Kravitz's This Old Stat

Listening to the Kravitz and Eddie Show on WFNI 1070 AM [A painful duty, but I was unable to listen to my usual The Zone on XL-950 at the time, but it gives me stuff I can put on here!] I had tuned in as they were discussing the NFL overtime rules and the coin toss. Bob Kravitz feels that since the winner of the coin toss in overtime has only won 52% of the time, that is not a significant enough difference to require any changes.

Well, Bobbo, you are correct (amazingly) that the coin toss winner has only won 52% of the time. However, that covers the time period from the inception of overtime in 1974 through 2003. Since the NFL moved the kickoff back to the 30-yard line in 1994, things have changed, more than just a little.

Looking at the NFL overtime games from 2000 to 2007, the winner of the coin toss has won 60% of the games. In addition to that, out of the 124 overtime games in that time frame, 37 were won on the opening drive in overtime without the opponent touching the ball. That's 30% of the games. So nearly 1 in 3 overtime games end up like the Colts-Chargers playoff game where once you lost the coin toss, you were essentially hosed.

Bob, I think you need to update yourself on some stats...in addition to a few other things. I imagine you are a batting average and wins kind of baseball idiot person and statistics like VORP, OBP and BABIP are just made up stats by geeks like us, huh?

It is definitely time the NFL do something about overtimes. What that should be is a matter of debate. One I'm sure will be represented on this site. Yet, something does need to be done.

Now if we could only do something about Kravitz...