Good Evening and welcome back to According to My Calculations where I fail to make sense of nonsense. Last time we met was only a couple of days ago when I announced the newest investigation into the game-to-game consistency exhibited in the NSFL across certain position groups. Last week we took a look at the consistency of the wide receivers and we discovered stuff that's not very important, but go read it anyway. This week we are looking at running backs!
I won't go as in-depth on my methodology as I spent enough time poorly describing that in that last episode. So go read it there. TABLE TIME:
They get uglier and uglier every time.
So here we're looking at some of the more productive backs this season sorted by the standard deviation of their rushing yards per game as well as the standard deviation of their attempts and yards/carry. We also have their season stats stuck in there for handy reference.
Right off the bat we can see that some of the backs with the greatest deviation per game in rushing yards are also some of the most productive, yet also seem to have higher consistency in YPC. A quick correlation between the deviation of attempts and deviation on yards confirms this nicely with a coefficient of 0.84! The game-to-game yardage is a result of their variation in rushing attempts, not overall productivity.
Next up we look at their efficiency or yards/carry. Ardie Savea and Reg Mackworthy are the two most consistent week-to-week in their YPC, but also have high variation in their attempts, Farlane also matches this dynamic with his 0.7. The most inconsistent were Kyle Cobb, Bubba Nuck, Leroy Jenkins, and Marcus Robinson.
Of the higher production backs Jack Durden appears to be the most consistent overall among all three metrics (using the highly reliable eye test), while among the lower producing backs Vick Bowers appears to be the most consistent overall.
And I also ran correlations between each stat and their association standard deviation and found solid correlations among all of them. It appears that overall as a player's yardage, touches, and efficiency increases their deviation does as well. And of course it does, it would be stupid if it didn't. But I'm telling you that anyway.
So that's all for this episode folks, check back next time for when I analyze the consistency of someone else!
I won't go as in-depth on my methodology as I spent enough time poorly describing that in that last episode. So go read it there. TABLE TIME:
They get uglier and uglier every time.
So here we're looking at some of the more productive backs this season sorted by the standard deviation of their rushing yards per game as well as the standard deviation of their attempts and yards/carry. We also have their season stats stuck in there for handy reference.
Right off the bat we can see that some of the backs with the greatest deviation per game in rushing yards are also some of the most productive, yet also seem to have higher consistency in YPC. A quick correlation between the deviation of attempts and deviation on yards confirms this nicely with a coefficient of 0.84! The game-to-game yardage is a result of their variation in rushing attempts, not overall productivity.
Next up we look at their efficiency or yards/carry. Ardie Savea and Reg Mackworthy are the two most consistent week-to-week in their YPC, but also have high variation in their attempts, Farlane also matches this dynamic with his 0.7. The most inconsistent were Kyle Cobb, Bubba Nuck, Leroy Jenkins, and Marcus Robinson.
Of the higher production backs Jack Durden appears to be the most consistent overall among all three metrics (using the highly reliable eye test), while among the lower producing backs Vick Bowers appears to be the most consistent overall.
And I also ran correlations between each stat and their association standard deviation and found solid correlations among all of them. It appears that overall as a player's yardage, touches, and efficiency increases their deviation does as well. And of course it does, it would be stupid if it didn't. But I'm telling you that anyway.
So that's all for this episode folks, check back next time for when I analyze the consistency of someone else!
Hank Winchester (S25 - Current) - Scrub
Angus Winchester (S1-S12) - 4x Ultimus Champ - #2 Career Sacks - Hall of Fame
Cooter Bigsby (S14-S23) - S23 Ultimus Champ - #4 Career Yards - #4 Career TDs - 2x MVP - Hall of Fame