Since there are two 13-0 teams, I thought I'd better take a look at the NFL in more detail. What are the odds both will finish 16-0? And what are the chances we'll have the dream of all dreams, a clash between two 18-0 teams in the Super Bowl?
Here is the Strength Power Rating for all NFL teams as of last Monday (12/14/2009):
rnk Team record rating offense defense
1. New Orleans 13-0 13.53 35.30 [ 1] 21.76 [ 20]
2. New England 8-5 11.51 28.12 [ 3] 16.60 [ 3]
3. Indianapolis 13-0 11.46 27.64 [ 5] 16.18 [ 2]
4. Minnesota 11-2 7.85 28.63 [ 2] 20.78 [ 15]
5. Baltimore 7-6 7.83 24.76 [ 10] 16.92 [ 4]
6. Philadephia 9-4 6.41 27.69 [ 4] 21.28 [ 16]
7. San Diego 10-3 6.05 27.56 [ 6] 21.50 [ 18]
8. NY Jets 7-6 5.72 21.28 [ 16] 15.56 [ 1]
9. Green Bay 9-4 4.23 25.02 [ 8] 20.78 [ 14]
10. Dallas 8-5 3.28 21.60 [ 15] 18.32 [ 8]
11. Denver 8-5 3.26 20.56 [ 18] 17.30 [ 5]
12. Houston 6-7 3.13 24.77 [ 9] 21.64 [ 19]
13. Arizona 8-5 2.99 23.09 [ 14] 20.10 [ 10]
14. Miami 7-6 2.40 24.40 [ 11] 21.99 [ 21]
15. Cincinnati 9-4 2.15 20.11 [ 19] 17.95 [ 6]
16. Atlanta 6-7 2.00 23.49 [ 13] 21.49 [ 17]
17. San Francisco 6-7 1.77 20.01 [ 20] 18.23 [ 7]
18. NY Giants 7-6 1.58 26.23 [ 7] 24.64 [ 28]
19. Pittsburgh 6-7 0.23 20.69 [ 17] 20.45 [ 12]
20. Tennessee 6-7 -0.41 24.18 [ 12] 24.59 [ 27]
21. Carolina 5-8 -2.45 18.05 [ 23] 20.50 [ 13]
22. Washington 4-9 -3.33 16.41 [ 26] 19.74 [ 9]
23. Buffalo 5-8 -3.68 16.60 [ 25] 20.28 [ 11]
24. Jacksonville 7-6 -4.62 17.65 [ 24] 22.28 [ 22]
25. Chicago 5-8 -4.65 18.24 [ 22] 22.89 [ 23]
26. Seattle 5-8 -5.33 18.97 [ 21] 24.30 [ 26]
27. Tampa Bay 1-12 -9.95 15.68 [ 29] 25.63 [ 29]
28. Cleveland 2-11 -10.43 13.29 [ 30] 23.72 [ 24]
29. Kansas City 3-10 -10.62 16.28 [ 27] 26.90 [ 31]
30. Oakland 4-9 -11.52 12.20 [ 31] 23.73 [ 25]
31. Detroit 2-11 -14.36 16.22 [ 28] 30.58 [ 32]
32. St Louis 1-12 -16.07 10.69 [ 32] 26.77 [ 30]
Unfortunately we see that we don't have two totally dominant undefeated teams. Indianapolis is #3 behind New England, even though they beat them (at home, by 1 point) and the Pats are now struggling somewhat. Indianapolis has only the #5 offense to go with the #2 defense, and more worrying is that the Saints have just the #20 defense, leaving even them open to defeat.
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The good news is that after the Colts it's a fairly good-sized to the next playoff-viable AFC team (San Diego), which means with home field advantage there's hope for two undefeated teams entering the playoffs, and some small hope for the dream Super Bowl.
Let's explore the odds, using the game-comparison system:
New Orleans Saints (13-0) win%
Dallas 80.5%
Tampa Bay 94.7%
@ Carolina 81.1%
Total odds of 16-0: 61.8%
Indianapolis Colts (13-0) win%
@ Jacksonville 74.0%
NY Jets 71.6%
@ Buffalo 75.7%
Total odds of 16-0: 40.1%
So it looks good for New Orleans but Indianapolis isn't out of the woods. Taken together, there's just about a 25% chance that we'll have two 16-0 teams going into the playoff season.
The good news is that both teams are heavy favorites in all three of their remaining games, so there's nothing stopping it from happening. It's not like either team has an exceptionally hard game remaining, so each week they stay undefeated the odds get greater.
Now let's assume that the teams enter the playoff season as the top seed, and see what it would take for them to meet in the Super Bowl. We'll just assume the playoff picture remains roughly the same as it is now. Where it's very close we'll project a winner and go with them in order to form the brackets.
New Orleans Saints win%
Arizona 75.7%
Minnesota 72.2%
Odds to Super Bowl: 54.7%
Indianapolis Colts win%
Baltimore 68.0%
New England 62.7%
Odds to Super Bowl: 42.6%
Once again New Orleans has a better chance, this time of making the Super Bowl, period. Though Indianapolis has the best chance of any NFC team by far (beating New England due to home field advantage), it's more likely that some other team makes it. This is a simple "odds paradox" where Indianapolis is the overwhelming favorite to make the Super Bowl but have less than a 50% chance of doing so. In these cases the assumption is that they'll make it, since the next best team's odds are about 30%.
So what are the odds of New Orleans going 18-0? And Indianapolis? We have to multiply the odds of going 16-0 with the odds of making the Super Bowl, and we get:
New Orleans, odds of going 18-0: 33.8%
Indianapolis, odds of going 18-0: 17.1%
So the Saints have about double the chance of Indianapolis of going 18-0, and making it to the Super Bowl undefeated. Still, those are pretty decent odds considering that only one team has done it before.
The odds of BOTH teams entering the Super Bowl undefeated are about 5.8%. In other words, a bit better than a 1 in 20 chance of the most amazing Super Bowl of all time. The odds of there being at least one undefeated team in the Super Bowl are very good at 45.1% as this breakdown shows:
18-0 New Orleans the only 18-0 team: 28.0%
18-0 Indianapolis the only 18-0 team: 11.3%
Both New Orleans and Indianapolis 18-0: 5.8%
Neither New Orleans or Indianapolis 18-0: 54.9%
Next: what are the odds of having a 19-0 Super Bowl winner? Assuming that these are the two teams that make it, whether or not they went undefeated during the regular season, here are the odds:
1) 18-0 New Orleans (33.8%) beats Indianapolis (whether 18-0 or not) (52.7%): 17.8%
2) 18-0 Indianapolis (17.1%) beats New Orleans (whether 18-0 or not) (47.3%): 8.1%
Total odds of having a 19-0 Super Bowl champion: 25.9%
So basically it looks like we have a 25% chance of two teams finishing the season 16-0, and also about a 25% chance of having 19-0 Super Bowl champion this year.
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