Why try your luck on Luck?

The Colts are going to take Andrew Luck first overall in the draft. No one will blame them if he doesn’t work out because every team without a star quarterback would draft him, given the chance. However, is this the right choice? Here are the career numbers for all first pick QBs since 1990 (from Pro Football Reference):

I listed each quarterback’s draft year, games played, winning percentage, completion percentage, TDs and INTs as a percentage

Rematch!

There were no True Wins handed out yesterday. The Ravens, Patriots, Giants, and 49ers treated us to two extremely close football games. Close games generally come down to luck to determine the winner; indeed, I thought both games would be close but was fortunate to pick both winners last week. Regular season True Wins and actual wins both predicted the Patriots victory but failed on the Giants, who are underrated by wins measures due to their ridiculous strength of schedule. For the first time since 2007 (and only the fourth time since 2002), actual wins is going to beat out True Wins in predicting playoff games. Both measures suggest the Patriots will win the Super Bowl, since they have far more wins and True Wins than the Giants, and actual wins are a half game up going into the final (5.5 games correct to 5 games correct):

The two championship games had some common themes, actually. The “offensive” teams (Patriots, Giants), playing against good defenses, did not have their usual panache. However, they both stacked the box

Adam Schefter and coaches: doh!

Adam Schefter posted some thoughts on the NFL on Friday. He led off by arguing that today’s NFL teams tend to fire coaches too soon:

In a society that craves results now, in a world that demands excellence every day, head coaches rarely are allowed the time they need to grow into the job and master it. Reminders of it come every year at this time. Head coaches are fired, head coaches are hired and the coaching carousel spins without producing in the ways NFL owners had hoped.

. . .

In today’s world, everyone loves eating the turkey, but no one wants to wait around for it to cook. They’d rather microwave it. Unfortunately, it’s not as tasty or savory, much like the seasons some of these unstable NFL franchises continually experience.

This is a typical “back in the good old days” point of view.