01.25.08
A Note on the NFL Single-Season Touchdown Receptions Record
One of my Math 1a students this past term is a member of the new Harvard Sports Analysis Collective. They enjoy sabermetrics and the analogues in other sports. And it’s not just a hobby; a couple of ivy leaguers (Paul DePodesta and Theo Epstein) have gone on to manage major league baseball teams using statistical analysis to change the way players are valued.
I had an interesting discussion on their mailing list about DVOA, a statistic to measure defense in football which I thought I invented 
but turned out to have been beaten to the punch by Aaron Schatz several years ago. On a less mathy note, Jason blogged a little bit ago about the single-season touchdown records set recently by Randy Moss and Tom Brady:
The previous holder, Jerry Rice, only played 12 games in the year he caught 22 touchdowns (A 24-day players’ strike reduced the 16-game season to 15. The games that were scheduled for the third week of the season were cancelled, and the games for weeks 4-6 were played with replacement players). Thus, Rice actually caught about 0.40 more TDs/game than Moss (about 1.83 vs 1.44). This certainly does not take away from Moss’ accomplishment, nor does it tell us that Rice was more valuable to the 49ers than Moss is to the Pats, or that Rice had the best receiving season ever and Moss had the second best—and this per/game analysis really doesn’t reveal anything new to us. However, it does remind us how great Jerry Rice was, and we can only wonder how many TDs he would have caught that year had he played 16 games. He won the Associated Press Offensive Player of the Year Award this season.
There’s a similar argument on the other end of the pass, and it seems to be a little more heated because it involves current players. Peyton Manning’s achieved his 2004-record 49 touchdown passes in the span of 15 games. His backup played most of the 16th game because it was irrelevant for playoff positioning.
After 15 games, Tom Brady had “only” 48 touchdown passes, one less than Manning at the same point of the season. Thus Peyton did average more touchdowns per game. So some, mostly Colts fans, will argue that Brady didn’t break Peyton’s record.
This is true as long as you change the record in question. Brady didn’t break Peyton’s record of “most touchdown passes in the first 15 games of a season” or “most touchdown passes per game”. But these aren’t records you’ll find in any books.
On the other hand, Peyton’s passer rating that year was 121.1 compared to Brady’s 117.2 this year. These are first and second all-time, and third-place is another four points down (Steve Young in 1994 had a 112.8).
See the NFL’s record book for passers and 2007 passing stats.
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Tags: statistics, football, hsac