538 Calls Tom Brady the 43rd Clutchest Postseason QB

[Hootie]

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/...s-eli-manning/

I found the following interesting:

Here’s the problem: This way of thinking about quarterbacks forces them to compete against themselves. Sure, the Patriots have often been favored to win their postseason games. But a lot of that is because Brady is their quarterback. How might the Pats have expected to do with a replacement-level QB instead?

They might not have been totally hopeless. Brady has usually had a little bit more talent surrounding him than Peyton Manning has. (Matt Cassel, who rates as somewhere between average and replacement-level, led New England to an 11-5 record when Brady was hurt in 2008.) Bill Belichick would probably have snuck them into the playoffs a few times. But they’d also have been playing good opponents. Our method projects them to a 12-14 or 13-13 postseason record rather than Brady’s 18-8.

I calculate these estimates based on a quarterback’s adjusted net yards per attempt (ANY/A), a metric that accounts for yardage, attempts, touchdowns, interceptions and sacks — basically it’s a better version of the NFL’s passer rating. A replacement-level quarterback typically posts an ANY/A at about 80 percent of the league average, so a QB gets credit for any performance above and beyond that.1 I then translate this into points added or subtracted in the regular season2 and translate points into a team’s Elo rating to evaluate the impact the QB had on his team overall.3

It’s notoriously difficult, of course, to distinguish the performance of a quarterback from that of his teammates, but this method produces some reasonable-seeming results. This year’s Green Bay Packers project as a slightly below-average team with a replacement-level guy subbed in for Aaron Rodgers , for instance. Instead of having been 59 percent favorites in their Sunday game against the Cowboys, as they were based on Elo ratings, they’d have been roughly 2-to-1 underdogs.

The principle is simply that the better the quarterback, the more his team would be harmed by removing him. In the case of Peyton Manning’s teams, I estimate that pulling Manning would hurt them by about a touchdown (7 points) per game. That’s enough to demote them to a projected 8-16 record in the 24 postseason games Manning has played.

This article projects that, with a replacement level QB, The Patriots postseason record would have been 12-14 or 13-13 without Tom Brady (they are taking out the Bledsoe game).

It projects that Manning's teams would have been 8-16 without Peyton Manning.

Pretty much has always been my point. Manning has a history of not playing like God in the playoffs, but he has always had a hell of a lot more on his shoulders than Tom Brady. And the whole idea of the "Tom doesn't have enough weapons!!!" is criminally stupid.

[Titty Meat]

Doubling down on the stupid.

[Bowser]

Give this up. Everyone knows Peyton sucks in the postseason, particularly when compared to Brady.

[SAUTO]

damn hoot, you are really taking this places.


props to starting your own web site. why did you pick 538 as the name?

[ToxSocks]

Wow, what a really stupid way to gauge players.

[Brock]

Brady has usually had a little bit more talent surrounding him than Peyton Manning has.

Ha haaa. Just idiotic.

[Bowser]

Originally Posted by Brock

Ha haaa. Just idiotic.

Troy Brown! Deion Branch! All time greats!

[Hootie]

Originally Posted by Bowser

Troy Brown! Deion Branch! All time greats!

The article isn't suggesting Tom Brady had better skill level offensive players around him.

It's suggesting that he had much better teams around him. Teams. Not just an offense. Teams.

For instance.

In Tom Brady's 9-0 start to his postseason career, the most important part of those teams were the defense. Tom was in charge of just trying to be efficient and not ****ing up. We all know that.

Skews the numbers.

Peyton has always had to be the best player on his team. Always. Tom? Not during the successful part of his postseason career. Those teams were always defensive minded teams with Tom being a very efficient game manager.

[Baby Lee]

Originally Posted by Hootie 2.0

The article isn't suggesting Tom Brady had better skill level offensive players around him.

It's suggesting that he had much better teams around him. Teams. Not just an offense. Teams.

For instance.

In Tom Brady's 9-0 start to his postseason career, the most important part of those teams were the defense. Tom was in charge of just trying to be efficient and not ****ing up. We all know that.

Skews the numbers.

Peyton has always had to be the best player on his team. Always. Tom? Not during the successful part of his postseason career. Those teams were always defensive minded teams with Tom being a very efficient game manager.

Hahahaha.

Who the **** cares about that in a 'QB driven' league?!?!?!



Perhaps the most tired meme in all of football.

[Hootie]

Originally Posted by Baby Lee

Hahahaha.

Who the **** cares about that in a 'QB driven' league?!?!?!



Perhaps the most tired meme in all of football.

I agree.

So it's official, then.

Tom Brady has always been on better teams than Peyton Manning so we can no longer pretend that Tom only loses because he doesn't have enough weapons ... since his teams are always expected to win...and even with Matt Cassel, still expected to win half of the time in the most pressure packed games (playoff games) as proven by Nate Silver.

Whereas, without Peyton, his team would only be expected to win 1 out of every 3 times.

[GoChargers]

Originally Posted by Hootie 2.0

In Tom Brady's 9-0 start to his postseason career, the most important part of those teams were the defense. Tom was in charge of just trying to be efficient and not ****ing up. We all know that.

Skews the numbers.

Peyton has always had to be the best player on his team. Always. Tom? Not during the successful part of his postseason career. Those teams were always defensive minded teams with Tom being a very efficient game manager.

So in other words, he was Russell Wilson?

[RobBlake]

Originally Posted by GoChargers

So in other words, he was Russell Wilson?

and wouldn't he take Russell over Rodgers? Yet, Brady has the pedigree to back up his "game managing".

I don't understand the concept of a QB needing to be the hero when he can rely on other aspects of the team to get the job done. A great QB knows how to play chess.

[Psyko Tek]

Originally Posted by Hootie 2.0

The article isn't suggesting Tom Brady had better skill level offensive players around him.

It's suggesting that he had much better teams around him. Teams. Not just an offense. Teams.

For instance.

In Tom Brady's 9-0 start to his postseason career, the most important part of those teams were the defense. Tom was in charge of just trying to be efficient and not ****ing up. We all know that.

Skews the numbers.

Peyton has always had to be the best player on his team. Always. Tom? Not during the successful part of his postseason career. Those teams were always defensive minded teams with Tom being a very efficient game manager.

o you are saying defenses win champion ships?
and QBs just get endorsements?

[Baby Lee]

Originally Posted by Psyko Tek

o you are saying defenses win champion ships?
and QBs just get endorsements?

I'd say, as I have for years, savior elite QBs are unicorns. The closest was when Elway willed the Donkeys to 3 lopsided SB losses, and the second closest was when Manning willed OK teams to a rash of 1 and dones.

SBs are won by good QBs on great teams and great QBs on good teams, 1-53.

'The right 53' might be attached to a shitty control-freak GM, but it's a sound premise. You can't have 30-35 amazing players and win, let alone 1. You need a team that either masks the shortcomings of the QB or a QB that overcomes a few controllable inadequacies on the team.

What people miss in the hype of a QB driven league, is the rise of comprehensive analysis. With all the HD footage, and replay capability, and advanced analytics, football minds can exploit everything that happens on the field. It's now longer the simple story of a GREAT MAN drawing a play in the dirt. It's knowing that one chip technique has a 5% greater success rate than another on a particular play, or the success rate for every inch away a FG attempt is made.

[Hootie]

fivethirtyeight is owned and operated by ESPN ; it's like Grantland

and also, a hell of a lot more credible than coldhardbostondotcomwriterfootballfacts.com that is paraded around as fact by the three Patriots fans on this website

The point is ...

A replacement level QB would've gone 13-13 or 12-14 based off of more research than anyone on this website has EVER done over the course of Tom's 26 full postseason games.

The same replacement level QB would've only gone 8-16 on Peyton's teams.

Discuss.