Winning and Turnovers

Turnover Rules do not apply to them

We have all heard "the teams that win at the end of the season are the teams with the least amount of turnovers" and I think it is fair to say that it is true. But wouldn't it be interesting to know which sport lays the greatest importance on controlling the ball. To figure this out we used numbers from basketball and football, both at the professional and collegiate level.
NBA
The team with the best turnover margin in the NBA is the Atlanta Hawks, who are able to turn the ball over 3.1 times less than their opponents in each game. When it comes to winning however they are only 10th in the league with a .561 winning percentage. The second winningest team in the NBA, the San Antonio Spurs, actually have a negative turnover margin while the Miami Heat, currently on a 23 game winning streak, are +.8. The Bobcats, who are worst in the league when it comes to winning, are actually in the positives when it comes to turnovers. The slope for the trend line is 2.9 which places the NBA second when it comes to turnovers equaling victory.

NFL
Atlanta and Denver tied for best winning percentage in the NFL despite the Broncos having a negative (-.2). Another team that broke the stereotype was the Indianapolis Colts who had the seventh best winning percentage (.688) even though they lost the ball an average (-.7) more than they got it. Philadelphia's bad season, 4-12, can easily be attributed to their league worst -1.5 turnover margin. No team had a winning percentage below .500 and a turnover margin greater than .5. The NFL's slope was 2.45 which is just behind the NBA and places it at third among the leagues covered.

College Basketball
 Obviously the most amount of data is to be found in College Basketball as their is over 340 teams. Gonzaaga had the highest winning percentage at .938 also had a great turnover margin (2.4). The only teams with winning percentages over .800 that had negative turnover margins were Kansas (-.8), Bucknell (-.6, terrible conference), St. Marys (-.4), and Weber State (-1.6). Louisiana Tech had a great turnover margin at 5.2 and finished with a WP of .806. Grambling State, who failed to win a game all year had a -7.8 turnover margin, to no ones surprise. NCAA basketball has a slope of 5.09 which puts it firmly in first place.

College Football
Ohio State was perfect last year but weren't able to play in the BCS due to sanctions. They weren't amazing when it comes to turn over margin either only at .2. Florida State was sixth when it came to winning percentage but had a negative -.6 TO margin. Chamion Alabama TO margin was 1.2 while the team they defeated, Notre Dame, was .8. Southern Methodist was the only team with a WP below .200 to have a positive TO margin. College football had a slope of just one making turnovers mean the least. This is probably due to teams playing in shitty conferences and such.

First Day of College Football: The Fall of the Navy Midshipmen, Penn State, and Misericordia(Even though there's just began)

Greatest Tackle in the History of Mankind

Well this was the first day of the 2012 college football season and instead of talking about all of the action from today I am going to focus on some of the games that meant most to me. As a lifelong fan of the Naval Academy it was heart breaking get destroyed in Ireland against Notre Dame. Oddly it seemed like Navy was the Irish and Notre Dame were the British. Penn State played its first game under new head coach Bill O'Brien and although they started off hot, they were just not able to finish. Meanwhile, the Gettysburg Bullets started their season off on a high note with a score that was just a little lopsided.

Ricky Dobbs

Navy's performance in their 50-10 loss was surprising to me, since my grandfather went their and my Dad went to Penn State but hated Joe Paterno, I always rooted for Navy and I just must have been lucky the past few years. Craig Candeto was the first Navy quarterback that I deeply remembered and that was because of his performance in an Army-Navy game quite a few a years ago and then he was followed by the solid  but not quite Candeto Aaron Polanco, he was the quarterback on some of the more successful Navy teams but it wasn't because of him. After that there was Lamar Owens who had real ability and a real team behind him. He later got in trouble with the law for an unspeakable good, but no one wants to think of one of their child hood idles as a sinner, so I have no problem forgetting about it and just looking at his accomplishments as quarterback. After Lamar there was the Hawaiian that will be known as Kaipo-Noa, who I spent some of the best Saturdays of my childhood idolizing. His back-ups name was Bryant and that is all I remember about him except for that he would come in late in games when Kaipo was tired and do alright, he was such an asset they had him play slotback and even return punts. Ricky Dobbs was next in line and he was the most skilled of the bunch, the one problem was that his team wasn't as good as previous incarnations and coach Paul Johnson left the new coach just wasn't able to do the job.

Craig Candeto

But coaches and quarterbacks weren't the only assets on the Navy teams during those years. Fullbacks such as Kyle Eckel, Adam Ballard, and Eric Kettani were such stalwarts in the backfield that it really helped the quarterback use the option offense to the best of their abilities. Slotbacks like Reggie Campbell and the current senior Gee Gee Greene will always have a place in my heart. I watched them play so many games and I might not remember all of them but I do remember them losing to Notre Dame on a last second field goal even though they blocked the kick. I remember when they sacked Jimmy Claussen for that one win (as well as Ram Vela diving for that tackle). I also remember them beating Mizzouri and losing to Texas Tech. I also remember their first lost to a service academy in 4 years last year (I think it was last year) and I will always remember this game against Notre Dame. They no longer had that swagger about them like they use to, no matter what the score was they would try to kill the ball carrier on each play but it just doesn't look like the same team. The kids use to be hungry and now they are always outmatched. Sure, they were always slower and weaker, but now they don't even look like they compete. Notre Dame may be a good team, but no Navy team I ever loved would lose like that.

Bill O'Brien

Off to Penn State now, since now half of me is a Penn State fan, I didn't get to watch much of the game but I'm sure the score doesn't tell the whole story. Penn State still has heart and talent, they just only have 30 minutes of it. There is no doubt that Penn State's starting 22 is better than Ohio's 22, its just that in football you need about 22 guys on each side of the ball to win the game. PSU just couldn't rotate their defensive line and that ended up hurting them in the second half (almost as much as the fact that their quarterback sucks). This might be a long year for Penn State fans but at least the kids are trying and the school may have gotten the short end of the stick not just on the punishment they were handed but on the people they chose to trust, the same thing could of happened to Bobby Bowden but it didn't.

Off to my true team, the Gettysburg Bullets. The only way to describe going to a Gettysburg College football game is to watch alumni talk about how much money their parents spent to send them there. Seriously, that is what this school is famous for, sure we are all going to have jobs when we graduate because this is a really good school, but everyone here is either upper middle class or upper middle class. Now the game was a blowout because it was Misericordia's first football game ever. I give the kids credit just for going out there every play they were getting stomped on. My floormate/middle linebacker Kodie had a great day (I'm sure kids at Penn State could say they live on the same floor as a football player). The score was 43-0 at halftime which I left at then watched the soccer team win 2-0.

Yes, we have really ugly uniforms

It is now safe to say that I am a Gettysburg fan and a Penn State observer, I don't think that I will be rooting for Navy anymore just because they are not the team that I use to root for. I don't know how Gettysburg season will shape up but now I am a part of that upper middle class G-Burg tradition, so I will root for them the whole way. Penn State will just be interesting to watch and I still think I will root for Navy when they play on the 15th, I just don't think I'll watch them play another game all year.

College Football Playoff Proposal

   With the BCS about to go to a playoff, they need to find a format that will make everyone happy. With some conferences asking that conference champions hold an edge over non-champions while others want a selection committee to pick the top 8 teams. I am a proponent of the conference champions argument because of two reasons. I feel that the regular season should hold great value and that means that if you can't win your conference championship then you don't deserve to compete for a national championship. Also, it allows teams to schedule tougher non-conference games because they will not have as much of an effect on their national championship hopes which means that we will get to see better football. I prefer an 8 team playoff over a 4 team playoff because there are currently 6 BCS conferences and I feel that you should not leave one of them out. It also means more football games and schools cannot argue that players will miss classes because they will be on winter break. Under my system conferences will be divided into 3 tiers. Tier I will consist of the top 5 conferences according to the ESPN Stats & Info Conference Power Rankings. Tier II will consist of the middle 3 and Tier III will consist of the 3 worst conferences. Conferences Now that that is handled I will now present my playoff system. 

1. All playoff teams must be in the BCS top 25

    My system will continue the use of the current BCS system to decide who the best teams in the country are. This rule is to prevent teams that would qualify through the following routes but are below playoff standard from lessening the quality of playoff football. If less than 8 teams qualify for playoffs because of the top 25 requirement, at large bids will be offered to teams that won their conference but did not qualify for playoffs; if no such team exists the bid would be offered to the highest ranked BCS non-qualifier. If for some reason a Tier I conference champion is not in the top 25 their spot would be handed to the highest BCS ranked team from their conference.

2. Tier I conferences have automatic qualifiers for their champion

    Starting in 2013 the Tier 1 conferences will be the Big Ten, Big 12, Pacific-12, Southeastern Conference, and the Mountain West Conference. The ACC and Big East were demoted from the AQs because of recent poor performance and because of the exceptional play of the Mountain West. the MWC will likely drop to Tier II after a few years because their top teams are leaving the conference.

3. 2 teams will make the playoffs from Tier II conferencs

    Tier II will consist of the ACC, Big East, and Conference-USA as well as the independents. Keep in mind that the rules only guarantee 2 teams but there is a good chance that each conference will be represented because of the "Top 25" rule. Independents will qualify if they have a higher BCS ranking than 2 of the conference champions.

4. 1 team will have a semi-guaranteed playoff spot from Tier III conferences 

   Tier III teams will be Western Athletic Conference, Middle American Conference, and the Sun Belt. Since  these are lower level conferences it is not very likely that they will send a team to playoffs.

5. How will games be played?

    What is unique about my system is that the current bowl system will be kept in use. Even current bowl contracts will be respected. This could mean that #1 could meet #2 in the first round of playoffs but that shouldn't be a problem. The 4 current BCS bowls will be used for the quarter finals so the Big Ten's champion will always meet the Pac-12 champion in the Rose Bowl. The Semi Finals will be known as the BCS semifinals which will be followed by the BCS final. The quarter finals will take place over December 31st and January 1st. One game played on December 31st will be at 6pm (all times are Eastern) while January 1st would have games at noon, 3pm, and 6pm. Fitting in the semi-finals will be difficult because an attempt should be made to have the games on the weekend. Semi-finals must be a minimum of 5 days after the quarter-finals and will be held on a Friday and Saturday. The Friday game will be at 7pm and the Saturday game would be at 3 pm. There would not be a direct bracket to link teams from quarter-finals to semis but the 4 teams who survived the quarters would be paired by geographical closeness.  The championship game will be held on a Saturday at 6:30 PM. With this schedule the student-athletes will be able to return to their classes because their season would be done by the end of winter break. 

  

6. Where will games be played? 

    The quarter-finals will be held at BCS bowl sites because of that tie in. The Semi-Finals would be held in one stadium out of a pool of stadiums that are reserved for Semi Final play. This is to ensure that fans will be able to get to games. The reason for teams being paired by geographical closeness is so that the stadiums will be filled on game day. The Final will be held at a rotating site consisting of some of the most storied college football stadiums in America.

With this system I believe that everyone could be made happy. Fans can get to games, athletes will be back before winter break ends, conference champions will have playoff preference, and there will be a true National Champion.

bedlam before Bedlam

Thank you Oklahoma State for causing controversy within the BCS, all you had to do was win out and everything would have been fine. Since you lost it will most likely be between Oregon and Alabama for who should play LSU in the title game.

If there was a plus one system, we could see LSU play the winner of Oklahoma State vs. Oklahoma, and Alabama vs. Oregon, then the winners of those games would play for the BCS championship.

top offenses vs. top defenses, 2 games to see which would prevail and if defense really does win championships

Fixing College Football Mole's Way

 For the past year or so, teams in major college football have been rumored to switch conferences. Many people seem to believe that schools want to switch conferences to better the competition they face, I feel that this whole ordeal is about money, that's right, cold hard green cash. The Big Ten Conference was formed in 1895 as a way for the colleges to regulate football rules, a few years after that the NCAA was formed and governed college football throughout the country. After that, the point of the smaller regional conferences was to make it easier for schools to schedule games and officiating. Now I am going to remind you that was 100 years ago when teams preferred to play teams withing 200-300 miles so they wouldn't have to travel. All conferences back then were regional and did not mix teams in Louisiana with teams in California.

All those states have teams in the Western Athletic Conference

Not earning their potential revenue

  Right now, teams are moving conferences just so they can take advantage of financial opportunities that other  conferences supply. The only schools that get help because of conferences are the small schools that never compete for national championships and only make money because they are in the same conference as the most prestigious and elite programs. Boise State may be the school most hurt by the conference system. If they were an independent team that could schedule whoever they wanted and didn't have to play cupcakes week in and week out, they might of played in a national championship game. Not to mention that if they were able to negotiate their own TV deal, they would most likely receive more money than they would in their current deal with the Mountain West Conference. Vanderbilt is an example of a team that takes advantage of the system. They are members of the SEC and are lucky to get more than 3 wins a year, but yet they bring in the same amount of TV money as Florida. For a sport that obviously does not care about parity, they do a shitty job of allowing schools to take advantage of their own self-worth.

I feel as if there are three options for college football at this point, and there is no middle ground when it comes to how I feel about college football.
1. Mark Titus's theory on college conferences; go to Grantland.com for more info

A possible 2008 bracket, wouldn't that just ruin college football

2. Have all schools join regional  conferences and adopt a playoff system. Right now there are 120 FBS teams so they could split everyone up into ten twelve team conferences. Each conference would then be split into two divisions, again based on location, each team would play all 5 teams in their division and half the teams in the other division, those games would switch on a year to year basis according to the teams end of year record and power ranking. This will undoubtedly make the regular season more exciting, as one loss could possibly mean the the team might not make their conference championship game. Sure, teams with one or two losses might make the playoffs, but it's better than no loss teams not having a chance to win a title. The winner of each division would then play for the conference championship game, with the winner receiving an automatic entry into a 16 team playoff. To decide the 6 teams that will join the conference winners, a BCS type system would be used. The at large teams would not half to be the runner ups but any team in the nation, meaning that a conference could end up sending 7 teams to the playoffs, although that would be very unlikely. In a addition to all conferences having equal playoff rights, all teams in the country would receive the same amount money.
         The last part of this plan is debatable, I feel this would be the best option but I part of me also      
         feels the stronger conferences should be able to make more money than the weaker ones.

3. This idea is pure capitalism, except that they are no trusts, sweat shops, or 2 year olds working 16 hours a day in a shed. NO conferences, that's right, each team for themselves when it comes to making bowl games and making cash. These idea does not need much explanation. Every team can schedule as many games as they want against whatever teams they want to, and at the end of the year each bowl's selection committee decides which teams it would like to invite to their game. Sure, you would almost never have an actual championship game, but college football worked so well without one for so many years. In this system the rich get richer and the poor get more poor. This is exactly why laissez faire economies never work. This system would eventually self implode as the bad schools would stop fielding a football team because they make no money and scholarship opportunities would be limited for student athletes and college football would become a 45 team league. This brings me to my next point, there are no rules on scholarships in this system either. If a school can give out 200 athletic scholarships, good for them, I'm sure they will enjoy the national championships.

There, I offered my solutions to college football, I want to see what other ideas you guys out there have and I honestly wouldn't be surprised if the NCAA someday follows #3, since it is clearly the worst choice in my mind.