The Kiss Of Death?
November 12th, 2021
Uh, oh.
So, what are we to make of Cynthia Frelund’s latest guess?
Frelund, the stat queen of NFL Network, is always talking about projections and models, and rattling off all sorts of stats with weird acronyms. But getting her to break down the game, well, she never does. Never.
So while she’s enjoyable to watch, Joe’s suspicious of a lot of what she, um, projects. For example, who will ever forget how she projected in the summer of 2020 that the Bucs had the worst starting cornerbacks in the NFL?
Where is @OldTakesExposed when you need him?
So in a look ahead for the second half of the season, Frelund predicts the Bucs will lose two more games and finish with wins (12.6 actually, but Joe is rounding off the number). This, Frelund believes, will get the Bucs the No. 2 seed in the NFC playoff bracket.
What Joe found equally if not more interesting was a nugget she pulled from NextGen Stats. Apparently, the Bucs secondary is improving from earlier in the year.
Per NGS, in the Bucs’ past three outings, the defensive backs have allowed 2 fewer yards after the catch on average than they did in Tampa’s first five games of 2021, improving in an area where they’ve experienced injuries. This team is really only limited by the health of its roster.
If the Bucs are improving as a secondary, imagine when they get both Carlton Davis and Sean Murphy-Bunting back to 100 percent?
Given Frelund’s track record, Joe isn’t comfortable setting in stone the Bucs will win 13 games. But her unveiling of that little intel about the secondary was quite interesting.
November 12th, 2021 at 12:17 am
More Cynthia Frelund on NFL Network! Pete can’t get enough of her. She’s fantastic
November 12th, 2021 at 12:37 am
Next 6 games will tell us , Washington, Giants, Colts, Falcons, Bills , and Saints . win those and they will run the table ,
November 12th, 2021 at 1:00 am
The hapless Dolphins just kicked the snot – kicked the sh!t – out of the mighty Ravens. This is today’s NFL. More parity than ever.
It’s probably crazy in Vegas these days.
November 12th, 2021 at 1:18 am
LOVE her modeling. And she’s decent at running spreadsheets too.
November 12th, 2021 at 3:29 am
First 5 QBs completion rates: Prescott (69.4%), Ryan (69.4%), Stafford (68.2%), Jones (68.0%) and Brissett (64.4%).
Next 3 QBs completion rates: Hurts (61.5%), Fields (59.4%) and Winston (59.0%)/Siemian (58.6%).
Might want to ask Cynthia if she thinks quality of QB play (and receivers’ talent?) has any impact on her analysis. Perhaps, just perhaps, better QBs playing for better teams achieve better results because they make better reads, throw receivers open, etc. Perhaps, just perhaps, lesser QBs actually make CBs & Safeties look better than they really are. Nah, couldn’t be.
November 12th, 2021 at 3:31 am
What’s up with Carlton Davis and if he can only get more speed he be a top 5cb…at this time he falls out the top 15 for me…I like to see us next yr aquire a top lvl cb..we will likely lose edwards…leaving us Whitehead n Winfield @ safety..Will need depth there…also feel like dt is big need 1rd pick maybe move up n grab the best one or trade one…vv is buc for life…
November 12th, 2021 at 4:02 am
On a different note did you see that the Panthers gave Cam $10m — with a $4.5m signing bonus? LOL! Those idiots actually think they have a chance, and apparently they didn’t watch any of his tape from the Patriots, because he’s done, he can barely throw the ball accurately to a RB on a swing pass.
November 12th, 2021 at 4:36 am
Projections are just that – kinda like a guess with as much info as you can gather. But football is a game of chance as well.
Injuries or an ill timed call are hard to predict but usually impact the game
She is nice to look at tho
November 12th, 2021 at 4:47 am
^^^
that was rocket science you typed there carlos
November 12th, 2021 at 6:35 am
Defense Rules is correct, her simplistic use of a summary stat ignores the opposition QBs, it also ignores passes defended which is a critical measure of a defensive secondary’s effectiveness.
She’s a financial analyst, not a quant jock who digs into data for key insights.
November 12th, 2021 at 6:37 am
lol…nfl experts.
November 12th, 2021 at 6:49 am
Her opinions and stats are irrelevant.
November 12th, 2021 at 7:22 am
Defense Rules – using stats to combat stats. All that is proven is they are linked. Chicken or the egg….
Football stats are not clean enough to be an accurate predictor of future results. It’s a true team sport.
Baseball however has a very strong individual contributor component larger same size and clean stats. Which makes future predictions much more likely.
In BA I Trust!
November 12th, 2021 at 7:23 am
Sample size
November 12th, 2021 at 8:21 am
She looks like such a goof ball on Fantasy show, she sits there and just laughs at nothing. Last show they were all dancing around, I had to change the station. Even my wife made a comment of how stupid she looked and she doesn’t watch the NFL station. Nice pooper though. Not sold on Davis, GMFB showing film of Jackson when he was on Rams smoking Davis multiple times in the Bucs/Rams game.
November 12th, 2021 at 9:01 am
The YAC stat also doesn’t count different CB’s playing each game!
November 12th, 2021 at 9:07 am
It doesn’t? Joe thought that’s what made the stat so good for the Bucs.
November 12th, 2021 at 9:39 am
Stats area fine thing, but no one notices them unless an anomaly of the stat world presents them.
The analytics that every team is playing up are statistics, too. It still doesn’t measure the heart, or sheer cussedness, of the guys on the field. I’ll take the Bucs winning out, Brady isn’t going to give an inch to anyone else.
November 12th, 2021 at 12:44 pm
Sport … Perfectly stated. ‘Football stats are not clean enough to be an accurate predictor of future results. It’s a true team sport.’ Yea verily especially on the ‘TEAM sport’.
Stats do however give a decent snapshot of past performance and that can be useful in evaluating ‘trends’ from a big picture standpoint IMO. For instance, Tom Brady has never had a losing season when he was the starting QB. That’s a pretty good ‘trend’ right there. Is it because he’s a great QB, because he’s always been surrounded by great teams, or some of both?
Even with 20 years of winning behind him, would Tom Brady have had a winning season if he’d signed with the Jaguars instead of the Bucs? (yes the Jags went 1-15 last season … without Tom Brady).
November 12th, 2021 at 6:38 pm
Well yeah if you give receivers a 7 yard cushion on 3rd and 4 and they catch passes for 5 yards and the tackle them immediately- you have given up very little yards after catch. I’m not sure thats indicative of good defense.
November 12th, 2021 at 8:25 pm
Butter face.