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Comment by fecak | Hacker News Reader

Over the past two seasons there have been 9 total fumbles by Patriot running backs - only 1 all this year. All of those backs are still employed by the Patriots. Over those two seasons, the majority of fumbles came from Brady and Edelman.

Of the backs that fumbled in 2012, only Woodhead is gone. He fumbled only once.

Two backs fumbled in 2011, once each. Woodhead (who is gone) and Ridley, who is still a Patriot.

Patriot backs simply don't fumble. Brady and Edelman do, and Welker did a bit. Your explanation isn't supported by the data.

Source. http://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/nwe/2014.htm

EDIT - I'm not sure my source differentiates fumbles from lost fumbles, although that doesn't seem to impact the conclusion regarding parent's comment.

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Couldn't this be tested by looking a the frequency of fumbles made by backs before and after they play for the patriots? I mean, if the explanation of the patriots low fumble rate is because they deflated the balls then it should cause a corresponding jump in fumbles for those running backs that move on to other teams (who presumably are not deflating the balls).

Danny Woodhead: 0 fumbles with NY Jets in 2009-2010 (didn't play much), 1 fumble with NE Pats from 2010-2012, 1 fumble with SD Chargers 2013-2014 (did not play full year with SD in 2014 due to injury, but had many more attempts in 2013 with SD than with NE). http://www.nfl.com/player/dannywoodhead/4327/careerstats

LeGarrette Blount: 3 fumbles each year with TB Bucs, 2010-2011 & no fumbles in 2012, 3 fumbles with NE Pats, 2013, 1 fumble with Steelers in early 2014, 0 fumbles with NE Pats in late 2014 http://www.nfl.com/player/legarretteblount/497149/profile

Laurance Maroney: 1 fumble in 2006, 4 fumbles in 2009 with NE Pats, 0 fumbles with Den Broncos in 2010 http://www.nfl.com/player/laurencemaroney/2506884/profile

Sammy Morris: I'm not going to summarize his stats, but he has a whole bunch of fumbles with a bunch of teams including NE. http://www.nfl.com/player/sammymorris/2504126/profile

Those are all the running backs I can think of who played for the Patriots and other teams in recent years. I'm not going to bother with Corey Dillion since he was before 2007.

ftr I am a Patriots who hopes that there is no wrong doing but is trying to keep an open mind.

"Patriots backs simply don't fumble": Yes, because if they have a fumbling problem, they stop playing until they fix it (Ridley) or they cease being Patriots if they can't fix it (Maroney). Belichick is well-known for having a "doghouse" for running backs who fumble.

"Your explanation isn't supported by the data": I wasn't trying to give an explanation supported by the data. I was trying to give an explanation for the data that makes sense and is supported by observing the Patriots play.

It's like saying Magnus Carlsen must cheat at chess, because the chance of him making so few errors is effectively zero assuming he makes errors at the rate that other grandmasters do.

I'm not sure how useful it is to compare a chess grandmaster to the relatively ordinary (other than fumbling) Patriot running back contingent, past or present. If Carlsen were found with an extra pawn on the board, that might raise eyebrows.

I understand that Belichick has a doghouse for backs that fumble. The point seems to be that his doghouse is likely to be rarely occupied since 2007, and whether that is due to coaching, drafting backs with good hands, or something less wholesome.

I appreciate the points on Maroney and Ridley.

I think it would be pretty easy to show, similar to this article -

Pre-computer era elite GMs and computer-era elite GMs have similar error rates[1], with the caveat that we presume disagreeing with the computer's top choice to be an error. They mostly agreed with the computer's assessment something like 50-57% of the time.

As far as I know Magnus' games haven't been subjected to this kind of analysis, and I recall 2 pretty bad moves in the recent match with Anand, so I'd be interested to see it. I suspect he may be even slightly above 60%.

Should it be something like high 70%'s though I think it would be time to start a conversation about it. It's how Ivanov was busted: overwhelmingly playing one of the top 2 engine moves, which is basically impossible. [2]

1 - http://en.chessbase.com/post/computers-choose-who-was-the-st...

2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jr0J8SPENjM

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