POINT BLANK – August 15
Don’t Get “Bowled” Over
From past surveys and research it has been made clear what a lot of you will be doing this weekend – while watching some NFL pre-season games, and continuing your MLB action as the pennant races heat up, it will also be time to dig through the pre-season NFL and NCAA annuals, with kickoff less than two weeks away. But while you are sorting through that information, there are some danger zones.
You are going to read the phrase “sports mediaverse” often in this column, usually referring to how misconceptions get routinely presented. They are good for us in the long run, because publication gives a certain stamp of authority. And when something is falsely stamped, yet still finds its way into minds of some in the betting marketplace, opportunities are created. Here are a few of those potential pratfalls to watch for in your reading -
Bowls
There is some lazy journalism at play here. You are going to read often that so-and-so coach “has led his team to five straight bowls”, or that an improving team is “ready to get back into the bowl picture”. But in 2014, references to bowl appearances lack meaning. There were 70 teams playing in bowl games at the end of last season, and that means a significant tier of mediocrity was allowed in. In many instances, teams that had seasons that should be regarded as failures were still playing that 13th game. Tune it out.
Total Yardage Rankings
You will casually read that Team X was “28th in the NFL in pass defense”, or some similar reference. It is one of the biggest sins of the unsophisticated levels of that sports mediaverse, using total yardage counts as being meaningful. They are not, yet they get used so often in the references because they are easy for the writers, requiring little added research or thought.
Total yardage tables can be as much about frequency as quality. A good team can give up a lot of passing yards because they are often playing with the lead, and opponents are throwing much more. At the same time, a good team can have a weak run defense, but often face few running plays in the 4th quarter of games. A bad team can seemingly have a decent pass defense, because opponents do not have to throw much in the latter stages, etc. Get the picture?
As the season progresses there will be a lot of time spent here breaking down where the best performance categories are to be found, and they are going to revolve much more around per-play standards, than overall. Don’t allow the total yardage ratings to play much part in your thought processes.
Returning Starters
First, these tables are sloppy enough, since the definition of which player was a starter is vague. Was it the player that started the most games at a position? Was it the player that played the most snaps? If a projected starter was injured early, and only came back to play three games later in the season, does he get recognized as a starter, despite only part-time snap counts? If someone was a starter in 2012, and missed all of 2013 to injury but is healthy again, is he actually considered a returnee? As such, you see variances from magazine to magazine in terms of how many returning starters each team has.
Second is the fact that in an era in which NCAA plays per game have increased significantly, there are more players being used in the rotations. A player may not necessarily be in the starting lineup, but could still be on the field for 400 or more snaps in a season. Players who are not listed as starters for some teams will have actually been on the field more than those listed as returning starters for others.
There is no easy way around this one, except to not put too much weight into the base tables. But experience really does matter, so take the time to read between the lines in this category if you can, and particularly look for Seniors that are at the top of the depth charts, but not highlighted as returning starters. If there has not been a coaching change since they were recruited, many of these players are in their 5th season of playing the same system, and that accumulated knowledge can make them the equivalent of a returning starter once the games begin.
This is not meant to denigrade all of the products that are out there – some are actually quite good. The Lindy’s “boxed set” has been an annual purchase for a couple of decades, and takes you much deeper inside of the NCAA teams than the others (now if only they could add separate ACC and PAC 12 editions). There are also several on-line sites with detailed previews - just be careful with the way that some of the information is presented, so that you are not led off into the wrong directions. And if you want to take the right path from the start, the Football Outsiders Almanac is in a league of its own for the NFL, not falling at all into those silly stat modes (and with some helpful NCAA info as well).
In the sights, I:
Texas starter Nick Martinez is not a “stuff” guy – he gets neither K’s (4.5-per-9), nor ground-balls (32.4 percent), and walks too many batters (4.1-per-9). As such his 2-8/5.22 is a pretty fair assessment of his current abilities. He is not here on merit, having been rushed into the rotation far ahead of schedule because of Ranger injuries. But what happens when teams get a second chance to see how limited his arsenal is? It gets even worse - how about an 0-3/11.08 in three “second look” settings, with Texas losing those games by a combined 12 runs. Given the confidence Garrett Richards is showing on the road, a 7-2/1.91 generated by a lights-out ratio of 91 K vs. only 49 hits allowed, plus the fact that the Angels bring a rested bullpen, the early markets are selling the Run Line aspect of this matchup a bit short.
In the sights, II:
The comments from Jets DT Sheldon Richardson regarding this week’s trip to Cincinnati have gotten a fair amount of buzz. When reminded of the 49-9 pasting the Bengals dumped on his team last October he responded with - “We owe them one. We owe them one big time. That was pretty much the only team that dog-walked this defense like that.” Is there a genuine degree of motivation for New York? That is a rather fragile place to start a pre-season handicap, especially since starters like Richardson can likely leave their helmets in the locker room at halftime. But if there is indeed any added spark there might be a fit at +3.5 given the Cincinnati QB issues.
Andy Dalton’s night will likely end early in the second quarter. Then it gets iffy. With Jason Campbell and A. J. McCarron unavailable, and Matt Scott playing through a shoulder injury, Tyler Wilson, who has only been in camp for a week, is slated to take the bulk of the second-half snaps. Wilson was anything but impressive in getting cut early by the Titans, not even deemed worthy of being kept around for a series or two in their opening pre-season game.