rams fans can breathe easy, I won’t be taking so many shots at your team this week.  Besides, you should all still be celebrating the (baseball) Cardinals victory!

Battleground Division #1 – NFC North

The NFC North is stacked with talent this year, led by the Super Bowl champion and The Power Rank leader Green Bay Packers (#1, 11.55).  Normally having a team like the Packers in a division would settle matters, but this year it does not.  The reason is that the Lions (#4,  5.17) are right on the Packers’ heels, and the Bears (#9, 3.78) are not that far behind.  That’s three top ten teams in one division.  The Lions may have a hard time keeping up their pace especially with their oft-injured quarterback having ankle problems last week, and the Bears are legendary for pulling wins out of thin air.  Just ask Dennis Green!  Even if the Packers’ high level of success continues and they lock up the division title early, the Bears and Lions will both still likely be in the playoff hunt, in fact if the playoffs started today both teams would receive a wildcard berth.  With a lot of division games left the NFC North division is going to be an interesting one to watch.

Battleground #2 – AFC North

What’s with the North being so good at football?  Although the AFC North doesn’t feature three top ten teams as the NFC North does, it comes very close.  This division is led by the Baltimore Ravens (#3, 7.80) but they are actually a half-game behind the Steelers (#11, 2.58) and only a half game ahead of the Bengals (#12, 1.69).  Now, I know nobody talks about the “top twelve” of any lists, but it is nonetheless impressive that this tight grouping all falls within the top 12 teams in The Power Rank.  It’s hardly a revelation to NFL fans that the Steelers and Ravens are going to be battling for a division title, or that the loser is likely to grab a wildcard spot.  What is unlikely is the upstart Bengals sticking their noses into the mix.  With a third solid team to contend with the Steelers and Ravens will not be able to take anything for granted this season, and the fight for a playoff berth may get ugly in this division that is known for misconduct both on and off the field.

Battleground #3 – NFC East

The NFC East doesn’t carry nearly as many strong teams as the NFC and AFC North divisions do, but with some schedule oddities the team that The Power Rank picks as the clear division favorite is lagging behind in the actual standings.  The Cowboys (#8, 3.85) should be running away with this division in light of the fact that their closest competition should be the Eagles (#18, -0.89) who are also struggling to find wins.  Instead the Giants (#24, -3.29) are leading the division with a 4-2 record.  True, it’s early in the season.  And yes, we at The Power Rank do think that as things shake out the Cowboys’ record will start to match their apparent strength.  Even so, with poor starts from teams with high expectations and surprising starts from teams with low ones, everyone is in the mix here and every game is going to be an especially heated contest.

Non-Battleground – AFC East

The Power Rank is scheduled to get some East Coast bias with our next software upgrade.  If you want to hear how this is the only division that matters this year (or any other) tune into ESPN.  We apologize for the inconvenience.  Sure, the AFC East has a lot of strength in top ten teams New England (#2, 9.77) and New York (#7, 4.36) but in spite of what some sports news anchors would have you believe, this is not news.  The addition of the up and coming Bills (#16, 0.41) is shaking some fans’ confidence in the Patriots and Jets getting their perennial playoff spots, but The Power Rank thinks otherwise.  The Bills are indeed a good team right now but good is not enough in a division that has contained two top ten (and usually top five) teams for the last few years.  This division will get down and dirty where it normally does (in the playoffs) with the teams it normally sends (the Pats and Jets).  Until then, my attention will be elsewhere.

NFL Rankings, Week 6

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How you play the game
San Francisco, Number Eight
Over Buffalo

It’s not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game.

Most people agree that this old adage belongs on a Pop Warner youth league field, but many would say that it really has no place in the results oriented win-at-all-costs culture of the NFL.  The Power Rank seeks to change this paradigm by examining not just how the teams have fared in the win and loss columns, but also examines the margin of victory used to dispatch their opponents.

For example, lets take a look at two of 2011’s 4-1 Cinderellas – San Francisco (#8, 2.33) and Buffalo (#12, 1.31).  Both teams started the season in a bit of a hole, as The Power Rank accounts for last season’s ranking during the beginning of the year.  At the end of last season both teams were in the cellar – Buffalo at #27 with a -3.80 rating and San Francisco at #28 with a -4.37 rating.  Ouch.  This poses a bit of a question though, how did the 49ers leapfrog the Bills and climb out of a bigger hole faster and end up farther?

The answer is the strength of their wins.

On paper, Buffalo has beaten more impressive teams:

Week 1 – @ Kansas City (#30, -6.39) – W 41-7

Week 2 – Oakland (#7, 3.28) – W 38-35

Week 3 – New England (#1, 14.30) – W 34-31

Week 4 – @ Cincinnati (#16, 0.46) – L 20-23

Week 5 – Philadelphia (#20, -1.19) – W 31-24

Their schedule includes two The Power Rank top ten teams, including the #1 Patriots.  For an algorithm that gives credit for strength of schedule, that win alone should have been solid gold.

San Francisco on the other hand boasts no top ten teams among their victims this year:

Week 1 – Seattle (#26, -4.98) – W 33-17

Week 2 – Dallas (#14, 0.87) – L 24-27

Week 3 – @ Cincinnati (#16, 0.46) – W 13-8

Week 4 – @ Philadelphia (#20, -1.19) – W 24-23

Week 5 – Tampa Bay (#17, -0.14) – W 48-3

So what does our algorithm see in a 49ers squad whose best win was against #16 Cincinnati, over a Buffalo team that shocked #1 New England and #7 Oakland?

The first answer lies in the blowouts.  In week one Buffalo surprised us by beating the 2010 AFC West champion Chiefs, and really caught our attention by doing so by burying them with a 41-7 final.  At the time this win made the world seem upside down, yet in hindsight the Chiefs are barely a shell of who they were last season, as their current #30 rank suggests.  In short, most teams in the NFL should have beaten the Chiefs by a wide margin in week 1.

San Francisco’s blowout came just this last week against the Bucs in a 48-3 game.  I suppose the best way to prevent Josh Freeman from creating another great come from behind victory is to make sure his team is down by five touchdowns.  The margin of victory is similar to Buffalo’s win over Kansas City, but earning that margin against an otherwise 3-1 team that is at worst an average team makes the win far more impressive.

While both teams have had a major blowout and a few close ones, other than the Chiefs the Bills have not been able to beat an opponent by more than one score.  On the other hand the 49ers have two solid wins under their belt.  First was the beatdown of Tampa Bay, and the second was a comfortable 16 point margin of victory over Seattle.  Good teams win.  Great teams never let their victory come into question, and The Power Rank’s algorithm naturally accounts for this distinction.

The second reason why the Bills were lapped by the 49ers is all about the Bengals.  Both teams faced the Bengals in Cincinnati this year but the outcomes were slightly different.  The Bengals account for the Bills lone loss, but the 49ers were able to put them away on the road.  The only other common opponent so far this year was Philadelphia, and both teams were able to beat the struggling Eagles.

The Power Rank’s algorithm gave Cincinnati credit for beating the Bills, and then gave the 49ers credit for beating a team that beat the Bills.  Without more common opponents to compare this early in the season, this football food chain helped slingshot San Francisco into the top ten this week while leaving the Bills behind – because as far as we are concerned, how a team gets a win is more important than the win itself.

NFL Rankings, Week 4

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Upper middle class
The Eagles, Falcons, Steelers
Room for improvement

This week, we see the rankings compress a little bit more, a trend that should continue over the next few weeks as this year’s games stabilize.  The Patriots remain #1 with a 14.73 rating after losing in a shootout with red-hot Buffalo (#13, 1.20).  The Chiefs helped their fans get off the ledge by keeping the game with San Diego (#12, 2.02) to within a field goal, so despite their loss they climb out of the cellar to #30 with a rating of -8.26.  The Rams now occupy the not-so-coveted #32 spot with a rating of -10.96  after a humiliating loss to #3 Baltimore (7.75).

What this means is that last week the range of ratings between #1 New England and then #32 Kansas City was 35.63, whereas this week the difference between #1 New England and new #32 St. Louis is 25.69.  That’s not encouraging news for Rams fans, or for the entire state of Missouri.  What is does indicate is what the scoreboards have shown this year:  no team is utterly dominant (sorry, Mr. Brady) and no team is completely pathetic.  Bad, maybe…  but not insanely horrible as Kansas City’s -19.52 rating last week indicated.

The news is best for fans of the “upper-middle class” of the football teams.  Not the dominant upper crust teams like New England (#1, 14.73, Green Bay (#2, 11.37), and Baltimore (#3, 7.75) with giant stretches of blue glory next to their names.  No, this news is for the fans of teams between rank 4 and 16.  The fans of teams that were supposed to come out with guns blazing, but have somehow tripped over the starting line.  What happened to the free-agent force of the Eagles (#15, 0.82) that was so highly touted by the offseason hype machine?  Wasn’t the return of Matty-Ice with Julio “the missing piece” Jones supposed to take the Falcons (#16, 0.62) from a playoff team to a Super Bowl favorite?  Did the mighty Super Bowl runner-up Steelers really fall to #6 with a good but uninspiring rating of 3.97?

It is these teams who should take note of this week’s movement.  Success in climbing The Power Rank ladder isn’t going to be as much about raising their rating from the 0-4 range up to the heights of Patriots in the teens.  That just won’t happen.  Because the outliers like the Patriots and Packers have little to gain (mathematically speaking) by crushing teams that The Power Rank expects them to crush.  But they can lose a lot by falling to teams who are beneath them.  Even close wins to inferior teams will lower their prestige.  So Big Ben and the Steelers don’t have to worry about trying to hang 70 on the the Brown and the Bengals to catch up.  The Eagles don’t need DeSean Jackson to return 2 punts for touchdowns every game to become elite.  If they can just continue to win for a few more weeks, the over-inflated Patriots and Packers will fall to more reasonable and reachable positions.

*Interesting note:  Running numbers from this year alone, the Bills would be The Power Rank’s chosen team with a rating of 14.28, with the Raiders not far behind with a 13.97 rating.  St. Louis would still be in the cellar, but at an astounding -23.50 instead of their current rating of -10.96.  While the Bills are definitely the hottest team in the NFL and a quickly growing fan-favorite, their official position of #13 suits them quite a bit better.  The Bills have proven that they have the talent, but they still have yet to prove to the league and to the algorithm that they have the ability to be consistent.  Because after all, that is the mark of a true champion.  By considering last year’s data as well as this year’s, The Power Rank cuts through the knee-jerk reactions and keeps the Bills somewhat humble with objective mathematical analysis, while still allowing them room to continue climbing up the ladder if they continue their run of impressive wins.

NFL Rankings, Week 1

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Pittsburgh, still near top
Arizona, not so great
Bills near the middle

Week One in the NFL – a glorious time when half of the league’s team become undefeated and their fans begin talk of this being “the year”, while the other half of the teams wallow in winless shame and their fans open up the forum to the debate over whether to tar and feather or just fire their team’s head coach and general manager.

Here at the Power Rank we pride ourselves in diligently working to stay out of the emotional mire that surrounds the first few weeks of the season.  In the past, we achieved this by quietly sitting back and waiting for a few weeks’ worth of data to roll in before beginning our own talks about who would be in or out of the playoffs.  This year we are boldly stepping up to bring you rankings after only one week of games while still keeping a data-driven analytical view of the game.

This year the early season rankings will account for some past data as well as using this season’s data.  This amalgamation has produced a ranking that places some undefeated teams near the bottom of the pile, while allowing other winless teams to hover near the top.  Let’s take a look at a few key examples:

Pittsburgh – Still Near the Top

The Steelers took one on the chin last Sunday, losing 7-35 to a bitter division rival, the Baltimore Ravens.  In spite of having the second worst season opener (after the Chiefs) in the league, Pittsburgh remains firmly in the top ten Power Rank teams at #8 with a rating of 4.34.  The Power Rank’s algorithm was generous to last year’s Super Bowl runner up because of their stellar showings in 2010 and the fact that the Ravens are a powerhouse as well, starting the 2011 season at #3 in The Power Rank with a whopping rating of 10.15 that is no doubt inflated by coming out and dominating one of the NFL’s more solid franchises.  With most of their talent returning it is a fair assumption to expect the Steelers to come back and earn their high standing in the coming weeks.

Arizona – Stuck in the Cellar

With all of the buzz surrounding the performance of rookie quarterback Cam Newton of the Carolina Panthers, some people seem to have forgotten that he didn’t get the most important stat a quarterback can earn:  a win.  Kevin Kolb arrived in Phoenix this year to help the Cardinals undo the damage the Derek Anderson inflicted on the franchise, if that is possible.  Kolb started the season the right way by guiding the Cardinals to the win column, a place that was largely unfamiliar to them in 2010.  So while Arizona shares the same record as the Patriots (#1), Packers (#2), and Ravens (#3) they are stuck near where they ended last season at #29 with a rating of -9.93.  The Cardinals suffer because The Power Rank is not convinced by a victory over last year’s weekly #32 team, the Panthers, who find themselves in familiar territory in 2011 with a ranking of #32 and a rating of -13.02.  In terms of both Arizona’s record and Newton’s 400+ yard performance The Power Rank is sticking with Public Enemy’s sage advice:  Don’t believe the hype.

Buffalo – Bill-ieve the Hype

Ok, maybe not all of it…  Ryan Fitzpatrick will not likely keep up his 4 touchdown per game pace and end the season with a record shattering 64 touchdowns.  Nor will the Bills be likely to snatch an AFC East title away from the Patriots (#1) or the Jets (#7).  On the other hand, the Bills earned a solid boost in The Power Rank by climbing to #18 with a rating of -0.02 by beating last year’s AFC West champion Kansas City Chiefs, who fell hard to #31 with a rating of -10.66.  Fans of perennially successful franchises may scoff at these numbers, but they indicate that the Bills might just possibly have a team good enough to break .500, or even maybe just possibly sneak into the playoffs.  This is monumental for a team that hasn’t been to the playoffs since the 1999 season, and who have only had one winning season since that year.  Yes, it is too early to say that the Bills are firmly on the rebound, but for Buffalo’s beleaguered fans it is never too early to start partying like it’s 1999.

Week 2 Matchup to Watch – Chicago (#4, 7.90) at New Orleans (#5, 5.22)

Coming off a huge win against 2010 powerhouse Atlanta, Chicago is looking to beat another NFC South juggernaut by stopping Drew Brees and the Saints on their home turf.  With the visiting team holding a slight rating advantage the Power Rank is going to predict that this match is too close to call, and too exciting to miss.