3Jack's Pre-Training Camp 2010 NFL Predictions

[Richie3Jack]

Here’s my pre-training camp 2010 predictions.

AFC EAST

New England 11-5
NY Jets 10-6
Miami 8-8
Buffalo 4-12


AFC NORTH

Baltimore 11-5
Cincinnati 8-8
Pittsburgh 8-8
Cleveland 5-11


AFC SOUTH

Houston 10-6
Indianapolis 10-6
Tennessee 9-7
Jacksonville 7-9


AFC WEST

Kansas City 10-6
San Diego 10-6
Denver 7-9
Oakland 6-10


NFC EAST

Dallas 11-5
Philadelphia 9-7
NY Giants 9-7
Washington 7-9


NFC NORTH

Green Bay 12-4
Minnesota 9-7
Chicago 8-8
Detroit 4-12


NFC SOUTH

Atlanta 11-5
New Orleans 10-6
Carolina 7-9
Tampa Bay 6-10


NFC WEST

San Francisco 10-6
Seattle 10-6
Arizona 7-9
St. Louis 3-13




3JACK

[secondary]

I like the effort Richie, but your NFC North is looking a little wack. Granted I am a Bear Fan for life, but I think you have the Packers and the Vikes switched? Plus I will take the under on the J-E-T-S wins. Overrated........

[gmbtempe]

Bears suck!

Hey Richie has my Lions doubling their win total from last year! So I got that going for me this year.

[Richie3Jack]

One of the things we’ll go into when the season gets going is the statistic I came up with called ‘QB Rating Differential’ (aka QBRD).

Basically you take a team’s QB Rating on offense and subtract the QB Rating Allowed on defense. The correlation between QBRD and winning/losing in the NFL is extremely strong. In other words, the higher the QBRD, the more you’re likely to win in the NFL. The lower the QBRD, the more likely you’re going to lose in the NFL.

With the college game, I feel that it’s similar, but not as big of an impact since there’s more running involved in the NCAA and there often is such a wide margin in the level of talent between teams (part of the reason why I’m not the biggest NCAA fan).

If I was an owner or a GM, I would try to focus my efforts on the positions that directly effect QBRD first, then the others last. Soooo…Quarterback would be my primary concern, probably followed by pass rushers (DE or 3-4 OLB’s), then offensive tackles, corners and receivers, followed by safeties and RB’s. And so on and so forth. Of course, I believe that you build your team thru the draft, not FA…as the Redskins have never quite learned. And since I believe that you’re better off drafting the best player available, sometimes I can see why a team may draft a defensive tackle that’s a great prospect over a need at say left tackle that just isn’t worth being selected at that point in the draft.

One of the other things I found awhile ago is from 2000-2007, each season saw an average of 4 of the 12 playoff teams being teams that had a losing record the year before. The past couple of seasons that has changed as in 2008 & 2009, they only had 2 of their playoff teams have that losing record. The main reason being is in those previous seasons, there were not a lot of teams with losing records.

In 2000-2006, the league would average about 13-16 losing teams each year. 2009 was another year with a low amount of losing records as only 12 teams had a losing record. So with that, my analysis predicts that of the 12 playoff teams, 2-3 of them will be teams with a losing record. Those losing teams from 2009 were:

Miami
Buffalo
Cleveland
Jacksonville
Oakland
KC
Washington
Chicago
Detroit
Tampa Bay
Seattle
St. Louis

The common thread for those teams that make the jump from a losing record to the playoffs the next year is usually a QB that is at the very least a solid, veteran QB. The other factor tends to be a successful coach…particularly a coach that has had success with the team before.

Last year the teams that made the jump were Cincinnati (Carson Palmer and Marvin Lewis) and Green Bay (Rodgers and McCarthy).

This year, at this moment, I’ve got the Chiefs and the Seahawks making the jump. I hate the Redskins, but they certainly fit the profile of a team that makes the jump. Problem is that they play in a tough division. The Chiefs have Cassel, who I would consider ‘decent.’ The Seahawks have Hasselbeck and Pete Carroll. Both play in weak divisions.

As far as the NFC North goes. McCarthy has had extremely high QBRD’s each year he has coached the Packers. Even in 2008 when they went 6-10. That year they just had such an incredibly porous defense against the run that it killed them. So with McCarthy and Rodgers still in tact, I think the Packers will be tough to beat for years.

The Vikings had a good QBRD last year, although they got lucky quite a bit last year and played a pretty weak schedule. Plus, the Williams Wall may be suspended for 4 games this year (IIRC) and I don’t know how much Favre has left in the tank. He’ll be coming back for sure, probably until he gets banged up where he has to miss a game…he just doesn’t want to come to training camp. And I’m also not a believer that a guy can miss all of training camp 2 years in a row and still perform at a high level. He did it last year and it surprised me, but I just don’t see it 2 years in a row.

The Lions I think are better than a 4-12 team, but I think that they’ve been losing for so long that they don’t quite believe in themselves yet. Lots of good, young talent there like Calvin Johnson, Smith at RB, Stafford, Delmas, etc.

The Bears I think could be really dangerous if they get the defense back. I think Lovie needs to get Martz to mix it up, which is why he was successful in St. Louis under Vermeil. The problem with Martz is he’s averse to the run at times and even worse, he’ll just keep calling the same 7 step drops and I’m not sure Chicago has the O-Line for that. I’m not down on Cutler as most people were. He needs to get back to his fundamentals with his footwork. Last year he had to throw on the run a lot, but did it way too often. He needs to get back to throwing on the run only when necessary.





3JACK

[gmbtempe]

You seem to follow it close Richie, I follow it but I am a college football junkie, and even that has sucked the last 3 years with my beloved Meeeechigan Wolverines. It aint going to be any better this year I am afraid (good offense, no defense).

[Richie3Jack]

Rodriguez's failure has surprised me a bit. Before his final couple of years at WVU, he used to be this great offensive coach that would find schemes to fit the players and did a great job with it. Almost unheard of these days in college football coaching. But he insisted from step one that he was going to run the spread at Michigan and that took awhile to get going. Although I generally like the spread and I'm glad to see Syracuse get into that a bit more.

College football is harsh on the fans because you can lose one freaking game at the wrong time and be out of it. But the coaching to me is mostly piss poor when it comes to teaching actual football techniques, gameplanning and basic fundamentals. It drove me nuts when watching Pasqualoni at Syracuse. I started to resemble Randy Quaid in Major League II in games after awhile.

With the NFL, a lot more strategy is involved. Plus, just better execution.

I will say that Doug Marrone looked like a genuinely great coach at Syracuse last year. He had guys well coached, with good techniques and fundamentals and had sound gameplanning and strategy. Unfortunately, he had little talent to begin with and the talent he did have wound up getting injured or kicked off the team. They won 4 games last year and beat Rutgers and Northwestern (dominated Rutgers in fact). If they can somehow manage to win 6 games this year and make a bowl, I'd watch out for Marrone because he looked like a better coach than most of the rest of the colleges had to offer last season.





3JACK

[gmbtempe]

Rich Rod IS a good football coach, excellent offensive mind, he basically helped craft Florida and Oklahoma's spread attacks as he is friends with Meyer and Stoops and did summer clinics to teach them the offense.

The best thing I can describe as an analogy for RR is if you consider Jack Nicholson's character in a few good men. Sometimes the best soldiers dont make the best politicians, and at Michigan its a big boat that you have political landmines to sidestep. Combine that with an almost cultish conspiracy that no one from the outside deserves to be there and its almost a no win situation.

I think winning would go a long way for the guy but not sure its in the cards at this school. I have no doubt he knows what he is doing.

[macfan]

I think you have 2 divisions right, the NFC East and the AFC North..that's about it. I also must chuckle at the Cutler analysis. I don't know why people think the Falcon's will be good with Matt Ryan..don't get it at all. I'll stop now before I get in trouble;) Enjoy the season.

[gmbtempe]

Atlanta is a very popular wise guy pick this year, injuries last year and the demise of NO that people are predicting. Not sure I am on board but lots making that claim.

[Richie3Jack]

In one of my posts, I went over the makeup of the playoff teams each year. There are 12 playoff teams each season. From 2000-2008, each year there would be an average of 4 teams that made the playoffs, despite having a losing record the year before.

After eight seasons of noticing that trend, I dubbed these teams the ‘Fab Four’ of the NFL. As luck would have it, this past season there were only 2 teams that made the playoffs despite a losing record the year before.

But, there was a reason for that. Typically during the 2000-2007 seasons, there were 13-16 teams in the league with losing records. But in 2008 there were only 11 teams with a losing record. Less teams with losing records = less chance of a ‘Fab Four’ scenario.

2009 didn’t fare much better as there were only 12 teams with losing records:

Miami
Buffalo
Cleveland
Jacksonville
Oakland
KC
Washington
Chicago
Detroit
Tampa Bay
St. Louis
Seattle

Like I mentioned in a previous post, the common thread for these ‘Fab Four’ teams is that they usually have a veteran QB that is considered a decent QB. The other type of QB is either the first year starting QB or the talented QB that is in the early part of their career. But the veteran QB is usually the case because there are just more of those guys around than the young upstart QB.

The other common thread, although far less common, is the head coach. The coaches that have success here are usually coaches that have made the playoffs with that particular team before.

Last year I was going to pick 3 ‘Fab Four’ teams because of the lack of losing records from 2008. I was going to pick Jacksonville, Seattle and Cincy. I particularly liked Cincy because Carson Palmer is definitely a ‘decent’, veteran QB and the Bengals have had success with Marvin Lewis in the past. But, I just couldn’t convince myself to go with it and I wound up choosing just Jacksonville and Seattle…neither of whom made the playoffs. It wound up being the Packers and the Bengals.

While I don’t read his stuff anymore, I do think Bill Simmons made a good point about NFL coaches over the age of 55 and how they tend to ‘lose it’ when it comes to staying within the game. So I’ll run down each losing team, their record, quarterback and coach’s age.

Buffalo
6-10
Trent Edwards
Gailey 58 yrs old

Miami
7-9
Chad Henne
Sparano 49 yrs old

Cleveland
5-11
Jake Delhomme
Mangini 39 yrs old

Jacksonville
7-9
David Garrard
Del Rio 47 yrs old

Oakland
5-11
Bruce Gradkowski/Jason Campbell
Cable 46 yrs old

Kansas City
4-12
Matt Cassel
Haley 43 yrs old

Washington
4-12
Donovan McNabb
Shanahan 58 yrs old

Chicago
7-9
Jay Cutler
Smith 52 yrs old

Detroit
2-14
Matthew Stafford
Schwartz 44 yrs old

Tampa Bay
3-13
Josh Freeman
Morris 34 yrs old

St. Louis
1-15
Sam Bradford
Spagnuolo 51 yrs old

Seattle
5-11
Matt Hasselbeck
59 yrs old

There are only 2 teams that meet all of these standards (at least a decent veteran QB, coach who has had success with the team before and is under 55 years old) and that’s Chicago and Jacksonville. Although both play in a tough division.

The teams that come close are Washington, Seattle and Miami. The rest that I think sort of fit the profile of a ‘Fab Four’ team are Cleveland and KC.

So, my guess is that if you take these teams:

Chicago
Jacksonville
Washington
Seattle
Miami
Kansas City
Cleveland

I believe at least 2 of them will make the playoffs in 2010, if not 3. I went with KC and Seattle for now, mainly because of the weak divisions they play in. I’d say that Jacksonville and Washington play in the toughest conferences.





3JACK

[secondary]

Love the analysis. Good stuff Richie. I am just not buying into Cassel though? MacFan had me chuckling. I think your Bears analysis is right on too. Considering what we know about our O coordinatior, I am still sort of baffled at why we haven't scooped up TO? If you are averse to running it, isn't lining TO up by himself on the far side and playing catch with Cutler for small gains of 5-7 yds a good alternative?

With you on Seattle, not on KC. Good topic.

[Richie3Jack]

The thing is that with the high injury rate in the NFL, there's usually some teams that have a lot more success than people would imagine. I don't think anybody predicted the Bengals to go to the playoffs. I originally predicted that they would, but changed my mind right before the season started. But they were a class A example of a 'Fab Four' team. I think I was more on the fence with Green Bay because I didn't know exactly how good Aaron Rodgers was at the time, but McCarthey did bring them to the playoffs in 2007.

Instead, I went with predicting the Jaguars and Seahawks. The Jags were a typical 'Fab Four' team with Garrard at QB and Del Rio as their HC, but they got hurt in part by playing in a very tough AFC South. The Seahawks just never really stood a chance.

So, KC certainly has a shot IMO, mainly because the AFC West is pretty weak. I'm not a big Cassel fan as he's only effective out of the shotgun. You can win doing that, but I still think the NFL is very much based around balancing your offense effectively so the team...at the very basic level....can run the ball when the opposing defense has 7 in the box and then throw the ball when they put 8 in the box.

I think the Bears probably most closely resemble the Bengals from last season in the sense that it may be Lovie's last year in Chicago if things don't get done and they play in a similar type of division with two very good organizations in Green Bay and Minny and won terrible organization in Cleveland that they can beat up on.

I just get a bit concerned about the makeup of the offense with Martz as the O-Coordinator. The Bears O-Line was horrible last year and Martz's offense doesn't exactly protect the QB. But, I've seen crazier things happen.





3JACK