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Stephanie's avatar

Sounds like a great day for you! I hope you sell a million books from it. Fascination conversations. I especially loved the question you posit with Stillman wondering how an organization would fare being run by one guy and a laptop instead of 100 employees in a front office. I think that's how most fans think it's done anyway.

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andrew stead's avatar

Two things that I hope we don't have to wait ten years to stop seeing: "taking the points" and the line showing field goal range.

For those who don't play blackjack--good for you--if the player is dealt a blackjack and the dealer shows an ace, the player has the option of "taking" even money. There is no risk or uncertainty, the offer of even money is available to be accepted, fullstop. There is no such offer for FGs. The Bills "took the points" against the Chefs, only for Bass to shank it. "Taking the points" is a grossly inaccurate misnomer.

Similarly, the concept of FG range has long been treated as something binary. We're conditioned to yes/no lines in football: a nose over the goal-line and one gets six. Of course, FG range is at best a spectrum, but the concept of being "in" range has been used to support numerous bad coaching decisions. Any graphic shouldn't be a single line, it should show the range of outcomes (ideally for this caliber of kicker/conditions, not a league average) over a larger area of the field. E.G. 50 yards might have a 60% chance of being made, while 38 yards has an 85% chance of being made.

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