Guest boatboatboat Posted May 17, 2016 Report Share Posted May 17, 2016 http://espn.go.com/i/mlb/infographics/greyline.png AFC East1. New England Patriots: 10-6 (10.3 mean wins, SOS: 16)2. Buffalo Bills: 9-7 (8.6 mean wins; SOS: 15)3. New York Jets: 6-10 (6.0 mean wins; SOS: 2)4. Miami Dolphins: 5-11 (4.7 mean wins; SOS: 4)This year's projections assume that Tom Brady will serve his four-game Deflategate suspension. While it's a big deal, you might be surprised to hear that in our current forecast, the Patriots win an average of 1.9 games during Brady's suspension; with Brady as quarterback, we would project them for 2.5 wins in those four games. So four games without Brady cost the Patriots less than one win. But at the same time, preseason forecasts like this end up grouping around 8-8 because they account for so much randomness. That means that one win indicates a bigger difference between teams than it would at the end of a season.Our forecast gives the Bills their best chance in a while to break that long playoff drought. We project a bit of a decline on offense, though it's hard to know what to expect from Tyrod Taylor after he was much better than anyone would have expected in his first year as a starter. But no matter what happens on the offensive side of the ball, the Buffalo defense is likely to bounce back from last year's collapse. The Bills had been a top-five defense by DVOA for two seasons before dropping to 24th in 2015.The Jets had the highest DVOA of any team to miss last year's playoffs, but there's a lot of reason to be pessimistic about 2016. We're expecting some relapse after the Jets improved so much on both sides of the ball last season, and that's exacerbated by personnel departures. On defense, the Jets have to replace four starters, particularly Demario Davis and (unless they want to return to a three-man line) Damon Harrison. Matt Forte is a great addition to the offense, but he won't mean much if the Jets don't have a reasonable quarterback. Re-signing Ryan Fitzpatrick would give the Jets an additional win in our mean projections. Plus, the Jets have a tough schedule, partly because we expect so much from the Chiefs compared to the rest of the AFC West and partly because they don't get to play the Patriots without Brady like Buffalo and Miami do.Speaking of the Dolphins, they ranked 29th in overall DVOA last year and aren't likely to be much better in 2016. Adam Gase is a good coaching hire, but offenses often take a step backward when learning a new scheme. Lamar Miller and Rishard Matthews are significant personnel losses. The defense lost a lot of players as well, but it should be a little bit better this year, both because of regression toward the mean and because most of the departed veterans have been replaced by similar veterans, such as Mario Williams for Olivier Vernon and Byron Maxwell for Brent Grimes.http://espn.go.com/i/mlb/infographics/greyline.png AFC North1. Pittsburgh Steelers: 12-4 (11.8 mean wins; SOS: 23)2. Cincinnati Bengals: 10-6 (9.8 mean wins; SOS: 20)3. Baltimore Ravens: 10-6 (9.6 mean wins; SOS: 24)4. Cleveland Browns: 4-12 (3.6 mean wins; SOS: 7)We talk a lot about which NFL division is the best top to bottom, but no division can compete with the AFC North when it comes to "top to almost bottom" quality. Three AFC North teams made the postseason in 2014, and the same will happen in 2016 if the season plays out according to our mean projections.We currently project Pittsburgh to be the best offense in the league, which makes a lot of sense considering they ranked third in offensive DVOA last year despite getting just 12 games out of Ben Roethlisberger and six out of Le'Veon Bell. The Steelers also have a strong, experienced offensive line that gets Maurkice Pouncey back from a missed season. The defense brings in some new blood with this year's top two picks (Artie Burns and Sean Davis) plus cornerback Senquez Golson, a 2015 second-rounder who missed his entire rookie year.Cincinnati ranked No. 2 overall in DVOA last year, trailing only Seattle, but we project some regression on the offensive side of the ball. The Bengals were only an average offense by DVOA in 2013 and 2014 before leading the league last year, and the unit must overcome the loss of wide receivers Mohamed Sanu and Marvin Jones. Cincinnati also gets only seven home games this year because of a game in London.The Bengals were remarkably injury-free last year until they lost their quarterback near the end of the season. Baltimore, on the other hand, was decimated by injuries all year long. By midseason, it seemed as though Joe Flacco had nobody left to throw to, and then he went out and tore his own ACL. The return of Flacco and other veterans such as Terrell Suggs, Steve Smith Sr. and Justin Forsett should help the Ravens bounce back after their first losing season since 2007. The biggest improvement is likely to be more takeaways by the Ravens defense. Last season, the Baltimore defense ended just 6.6 percent of opposing drives with takeaways. That ranked 31st in the NFL. There's a lot of year-to-year regression in turnovers, so that stat is a very strong indicator of improvement in 2016. (In 2014, the lowest teams in this stat were the Jets and Chiefs, who turned their defenses around significantly in 2015.) Baltimore also has the highest projection for special teams, as they are one of the few teams to have excellent special teams nearly every year.Cleveland will spend the year scouting college quarterbacks.http://espn.go.com/i/mlb/infographics/greyline.png AFC South1. Houston Texans: 8-8 (8.0 mean wins; SOS: 25)2. Jacksonville Jaguars: 7-9 (7.4 mean wins; SOS: 22)3. Indianapolis Colts: 7-9 (7.1 mean wins; SOS: 21)4. Tennessee Titans: 7-9 (6.6 mean wins; SOS: 32)Our forecast once again sees the AFC South as the division nobody wants to win. Just 1.4 mean wins separate the four teams, making this a real toss-up.With Andrew Luck hopefully healthy for all 16 games, it sure seems as though we should go back to favoring the Colts to return to dominating a weak division. But our projection system is accounting here for the fact that the Colts' offense wasn't very good even when Luck was on the field last season. Subjectively, we might explain away Luck's Week 1-3 performance as an early-season slump, and we might explain away his Week 6-8 performance as coming back too soon from his first injury. Objectively, our projection system sees that the Colts would have finished 20th in offensive DVOA even if we only counted games with Luck in the lineup. Meanwhile, the Colts probably will have the oldest defense in the league, generally an indicator of decline. Six projected starters will be 30 or older, as will pass-rush specialist Robert Mathis and nickelback Darius Butler.The Texans are essentially forecast to be the roughly the same team as last year, which is enough to make them division favorites. Brock Osweiler is unlikely to be an upgrade on Brian Hoyer -- or at least, what Brian Hoyer did in the regular season. Lamar Miller is an improvement at running back, but that's balanced out by losses along the offensive line. Most of the defense returns, although the Texans have to figure out how to fill the giant hole opposite J.J. Watt caused by the departure of Jared Crick. The Texans also get a boost to their win chances in two specific games because they will face the Patriots without Brady and the Raiders in Mexico instead of Oakland.Jacksonville will surely be a hot pick to win the AFC South, and our projection system agrees that its defense should be much improved this season. The Jaguars' defensive profile is boosted by the addition of three high draft picks: Jalen Ramsey, Myles Jack and last year's third overall selection, Dante Fowler Jr., who will finally play after losing his entire rookie season to a torn ACL. However, we project the offense to regress a bit after last year's significant improvement.We still have the Titans projected to finish last in the division, but we do expect improvement in Tennessee. That's driven by the offense, primarily because our QBASE college quarterback projection system absolutely loved Marcus Mariota. That still matters in these team projections because we're early in his career and have only one year of NFL play to go on. The Titans also get a boost from the addition of wide receiver Rishard Matthews. Surprisingly, they don't get a boost in this forecast from adding DeMarco Murray because Murray was so awful in Philadelphia last season, but Murray is probably better than that -- one reason the Titans might be better than this projection.http://espn.go.com/i/mlb/infographics/greyline.png AFC West1. Kansas City Chiefs: 12-4 (11.6 mean wins; SOS: 29)2. San Diego Chargers: 8-8 (8.4 mean wins; SOS: 31)3. Denver Broncos: 7-9 (7.1 mean wins; SOS: 13)4. Oakland Raiders: 6-10 (6.4 mean wins; SOS: 14)The AFC West has our most controversial projections for 2016, none more so than saying the defending champion Broncos are more likely to have a losing record than a winning record in 2016.The driving concept here is that the best defenses in the NFL tend to regress toward the mean the next season more than the best offenses, and predictions for defense come in a much wider range of possibilities than the predictions for offense.This doesn't take away from how amazing the Broncos were in 2015. DVOA rated the 2015 Broncos as 25.8 percent more efficient than the average defense, ranking No. 8 among all defenses since 1989. But only one defense in the past 25 years has been 20 percent better than average for two straight seasons (the 1999-2000 Ravens). The 20 best DVOA defenses before last year's Broncos ranked, on average, just eighth in the league the following season. Right now, we project the Broncos as the best defense in the league for next season, but that average projection is just 11.4 percent more efficient than average.That would make the Denver defense about as good as it was two years ago, which would be fine if the Denver offense were as good as it was two years ago. But as bad as Peyton Manning was during his final regular season, there's no reason to believe Mark Sanchez or Paxton Lynch will be any better. Sanchez is simply not a starting-quality quarterback, finishing with a QBR of more than 45 only once in his seven-year NFL career, and our QBASE system gives Lynch a 67 percent chance of being a bust. If the Broncos have a defense only 10 percent better than average and an offense as bad as last year, they aren't a Super Bowl contender. They're just the Rams.Replacing the Broncos as the likely AFC West standard-bearers are the Chiefs. This is only a surprise if you don't realize just how good the Chiefs were last year when they finished the regular season with 10 straight wins. Even incorporating their 1-5 start, the Chiefs ended up with a higher overall DVOA (fifth) than the Broncos (eighth). One big question here will be the health of pass-rusher Justin Houston. We don't know if he'll be ready by September or miss the whole year; for this projection, we assumed he would miss half the season. But while the Chiefs are definitely not as strong on defense without Houston, they won the last five games in that 10-game streak with Houston stuck on the sidelines.But wait, isn't it finally the time for the Raiders to shine thanks to a couple of successful drafts and a lot of young talent? Actually, I agree: Of all 32 objective forecasts spit out by our projection system, this is the one I subjectively disagree with most. A statistical projection system like the one we use recognizes that teams that significantly improve from horrible to average will tend to take a step backward the next season. This is what Bill James called the "Plexiglass Principle." Some teams, however, will take the next step and become playoff contenders that next year. Usually, these are teams with a blossoming core of young talent, but we have yet to pinpoint an age/talent variable that will identify these teams with statistical significance. Thus, we're left with a system that projects the Raiders to decline just like the Jets, a much older team that made a similar jump in quality last year. Khalil Mack can't really get any better than he already was in 2015, but the young offensive players sure can, so a playoff season by the Raiders would certainly not be a surprise. But it's also far from a guarantee. Remember also that the Mexico City game means the Raiders have only seven home games this season.That leaves San Diego. Why do we have them finishing second in the AFC West? Defense and special teams performance is less consistent year-to-year than that of the offense. That means that the Chargers' defense that ranked 28th in DVOA last season is likely to be better in 2016, as is San Diego's special teams unit that ranked 31st. Combine that with a good quarterback and a tremendously easy schedule -- the whole division gets the AFC South and NFC South, but the Chargers also get Cleveland and Miami -- and the result is a team with an average projection around 8-8.http://espn.go.com/i/mlb/infographics/greyline.png Full AFC projected playoff standingsHere's what the 2016 AFC playoff picture would look like according to our early projections.1. Pittsburgh Steelers (12-4)2. Kansas City Chiefs (12-4)3. New England Patriots (10-6)4. Houston Texans (8-8)5. Cincinnati Bengals* (10-6)6. Baltimore Ravens* (10-6)7. Buffalo Bills (9-7)8. San Diego Chargers (8-8)9. Jacksonville Jaguars (7-9)10. Denver Broncos (7-9)11. Indianapolis Colts (7-9)12. Tennessee Titans (7-9)13. Oakland Raiders (6-10) 14. New York Jets (6-10)15. Miami Dolphins (5-11)16. Cleveland Browns (4-12)*Wild-card teams Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KingKolzig Posted May 17, 2016 Report Share Posted May 17, 2016 another shitty cut and paste by boat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest boatboatboat Posted May 17, 2016 Report Share Posted May 17, 2016 I assume there are some here that don't pay to subscribe to ESPN insider and appreciate the gesture of sharing the info. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deemer Posted May 17, 2016 Report Share Posted May 17, 2016 I don't subscribe because it's shit Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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