Okay, so today I wanted to figure out this whole “strength of schedule” thing in the NFL. I’ve heard people talk about it, but I never really understood how it’s calculated or if it’s even useful. So, I dove in.
My Little Experiment
First, I grabbed a piece of paper and a pen – old school, I know! I started by listing out all 32 NFL teams. My handwriting is terrible, but it got the job done.
Then, I went online and found each team’s win-loss record from the previous season. I think it’s safe using info from reliable sports news sources. I carefully wrote those down next to each team.
Next, the slightly trickier part. I needed to find every team’s opponents for the upcoming season. Again, back to the internet. I found the schedule. I started jotting down all the opponents for each team.
- This took a while! There are a lot of games in an NFL season.
- I almost messed up a couple of times and had to double-check my work.
Once I had all that, I calculated the combined winning percentage of each team’s opponents. Basically, I added up all the wins of a team’s opponents, then divided that by the total number of games those opponents played (usually 17, you know, from the past regular season). I wrote all those calculations.
For example, if a team’s opponents had a combined record of 150 wins and 139 losses, I did 150 / (150 + 139) = 0.519 (rounded up).
I repeated this for every team, writing down their opponents’ combined winning percentage. That percentage, I learned, is essentially the “strength of schedule.” The higher the number, the “tougher” the schedule, at least based on last year’s performance. I marked the results down.
What I Realized
It’s a pretty simple calculation, really. It’s just adding, dividing, and keeping track of a lot of numbers. I can see why people use it as a quick way to get a sense of a team’s schedule.
I understood everything at the end!
But honestly, it felt like a lot of work for something that might not even be that accurate. So many things change from year to year in the NFL – new players, new coaches, injuries. I doubted if it is accurate at the end.
Anyway, it was a fun little project for the day. Made me feel like a sports analyst for a couple of hours!
I finished the whole thing.