Positional Storylines: Checking-in With the Eagles Halfway Through the Season

Original Post: November 2, 2018
By Eric Marturano

This summer, while we were reveling in the afterglow of the Eagles’ first ever Super Bowl win, we took a look at some of the positional storylines for the upcoming season. After four weeks, we checked-in again. Here’s where we’re at the season’s midpoint:

QB: Wentz

He’s Shaken Off the Rust, but Can He Return to MVP-Caliber? 

Since taking over in Week 3, Wentz has gone 3-3 with wins vs. Colts, at Giants, against Jaguars (London) and losses at Titans, vs. Vikings, and vs. Panthers.  In those 6 games, he’s steadily improved and has started to look like the guy we saw last year. Particularly, in the last 3 games (Jaguars, vs. Panthers, at Giants) he’s posted both high completion percentages (70%, 81%, 72%, respectively) and QB ratings (119.6, 119.6, 122.2). Other than the Giants blowout, Wentz has been in a lot of tight games this year and on the losing end of 3 of them. I’m tepid to say “he’s back” to where he was last year until he’s routinely leading the Eagles to 30+ pts of offense and comfortable win margins. Wentz is good right now – if he can return to being great the Eagles have a good a shot as anyone at the title.

RB

Frustrated and Hurt – Who Can Step Up?

With Jay Ajayi out for the year, Sproles still on the mend, and so-far lackluster performances from Clement and Smallwood, this unit is in trouble. Josh Adams has shown some promise in limited a sample (5.4 yards/carry avg. on 20 attempts), but it’s too early to tell if he will provide the needed boost to a middling Eagles rushing attack. While the Eagles favor the pass at about a 60%/40% split, they’ll need a reliable run game to sustain drives and keep defenses honest. With no move at the trade deadline, Sproles, Clement, Smallwood, and Adams are the guys we’re going with – so who will step up?

WR/TE

Ertz Taking Advantage and WELCOME GOLDEN TATE!

I mentioned at the four week mark that the return of Alshon Jeffery has opened up the rest of the field for all other WRs and TEs on the team. Nobody has benefited more than Zach Ertz, who is not-so-quietly putting up one of the best seasons ever for a TE. Add in former Pro-Bowler Golden Tate and Wentz has one of the best fleets of pass-catchers in the league. I shudder for defenses trying to defend Jeffery at WR1, Tate in the slot, Ertz up the seam, and Agholor down the sidelines and am looking forward to see what Wentz can do with this talented group.

OL/DL

The Pain of Injury, the Value of Depth

Every season in the NFL is a war of attrition as teams pile up injuries in key spots. The best way to preempt the inevitable is to have a stocked cupboard. The Eagles are well-prepared to combat injury on the defensive line, but a little less-so on the offensive line. With Lane Johnson set to be out for several weeks (and possibly the year) with an MCL sprain and Jason Peters continuing to be on-and-off the field with various injuries, immense pressure falls on Halapoulivaati Vaitai, Issac Seumalo, and Stefen Wisniewski to pick up the slack. On the defensive side, the Eagles are better prepared for the loss of Derek Barnett – Michael Bennett has continued to play well, Haloti Ngata is back, and the Eagles are rumored to be reaching out to Timmy Jernigan to further bolster a unit that already boasts Fletcher Cox, Brandon Graham, and Chris Long.

LB

More Blitzing on the Horizon?

This observation is more Jacksonville-specific, but I loved the blitzing strategies that utilized Bradham and Hicks a lot this past week to help force one-on-one match-ups for our pass rushers against a bad QB. Fran Duffy has a nice breakdown on Twitter of how this higher risk strategy can yield rewarding results. With two games against Dak Prescott and one game against Eli Manning left in the season, I’m curious to see how aggressive Jim Schwartz will be with the blitz – especially as the secondary continues to struggle.

DB

Still the Weak Link

The Eagles are currently 27th in the league against the pass, which has been perhaps the largest limiting factor for the team this year. A shotty secondary can be a nightmare for a fan, as it’s hard to trust that the team will win if they don’t hang 30 pts on their opponent and provide some room for what feels like inevitable defensive errors. Avonte Maddox has shown some promise at safety, but it will be crucial for Jalen Mills, Ronald Darby, Malcolm Jenkins, Corey Graham, Dexter McDougle and Sidney Jones to continue to tighten their play up to take pressure off of the offense.

Special Teams

Missing Darren Sproles

The Eagles are in the bottom half of the league for kick returns and the bottom third for punt returns. More importantly, they have yet to score a return touchdown. Sproles has been mentioned as “day-to-day” with hamstring woes for a while, but Coach Pederson seems to believe he’ll hit the field again sometime this year. It can’t come soon enough for a struggling return game.

“No one likes us. We don’t care.”

At the mid-way point, Jason Kelce’s iconic rendition of this song comes to mind. At 4-4 and with five division games left, the Eagles control their own destiny. I like them to win the division at 10-6 and, if this talented group can gel and either 1) tighten up on defense or 2) consistently score enough points to where that won’t matter, they have a shot at another Super Bowl. Not many people like the Eagles to repeat at this point – but we don’t care.

Views from 116: 2018-19 Home Opener

Original Post: October 19, 2018By Eric Marturano

Well, the season is finally underway! Hard to believe we’re here…welcome to Views from 116. In case you forgot, this column is a perspective from the stands for the fans. Let’s get to it.

Sixers vs. Bulls – Thursday, October 18, 2018

Last night was the 2018-2019 season home-opener.

Pregame:

Trying to shake off the stark reality-check from the Celtics on Tuesday, I made my way down to The Center for last night’s tip-off at 8pm – an hour later than usual due to the primetime national TV matchup with the Chicago Bulls (who stink but play in a big market).

My section (116) is right in front of the Care Auto Insurance Bar, so that’s where I tend to enter. The bar is always hoppin’ and even more so when the game tips-off late…but for the home opener? The buzz was nearly PLAYOFF-level and the concourse was super-populated. People clearly bought tickets way ahead of time – it was a far-cry from the home opener two seasons ago when some goofus fan flipped off Russell Westbrook.

Free shirts light up the stadium

The pregame buzz in the stadium in stands was around one player and one player only: Markelle Fultz. I heard comments all over the map – from along the lines of “what’s Fultz’s rope?” to “why can’t he just shoot?” to “they need to play him as many minutes as possible” to the ever-optimistic “listen buddy, we already got a third star.”

Fans in attendance were lucky enough to get some free shirts, which lined the seats.

There was your typical weirdness in pregame, with one ref stretching in a very strange fashion and Sixers Mascot Franklin playing some sort of hangman flipchart game with Robin Lopez while mercilessly taunting the Chicago big man.

Ron Brooks belts out another stellar anthem.

By the time of the anthem, it was a packed house – and the masses were rewarded with Sixers fan-favorite Ron Brooks for the anthem. Meek Mill rang the bell, Embiid addressed the crowd, and Sixers in-arena announcer Matt Cord got some well deserved camera time.

First Quarter:

As soon as Markelle Fultz caught the ball on the 1st possession, everyone in the building was screaming for him to shoot. He was certainly open, but this was a trend throughout the whole quarter anytime Markelle touched the ball -“SHOOOOOOOT IIIITTT!!” I’m very curious to see how much patience our fanbase will have with his development. The Sixers ended the quarter down 38-41.

Other 1st quarter observations:

• Our defense looked good on possessions but somehow gave up 41 points. I’m not sure the Bulls missed.
• The Sixers Stixers drumline put on a nice show halfway through the 1st quarter – drumlines should be at more sporting events.
• I got on a rare 1st quarter Carlton Cam – I’m 1 for 1 on the season.
• As many threes as Robert Covington can miss, I think he almost always hits the 2nd chance three on the same possession – as some say, Cov is always better the second time around.
• The Chick-Fil-A Challenge (make a layup, free throw, and three pointer in 1 min) participant was an able-bodied bro who just couldn’t sniff the basket from three. I mean these shots were EMBARRASSINGLY short. Accordingly, this bum was booed.

  
  “YARRRRGH I GOT YUENGLINGGG”

• ShopRite had a promising “Price is Right” promotion, but the fan contestant lost due to the fact that ShopRite’s price was consistently higher for whatever item the contestant was guessing for. I now believe that all ShopRite prices are too high.
• There’s a pirate man (complete with fake parrot on shoulder and fake pirate voice) who sells beer in my section – I just wanted to share this with you.

Second Quarter:

This was a nice quarter from #OurGuys. JJ Redick had a four-point play, Landry Shamet looked good, and most importantly – the Cov, Fultz, Simmons, Embiid, and Redick lineup got long minutes together. I was intrigued by this lineup possibility when scrolling through the roster, and they seemed to play well together. I’m hoping that the Sixers are able to continue testing out different strategies with Fultz on the floor, particularly against bad teams like the Bulls. The Sixers ended the half up 65-58.

Halftime:

Speed-painter David Garibaldi is all about the Benjamins

The halftime show was a speed painter named David Garibaldi. He’s done Sixers’ games before, but I was surprised to see him at the home opener. He threw on some fun music and speed-painted the Benjamin Franklin Sixers logo in just a few minutes. Speed painting is a solid halftime activity – it’s not super-high energy so you can chat or get up from your seat, but it’s also entertaining enough to hold your interest. I hope one day to develop advanced metrics on professional basketball halftime shows, but for now I’ll settle for the eye-test.

Third Quarter:

Robert Covington found his 3pt stroke this quarter and, let me tell you – when Cov is hitting his threes, the Sixers are gonna win. We also caught a nice stretch of our “old starters” from last year – which happened to be the best 5-man unit in the league! I hope Brett Brown continues to utilize this lineup while also developing talent (read: Fultz) during games against bad teams. The Sixers broke away here, ending the quarter 102-76.

Other 3rd quarter observations:

• There was a hotly contested game of musical chairs, which is really one of the best ongoing break entertainment gags in the stadium. As always, people forget to box out and it costs them!
• When the Sixers play nationally, there are slightly longer TV breaks, which provides ample time to make a speed run to the bathroom. I did this twice during the game and both times didn’t miss any game action. Not all heroes wear capes.
• Throughout the night more than one person in my section was eyeing up #2 on the Bulls wondering who it was…in the third quarter one wondering fan realized loudly it was Jabari Parker, which…well…doesn’t say a whole lot about the state of Jabari Parker’s career.
• Robert Covington is my favorite Sixer, but I recognize he is also a very polarizing Sixer. He sort of reminds me of Asante Samuel in that when he’s good, people notice, but when he’s bad people, seem to notice a lot more. I’m still work-shopping this take, so bear with me.
• Landry Shamet hit a few threes this quarter and I’m very much thinking about doing a SHAM WOW gimmick at some point this season.

Fourth Quarter:

Since the Sixers blew the game open in the 3rd quarter, the final quarter was mostly garbage time. Fultz stepped into a 3 which brought the house down

This fan nailed the Dario dance

and prompted many “FULTZ” claps. Dario not only starred in a fun 76ers Showdown Jumbo-tron dance-off, but found a bit of rhythm on the court from 3, and to top everything off, the Sixers popped the Kork(maz). The only thing that irked me was Embiid staying in the game a bit too long, despite it being very nice to see both him and Simmons get a curtain call with a 30 pointt double-double and a triple double, respectively. All in all, a solid night taking care of business at home against a bad team.

Sixers WIN 127-108. Say it with me: “Fresh water. $1 pretzels.”

Next time I’m in 116, I’ll share some more views. Until then: 1-2-3-4-5-Sixers!

NBA Win Totals: 2018-2019 predictions for every team

Original Post: October 5, 2018
by Eric Marturano

A few years back, one my pals and podcast partner Mike Pizza and I began posting our NBA Win Totals on Twitter. We did this because we pretend to know a whole lot about the league and also because it’s really fun.

However, now that legal sports betting is only a quick drive down the Atlantic City Expressway for me, I can finally put my money where my mouth is. This past weekend, I bet on 26 teams at Bally’s Wild Wild West Sportsbook in Atlantic City. I would have bet on all 30, but four – the Miami Heat, Minnesota Timberwolves, Oklahoma City Thunder, and Phoenix Suns – were pulled from the books for various reasons (Jimmy Butler trade rumors, Russell Westbrook minor surgeries, etc.). While I’m planning on making a trip down next month to get some action on those teams, I still had to set win totals for each of them now, since it was needed for both the benefit of my entire system and also because if I’m doing this thing….well, I’m DOING this thing. If you’re curious about the not-so-complex system I use to set win totals, feel free to @ me on Twitter (@TheEMart).

Without further ado, let’s get to the picks and hopefully make some money. Note that all bets were made at -115, so there were no added benefits to taking one side or another:

Eastern Conference

15. Atlanta Hawks – 19 wins (UNDER 24.5) – $50 to win $93.48

Tweet-length rationale: There is no win-total low enough for Trae Young’s shot selection crossed with your best player being Kent Bazemore. Shout out to the still-employed Vince Carter.

14. Orlando Magic – 23 wins (UNDER 30.5) – $50 to win $93.48

Tweet-length rationale: Bamba No. 5, Jonathan Issac, and Aaron Gordon might end up being fun to watch, but this directionless team feels prime for trades.

13. Chicago Bulls – 25 wins (UNDER 30.5) – $50 to win $93.48

Tweet-length rationale: You can Markkanen da Bulls down for another disappointing year.

12. Cleveland Cavaliers  – 28 wins (UNDER 30.5) – $20 to win $37.39

Tweet-length rationale: How many wins is LeBron worth in 2018? 22 seems low, but here we are. Even though they won 50 games last year, this team will be lucky to get 30 this season.

11. Brooklyn Nets – 30 wins (UNDER 31.5) – $10 to win $18.70

Tweet-length rationale: A who’s who of who the hell is that, the Nets are going nowhere fast.

10. Charlotte Hornets – 33 wins (UNDER 35.5) – $20 to win $37.39

Tweet-length rationale: Predictably stinky, the Hornets have had exactly 36 wins the last 2 years. I think they’ll be a little worse this year.

9. New York Knicks – 34 wins (OVER 29) – $50 to win $93.48

Tweet-length rationale: This is a fun team, and I believe in Kevin Knox. If they get anything out of KP, they should bank some wins in the terrible East. I also fully expect to lose this money because James Dolan is involved.

8. Detroit Pistons – 41 wins (OVER 38) – $30 to win $56.09

Tweet-length rationale: The anti-Process, middling bastion of mediocrity should make the 8th by default in a weak East with Dwane Casey at the helm.

7. Milwaukee Bucks – 44 wins (UNDER 48) – $40 to win $74.78

Tweet-length rationale: Too many people love this team to make another leap in a weak East. I’m going the other way – I don’t believe in Giannis or new coach Mike Budenholzer.

6. Miami Heat – 45 wins – BET PULLED BY BOOK

Tweet-length rationale: A well-coached rec league team that plays with pride. Even if they can’t wrangle Jimmy Butler, they’ll be an interesting lower-half playoff team.

5. Washington Wizards – 48 wins (OVER 44.5) – $30 to win $56.09

Tweet-length rationale: This hot-mess of a roster is crazy….so crazy it just might work.

4. Toronto Raptors – 50 wins (UNDER 55) – $50 to win $93.48

Tweet-length rationale: Growing pains with a new coach and big question marks surrounding Kawhi’s health, motivation, and fit are my reasons to slam the under here.

3. Indiana Pacers – 53 wins (OVER 47.5) – $50 to win $93.48

Tweet-length rationale: Absolutely love the addition of Tyreke Evans to a team that was trending upward under the leadership of Victor Oladipo. I would not want to face this team in the playoffs.

2. Philadelphia 76ers – 57 wins (OVER 54.5) – $20 to win $37.39

Tweet-length rationale: #RunItBackWithUs SZN approaches – with improved Simmons, Embiid, and Fultz leading the charge. Sky’s the limit, baby!

1. Boston Celtics – 59 wins (OVER 58.5) – $10 to win $18.70

Tweet-length rationale: This group of bums should clean up in a weak East. Even I’m excited for Jason Tatum’s second year of being only 19, now with gym-rat Gordan Hayward and sneaky-good Kyrie Irving. Here’s to a locker room implosion!

Western Conference

15. Sacramento Kings – 22 wins (UNDER 26) – $40 to win $74.78

Tweet-length rationale: The Sacramento Kings – where the whole is somehow consistently less than the sum of its parts.

14. Phoenix Suns – 26 wins – BET PULLED BY BOOK

Tweet-length rationale: The Suns will be a fun League Pass team. They’ll also play in the loaded West. If they can land Jimmy Butler without giving up too much, they’ll be intriguing…but for now, they’ll stink.

13. Dallas Mavericks – 33 wins (UNDER 35) – $20 to win $37.39

Tweet-length rationale: Doncic will be fun, but this team will have growing pains in a rough conference. Take the over at your own risk.

12. Los Angeles Clippers – 33 wins (UNDER 37.5) – $40 to win $74.78

Tweet-length rationale: Everyone on this team is either too old, inevitably hurt, or both. Doc Rivers ain’t it. The development of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is about the only thing to be excited about.

11. Memphis Grizzlies – 35 wins (OVER 33.5) – $10 to win $18.70

Tweet-length rationale: This line seems a bit too low for a team led by vets Marc Gasol and Mike Conley, infused with the youth & talent of Jaren Jackson. Barring injury, I think they’ll clean up against the bad teams in the league.

10. New Orleans Pelicans – 41 wins (UNDER 45.5) – $40 to win $74.77

Tweet-length rationale: 45.5 wins is a little high for a team that will likely miss the playoffs in a highly competitive West. Take the under.

9. Minnesota Timberwolves – 42 wins – BET PULLED BY BOOK

Tweet-length rationale: I was low on this team even before the Jimmy Butler trade request because I don’t trust Thibs in the NBA in 2018. Maybe moving him will change things, but I’m not optimistic.

8. Portland Trail Blazers – 45 wins (OVER 42) – $30 to win $56.09

Tweet-length rationale: Rip City benefits from stability – while the rest of the West has changed, they’re about the same team that won 49 in a tough conference last year. More importantly, their cohesion allows them opportunity to steal games from talented but newly formed teams. 45 wins seems right.

7. San Antonio Spurs – 46 wins (OVER 45) – $10 to win $18.70

Tweet-length rationale: In getting nothing out of Kawhi last year, this well-coached team essentially swapped Danny Green for DeMar DeRozan. I think they squeak the over –  the competition is better but so are they.

6. Denver Nuggets – 46 wins (UNDER 47) – $10 to win $18.70

Tweet-length rationale: Jokic is fun, but I don’t see this team out-faring others in the a difficult conference. They might not get anything out of Michael Porter Jr. Also…who is Paul Millsap?

5. Oklahoma City Thunder – 51 wins – BET PULLED BY BOOK

Tweet-length rationale: There is a lot to like about OKC, or “Sixers West” as I like to call them, due to the additions of Nerlens Noel & Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot to a team that already employed Jerami Grant. Russ & PG13 are hungry and should compete, even in a loaded West, barring injury.

4. Los Angeles Lakers – 52 wins (OVER 48.5) – $30 to win $56.09

Tweet-length rationale: In my opinion, it is free money to bet that a team with LeBron James on it will win at least 50 games.

3. Houston Rockets – 53 wins (UNDER 55.5) – $20 to win $37.39

Tweet-length rationale: I think they got worse, and their window was last year. Additionally, there is dumpster-fire potential in the locker-room if things with Melo go south. The under feels right.

2. Utah Jazz – 55 wins (OVER 49.5) – $50 to win $93.48

Tweet-length rationale: Barring injury, the Jazz are a mortal lock for winning more than 50 games. Bet accordingly.

1. Golden State Warriors – 61 wins (UNDER 63) – $20 to win $37.39

Tweet-length rationale: This team should never lose. But they do. My guess is the 73 win chase isn’t worth it (and also, it didn’t work out, if you recall). A shade over 60 wins feels right.

So that’s it! Those are my picks. Now all that’s left is for the 2018-2019 season to get underway. Let’s go Sixers, baby!

Positional Storylines: Checking-in with the Eagles after Four Weeks

Original Post: October 2, 2018By Eric Marturano

This summer, while we were reveling in the afterglow of the Eagles’ first ever Super Bowl win, we took a look at some of the positional storylines for the upcoming season. After four weeks, here’s where we are with the 2-2 Philadelphia Eagles:

QB: Thanks Nick, but Carson Wentz is back.

After holding down the fort adequately for two weeks, Nick Foles took a seat in Week 3 and Carson Wentz took over vs. the Colts. Wentz shook off the rust and escaped the Colts game with a win despite 2 turnovers. Against the Titans in Week 4, Wentz was still shaking off some rust but looked better – largely thanks to the return of stud wideout Alshon Jeffery. Although he has yet to return to his dominant self, QB is clearly Wentz’s job to lose – although it is nice to know in the event of an injury that evidence exists that Nick Foles can have success with a healthy WR corp. Each QB is 1-1 through Week 4.

RB: Inconsistency limits an at-times promising squad

The law-firm of Ajayi, Clement, Sproles, and Smallwood have had flashes of brilliance but have yet to dominate. Separately, nobody has really stood out – Jay Ajayi is nowhere near his extremely productive 5.8 yards/carry last year, Clement and Smallwood have been explosive at times but have had trouble holding onto the ball, and Sproles is unfortunately injured again. My hope is that this unit finds some consistency in the coming weeks.

WR/TE: This unit goes where a healthy Jeffery takes them

After lackluster performances in the first three weeks of the season, the receiving corp took on new life with Alshon Jeffery in the fold during Week 4’s tilt with Tennessee. As the clear number one option, Jeffery’s size and speed opens up the rest of the field for Ertz, Agholor, and everyone else. Although the game resulted in a loss, a healthy Jeffery bodes well for the success of this unit as Carson Wentz rounds back into form.

OL: Jason Peters’ health woes continue

While Jason Peters hasn’t missed a game in its entirety, he’s been on-and-off the field a lot these past four weeks and something is clearly affecting him. While the rest of the unit maintains, Peters may have to sit and get healthy from whatever injuries are hampering him while Halapoulivaati Vaitai or Jordan Mailata step in for more stable reps. It’s understandable that the veteran and locker room leader wants to be in the fold in the title defense run after missing all of last year, but we may be at the point where it’s hurting both him and the team. Time will tell – hopefully we see Jason Peters hoist the Lombardi trophy at the end of this season.

DL: The best ability is reliability

The Eagles’ pass rush and run defense has been consistently strong and their saving grace on a defense that is struggling to cover the pass in the secondary. As hoped, Michael Bennett and Haloti Ngata have been excellent support for an already dominant group of Fletcher Cox, Brandon Graham, Chris Long, and Derek Barnett.

LB: Stay healthy, stay strong

Bradham and Hicks have been solid against the run, although pass coverage in general has been a weak spot for the Eagles. If they can remain healthy, this unit should continue to succeed in supporting the efforts of a dominant defensive line and a struggling secondary.

DB: Where’s the coverage?

As if Week 2’s exposition against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers wasn’t bad enough, Week 4 against the Titans was horrendous. Something needs to change with this unit and fast – whether that’s personnel, strategy, or overall execution is up to the wisdom of defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz. Missed tackles and blown coverage by Jalen Mills, Ronald Darby, Malcolm Jenkins, Corey Graham, and Sidney Jones have marked many of the low-lights of the first few weeks.

Special Teams: Aussie RULES

P Cameron Johnston has been fantastic, currently averaging 51.5 yards/punt and consistently bailing the Eagles out of tight spots when the offense sputters. Any concern in losing the beloved Donnie Jones has been assuaged.

“It’s the whole team.”
As the season moves forward, I can’t help but think back on Jason Kelce’s emphatic statement that a championship run takes “the whole team”. That means each one of these positions, some of which are struggling more than others, matters. The most pressing issue for the Eagles early on is their secondary – if they can’t figure that out, then they’ll be hard pressed to repeat the success of last season.

Testing the “3 Field Goal Theory”

Original Post: August 10, 2018by Eric Marturano

I’m not sure when it started, but it was definitely under Andy Reid.

The Eagles lost 16-17…or maybe it was 23-24. It probably wasn’t 9-10…but who knows, it could have been that too. Anyway, they lost and they kicked 3 field goals – that much I do know. I know this because I remember sarcastically lamenting to my Dad, “Hey, well at least we got down the field 3 whole times and have 9 to show for it!” during what was surely a losing effort. Since that undefined moment in time, “The 3 Field Goal Theory” was born.

Nowadays, my family and friends will text me when there is “3 Field Goal Game” in play. It feels like these games are (almost) always losses for the team with 3 Field Goals. Could there be something to this “3 Field Goal Theory?”

Before going any further, I should probably explain in more detail – “The 3 Field Goal Theory” can be described as follows:

“If you kick 3 field goals, you’re probably gonna lose”.

This theory rests on the following, semi-related premises:

1. Kicking field goals is often the result of stalled drives.
2. If you’ve kicked 3 field goals, you’ve probably stalled too many drives that were otherwise prime scoring opportunities – and in a 60 minute game where sustained drives can sometimes last up to 10 minutes, this can be the kiss of death.
3. If you converted all 3 of your field goal attempts (and thus have 9 points to show for it), you remain vulnerable to coming out down 1 point from that advantage in just two opposing scoring drives (TD + extra point + field goal = 10 points…which is 1 more than 9; the power of math, I know). Anybody who has ever settled for multiple field goals in a game of Madden (couldn’t be me!) knows this all too well.

So after years of having this goofy “3 Field Goal Theory” in my life, I wanted to know…does this theory, born out of the frustration that could only be induced by one Andy Reid, actually hold up against any sort of objective test?

As I quickly found out in my research, this is not an easy question to answer, at least with publicly available data. Not having the capital (or the trust, quite frankly) to pay for football data sets others may have compiled, I decided to take a few different routes in pursuit of some semblance of an answer. What follows is a journal of nerdy madness – please keep all hands and protractors inside the vehicle at all times as we proceed through the unhinged thought processes that occurred as I investigated this theory. If you black out halfway through, feel free to skip to the end; I won’t be entirely offended:

• First, I started with running a simple correlation between wins and field goal attempts per game from the 2015, 2016, and 2017 seasons (n=96; 3 seasons of 32 teams). I found it funny that in 2017, Andy Reid’s Kansas City Chiefs led the league in field goal attempts per game with nearly 3 (2.81 to be exact). Who better than Father Time himself to give me hope that I was onto something? (Data was pulled from our good friends over at ESPN.com)
• The correlation between wins and field goal attempts per game from these 3 years was a weak positive correlation (0.31), suggesting that 3 field goal attempts isn’t indicative in-and-of-itself towards losing a game. In fact, kicking three field goals seems to actually help, if only a little bit. This makes sense intuitively: more points is always better, and 3 points is better than the 0 points you didn’t have a moment ago. It should come as no surprise that more points generally means a higher likelihood of winning. To quote one of my high school defensive coordinators – “If they don’t score, they don’t win.”
• However, mere correlations don’t factor in the situation, or opportunity cost, of kicking a field goal – a key element to the “3 Field Goal Theory.” Touchdowns are worth more than twice as much as field goals (after accounting for the extra point), and there are limited chances to get them throughout a game. Through this lens, every field goal kicked potentially represents 4 (or 5) points left on the board. In other words, a gain of 3 points is nice…but a gain of 7 (or 8) is much nicer. Each possession not ending in a touchdown, thus, leaves the team that is failing to reach paydirt further and further exposed to their opponent as the clock marches towards 0:00.
• Brainstorming ways that I could begin to test this notion, I next attempted to manually construct a data set that would allow me to incrementally examine the potentially diminishing returns of kicking 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5+ field goals during the course of a game. I believe there must be a point of diminishing returns for attempting field goals, and I have a hunch that it’s around 3. After all, if an opponent plays its cards right, it can make up the 15 points from 5 made field goals in just two trips down the field. There is a reason teams don’t kick field goals until 4th down.
• Unfortunately, as I combed through and began to assemble various online data by-hand to answer this unorthodox question, I realized it would be a data set that would take multiple months to construct the right way. I’m impatient, so I elected to shift instead to general regression analysis regarding field goal attempts per game and their relationship with Wins.
• To build this dataset, I scraped two websites for 2015-2016 NFL regular season data: NFLSavant.com and ESPN.com. NFLSavant.com provided me with 2015 and 2016 season play-by-play data and ESPN.com was able to give me 2015 and 2016 final regular season standings, team offense, defense, and kicking data. This data was then copied, pasted, and formatted into columns in Microsoft Excel.
• Next, I further formatted the data that I had gathered from the web by using the pivot table feature in Microsoft Excel to more easily manipulate the data. My end result was an Excel database of two seasons worth of NFL play-by-play data that was ready for regression analysis.
• I used the correlation and regression analyses features in JMP Pro 13 (a very useful tool for those looking to dabble!) to quickly analyze my data. In total, 64 unique data points (32 teams x 2 years) were assessed.
• After loading my data into JMP, I ran multivariate correlations of each variable on others, looking for relevant correlations with wins.
  • One thing that shocked me was how little correlation any of these metrics had with Wins, let alone my metric of interest (FGA; 0.0634). It wasn’t like I skimped on metrics either – take a look at how expansive just this small section of my correlation table was. I checked everything from well known metrics to more detailed ones. The unique team dynamics of football are on full display here – no one aspect of the game is too heavily responsible for a win:

    
    

    The joys of JMP Pro 13

  • The measures that were most correlated with Wins were OFFPTS (Offensive Points…shocker, I know), XPM (Extra Points Made, which essentially serves as a proxy for touchdowns), and %4thIsRush (meaning the % of 4th down plays that are running plays). While these metrics were the most correlated with Wins, they only fell into the “weak positive” 0.25 to 0.37 range.
    • Another minor observation came from this analysis: when I compared tendencies of how playoff/non-playoff teams behave on a down-by-down basis, I found that they behave essentially identical, except for 4th down – where I found that teams that made the playoff teams were 5% more likely to run on 4th down than pass.
  • Finally, I was ready to explore the relationship between FGA and Wins using regression analyses. After much trial and error, I settled on the following 5 models, which collectively paint a similar picture:
    • Model 1 (Adj. R^2 = 0.22; FGA p=0.0545):
      Win = 14.149 + 0.125 FGA + 0.278 XPA – 0.004 OFFYDS
    • Model 2 (Adj. R^2 = 0.25; FGA p=0.0962):
      Win = 12.465 + 0.106 FGA + 0.258 XPA – 0.003 OFFYDS + 4.809 %4thIsRush
    • Model 3 (Adj. R^2 = 0.26; FGM p=0.0253):
      Win = 14.704 + 0.152 FGM + 0.275 XPM – 0.003 OFFYDS
    • Model 4 (Adj. R^2 = 0.29; FGM p=0.0380):
      Win = 13.019 + 0.138 FGM + 0.267 XPM – 0.004 OFFYDS + 4.866 %4thIsRush
    • Model 5 (Adj. R^2 = 0.21; FGA p=0.0676):
      Win = 13.940 + 1.89 FGA/G + 4.17 XPA/G – 0.05 OFFYDS/G
  • Not surprisingly, in the models above, Wins were better explained by FGM and XPM (made attempts) than FGA and XPA (attempts, regardless of make or miss). Again, having points is better than not having them.
  • It should also come as no surprise that each regression model also showed that an Extra-Point Attempt (XPA) is worth a little more than 2 FGAs (2.1), all things equal.
  • So what do those equations mean in English? I’ll use Model 5 as an example, which would translate to this finding:
    “We can reasonably expect each additional FGA per Game to result in an additional 1.89 Wins on the season.”
    • Note: Models 1-4 need to be interpreted at the season total level (i.e., for Model 3, each additional FGM results in 0.152 more wins on the season). It’s also important to remember regular season wins are capped at 16.
• Some more findings:
  • In most of my models, FGA hovered right around the 5% level, with Model 2 being the highest at p=0.0962 (i.e., significant at the 90% confidence interval) and Model 1 being the lowest at p=0.0545 (i.e., significant at about the 95% confidence interval). I took this to mean there was a weak impact of FGA on Wins, especially since my Adj. R^2 were fairly low for each model.
  • I found that including some form of OFFYDS helped control for a team’s ability to move the ball. Oddly enough, my coefficients for any iteration of this these were very, very small negative numbers. This further indicated to me that I should view OFFYDS as simply a way to remove or “hold out” a team’s ability to move the ball from the regression analysis.
    • Moreover, according to one of my “3 Field Goal Theory” premises, this finding provides some evidence that the disadvantageous point value of 9 (3 field goals) might carry more relative weight than the drawback of settling for a field goal on a stalled drive. While further study is needed, I found it to be an interesting finding even in a general analysis.
  • Another thing to note was the choice to include the %4thIsRush variable and its large coefficient of about 4.8 in Models 2 and 4. The interpretation here is that for every 1% increase in 4th down rushing tendencies, a team can expect 0.048 more wins. That means that about a 20% change in 4th down strategy should account for 1 extra win per season. I’m not sure this would exactly hold in reality, but it provides food for thought and future studies regarding run/pass tendencies in certain situations. Coaches who like to gamble on 4th down – like our very own Doug Pederson – would probably be pleased to know this sort of thing.
  • The overarching result of these regressions is that FGA has a fairly weak impact on a team’s likelihood to win.
    • Unfortunately, none of my models had an Adj. R^2 above 0.30 (which isn’t great to begin with). Given the right data set and the ability to bucket the data into my aforementioned categories of field goal attempt interest, perhaps I would have found something a bit more clear.
    • Regardless, the results of this general inquiry imply that the number of FGAs has little impact on if a team wins or not.

Are you still with me? Or did you black out from the joys of analysis? I hope you found that as fun as I did!

I’ll let my final word on “The 3 Field Goal Theory” be this: It was a theory that was born out of frustration with Andy Reid’s pace of play and is a theory that is a lot of fun to follow live, if only for the jokes when your friend’s favorite team attempts that 3rd field goal. The results of my various tests are inconclusive to me – there is some evidence both for and against this theory becoming a law. While this all began with Andy Reid, perhaps another Eagles coach – Doug Pederson – provided me with some even more compelling data to chew on: The Eagles won the Super Bowl on February 4th, 2018. Jake Elliot was 3/3 on Field Goals Attempts. Stephen Gostkowski? Well, he was only 2/3 that day. I guess when both teams have 3 Field Goal Attempts, the one that makes them wins. It also helps to have a quarterback that can catch – I’ll let you know if I find any more data on that topic some other time. Until then, enjoy the “The 3 Field Goal Theory” and feel free to argue with me on Twitter (@TheEMart) about it anytime a 3 Field Goal Game is in play. Go Birds.