It's highly unlikely we'll ever see uniformity in how stat crews award tackles. It was worse when the team supplied their own stats years and years ago and, while it's improved now, there continue to be wide variations. As we've reported here for years, the NFL makes an effort to standardize the reporting system but has largely been unsuccessful.
The issue isn't going away. Over the past two seasons in particular, with the unusually large number of linebacker injuries and the ever-increasing number of platoon situations in the league, I would argue the stadium tendency charts in Larry Thomas' spreadsheet have been second in importance only to snap count for weekly IDP projections.
We discuss the stat crew tendencies in our articles every week and they almost always get a mention in our weekly podcast. I understand it's a bit of extra work to open the document and sift through the tables. But if you like to look at matchups to make lineup decisions and you aren't looking at Larry Thomas' spreadsheet -- which has 1-year, 3-year and 5-year trends and a weekly reckoning of all solo and assist numbers corrected for total tackle opportunity, you're really missing out.
It's just so strange to me. How difficult can it be to lay down some basic rules on what constitutes a solo tackle and what constitutes an assisted tackle? It just seems like they don't care at all, but with the importance of fantasy football and its impact on TV deals one would think they should care. With the growth of fantasy football there is sure to be a lot more people moving over into dynasty and IDP so it seems like something they should care about. I know I'm preaching to the choir, or the priest himself, but it just baffles me.
I'm with you. It's frustrating to those monitoring the stat crews, too.
The rules are there. There are guidebooks and an online tutorial to show spotters and recorders how the NFL would prefer tackles to be recorded. There's a default in the computer entry system to award two assists on plays in which two players are credited with a tackle. It can be overridden, as has been noted earlier in the thread.
It is difficult from the press box (and often times from the TV angle) to know exactly who contacted a ballcarrier first. But there's no question there are multiple plays a game where the stat crew makes a decision that a large majority of other observers would disagree with.
You're correct in your argument that the league should care about how fantasy football affects its bottom line. There's a reason tackles are currently, and likely will remain, an
unofficial statistic, however. Who's going to certify the tackle results, mediate disputes and do so in a timely fashion? Therein lies the rub.
Much of fantasy sports involves exploiting inefficiencies in how the masses see and understand the game. Some of it is true football -- can you evaluate talent, make educated guesses on game scripts and understand how the playbook affects each player? Some of it -- like this -- isn't. It's frustrating as hell to see your player not credited with a tackle when he should've been, but there are other ways to take advantage of this information, too.
ETA: There are a handful of us that have a good relationship with the person who monitors the stat crews. I'm sure Jeff may be included in that group, too. What we've been lucky enough to do is make suggestions in how some data gets reported to us. We're often given a heads-up when the default or reporting system changes so we can keep our projections and rankings as informed as possible. Hopefully, that relationship will continue in future years.
