fumbles

[Kingswood]

Someone can check my math and assumptions, but here's a general comparison on fumbles.

In the NFL in 2021, stathead.com shows 267 fumble recoveries by defensive players. There were 272 games played 17 weeks *16 games per week, so that averages out to 0.98 fumble turnovers per game on average. Some will be more, some will be less. That's not a perfect number because you might have offensive players creating turnovers or defensive players preventing turnovers on special teams, but it's in the right ball park.

I don't have results over all leagues, but I looked in the three leagues where I have teams. We're through 13 weeks in those games, so we've played 13 weeks * 12 teams per week = 156 games. In my three leagues, the fumbles recovered by defenses are 72, 92, and 90. That averages out to 0.46, 0.59, and 0.58 fumbles lost per game. (I'd have to ask if that includes special teams fumbles or now, so it might be low.)

So in my three leagues, fumbles are not happening at a high rate at all, and appear to be lower than the NFL rate. Now, in part that might be because offensive players who hold onto the ball may be concentrated in a 24-team league, or it could be randomness for low-likelihood events. I'm not sure. I think that low-probability events always cause a stir when they happen, in part because they are low-probability events, so the question in my mind s whether other leagues are seeing fumbles at a high rate. These are things we can look at. I can't talk about adjusting these things because I'm not a game programmer.

I'll say that I feel like I see a lot of fumbles, but when the stats get added up they're not high, or at least not in the three leagues I'm playing. How many total fumble turnovers are people seeing?

(And note that I'm only looking at fumble turnovers. Total fumbles will be a lot higher.

Also note that it's midnight and I may not be thinking clearly, so if someone else can do a better analysis, feel free.

You and Cox are correct. NFL teams average a fumble every 2 games. My leagues tend to be right around that average in league play. I'm not sure about Challenges since we don't have the stats. The only way I could see the challenges being different would be if some of those parameters in the league are utilizing season averages as well as game averages to minimize the probability of an unrealistic season. Using the word frequency is my mistake. I guess my question is more in line with consistency? I've had a game where 3 straight drives began and ended on the first play with a fumbled snap. I've had a few games where we're trading interceptions 3-4 straight drives. Now obviously these things are possible but the probability of it happening in sequence that many times is negligible. I've noticed this tends to happen with penalties, too, where the defense will consistently save the offense throughout the drive. Now obviously that happens plenty but I just wanted to point out the trend. It seems these low probability events are clustering together instead of being spread out which gives it the impression that these are more constant than they truly are. Having up to 6 challenge games a day, too, obviously is going to increase the amount of low probability events that we experience. Is it possible to decrease the odds of these events after they've already occurred?