Blackout Sunday? 25% of NFL games have a quarterback concussion

 

This is a statistic that shouldn’t be buried in a one paragraph story:

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/extras/2012/11/13/gif-beats-yolo-for-word-of-the-year/

“On Sunday [Nov 11, 2012], 25 percent of NFL games had a starting quarterback leave with a concussion, according to The Associated Press.  The quarterbacks included Jay Cutler of the Chicago Bears and the San Francisco 49ers’ Alex Smith. Both quarterbacks, however, stayed in the game for multiple plays after the hit that caused the concussion.”

Can you predict NFL dogs?

Before this year's National Football League season, I was at a party with a friend who follows football with much more intensity than I do. At one point, I challenged him to name 7 teams who wouldn't make the playoffs this year.

By way of background, there are 32 NFL teams, 12 of whom make the playoffs (38%).

Kirk made eminently reasonable choices, but let's see how they turned out.

Oakland Raiders 5-11
Miami Dolphins 11-5, made playoffs
Atlanta Falcons 11-5, made playoffs
Kansas City Chiefs 2-14
St. Louis Rams 2-14
San Francisco 49ers 7-9
Arizona Cardinals 9-7, made playoffs (and playing for the NFC championship next weekend)

So, 3 of these 7 teams (43%) made the playoffs -- not any different than the base rate. Furthermore, these are in the order he wrote them down. This means 2 of the 3 teams he was most certain wouldn't make the playoffs -- Miami and Atlanta -- did.

So,even a dedicated, knowledgeable fan has trouble doing better than chance. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have done any better, since all his choices seemed reasonable at the time.

Kirk notably missed the Detroit Lions (the first 0-16 team ever).

Pigskins and Politics: Linking Expressive Behavior and Voting

Andy Eggers at the Social Science Statistics Blog has this fascinating entry:

Pigskins and Politics: Linking Expressive Behavior and Voting
David Laband, Ram Pandit, Anne Laband & John Sophocleus
Journal of Sports Economics, October 2008, Pages 553-560

Abstract:In this article, the authors use data collected from nearly 4,000single-family residences in Auburn, Alabama to investigate empirically whether nonpolitical expressiveness (displaying support for Auburn University's football team outside one's home) is related to the probability that at least one resident voted in the national/state/local elections heldon November 7, 2006. Controlling for the assessed value of the property and the length of ownership, the authors find that the likelihood of voting by at least one person from a residence with an external display of support for Auburn University is nearly 2 times greater than from a residence without such a display. This suggests that focusing narrowly on voting as a reflection of political expressiveness may lead researchers to overstate the relative importance of expressiveness in the voting context and understate its more fundamental and encompassing importance in a variety of contexts, only one of which may be voting.

Ungated working version here; I haven't read it yet.

I'd never thought of this link before, but it makes sense. In both cases, the individual's behavior (putting up football paraphenalia, voting) has only a tiny effect on the outcome (winning games, determining the election). So it makes sense that people who have faith that one form is efficacious might have faith that the other form is efficacious.

And, in both forms of behavior, there is some demonizing of the opponents (the University of Alabama, the opposite party).