Effort in football and the 100 view mark

Well before I start I'd like to start my one dedicated reader for helping me get to the 100 views mark. Half are mine and the other half yours! Thanks!

Nobody can play at 110%. No one can exceed their potential.

In fact, very few people can even sustain 100% effort or intensity for very long.

Consider this: think of when you were working your hardest, focused on something to complete exclusion of everything else. That is 100%. Competing with desperation. Playing with fear, with an adrenaline rush so intense that it feels like a lion is chasing you. That would be 100%.

So most players are operating in some level between 60 and 90% effort.

100% effort looks almost insane. Its irrational. Its the exclusion of everything else from that persons life.

So maybe most people only give 95% effort at most.

The value of a "motivator" type coach: getting everyone in the organization to raise their effort level by maybe 5 or 10 percent.

And that's all it takes to win a lot of games. Is inspired effort in the weight room, in practice, in film sessions, and lastly on the field.

Bowl Games: Part 1

When analyzing this season's worth of bowl games, a few things must be remembered:

1) Some teams are playing home games, in front of huge crowds.
2) Teams traveling long distance are not likely to have big crowds with them; especially crowds going from the south to the north because of the weather difference.
3) Some teams have lost coaches/coordinators before the bowl games.
4) Some players will be suspended for the bowl game.

FAU v Central Michigan
This is a home game for the Michigan team, and I doubt FAU will have many fans making the trip.
Cold weather could be a factor in practicing and general energy levels.
Sagarin Ratings: Central Michigan is +8.18 Line: CM by seven.

Prediction: CM covers spread.


Cal vs. Miami (Emerald Bowl)
Home game for Cal.
Miami has had 5 players suspended.
Miami relies on a lot of younger players.
Miami is making a huge road trip and is unlikely to bring more than a few thousand fans.
Miami has struggled running and Cal has a great running back/running game.
Cal has a much older team.
This is the Miami coaches first bowl game.

Prediction: Cal covers spread.

Champs Sports Bowl (Wisconsin v FSU)
Florida is +8.72 in Sagarin Ratings, favored by 5
Home game for Florida state
A N/S game because they are playing Wisconsin
blah blah blah.
Speed is more emphasized in the heat.

Prediction: Florida covers

Home Field Advantage in College Football

Just read some of JR Miller's book about beating the Pro Football Pointspread. Football is football is football, and it got me thinking about college football and its relevance to today's topic: home field advantage.

Some JR Miller quotes:
"There are actually wide differences in home field advantages from team to team for extended periods of time" (2-4).

"There is a general tendency for teams to play better on home turf" (2-4).

"For a three year period ending in the early '90s, the Washington Redskins...actually performed 3 points worse at home than on the road" (2-4).

In college football I'm sure the effect is magnified. The players are younger, more emotional, less confident, and less professional (on average) than their professional counterparts.

So how could this study be done and its effects measured?

Well one could look at the difference in average score between home and road, difference in average margin of victory or defeat, and also look at how visitors do at a certain stadium compared to the road and overall average.

The problem of course is not all college teams are made equal. Ohio State's stadium will have given up fewer points than most teams because they traditionally emphasize defense and ball control.

Over the years that will have given them a skewed measurement of how much effect their stadium has because they also have above average defenses. So one would have to look at how opponents do in a given season against common opponents.

This is actually a very tricky question because teams have certain identities over the years. One could look at the difference between consecutive years playing Ohio State on the road or at home to get an idea of the difference that stadiums and home field advantage have.

Or if teams play twice in one season, looking at the difference in scores. Unfortunately I'm dealing with something that has high variability over the course of a season(injuries) and between seasons (player turnover and graduation) and very few instances.

I could look at various statistical measures such as a t-value (for average variability around an unknown value). But that would be getting very complicated very fast.

Lastly, the effect could be measured for young teams (freshman, sophomores) versus teams that are experienced/older (juniors, seniors). Also comparing seasons started per team. I'd think that more experienced teams would perform better.

Also, a three year starter would have played at Ohio State, then hosted them his junior year, and then go back again his senior year to the horseshoe. So that would be a real advantage because he'd already have played their once and seen the kind of debacle he was walking into.

Warriors lose to Magic: Get Used to It

The Warriors recently lost to the Orlando Magic.  And last night they lost to the Heat.  And they are going to do a lot more losing.  

Everyone on the team knows what Don Nelson knows: they aren't making the playoffs.  They are making any noise.  They aren't getting hyped.  

And Don Nelson doesn't rebuild.  He doesn't energize.  He doesn't berate like Pat Riley.  He won't discipline and focus like Greg Popovich.  He simply unleashes.  

And if you unleash mediocre players, they will give you below-mediocre level of play.  Mediocre players with good, hard coaching can get you mediocre results.  Why?  Because in the NBA there are lots of good players.  And lots of great players.  Lots of 40 inch vertical leaps, enormous centers, and teams put together to win lots of games. 

And then there are the warriors.  With a collection of talent that was able to get to the playoffs one year on the last game of the season.  And thats it.  They were never even a good team.  Good enough to compete, but not good enough to win.  No fourth seeds, no home court advantage, no ten game winning streak.  Nothing.  

And Don Nelson just signed a fat contract.  So he isn't going to be pouring in effort at midnight, talking with players, figuring out the perfect inbounds play, analyzing each teams defenses for weaknesses.  He's too experienced, too old, too fat.  

The Warriors will plummet to the bottom of the NBA.  And along the way they are going to get blown out a lot.  

I think the following factors will contribute most to their defeats:

Games on the road.

Games against teams that are "rising" rather than "established".  A rising team right now would be the Orlando, Atlanta, Miami, New York, Cleveland, Portland, Houston, and New Orleans.  

A few maybe cases are Denver, Milwaukee, Utah, and of course Boston.

The younger and better the team, the more likely they are to blow us out. 

And at start of a road trip the Warriors are more likely to mail in a game.  After a bad loss or two they will try harder to try to salvage a road trip.  But at the end they are less likely to get blown out if the trip has gone badly.  If it has gone well, then they might mail in a game.  

And at the end of the season as the playoff race heats up and we are putting in a lot of "next year's" players.  

Navy's Inherent Advantage or "economic moat"

Does the Naval Academy's football team have an inherent advantage?  I think so.

In 2000 they became an independent and have since had a serious strategic advantage over their opponents. 

Conference wins and losses are much more important than out-of-conference losses.  A team can have several out-of-conference losses and still win their conference, but more than one or two conference losses all but dooms a team from achieving their goals and any recognition outside the conference.

Navy runs an unusual offense in the form of the triple option, a running based attack and they rarely throw more than 5 or 6 passes a game.  It requires more practice and game-planning to teach linebackers and corners the new assignments and how to "stay-at-home" in a zone rather than just pursuing the ball as they usually do.  

But a loss to Navy is not nearly as bad for the opponents because they are out-of-conference.  Hence, less game planning, less emphasis in practice, and less year-to-year focus because they are less likely to repeat against opponents more than two or three games.  

Why would a coach spend more than a few practices preparing against Navy when he is more important offenses and intra-conference opponents coming up?

Well, I don't think he would.  And that's why I think Navy has an inherent advantage in college football by being an independent.

Arizona at New England: The Curse of Cold Weather

This past weekend New England hosted the Arizona Cardinals.  A summation of the conditions leading up to the game is this:

Arizona had locked up its playoff spot and could not gain a higher seed.

New England was still fighting for its playoff spot; this was a must-win game.

Arizona is a warm weather team playing in a snow storm.

Arizona is a West-coast team traveling to the East coast.  

It is also a southern team traveling to the north.  

New England is coached by Bill Belichick, one of the best game-planners in the league.

The Cardinals were being quarterbacked by Kirk Warner, a passer already game-planned against successfully in the Patriots first Super Bowl victory.  

The Patriots were favored by 4.5 points.

They lead 47-0 with five minutes remaining in the fourth quarter.  Final score 47-7.  

The Cardinals were trailing the previous week 28-0 at half time.  This is an NFC West team that is very weak, but in charge of an even weaker division.  So they are getting blown out and should continue to do so until the merciful end of their regular season.  

This was a really golden opportunity.  Too bad I missed out.  But there will be more opportunities.  

The Mike Singletary Era: Part II

Mike Singletary, the new coach of the 49ers, has been preaching effort. He wants his team to trust their teammates, play as hard as they can, and be ferocious.

And it has paid off. Since he took over, the 49ers are 3-3. Their record prior to his taking over was 2-5. And more importantly, two of their losses have been very close games, with San Francisco hanging in there until the last minute.

Another indicator of the effect of effort can be seen in San Francisco's performance relative to the spread. The spread, or betting line, is an indication of (essentially) a consensus on whether San Francisco will win or lose, and by how many points.

Prior to Singletary's takeover, which I'd call the "poor effort" era, a team demoralized by losing and a quarterback controversy, was 2-5 against the spread. There were high expectations for the team the year before, and this year they stumbled through the season.

After Singletary's takeover, the personnel remained the same, except for a quarterback switch. The difference was how much effort he was getting from his players. He is big, black, a former linebacker ( I think) who looks tough, talks tough, and was known for his intensity while he was in the league.

The team is now 5-2 against the spread.

5-2 is quite a good winning percentage. 71% to be exact. The 49ers are having a period of sustained superior effort. They are playing hard, getting results, and believing again. They also have a staff and coach that knows there is a lot of money and prestige to be made by signing a contract extension at the end of the season. So everyone is putting in a ton of effort to make sure everyone plays their heart out.

So among the factors contributing to this new effort are a new coach known for his intensity and the uncertainty of cuts or extensions at the end of the season.

The two questions are: can this uptake be anticipated? A coach with credibility both in the league at large and with the 49ers in general, and a team perhaps underperforming?

The second is: how long will this sustained superior effort last? What are the limits on a human's ability to have sustained superior effort? There are two games left in the regular season. Can San Francisco keep it up? Especially now that their next opponent is a repeat opponent they already played and beat upon during the new era? I would think they would have trouble getting up for the Rams like last time. But Singletary is a great motivator.

Interesting questions to ponder.

Interesting article on the sports economist

The dominance of southern football (all schools in the south) could be chalked up to superior local athletes (most people) or the warmer temperature (myself).  But the sports economist thinks its because of the fact that pro football teams were all in the north during the seventies and early eighties, so all the football infrastructure in the south was built up around college teams.  

And the large college teams are benefitting from the boosters, the money, the fans, and the infrastructure.  But with the proliferation of pro teams in the south and increase of college football teams in general, it is weakening the stranglehold that the major southern schools had on recruiting.

Urban Meyer, in the book Urban's Way, emphasizes the recruiting aspect of his program and how its success is built on having the best athletes on the field and making them work the hardest.  So if Florida's football program declines, it won't be without notice.  He'll keep recruiting the best athletes he can find.

But the real issue is prestige.  Can the major schools maintain their prestige?  Because that is their "economic moat" to use a Warren Buffet term. 

Following a blog

I'm having trouble figuring out how to follow blogs that aren't part of the "blogger" network.  

Specifically, I'd like to play closer attention to "http://www.thesportseconomist.com/" but can't seem to get it to work.  Lame.

Detecting Failure

Success has a thousand fathers.  Failure is a bastard.  

Thats what my Father tells me, often as a joke.  But it's true.  Success catches the eye, draws attention, gets analysed.  All the sports books I read are about successes.  

Where are the books about failures?  There are just as many losers as winners in every sport.  Maybe even more losers.  

Its more important for prediction and betting to detect failure.  After all, when two teams try as hard as they can, the result can be determined by the random bounce of a football, or the millimeter difference in a shot going in or out.  

But when one team gives up?  When one team has consigned themselves to defeat and doesn't care if they lose?  Then the result is guaranteed.  

What are the predictors of failure?  The body-language of failure?  The facial expression of a person who is waiting to retire, waiting to sign with another team, a person who wants to screw over their coach no matter the personal cost?

Those would be more valuable than focusing on when players are motivated.  Motivation is easy to see but relatively worthless if you follow winners.  After all, nearly all winners are motivated so there is no real advantage.  Its more important to find teams that have quit even though the season is half way done.  Players who are just ready to graduate and leave football for good.