Football Outsiders Alamanac - 2009

by TheJeezus on Jul 15, 2009 2:36 PM CDT Comment 10 comments

Just got finished reading the Cowboy-related content in this year's installment of Football Outsiders Almanac.

For those of you who aren't familiar with FO, they're a football analytics site that uses unconventional and advanced statistics. I highly recommend visiting their site and buying the Almanac ($12.00, PDF download). Even if they are occasionally off-base in their analysis, their publications are gold mines of well-organized statistics.

Here are some of the high points:

The mean wins projection for the Cowboys this year: 8.0
Last year's failures can be attributed to injuries and the lack of depth to mitigate them.
Phillips' assumption of the defensive play-calling duties was at least partially responsible for the defensive improvement after the STL game.
Brad Johnson was the third worst performing backup QB since 1994.
Miles Austin is their top "prospect" going into the season (O. Scandrick is #7; T. Choice is #9)

Unfortunately, they also go into a meandering discussion of the threat of Jerry's control over draft choices and other personnel decisions. It's pretty out-of-touch with reality and serves little purpose.

There's also a blurb that reiterates what I've been saying all along about everyone's favorite rapper/comedian, MartyB:

Bennett’s great DVOA is a function of slipping open on plays where the defense simply ran out of guys to cover Cowboys, but hey, he still caught the ball.

But the most interesting thing I read was their projections for Roy Williams:

67 rec, 982 yds, 9 TD

Sounds an awful lot like the numbers that someone else put up last season. I would be thrilledwith those stats from RW. Thrilled. (FWIW, their projections for Owens in BUF: 66/935/7)

There's a lot more information in there. Anyone else here get a chance to read it? Thoughts?

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Comments

FO has become kind of annoying

I find they are a pretty smug lot, and never miss a chance to bash the Cowboys and especially Romo. Do you recall that after Romo came on the scene they predicted his downfall once other teams had video on him?

They lost me when Aaron Schatz (head dork) wrote an article about how wonderful football is and that winning isn’t everything – after his beloved Pats gagged up a Superbowl to the Giants.

I did sneak a c bomb onto their message boards that is still there though – so I got that going for me. Which is nice.

by I_miss_Switzer on Jul 15, 2009 2:54 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

I agree

to a point. Schatz is a douche and their editorializing is a tired act, but they’re still the best around IMO when it comes to compiling and organizing data.

And their analysis isn’t any worse than KC Joyner or any of the other stat hacks out there.

Purgatory's kind of like the in-betweeny one. You weren't really shit, but you weren't all that great either. Like Tottenham.

by TheJeezus on Jul 15, 2009 3:07 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I agree with you about the draft issue, this draft had WP finger prints all over it.

It was a non flashy uneventful draft, that is not JJ style; the same could be said of FA this offseason, not big FA splash signings.

Ignore the Mainstream Media, EMBRACE THE HATE!!!!

by cowboy78 on Jul 15, 2009 3:36 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

I bought PFP 08 last year

And was immensely satisfied with it. I read through that thing two or three times. A lot of the theories proposed are spot on, the projection is the most accurate out there, and a couple of the guys (Barnwell and Tanier, mostly) are actually very good writers.
I don’t think I’m buying it this year, however, for the very reason that’s been stated; DVOA could never figure out the Cowboys, for some unexplainable reason, and the fact that they regard it as sermon in this basis pisses me off.
Last year, every single possible break went against the Cowboys and they STILL beat their win projection. In previous years, the team has consistently beaten their projected record by 3 or 4 games. It’s petty and I sort of feel bad about it, but FP is just a bit too Northeastern for my tastes. The camel-crippling straw was the fact that they now post most of their relevant articles on ESPN Insider, behind a pay wall there’s no way I’m jumping for.

Kanye, you want to be the voice of this generation? Get in line! It goes me, Obamagirl, the Freecreditreport.com guys, then It's a tie between you-and Crocs.
-Stephen Colbert

by Conjunction on Jul 15, 2009 8:44 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

If you like FO - then you definitely need to get KC's Football Scientist

I prefer KC’s stuff – although its more oriented at individual rather than team or unit performance.

Also available in PDF – which is great for overseas fans like me – when the postage costs were more the cost of the publication.

(and you reminded me I still have to download it after waiting for my payment to go through….)

"Where's Woody? - We need another Darren Woodson

by BoyfromOz on Jul 15, 2009 10:29 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Yeah

I like KC, but he sometimes forces the issue with his metrics; trying to see causality where there is none. On the whole, though, I think most of his stuff is well thought out.

Purgatory's kind of like the in-betweeny one. You weren't really shit, but you weren't all that great either. Like Tottenham.

by TheJeezus on Jul 16, 2009 9:56 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

No doubt

But at least there is some real analysis and tape study.

Unlike the bulk of the mediots out there who are just plain lazy and just run variations on whatever issues are hot or tabloid worthy…

"Where's Woody? - We need another Darren Woodson

by BoyfromOz on Jul 21, 2009 9:03 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

Also I strongly encourage reading the Hidden Game of Football

A somewhat old (80s?) football book, no longer in print, but you can find copies via 2nd hand sellers on Amazon etc.

Does a lot of interesting analysis of football and was the inspiration and foundation for what Football Outsiders does (and to a lesser degree KC – who I think was more inspired by Bill James’ analysis of Baseball)

A great read.

"Where's Woody? - We need another Darren Woodson

by BoyfromOz on Jul 15, 2009 10:34 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs