In the wake of Deflategate, plenty has been made about whether or not the Patriots might have tampered with footballs or whether their pregame preparations of footballs have been on the level. But aside from the general notion that it might be easier to grip, throw, or catch a deflated football, the measurable impact of a football with lower air pressure received little attention.
And then Warren Sharp’s study went viral.
Last Thursday, Sharp — an engineer who maintains a blog focused on quantitative analysis of the NFL — published a post entitled, “The New England Patriots Prevention of Fumbles is Nearly Impossible.”
He then authored follow-up examinations of the Patriots’ startling fumble-proof performance in recent years, concluding that New England’s improved ability to avoid fumbles has become so extreme as to merit comparisons to winning the lottery.
The reaction?
“Bananas,” said Sharp. “My website server, by Friday, reached capacity. They had to upgrade me from one platform to the next. That one crashed. They put me on the next. That one crashed. Finally, they moved me onto a completely different dedicated server.”
Interest exploded based on Sharp’s examination of 15 seasons of fumbling data gleaned from outdoor teams.
From 2000-06, the Patriots fell in the middle of the pack among non-dome teams in the NFL, fumbling roughly once every 42 plays. Starting in 2007 – the first season that the NFL allowed each offense to prepare and supply its own balls for a game, rather than placing the responsibility solely on the home team – the Patriots, Sharp showed, have fumbled just once every 74 plays, roughly 32 percent better than any other team. This season, the Patriots had the second-fewest fumbles in the NFL with 13.
Something, Sharp concluded, changed to alter drastically the frequency with which the Patriots held onto the football and to make them over a multi-year span the best team in at least the last 25 years at avoiding fumbles. The fact that the Patriots make their home in one of the worst regions for maintaining control of the football in the NFL — they play outdoors, subject to the full barrage of climate surprises unfurled by New England’s weather — made the findings all the more startling.
“Something in the 2007 season began for the New England Patriots that allowed them to fumble at a rate significantly less than the rest of the NFL. That’s the biggest conclusion. We don’t know specifically what that was. It appears to coincide timing-wise with this rule change,” said Sharp. “There is something going on. The question is what. This data is not going to tell us what.”
Still, given the swirl of controversy surrounding whether the Patriots have been doing anything to alter the air pressure of footballs, some interpreted the study as corroborating evidence that the Patriots systematically have sought some kind of advantage, potentially one against NFL rules. Others have questioned Sharp’s methodology.
Coach Bill Belichick’s emphasis on protecting the football is unwavering.
“I talk about it all the time. It’s one of the most important things in the game: Ball security,” Belichick said. “We talk about it every single day. Not a day goes by when I don’t talk about that.”
Patriots players and coaches say Belichick’s attention to the significance of turnovers and commitment to practicing in a fashion to minimize fumbles is unmatched, noting, for instance, that to prepare for a ball-hawking Seattle team in the Super Bowl, the team finished the week with three days of concentrated work on fumble prevention.
“We probably did more fumble drills and ball-security drills these last three or four practices than we did all season,” noted receiver Brandon LaFell.
The Patriots employ unusual techniques in practice.
Their commitment to practice outside even in the elements exceeds that of most other teams. Belichick will douse footballs with water (something that other teams also employ). Rather than isolating the offense and defense on ball-control drills, the Patriots will put both units together to intensify the challenge. And, in a practice that several players and coaches said they have encountered only in New England, there is the grease.
“We slick down the balls with some crazy spray – oil spray and grease, which makes it almost impossible to handle,” said offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels, who said he never used the concoction for practices in his other coaching stops.
The approach is viewed by players as effective, if unpleasant.
“I experienced [wet practice footballs] before but not the greased balls. The greased balls mess up your gloves. You’ve really got to go out there with no gloves on,” noted LaFell. “[But] it definitely works to keep your mind on the ball, keep your focus on the ball more.”
The idea that Belichick has created a culture to minimize footballs seems a logical conclusion. Yet that theory, notes Sharp, leaves unanswered the question of why that culture hadn’t taken hold from 2000-06, when the Patriots landed in the middle of the pack in fumble prevention.
Do the Patriots simply place a greater emphasis on acquiring players who don’t fumble? That seemingly plausible explanation would not explain why, on the whole, Sharp found players (in the aggregate) who change teams fumble at a much higher rate both before and after their time with the Patriots than when they make their homes in New England.
So does Sharp’s study of the Patriots’ extraordinary ability to protect the football offer statistical proof of doctored footballs? A pair of former coaches dismissed the idea.
“I don’t know if you can link those two together. Taking nothing away from the Patriots, but if they were doing something special to make that happen, everybody else would be doing it. This is a league of thieves,” said former Ravens coach Brian Billick. “You take what someone is doing, you make it your own, and then you claim to invent it. They just have had a good run with prioritizing it and doing those things that tend to let them not turn the ball over.”
“When I left the game, my teams were first or second best at taking care of the football, turnover rate per game. There were no deflated footballs,” noted former 49ers and Lions coach Steve Mariucci. “I think the reason they’re good at taking care of the ball, they’ve got a quarterback that doesn’t throw a lot of interceptions – like an Aaron Rodgers – and they stress points of pressure, hands on the ball, like good coaches do. That’s the reason, in my mind, that they’re good at it. I can’t imagine the deflated ball has anything to do with it.”
Yet at a time when a spotlight is glaring on the Patriots’ handling of the football, studies such as Sharp’s invariably will stir a pot that remains at a boil.
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