The Physics of Natural Football Deflation

^^ Nate Silver would never let his name be attached to such statistics ignorance. Statistically improbable occurrences are a dime a dozen through the retrospectroscope.

Try this experiment:
Flip a coin 20 times and record the results in their exact order.

Now keep flipping in groups of 20 until you repeat the original result. Your inability to do it again is suspicious, right ?

 

Try to get him interested, or pay him enough.

 

I gather that teams leave the decision of football pressure to the quarterback, and the QBs will small hands prefer lower pressures. So if you could find a group of teams that choose low(er) pressure balls, you could compare fumble stats to those teams who prefer high(er) pressure balls. You would still need to control for weather variables, which might (actually, probably) introduce too much noise into the data to find any statistically significant results.

 

The ball pressure conspiracy people should realize that any QB could have set the offensive balls to 12.5 psi if they wanted to. Those that did not, simply chose the pressure they thought gave them the best advantage. A QB that set the ball pressure to 13.5 at an balmy indoor temp of 68F, and then played at 100F outside was playing with a ball that was as 'illegal' on the high side as the balls the Pats played with Vs. the Colts, but on the low side.

That much is obvious from simple physics. So why are you not declaring that NFL games have been rigged since 2006 ?

 

It was second down, and some 20 seconds remained on the clock. A running play takes over 10 seconds IIRC. So taking a time-out to sort out the player package would have burned one of their remaining downs.

AND, they called a play that NE was not expecting and was ill-equipped to defend. The more I think about it, the less I am convinced it was a bad decision. Hindsight is easy.

 

The decision is before the result. A 'good' decision is one expected to work out more often than not. It is a rare decision that works 100% of the time; and when it does not, it does not become a 'bad' decision except in the (I use this word loosely) 'minds' of fans.

Let me put it this way: if the pass had resulted in a TD and 'hawks win, would you be calling the play the dumbest in history ? I suspect not. In fact, I'd be reading media this morning about Carrol the diabolical genius. When historians say that 'history is written by the winners,' they are also pointing out this logic fallacy.

 

Actually, I wish to avoid hindsight. My points in favor of the decision are these:

1. NE was off-guard for a pass play
2. A rush on 2nd down was a low probability of success decision, and would have taken ~ 10 seconds of the 20 seconds remaining
3. A called time-out would have wasted a down
4. Wilson was very unlikely to throw an interception

If more time had been on the clock, running Lynch seems like the smart choice. Since there were only 20 seconds, I certainly will not judge the decision with any confidence.

 

Ahh ... don't get me started on the idiocy that is 'Spy-gate.'

Every time I watch a game, I see the coaches calling plays behind their play cards. As if they didn't trust all the morally upright spectators and teams to avoid reading lips. And the attempts to decipher QB cadences ? CRIMINAL, I tell you.

Hell, the entire game of football is one big deception played out along 100s of ways every play. That is the allure; other wise we would just watch 40 yard team dashes.

 

The balls are inflated to 13 psi at the factory and then delivered to the teams.

And while I think Nye got it wrong (if he was actually trying in the first place), you of all people should refrain from calling someone 'dumbass.'