Sunday, January 02, 2011

Football Stats the MAC Should Keep, But Does Not, Part I

I have said before that football needs a measure of explosive plays.  I would prefer that they simply rank teams and players by the number of 20+ plays they have, or the percentage of their overall plays that are over 20+ yards.

Another measure is non-red zone touchdowns.  Here's how I got to it...


  • MAC Only.
  • Offensive TDs only--no special teams or defense
  • Subtract offensive TDs from Red Zone TDs
  • These stats include 8 games for each team.

Results are not too surprising.  NIU and UT clearly had the most explosive offenses in the MAC and you can see it here.  NIU might be a little surprising due to their reputation as a running team, but running teams can be explosive.  With their WRs, WMU also has to get a lot and they do.

I was surprised that BSU had 11.  The most important thing in this chart, however, is the disparity.  You have 5 of 12 teams averaging less than .5 Non RZ TD per game.  This is an area that clearly seperates teams int he MAC.  No surprise, the worst teams in the MAC are on the bottom of thi chart.

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