Possessions in other sports

[Mike G]

In the NFL, teams average about 12-13 possessions per game. This is about what an NBA team gets in half of a quarter of play. So is the result of a pro football game any more descriptive of the 2 teams' relative strength, than one quarter of NBA play? or the last (or any) 12-13 possessions?

These kinds of headlines are standard for football articles:

The Giants’ Feel-Good Season Ends on a Soul-Crushing Final Note
The team could be on the brink of a major roster turnover this offseason, ...

Fire the coaching staff! -- nobody gets fired midway thru the 1st quarter of an NBA game.
Tear down the lineup and start over! -- Yes, the coach may yank the starting lineup for a spell, but he doesn't start looking to trade them all right away.

In football, there are 11 guys trying to do their job, and it's about 6 plays per avg possession. But only 1 or 2 guys get to touch the ball each play, and the 2nd guy almost never has the option to pass it off to another. This leaves about the same number of handoffs/passes, and the decisions going into those actions, as you have in an avg basketball possession.

If we allow that one quarter of NBA is as complex as one NFL game, then a given playoff team winning the Super Bowl is roughly as likely as an NBA team winning all 4 quarters of one game -- if each quarter were against a different opponent?

[xkonk]

I always thought an NFL game was fairly random. But then it was pointed out (I forget where I read it) that NFL betting lines for wins are fairly big. I don't remember how they compare to a single NBA game, but both are much larger than MLB, for example. From that perspective, I wonder what lines for a quarter of an NBA game are like.

[Mike G]

Maybe one way to test how 'random' football is vs b-ball is to see what % of time the better team wins -- 'better' being defined as better season MOV up to that point -- in NBA overtime games. Five minutes should have about 10 possessions, which is just a bit lower than an avg NFL game.

NFL playoff games have a whole season behind them, for background as who is favored to win. What do bettors think about home field advantage?

Now baseball seems to have just 9 possessions per team, unless the home team doesn't need their 9th. No shot clock and no limit to the number of points/runs in a possession.

[DSMok1]

Randomness (noise vs. true talent) was discussed at the team level back in 2006 by Tom Tango:

http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.p ... s_leagues/

Many of the early APBRMetrics writers were involved on that thread.

[J.E.]

In the NFL, teams average about 12-13 possessions per game.

From an "Adjusted +-" point of view, it helps viewing each "drive" as an observation, other than in basketball, where obviously each possession is an observation

The "outcome" of each drive would be the difference in EV from the *drive start position* to *drive end position*.
Also, there are substitutions between drives

[DSMok1]

In the NFL, teams average about 12-13 possessions per game.

From an "Adjusted +-" point of view, it helps viewing each "drive" as an observation, other than in basketball, where obviously each possession is an observation

The "outcome" of each drive would be the difference in EV from the *drive start position* to *drive end position*.
Also, there are substitutions between drives

Alternatively, you can look at each play through the same lens. EV change from before to after.