Numbers Don’t Lie

This week the Bengals travel to Minnesota with a chance to clinch the division with a win. The play-off math indicates that we must win one more game to secure the division and our berth in the 2009 play-offs. It is the biggest game since Pittsburgh and certainly, given Pittsburgh ’s performance to date, a more worthy opponent. The Vikings are loaded with talent. They have an awesome defensive line. They have playmakers all over the place, with big time names like Percy Harvin, Adrian Peterson, and Jared Allen. Brett Favre is having an MVP caliber season. To make matters worse, their head coach, Brad Childress, has a special head set that makes him look like a telemarketer. What’s that all about? Is that an unfair advantage?

But, fear not Bengal fans, for this week reason is on our side. Reason encapsulated in the pure, distilled form of Math. Numbers don’t lie. If we win Sunday, we win the Division. Numbers will also impact the game in other ways. If you watched last week’s Sunday night game you saw the announcers go on and on about the season Brett Favre is having and, in particular, the incredible decrease in interceptions against his career average. Of course, he went on to throw 2 INTs that night. The fact that he threw 2 picks is key to my point. Football may be a game of inches, but it’s also a game statistics. Maybe not to the extent of baseball, but in general a player’s performance is measurable. If it wasn’t, you wouldn’t care about Peterson’s 40 time or his average yards per carry. Granted, the season and the player’s shelf-life is much shorter which makes football statistics less meaningful than baseball. But, I argue that Brett Farve and his Ripken-esque streak of consecutive games played gives us a tremendous body of work to review and make projections off of.

Based on his career stats, he throws about 20 interceptions per year and he averages 34 attempts per game. How many passing attempts per game does he have this year? The answer, 33.6. Sounds pretty consistent to me…

But wait, you say, “He only has 5 picks so far….”

I answer with “Balderdash! There is plenty of football left. Statistics will prevail!”

A zebra doesn’t change his stripes. Although a 40 year old QB can change teams and vacillate more than Hamlet, he cannot change who he is. The immutable laws of math dictate that inevitably Brett must throw more picks. This Sunday he threw 2 picks. By my calculations, he owes at least 15 more to equal his career average. With 4 games left, that’s 3 or 4 picks a game. The 2 on Sunday night were just a down payment, the beginning of a torrent of interceptions thrown by Favre to close out the year. He may finish below his average, but he won’t finish 50% below average.

Like the infamous Viking pleasure cruise from a few years ago, there are going to be balls everywhere. Leon Hall, Jonathan Joseph, and Chinedum Ndukwe will have a field day. All they have to do is reach up and grab them. I predict a 4 turn-over day, three INTs from Brett Favre and 1 forced fumble from AP. Cedric Benson and company will get their 100+ yards a game, and we will grind away on the ground eating time of possession like Pat Williams at a Golden Corral. Carson will throw at least one touchdown pass. Chad will probably get fined for wrestling with the Vikings mascot. With the math firmly on our side, it all adds up to an AFC North-clinching Bengal win.