Penalties and Effect on Teams

[Temo]

Great article about penalties and how they affect teams. I hate when people copy/paste whole articles, because the orginal author deserve page views for their work. So the highlights are below, but consider clicking through for the entire thing.

http://www.jsonline.com/sports/packers/65706132.html

There's no disputing it, the Green Bay Packers are the worst team in the league when it comes to penalties.

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The Packers average 2.13 points per drive this season when you eliminate run-out-the-clock scenarios. When they don't have a sack or penalty on a drive, the Packers average 3.18 points. For comparison, the New Orleans Saints, with the NFL's top offense, average 3.84. The third-ranked Indianapolis Colts average 2.7. When the Packers have a penalty on a drive, their average slips to 2.07. When they have a sack, it falls off a cliff to 0.75.


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In their 2007 Pro Football Prospectus, Aaron Schatz and Bill Barnwell from footballoutsiders.com studied penalties from 2002-'06. They found there was "almost zero" correlation between record and defensive or special-team penalties. There was, however, a much stronger correlation with offensive penalties.

 

[jobberone]

Good find and interesting read.