Against Analytics: The NFL's Popularity and Anti-Intellectualism

by Chris Alarie

That football is the most popular sport in America and that the NFL is the most popular professional sports league are indisputable facts. This is a frequent source of consternation for me because, while I am certainly a football fan, I find it to be a vastly inferior sport to both baseball and basketball and believe that the NFL is one of the most onerous institutions in all of sports. Of course, the reason for football's dominance are myriad—from the primal appeal of the sport's violence to the relatively short season and once weekly games to the sport's particularly good fit for gambling and fantasy leagues—but there is one key factor that seems to have been overlooked: football's comparatively lesser engagement with advanced statistics.

Both baseball and basketball have been embroiled for years—or decades, in the case of baseball—in debates about the merits and value of advanced statistical methods of quantifying and evaluating the performance of players and teams. These debates often divide along generational lines, with younger writers, fans, and executives generally tending to lend greater credence to these advanced statistics than their older peers. And rather than offer a defense of one approach or the other,¹ I'd just point out that these debates are essential parts of the fabric of both MLB and the NBA. Football, however, has mostly managed to avoid this debate and, really, the encroachment of advanced statistics almost entirely.

Indeed, when ESPN tried four years ago to introduce an advanced football statistic titled QBR, it was roundly ignored and routinely mocked. It exists now primarily as a means for other sports media organizations to criticize the "Worldwide Leader". But beyond reflecting somewhat poorly on Disney's otherwise impenetrable sports behemoth, the failure of QBR further serves to demonstrate football's immunity to having advanced stats as a part of the general discourse surrounding the sport. QBR's flawed analysis and laughable conclusions is a larger part of the NFL media and fan landscape than far better and far more useful advanced statistics such as Football Outsiders' DVOA. Often times the debate surrounding advanced stats is reduced to "numbers" vs. "the eye test"; in football, "the eye test" reigns supreme.

The question implicit in this is: why doesn't the majority of football fans care about advanced statistics? While I wouldn't claim to fully explain it, I can hazard a few guesses. Partly it is because football is so much less about individual achievements than baseball and basketball and much of advanced statistics focuses on the performance of individual players. But even still, there are advanced stats (such as the aforementioned DVOA) that focus on team performance and have not gained much traction among the mass of football fans. Perhaps it is a result, in part, from football's militaristic symbolism² and borderline fascistic obsession with the strength, unity, and secrecy of individual franchises and the league as a whole. The NFL is well known for its paranoid credo, "Protect the Shield". And, as Tim Kawakami frequently observes, NFL fans, more than fans of any other sport, have an extreme loyalty to their franchises and owners over players or even coaches. And the paranoia³ and gamesmanship of NFL coaches is legendary. So perhaps advanced stats, which ostensibly peel back the curtain of of the sport and offer a deeper understanding of why teams and players succeed or fail, are, to NFL fans, the proprietary realm of the overlords running the teams and not the business of us plebes in the general sporting public. Another possible explanation is that the dominance of fantasy football—which traffics almost entirely in traditional stats as opposed to advanced stats—has kept all but the most dedicated fans uninterested in these more complicated statistical analyses. Whatever the reasons, it is clear that advanced stats do not have the same place in football discourse as they do in the realms of baseball and basketball. And that lack of advanced stats is part and parcel of the NFL's perhaps confusing dominance in this country.

This is perhaps an oversimplification, but I suspect that the disparity between the NFL and MLB/NBA reflects, in some ways, differences within the culture as a whole. Advanced statistics, and the sports that more directly incorporate them, seem more likely to appeal to intellectual, coastal elites. By contrast, the NFL, with its rejection of advanced stats in favor of more primal, simplified, and traditional notions of sports, seems more likely to appeal to the mass of red state denizens who feel like the coastal elites and the media ignore their concerns and interests. As I said, this is probably not entirely accurate—among other problems, plenty of us coastal intellectuals still watch football. But it seems, at very least, to be of symbolic importance that probably the biggest football fan among American presidents was Richard "Silent Majority" Nixon while Barack Obama is famously obsessed with basketball. And it is worth noting that the same analytically inclined media that dominates baseball and basketball has been unable to predict or even understand the continued successes of Donald Trump's presidential campaign.

In this somewhat convoluted metaphor, the baseball and basketball focused, pro-analytics crowd is the coastal, media-saturated segment of the population arguing in increasingly minute, esoteric detail about the various discrepancies between Hillary Clinton's complicated financial regulation plans and Bernie Sanders's promise to "break up the banks!"⁴ The more conservative, anti-advanced stats faction of the baseball and basketball world is analogous to the conservative intellectuals futilely decrying Donald Trump's conservative bona fides in the pages of The New Republic. In the meantime, the remaining hordes are actively defying both sides of these debates by watching football and pledging their intention to vote for Donald Trump. This is not to say that all football fans are Trump supporters or vice versa, but there is clearly a similar dynamic playing out in the realms of sports and politics.

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1 Of course, like any good liberal, I almost neurotically try to split the difference between the two camps in my personal feelings toward the subject.^↩
2 George Carlin's famous routine about the difference between baseball and football remains as true as ever.^↩
3 There's that word again.^↩
4 Clearly, I fall into these camps.^↩

Chris Alarie is Spectacular Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

To Live & Die a Warriors Fan

The last few days, KNBR has been repeatedly replaying Tim Roye's radio call from the end of game 5 of the Western Conference Finals: “The phrase you thought you would not hear in your lifetime: the Golden State Warriors are going to the NBA Finals!” From my perspective, it is about as accurate a description of the circumstances as possible; while I have been a loyal Warriors fan essentially all my life, I absolutely never thought they would ever accomplish this much. This isn't to say that I didn't believe in my team, but more that I had become so accustomed to failure that my expectations were low enough to be virtually nonexistant.

I'll point to other writers to offer detailed explanations of the franchise's failings[1] or explain what the team and its success means to the changing dynamics within the Bay Area[2] or analyze the Finals matchup between the Warriors and the Cleveland Cavaliers, and instead just offer an explanation of my own personal experience as a fan of this long moribund franchise, hopefully shedding some light on what other Warriors fans are experiencing in this moment of unanticipated success.

The NBA playoffs have a somewhat anomalous[3] format compared to other American professional sports leagues. More than half the teams in the league make the playoffs every year and—due to the number of rounds, length of the series, and necessary rest and travel days between games—the entire postseason lasts an exceedingly long two months. Between age nine and age 22, I watched as my favorite NBA team, the Golden State Warriors, failed to make the playoffs for 12 straight seasons. As such, one of my annual rituals was to find a rooting interest in other teams come playoff-time—usually determined by which teams had the most prominent former Warriors,[4] former Cal players,[5] or just anyone with some tie to the Bay Area.[6] But my team was never involved in any meaningful way, other than the brief distraction and disappointment of the annual draft lottery.

To be honest, by the time the playoff drought reached only a handful of years, I stopped even having any hope of the Warriors participating in the playoffs or having any role in the NBA other than as a doormat. I continued to watch their games because I loved basketball and remained loyal to my team, but I eventually developed such low-expectations of my team that I never really thought they would be good. I never harbored any hope for a championship or even so much as a sustained playoff run because it just seemed impossible.[7]

Instead, I learned to appreciate small victories and other minor positive attributes, such as the night former Cal great Sean Lampley scored 14 points during his brief tenure with the team or longtime backup center Adonal Foyle's reputation as being one of the smartest and most cultured NBA players. And I was always able to enjoy the excellent broadcasting of Jim Barnett and take solace in the Warriors' fans' reputation as the best fans in the NBA. When the lovably unconventional We Believe team finally made the playoffs and defeated the heavily favored Dallas Mavericks in the first round in 2007, I assumed that would be the franchise's greatest moment in my lifetime.[8] But I never expected a championship.

While some of this pessimism may have been the result of the fatalism endemic to fans of incompetent and unsuccessful franchises, much of it owed to the dark presence that was owner Chris Cohan. Indeed, it seemed impossible that the Warriors would be successful as long as Cohan owned the team and it seemed unlikely that Cohan would ever sell the team.[9] However, when Cohan sold the team to Joe Lacob and Peter Guber in 2010, my expectations for my favorite basketball team changed. While I didn't necessarily believe that they would win a championship, I harbored hope that they would eventually become a normal, competent franchise that occasionally made the playoffs and contended for something resembling a championship run.

While Lacob made some statements early in his ownership tenure that bothered me[10] and made decisions that I didn't necessarily favor,[11] I was willing to give him a significant benefit of the doubt simply because he wasn't Cohan. Of course, not every other Warriors fan felt the same way. My dad and I were actually at the game where Warriors fans mercilessly booed him during a halftime ceremony honoring Chris Mullin. We were among the only people in our section—and likely, among very few in the whole arena—who were not booing.[12] We didn't boo,[13] in part, because we didn't want to detract from Mullin's moment,[14] but also because our expectations were so low that Lacob would have had to repeatedly prove his incompetence to earn our ire—something he had not had nearly enough time to do at that point.

Indeed, the success of the last few seasons have validated Lacob's decisions as owner and, perhaps, set up new expectations of success for the fanbase. But I keep thinking about all those years where I started the season without even the slightest hope of success, all those years where I had to find a team to halfheartedly follow during the playoffs, all those years where I watched other teams and felt jealous of their competent front offices and genuine superstars. Now the Warriors have a great front office and a great, fun team lead by the league's MVP.[15] The franchise that was so terrible for so many years that I couldn't even so much as hope for a championship is now only four wins away from a title.

I don't even know how to express how I feel. It is some mixture of catharsis, bewilderment, excitement, and some unnamable, intangible emotion. All throughout the playoffs, I have texted my dad about the team's run.[16] Lately, I have run out of things to say about the team and have taken to just texting, “This is amazing!” and “This is unbelievable!” I know that there is still a potentially difficult Finals against LeBron James,[17] the best player in the world, but this season has already far exceeded my wildest expectations.[18] I don't know, man, this is unbelievable.

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[1]    When I first read Simmons's article three years ago, I had to stop reading at multiple points because I got so angry and had to take short walks to calm myself. I think that is an indication of how the article does an excellent job of summarizing the various demons haunting the Warriors' fanbase.

[2]    Grant Brisbee is my favorite baseball writer and does a fairly good job with this article, which is a bit outside his usual purview. But, as Uncanny Valley's own Alexis Faulkner pointed out, his understanding of the supposedly new hipness of the East Bay is problematic. For example, Oakland has, for decades, been a haven for artists, musicians, and other creative individuals but non-East Bay residents such as Brisbee have only recently taken notice.

[3]    The NHL actually has a virtually identical playoff setup to the NBA. But I am not a hockey fan so I have nothing further to say on the subject.

[4]    e.g. Tim Hardaway's Miami Heat and Chris Mullin's Indiana Pacers.

[5]    e.g. Kevin Johnson's Phoenix Suns or any of Jason Kidd's playoff teams.

[6]    e.g. Gary Payton's Seattle Supersonics or (later on) Leon Powe's Boston Celtics—but not Brian Shaw's Los Angeles Lakers.

[7]    This stood in marked contrast to my deep psychological and emotional need for the Giants to win a World Series.

[8]    Sure enough, the next season's team set a record for most victories without making the playoffs and the franchise stumbled back into irrelevance.

[9]    Ironically, a significant portion of the perception of Cohan's neverending ownership of the franchise came from the fact that the fans' vaunted loyalty made the team profitable despite its lack of on-court success.

[10]  I was most bothered by his decision to move the team to San Francisco.

[11]  I was borderline apoplectic at his hiring of Mark Jackson.

[12]  My dad was so embarrassed by the whole incident that he actually emailed Lacob an apology on behalf of Warriors fans. I doubt that Lacob actually read the email, though.

[13]  Anybody who knows me knows that I usually love to boo at any opportunity.

[14]  We also didn't boo because we supported the recently competed Monta Ellis for Andrew Bogut trade that was the source of much of the fans' ire.

[15]  Since this article has mostly focused on the past, I haven't really given the current team anywhere near the attention that they deserve, particularly Steph Curry. Let me just say that Curry is now my favorite basketball player ever (it is strange to have a favorite player who is younger than I am) and one of the most exciting athletes that I have ever watched in any sport.

[16]  I've had to text him because I recently moved across the country to Brooklyn.

[17]  My Finals pick: Warriors in 5.

[18]  I'm going to note that I realized that there was something potentially great about this team very early in the season and actually predicted in November—to my dad and my roommate—that they would win the title. But there is a difference between knowing that a team can win a title and actually being this close to it happening.