OU’s transfer players were nothing if not productive at their previous stops. For example, if a player with 100 tackles the prior season transferred to a new team, that team would have 100 tackles added to the amount returning from the year before and 100 added to the total number of tackles from the prior season. In other words, he added the relevant stats from the prior season to both the numerator and the denominator of the metrics that go into returning production – a technique that he acknowledges makes for a crude solution to the problem. Notably, Connelly’s approach to calculating returning production involved one-to-one additions of stats for transfers between FBS schools. According to Connelly’s numbers, the Sooners had 78% of their production returning on defense, ranking 21st in the country. The returning production variable weighed heavily in OU’s favor in 2022. *Note that while the inputs for returning production on defense have remained the same in the new round of projections, Connelly appears to have tweaked the weighting. The four inputs for returning production and their individual weighting at the time included percentage of returning tackles (59%), percentage of returning passes defensed (28%), percentage of returning tackles for loss (8%) and percentage of returning sacks (5%). With the benefit of hindsight, though, we can see why SP+ had such an inflated opinion of OU’s defense at this time a year ago.Ĭonnelly’s preseason projections encompass an amalgamation of three factors: returning production, recruiting and recent history. Looking at how the 2022 preseason numbers broke down, the projected gains were going to be fueled by a defense slated to improve dramatically from 68th in Defensive SP+ in 2021 to 21st in 2022.įar cry from where OU ended up, of course. 4 overall heading into the season, up from eighth at the end of 2021. If you based your level of confidence in OU’s 2023 projection strictly on last year’s numbers, skepticism would be warranted. The 2023 preseason rankings have OU at sixth on offense and 37th on defense. OU finished the 2022 season ranked 20th nationally, with an Offensive SP+ ranking of 10th and a Defensive SP+ ranking of 70th. 13 team in the country.įor the uninitiated, Connelly designed SP+ as a measure of efficiency that accounts for the impact of tempo and opponent strength. In news relevant to this particular audience, his computers spit out the Oklahoma Sooners as the No. It’s the season for college football preseason predictions, and ESPN analytics guru Bill Connelly has dropped his latest SP+ projections for 2023.
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