I've long held the belief that the time you play often impacts the game. I've always felt that night games are generally won by the home team at a higher rate than normal daily games, and even the 4pm games are won more than the 1pm games. I looked back at all the playoff games since realignment to see if these predisposed ideas were in fact true, and what other trends I could pick up. I picked to start in 2002 since that was the first year of the NFL that exists today. 32 teams. 8 divisions. 2 wild cards. It does leave out one year of night games (the NFL started 8:00 Saturday Night playoff games in 2001, with the Raiders beating the Jets, and then losing to the Patriots in the Tuck Rule game), but captures the NFL in a time when upsets were happening at a rate that is significantly higher than what had occured before. Hell, four of the last five #1 seeds in the NFC have lost. It spans the Giants beating the Cowboys in 2007, to the Giants beating the Packers in 2011, with the Giants themselves falling victims to it in-between. Anyway, this also led to an NFL where the #5 seed was often stronger than the #4 seed by record. In the 32 team NFL no wild card team could have a home game (unless there was a #5 vs #6 Title Game), so it also increased the amount of road favorites. Anyway, before we break it down, here is a handy little pictorial that shows the findings:
So, the first three charts are just the playoff results each weekend, by year on one axis and by time on the other. I realize the Super Bowl does have a designated home, but that designation really has no impact, so the numbers on the fourth chart are just for the firs three rounds of the playoffs. The corresponding number is just how many games ended that way out of how many there were with that team favored.
Overall, some immediate takeaways (I'll put the disclaimer right now that everything that I can infer or take out of this analysis is far from completely certain since this is still a small sample size):
Something coming tomorrow!
So, the first three charts are just the playoff results each weekend, by year on one axis and by time on the other. I realize the Super Bowl does have a designated home, but that designation really has no impact, so the numbers on the fourth chart are just for the firs three rounds of the playoffs. The corresponding number is just how many games ended that way out of how many there were with that team favored.
Overall, some immediate takeaways (I'll put the disclaimer right now that everything that I can infer or take out of this analysis is far from completely certain since this is still a small sample size):
- There have been 14 road favorites, and the occurrence is only increasing. From 2002-2007 there were just four road favorites, and they all won. In the past four years, a road team has been favored 10 times, and is just 4-6. So either home underdogs are now taking this as a sign of respect, or Vegas feels that the public is buying into over-hyping "hot" away teams. It comes as no surprise that only one of these road favorites has come in the divisional round, since the team off of the bye is almost always the better team, but it did happen this year.
- Home teams are better on Saturday than on Sunday. Home teams overall are 27-13 on Saturday (including 14-6 for the late Saturday games), while just 21-19 on Sunday. The one affecting variable is that there have been more road favorites on Sunday, but even if we restrict it to home favorites, Saturday teams are 24-11, while Sunday teams are 19-15.
- It may seem that teams off of byes are more vulnerable than ever, but actually, 2nd round upsets have calmed down in the past three years. There was a ridiculous stretch from 2005-2008 where home teams (all favored) went 7-9 straight up and 4-12 ATS. This was definitely a case of lines just being too high for home teams.
- Furthermore, the league went 13 straight divisional games with just one cover. Starting with the Steelers upset of the Colts in 2005, and ending with the Eagles upset of the Giants in 2008, there was just one cover, and 9 home teams lost outright.
- I used to always think that the 1pm game had the largest chance of an upset, because crowds and teams are usually lethargic at 1pm, and get progressively more amped (as well as progressively drunker, as far as fans are concerned) throughout the day. However, it looks like the real jinx is just playing on Sunday. There have been 10 wins by road teams since 2002 for the Sunday 4pm game (2 by road favorites), and 9 by road teams at 1pm (2 by road favorites). The 4pm is really kryptonite for home teams, as in the past 16 playoff games at 4pm on Sunday, the home team is just 6-10 (4-8 as a home favorite), while this game has given us a road upset in six of the past seven divisional rounds.
- That 6 of the past 7 divisional round 4pm Sunday game upset stretch might truly be the most unbelievable stat in this process I have come across (other than maybe the fact that only one road favorite has won and not covered). Other time slots had odd stretches, such as 3 straight road wins in the Saturday 4pm Wild Card game from 2003-2005, or the four straight road wins in the Sunday 1pm Wild Card game from 2007-2010, but those were both effected by road favorites. This was six out of seven home favorites off of a bye going down.
- From 1997-2006 one of the two home teams on Championship Sunday went down ('97 - both, '98 - Vikings, '99 - Jags, '00 - Raiders, '01 - Steelers, '02 - Eagles, '03 - Eagles, '04 - Steelers, '05 - Broncos). Since then, the home teams have swept three of the past five years. Championship Games have the best home winning percentage (12/6 vs. 22/18 and 25/15) and favorite cover percentage (11/7 vs. 19/21 and 16/24).
Something coming tomorrow!
