Here is what I came up with a year ago on this topic and I still want to compare the findings to 2006 data (and earlier seasons as well) but just need to find the time. Figured I'd post it here in case anyone was interested and thought it might generate some good discussion. Remember these statistics are for the 2005 season.
When it is this early in the season, it is hard to put much faith in the statistics from last week when setting your lineups. The sample size of 1 game is just way too small and there are likely quite a few fluke performances that would skew the numbers. So, what I decided to do was to look at some of the data from last year on the more subjective statistics like assisted tackles and passes defensed and try to come up with some general conclusions that can help you in setting your lineups each week. Unfortunately, I don't have the data ready to check on whether these trends hold up from year to year, but that will be a project for the offseason. There are some interesting findings here though and I'll let you decide how much influence they should have.
ASSISTED TACKLESTeam Home Away Total====================================================PIT 177 69.7% 77 30.3% 254GB 162 63.5% 93 36.5% 255MIA 193 62.9% 114 37.1% 307TEN 162 62.3% 98 37.7% 260SD 133 62.1% 81 37.9% 214NE 159 61.4% 100 38.6% 259NYG 126 60.6% 82 39.4% 208IND 134 57.8% 98 42.2% 232CIN 138 57.7% 101 42.3% 239BUF 180 57.5% 133 42.5% 313SEA 117 57.4% 87 42.6% 204TB 118 55.4% 95 44.6% 213NO 113 54.3% 95 45.7% 208SF 115 53.5% 100 46.5% 215DEN 75 53.2% 66 46.8% 141CLE 165 52.2% 151 47.8% 316NYJ 159 51.8% 148 48.2% 307DAL 86 51.5% 81 48.5% 167HOU 138 51.5% 130 48.5% 268DET 121 51.3% 115 48.7% 236CAR 93 50.5% 91 49.5% 184BAL 90 49.5% 92 50.5% 182WAS 67 48.9% 70 51.1% 137PHI 59 46.8% 67 53.2% 126MIN 90 44.3% 113 55.7% 203OAK 72 42.9% 96 57.1% 168CHI 77 42.5% 104 57.5% 181ARI 68 42.5% 92 57.5% 160KC 54 40.3% 80 59.7% 134JAX 55 32.2% 116 67.8% 171STL 44 28.2% 112 71.8% 156ATL 39 21.9% 139 78.1% 178====================================================Total 3579 52.7% 3217 47.3% 6796This is the total number of assisted tackles for each team divided by home and away games. Then, I looked at the % of total assisted tackles awarded at home and sorted by that. You immediately notice that the stat keepers for Pittsburgh, Green Bay, Miami, Tennessee, San Diego, New England, and the Giants were all very generous with the assist numbers. Players from those teams got 60% or more of their total assists in home games. Not surprisingly, many of the best fantasy linebackers have come from these places in recent years. Players like James Farrior, Nick Barnett, Zach Thomas, Keith Bulluck, Donnie Edwards, Tedy Bruschi, and Antonio Pierce have all potentially benefited from this in the recent past. Meanwhile, stat keepers in Atlanta, St. Louis, Jacksonville, and Kansas City appeared to be much stingier than the rest as players from those teams wound up getting 40% or fewer of their total assists while playing in home games. Perhaps players like Keith Brooking, Pino Tinoisamoa, Mike Peterson, and Kavika Mitchell or Derrick Johnson could have been more productive fantasy players if they happened to play in a more favorable environment.Also, to give you a better idea of the scope of these differences, each column includes the sum of assists awarded in 8 games. So, Atlanta only gave out an average of 5 assists per home game while Pittsburgh was giving out 22 per game on average. Those two teams were obviously the most extreme last year but that's a pretty big range.
There were similar discrepancies with passes defensed as well:
PASSES DEFENSEDTeam Home Away Total====================================================PHI 95 74.8% 32 25.2% 127CHI 63 69.2% 28 30.8% 91HOU 49 67.1% 24 32.9% 73MIA 53 64.6% 29 35.4% 82DET 45 64.3% 25 35.7% 70SF 59 63.4% 34 36.6% 93DEN 64 61.0% 41 39.0% 105TEN 37 59.7% 25 40.3% 62NYG 52 59.1% 36 40.9% 88TB 46 58.2% 33 41.8% 79STL 38 57.6% 28 42.4% 66BAL 39 55.7% 31 44.3% 70IND 39 54.9% 32 45.1% 71NO 36 54.5% 30 45.5% 66BUF 41 53.9% 35 46.1% 76CLE 38 53.5% 33 46.5% 71MIN 45 52.3% 41 47.7% 86CIN 39 51.3% 37 48.7% 76PIT 43 51.2% 41 48.8% 84ARI 35 50.7% 34 49.3% 69WAS 44 50.6% 43 49.4% 87GB 33 47.1% 37 52.9% 70NYJ 30 46.9% 34 53.1% 64SD 43 45.7% 51 54.3% 94KC 40 45.5% 48 54.5% 88OAK 30 44.1% 38 55.9% 68SEA 42 43.3% 55 56.7% 97JAX 34 43.0% 45 57.0% 79CAR 40 42.1% 55 57.9% 95ATL 27 38.6% 43 61.4% 70NE 26 38.2% 42 61.8% 68DAL 30 37.0% 51 63.0% 81====================================================Total 1375 53.6% 1191 46.4% 2566The stat keepers in Philadelphia really stand out as being incredibly generous with almost 75% of the passes defensed recorded by their players being awarded in home games. Chicago, Houston, Miami, Detroit, San Francisco, Denver, and Tennessee were also quite generous, resulting in the players from those teams getting credited with 1.5 times as many passes defensed in home games compared to road games. Meanwhile, players in Dallas, New England, and Atlanta seem to have a much harder time getting credited with a pass defense when playing at home than the rest of the league. The raw numbers here are much smaller than those for assisted tackles so these won't have a huge impact on fantasy value. But, it is something interesting to keep in mind and highlights the inherent subjectivity with these particular IDP stats.For comparison purposes, here is the data for solo tackles, which are much less subjective:
SOLO TACKLESTeam Home Away Total====================================================NE 376 57.5% 278 42.5% 654IND 395 53.7% 340 46.3% 735KC 354 53.6% 306 46.4% 660STL 390 53.1% 344 46.9% 734NYJ 395 51.4% 373 48.6% 768BAL 346 51.1% 331 48.9% 677TB 344 50.8% 333 49.2% 677ATL 356 50.7% 346 49.3% 702SD 355 50.6% 347 49.4% 702HOU 375 50.5% 368 49.5% 743NYG 362 50.2% 359 49.8% 721CHI 366 50.2% 363 49.8% 729CAR 335 50.1% 334 49.9% 669ARI 333 50.0% 333 50.0% 666CLE 368 49.7% 372 50.3% 740MIN 345 49.7% 349 50.3% 694SEA 373 49.6% 379 50.4% 752JAX 343 49.5% 350 50.5% 693NO 344 49.4% 352 50.6% 696TEN 334 49.3% 344 50.7% 678DET 336 49.1% 348 50.9% 684WAS 317 49.1% 329 50.9% 646GB 335 49.0% 348 51.0% 683BUF 351 48.9% 367 51.1% 718OAK 379 48.8% 397 51.2% 776PIT 322 47.4% 358 52.6% 680DEN 293 46.4% 338 53.6% 631SF 337 45.9% 398 54.1% 735CIN 286 45.5% 343 54.5% 629PHI 330 45.1% 402 54.9% 732DAL 265 43.2% 348 56.8% 613MIA 291 42.5% 393 57.5% 684====================================================Total 11031 49.5% 11270 50.5% 22301The stadium impact here seems to be much more subtle with no teams going above 60% or below 40% and the overall numbers showing up almost exactly at 50/50. One interesting thing to point out here is that Miami ranked dead last for solo tackles after ranking #3 in generosity for assisted tackles and #4 for passes defensed. That suggests that these differences may not be due to a stat keeper trying to pad the stats of the home players (as many would probably assume) but could simply reflect a difference in the standards being used to distinguish a solo from an assisted tackle.The numbers up until this point looked at how each team did at home vs the road so the individual teams were the focus. Next, I wanted to break things down by stadium, so for each of the 32 stadiums (treating Giants and Jets separately here) I compared the combined stats from the home team Vs the road team (all 8 road teams are grouped together as one). This should help tell us whether the stat keepers are biased towards the home team or if they are simply more generous with assisted tackles for both the home and away teams.
ASSISTED TACKLESStadium Home Road Total P/Game========================================================MIA 193 50.0% 193 50.0% 386 24.1PIT 177 49.3% 182 50.7% 359 22.4TEN 162 49.1% 168 50.9% 330 20.6BUF 180 54.7% 149 45.3% 329 20.6NE 159 50.0% 159 50.0% 318 19.9CLE 165 54.8% 136 45.2% 301 18.8GB 162 56.1% 127 43.9% 289 18.1HOU 138 50.0% 138 50.0% 276 17.3NYJ 159 58.2% 114 41.8% 273 17.1CIN 138 51.5% 130 48.5% 268 16.8IND 134 50.0% 134 50.0% 268 16.8NYG 126 50.0% 126 50.0% 252 15.8DET 121 51.9% 112 48.1% 233 14.6BAL 90 39.0% 141 61.0% 231 14.4SEA 117 51.3% 111 48.7% 228 14.3NO 113 50.0% 113 50.0% 226 14.1SD 133 59.4% 91 40.6% 224 14.0SF 115 52.8% 103 47.2% 218 13.6TB 118 56.2% 92 43.8% 210 13.1CAR 93 49.2% 96 50.8% 189 11.8MIN 90 50.0% 90 50.0% 180 11.3DEN 75 42.1% 103 57.9% 178 11.1ARI 68 41.2% 97 58.8% 165 10.3DAL 86 55.1% 70 44.9% 156 9.8WAS 67 45.6% 80 54.4% 147 9.2OAK 72 53.7% 62 46.3% 134 8.4CHI 77 58.3% 55 41.7% 132 8.3PHI 59 49.2% 61 50.8% 120 7.5JAX 55 50.0% 55 50.0% 110 6.9KC 54 50.0% 54 50.0% 108 6.8STL 44 55.7% 35 44.3% 79 4.9ATL 39 52.0% 36 48.0% 75 4.7========================================================Total 3579 51.2% 3413 48.8% 6992 437.0Pretty huge difference between the stingy teams like Atlanta and St. Louis who gave out fewer than 5 assists per game to both teams combined and teams like Miami and Pittsburgh who gave out over 4 times more assists per game. Also, none of the stadiums appear to have a huge home field advantage where the home team gets many more assists awarded than the road teams, but there are a handful of teams that appear to be headed that direction (NYJ, SD, CHI, GB, TB). Baltimore, Denver, and Arizona look like they may actually have a slight bias against the home team as they awarded only about 40% of the total assisted tackles to home players. These differences could obviously also be explained by differences in the number of plays so further analysis is needed to see if they still hold after you control for the number of plays.Same table for passes defensed:
PASSES DEFENSEDStadium Home Road Total P/Game========================================================PHI 95 47.3% 106 52.7% 201 12.6MIA 53 47.3% 59 52.7% 112 7.0SF 59 60.8% 38 39.2% 97 6.1DEN 64 68.1% 30 31.9% 94 5.9ARI 35 37.6% 58 62.4% 93 5.8NYG 52 56.5% 40 43.5% 92 5.8CHI 63 69.2% 28 30.8% 91 5.7HOU 49 55.1% 40 44.9% 89 5.6TB 46 52.3% 42 47.7% 88 5.5DET 45 51.7% 42 48.3% 87 5.4NO 36 42.4% 49 57.6% 85 5.3TEN 37 45.7% 44 54.3% 81 5.1BUF 41 51.3% 39 48.8% 80 5.0SD 43 53.8% 37 46.3% 80 5.0CAR 40 51.3% 38 48.7% 78 4.9BAL 39 51.3% 37 48.7% 76 4.8OAK 30 39.5% 46 60.5% 76 4.8PIT 43 58.1% 31 41.9% 74 4.6SEA 42 56.8% 32 43.2% 74 4.6GB 33 45.8% 39 54.2% 72 4.5IND 39 54.2% 33 45.8% 72 4.5CIN 39 55.7% 31 44.3% 70 4.4CLE 38 54.3% 32 45.7% 70 4.4STL 38 54.3% 32 45.7% 70 4.4MIN 45 67.2% 22 32.8% 67 4.2KC 40 61.5% 25 38.5% 65 4.1WAS 44 71.0% 18 29.0% 62 3.9ATL 27 45.8% 32 54.2% 59 3.7JAX 34 57.6% 25 42.4% 59 3.7NYJ 30 51.7% 28 48.3% 58 3.6DAL 30 61.2% 19 38.8% 49 3.1NE 26 57.8% 19 42.2% 45 2.8========================================================Total 1375 53.6% 1191 46.4% 2566 160.4Philadelphia looks like the main outlier here, but teams like Miami and San Francisco gave out about twice as many PDs as New England and Dallas did.Same thing for solo tackles:
SOLO TACKLESStadium Home Road Total P/Game========================================================BAL 346 44.9% 424 55.1% 770 48.1SEA 373 48.8% 391 51.2% 764 47.8HOU 375 49.3% 385 50.7% 760 47.5STL 390 51.5% 367 48.5% 757 47.3IND 395 52.6% 356 47.4% 751 46.9SD 355 47.8% 387 52.2% 742 46.4OAK 379 51.4% 359 48.6% 738 46.1NYJ 395 53.6% 342 46.4% 737 46.1KC 354 48.6% 375 51.4% 729 45.6ARI 333 45.7% 395 54.3% 728 45.5ATL 356 49.1% 369 50.9% 725 45.3CLE 368 50.9% 355 49.1% 723 45.2NYG 362 50.3% 357 49.7% 719 44.9TB 344 48.3% 368 51.7% 712 44.5NE 376 53.0% 334 47.0% 710 44.4CHI 366 51.6% 343 48.4% 709 44.3NO 344 49.0% 358 51.0% 702 43.9JAX 343 49.3% 353 50.7% 696 43.5GB 335 48.4% 357 51.6% 692 43.3PHI 330 47.8% 361 52.2% 691 43.2TEN 334 48.5% 354 51.5% 688 43.0WAS 317 46.7% 362 53.3% 679 42.4MIN 345 51.9% 320 48.1% 665 41.6BUF 351 53.1% 310 46.9% 661 41.3CAR 335 50.8% 324 49.2% 659 41.2PIT 322 49.4% 330 50.6% 652 40.8DEN 293 45.0% 358 55.0% 651 40.7SF 337 52.2% 309 47.8% 646 40.4DAL 265 41.4% 375 58.6% 640 40.0DET 336 53.5% 292 46.5% 628 39.3CIN 286 47.0% 322 53.0% 608 38.0MIA 291 51.1% 278 48.9% 569 35.6========================================================Total 11031 49.5% 11270 50.5% 22301 1393.8Not much difference, although it is interesting that Miami and Pitt show up on the low side here while showing up at the top of the assists list. That's a pretty clear indicator that they aren't simply inflating stats across the board but rather are just using a different standard when determining who gets credit for a tackle. Looks like they are more likely to give out multiple assists instead of trying to identify the one person who should be credited with a solo stop.Here's a table of overall numbers to try and get a sense of the big picture here.
OVERALL NUMBERSStadium Solos Assist PD Points Pts/G================================================================HOU 760 276 89 987.0 61.7BAL 770 231 76 961.5 60.1IND 751 268 72 957.0 59.8PHI 691 120 201 952.0 59.5SEA 764 228 74 952.0 59.5CLE 723 301 70 943.5 59.0NYG 719 252 92 937.0 58.6SD 742 224 80 934.0 58.4TEN 688 330 81 934.0 58.4NYJ 737 273 58 931.5 58.2NE 710 318 45 914.0 57.1GB 692 289 72 908.5 56.8BUF 661 329 80 905.5 56.6PIT 652 359 74 905.5 56.6TB 712 210 88 905.0 56.6ARI 728 165 93 903.5 56.5NO 702 226 85 900.0 56.3OAK 738 134 76 881.0 55.1MIA 569 386 112 874.0 54.6STL 757 79 70 866.5 54.2CHI 709 132 91 866.0 54.1SF 646 218 97 852.0 53.3KC 729 108 65 848.0 53.0DEN 651 178 94 834.0 52.1CAR 659 189 78 831.5 52.0DET 628 233 87 831.5 52.0MIN 665 180 67 822.0 51.4ATL 725 75 59 821.5 51.3WAS 679 147 62 814.5 50.9CIN 608 268 70 812.0 50.8JAX 696 110 59 810.0 50.6DAL 640 156 49 767.0 47.9================================================================TOTAL 22301 6992 2566 28363.0 1772.7So, what can we conclude from all this? Not completely sure. I would really like to find out if these differences are consistent from year to year, and also want to try and break things down by play at some point to see how much of these differences can be explained by simple differences in the number of plays being run. I also hope to compare these numbers with the 2006 data and also to eventually compare them to 2004 and maybe earlier years as well.For now though, there are some things that I think we can take away from these numbers:
* Defensive backs who play in Philadelphia are generally going to be good starting options because they seem to hand out PDs like candy there. Home and road teams combined for 12.6 PDs/game last year, which was 2.5 times the league average of 5. In contrast, DBs who play in New England look like weak plays as they only handed out 2.8 PDs/game last year.
* Players who have games in Miami, Pittsburgh, Tennessee, Buffalo, and New England are probably more likely to be credited with assisted tackles when they are involved in a play than players in Atlanta, St. Louis, Kansas City, Jacksonville, and Philadelphia. These differences may be offset by a reverse trend in solo tackles, however, so be careful not to rely too much on any individual statistic.
* Overall, it looks like some of the more fantasy-friendly stadiums last year were Houston, Baltimore, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, and Seattle. In contrast, places like Dallas, Jacksonville, Cincinnati, Washington, Atlanta, and Minnesota seemed a little unfriendly to fantasy owners.
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interesting. Defenses seem to fair very well at home.
