Statistical ways to quantify "garbage time"

[Discuss Thrower]

How would you do it? I ask because the whole Cassel thing had me thinking about how often garbage time scores influence the total game statistics, and that there should be an unofficially-official way of displaying the accumulated states when a game was effectively decided and thus "over" before the final whistle blows.

In basketball there is the "safe lead" formula, and I'm guessing one could be derived for football but I don't think it's as effective.

Is a game "over" if Team A has a 3+ touchdown lead over team B going into the 4th quarter?

If I were to venture a definition, I'd mark the point where team A has a 4+ possession lead over team B and write down what the statistical measures are at that point. Unless team B comes back to within 2 possessions of team A, those are in effect the "true" statistics of the game and should be seen as such.

Or maybe I'm just a prick.

DISCUS