Overthinking Fandom and Infamy Off the Field

One of the authors of the brilliant pop culture analysis blog Overthinking It wrote an interesting article after it was revealed that Arnold Schwarzenegger committed adultery and fathered a child with his maid. The main gist of the post deals with our relationship as fans of public individuals — such as actors — who engage in immoral actions in their private lives. The author grapples with a simple question:

What does it mean to be a fan of someone’s work, rather than a fan of that person? Is such a distinction even possible?

This type of problem applies to our fandom regarding a wide range of other actors and stars, as well as politicians of all parties. Is it possible to continue to support someone after they’ve done something morally repugnant?

When Anthony Weiner tweets pictures of, well… his weiner, it’s easy to denounce him and call for his resignation. But what if you agree with his politics? Scorn flows effortlessly after Schwarzenegger’s actions, but must we disavow his movies as well?

Perhaps in a previous era, when we didn’t know as much about our stars and heroes, turning a blind eye was the obvious answer. Now, even if we choose to accept their private actions, we can’t definitively separate what we know from the person in front of us, be they on the movie screen, the floor of the House of Representatives, or… running by defenders into the end zone.

Yes, ultimately this post comes back to Michael Vick.

Eagles fans seemed as outraged as anyone else when Vick’s dog fighting ring came to light. But time passes, and before we knew it there was #7 in midnight green. Some people immediately and permanently disavowed the team. Most fans adjusted, either by learning to support Vick, or by trying to dissociate his off the field crimes from his on the field feats.

Neither choice is wholly satisfying. The section of fans who quit the Eagles (and I’d venture it was a small sliver) certainly have moral satisfaction. Yet, many of us explicitly or implicitly found that the cost of abandoning our team loyalty wasn’t so easy. We wanted to both root for Vick and condemn him simultaneously. That’s a tremendous burden of cognitive dissonance.

Perhaps more than politics and film, sports fandom rests on an unambiguous moral authority. The Eagles become a sacrosanct piece of ourselves that we support against the corrupt outsiders in Dallas, New York, and Washington. The insults we hurl at opposing teams and fans far surpass what we could get away with in any other context. Disloyal stars take on new dimensions as traitors. This is part of the fun.

Unfortunately, I don’t see a way to reconcile the dissonance. We’ve ceded the high ground and prevented ourselves from being fans with the same moral vigor that we easily held before. With more time and more community service from Vick, we might be able to slowly assuage our lingering doubts. But at the end of the day I just can’t like the guy 100 percent, and that’s enough to taint every touchdown, every scramble, every spectacular pass just a little bit.

Photo from Getty.

Michael Vick is a Scrambler, Not a Runner

What made Michael Vick so much better in 2010 than he was in 2009? To some extent we already know the narrative. Vick needed a year to mature, to learn the system, to shake off the rust, to get back his trademark speed.

But I wonder now how much was really physical improvement from year one to year two and how much was simply opportunity. Obviously such a question is hard to measure.

One statistic does make that case, though. If we look purely at Vick’s running chances, we see that he didn’t really improve - he just had different (read: better) opportunities.

In 2010, according to Pro Football Focus, Vick was in on 21 planned runs, not including QB sneaks or kneel downs. On those runs, which were mostly wildcat plays, Vick averaged only 3.9 yards per carry and caused only three missed tackles. I wouldn’t necessarily call him ineffective just based on those numbers, but everyone wondered if those snaps were better spent with Donovan McNabb at the helm.

Fast forward a year, and Vick had almost the exact same number of planned runs. In 29 chances, Vick ran for 3.8 yards per carry and four total missed tackles. Those numbers are almost identical to 2009. He didn’t show any increased speed or agility in that category of plays.

Vick’s “newfound” speed in 2010 manifested only in scrambling attempts. In that subset of runs, Vick averaged 9.6 yards per scramble, scored 10 touchdowns and broke 22 tackles in 62 attempts. Since Vick wasn’t on the field to pass in 2009, he never got the opportunity to scramble. Yet that was where he was most effective - and where I’d reckon he has always been most effective.

Vick isn’t a really a “running quarterback.” Like many others before him, Vick is a scrambler. That’s what separates him from the pack, or, more accurately, from the defenders. When he wasn’t utilized that way in the last two years, he was ineffective.

Hopefully, in 2011 the Eagles will leave the planned runs to LeSean McCoy and let Michael Vick do what he does best: improvise.

Photo from Getty.

Offseason Moves and the Expectations Game

Unexpected success is undoubtedly the best outcome in sports. Sure, it’s nice when we expect Roy Halladay to throw a complete game shutout and he goes out on the mound and delivers. But there’s nothing quite as invigorating as watching a no-name player like Vance Worley start a game with few expectations and perform better than anyone could have rightly predicted.

As far as the Eagles go, that means that fans often take guys like Trent Cole and Jason Peters, easily two of the best players on the team, for granted. Meanwhile, players who give you a little more than you expect - guys like Jamar Chaney and Kurt Coleman perhaps - are lauded.

What I’m saying is that the expectations matter, sometimes more than the results themselves. Perhaps Cole and Chaney aren’t in the same league, but what about Chaney and Stewart Bradley? There are lots of people who want to kick Bradley to the curb and move on with someone else. As I wrote last week, I think that the Eagles might agree.

But just because Bradley lagged behind his expectations and Chaney soundly beat his doesn’t mean that such a move would be a guaranteed win. We should be mindful such that our perceptions often outpace reality. Would King Dunlap really be an upgrade over Winston Justice? Was Dimitri Patterson much better than Ellis Hobbs in the long run?

Sometimes short term play and limited expectations for success can greatly cloud our judgement. It’s good to keep that in mind as we consider the Eagles possible offseason moves.

Photo from Getty.

Does Stewart Bradley Have a Future in Philly?

Two years ago Stewart Bradley was hailed as the next star on the Eagles defense. Then, in one fell swoop, he tore his ACL during 2009 Flight Night, ending his season before it began and crippling his future.

A few weeks back I mentioned Bradley in my post about the five Eagles most likely to lose their jobs. At the time, I still thought there was more than a 75 percent chance he would return for the 2011 season. But now, with reports indicating that unrestricted free agency will likely go back to four years of experience under the new collective bargaining agreement, that forecast looks optimistic.

Assuming the restricted free agent tender goes away (the Eagles tagged him at the second-round level), Bradley would have no reason to return to Philly. He can simply accept the largest deal on the open market. And I have a feeling that the biggest signing bonus won’t be handed down by Joe Banner and company.

The Eagles, under Juan Castillo, will likely have a new defensive system that emphasizes speed, reacting to the ball, and playing in space. The team has a host of young linebackers, three of whom were drafted specifically to play in this system. Bradley, on the other hand, seems like a relic from the post-Trotter years. He’s certainly athletic, but with a bigger, downhill style.

It might be a good idea to keep a veteran in the middle of this defensive shift. There’s enough youth all over to be worried about without looking for two new starters at linebacker. Not that the Eagles have put a big priority on consistency at the position, though.

Bradley deserves another season to prove that he’s all the way back from that knee injury. But I wonder if that chance will come in a different uniform. How much money and how many years are the Eagles going to offer to an oft-injured player blocking the development of younger linebackers who are a better fit?

Photo from Getty.

Could Michael Vick be the Oldest Eagle in 2011?

It’s easy to forget or to gloss over how young this Eagles team is. But there’s a fair chance that Michael Vick could be the oldest position player, if not oldest player on the whole team.

Vick turned 31 earlier this month. That’s not particularly old for a quarterback. But there aren’t more than a handful of players on the Eagles roster right now who are older. In fact, there are only four.

David Akers, 36, is as good as gone. Drafting Alex Henery in the fourth round of the draft basically assures that.

Juqua Parker, 33, certainly doesn’t have a guaranteed roster spot. He wasn’t looking any younger at the end of the season, and if a few of the rest of the muddle of defensive ends step up, he could easily be gone.

Ditto for Jamaal Jackson, 31, who’s coming off of two consecutive season-ending injuries. With plenty of young blood behind him, I could easily see Jackson being one of the older casualties.

The player who’s most likely to still be around is also the oldest: punter Sav Rocca, 37. The Eagles at least threw a tender at him, but he’s never been much better than average, so they could easily flip both kicking specialists in one offseason. I doubt many fans would complain about that.

The Eagles have always been focused on youth, but they’ve never — as far as I remember — been so close to such a young team. To have the oldest player be only 31 years old would be quite a statement, and it’s not all that unlikely.

Photo from Getty.

Is Joe Banner More Valuable than Andy Reid?

Andy Reid certainly isn’t universally beloved in Philadelphia, but overall I think Eagles fans do credit the coach with the team’s decade-plus success. It has been his offensive schemes, his player decisions, his strategic choices that have driven the Eagles to so many winning seasons.

But I wonder, just as devil’s advocate, how much of the success is attributable to Reid, and what percentage of the credit actually rests with the only man in the organization who is more detested: Joe Banner.

I’ve previously talked about how we can’t really separate the two, often after reporters suggest a big rift in the Eagles front office. But it’s an interesting case to make. Coaching and personnel decisions are probably more important than financial ones, but how much more?

As good as Reid’s been, I don’t think many people would make the case that he is the absolute best coach in the NFL. He’d be in everyone’s top five, but rarely number one. On the other hand, there’s a good argument to be made that Banner is the single best financial/salary cap executive in the game. In today’s NFL, that might be more valuable — or at least closer than you might think.

Let’s be honest. How much success could Reid have had without Banner keeping the team active on the free agent market every offseason despite consecutive playoff appearances? The NFL, as noted recently, has the most financial parity and revenue sharing of any professional sports league. It’s extremely difficult to outspend other teams (although that doesn’t stop Dan Snyder from trying). Therefore, most franchises go through winning and losing cycles tied as much to salary restrictions as player performance.

Reid is responsible for the high quality of the product on the field, while Banner enables Reid to coach without significant restraints or restrictions. It will be interesting to see if the team can sustain success if one of them departs before the other.

Photo from the Philadelphia Eagles.

A Super Bowl Indicator: Net TD Efficiency

In the last post we ranked NFL offenses according to their touchdown efficiency per plays, yards, and drives. Eliminating field goals and calculating rankings based on efficiency rather than raw scores helped isolate the best and worst offenses.

So for the next step, we’ll add defense. I added up touchdowns allowed by each defense and figured out the same efficiency stats as yesterday. Then, simple enough, I subtracted defense from offense. Positive scores indicate better teams. For example, the New England Patriots make their opponents go 13 extra plays, 64 extra yards, and 2 extra drives to get a touchdown. They are ranked third overall.

First and second, by a solid margin, go to the two Super Bowl teams. They were 1-2 in every category, and outpaced the third place teams significantly in Net Plays per TD and Net Drives per TD. Predictive stats are often too reductive, but if you used this measurement to pick the Super Bowl teams at the end of the regular season — it would have guided you well.

The Eagles, despite their highly ranked offense, come out only 13th in the net rankings. If you didn’t figure it out already, Sean McDermott’s defense was a huge liability in 2010. Also note that while we’ve eliminated some biases, the stat doesn’t account for strength of schedule. Not sure how much that would change things, but keep it in mind nonetheless.

See the full rankings below.

Photo from Getty.

Ranking NFL Offenses by Touchdown Efficiency

Yesterday we saw how offensive touchdowns are much more important for success than field goals. But let’s not stop there.

If touchdowns are important, it’s not enough to just rank teams by the number of touchdowns. Some teams have more opportunities or have worse field position. Instead of just counting overall touchdowns, we can weight them by how many yards, plays, or drives each team needs to get one.

With that in mind, I calculated touchdowns scored per all three factors in the 2010 season. Each measures something slightly different. For example, the Eagles were 8th in Yards per TD, 5th in Plays per TD, and 7th in Drives per TD. Fairly close, but the best showing in Plays per TD probably reflects the huge number of big plays and long touchdown catches last year.

Below you’ll find the full chart of all NFL teams, best offense to least according to the average rank of these three measurements. It likely gives a more accurate picture of the best and worst offenses than any ranking that accounted for field goals or other methods of scoring.

Tomorrow we’ll bring the ranking one final step further.

Photo from Getty.