We have our first beatloop.
Can you see it? Yep, the one beatloop so far is ARI=>SEA=>CIN=>BAL=>ARI .
For those new people, the reason we cancel out beatloops is not because we see the teams as roughly equivalent – it’s simply because it makes the direct relationship between those teams ambiguous, and because we assume that there is enough information in the rest of the graph to give us an overall holistic sense of the pecking order.
The power rankings had to apply a tiebreaker to three teams for first place this week: Indianapolis, Dallas, and Green Bay. The tiebreaker is in the order they were ranked last week.
| Rank | Team | Notes | Last Week | BeatPower |
1 |
 |
(Beat HOU) Indianapolis rises mainly because the quality of their opponents is looking better and better. The AFC South in general might be scarily good this season. |
3 |
100.0(14/14 – 0/14) |
2 |
 |
(Beat SD) Holy moly! It’s Green Bay! Ranked second! |
13 |
100.0(13/13 – 0/13) |
3 |
 |
(Beat CHI) And now, it’s looking as if Dallas might actually be for real. The NFC East – late to the party – decided to join in with the rest of the league, and they’re ranked pretty high up in the graph overall. |
14 |
100.0(12/12 – 0/12) |
4 |
 |
(Beat WAS) Yes, we have three NFC teams within the top four of the Beatpaths Rankings. It is only week three, of course, and there will be plenty of opportunity to beatloop away the beatpaths that these teams are relying on. But so far, the victories plus schedule strength mean the NFC is representing itself pretty well. |
24 |
81.8(9/11 – 2/11) |
5 |
 |
(Beat NO) Beating New Orleans didn’t give them a lot of added advantage. But JAC=>DEN and OAK=>CLE has given them a nice long beatpath. |
10 |
88.9(8/9 – 1/9) |
6 |
 |
(Beat BUF) #6 isn’t too bad – San Diego at least gets them that far – but their opponents still haven’t been the strongest. Early on in the season, you’re not going to be ranked very highly unless you’ve beaten teams who have beaten teams (and so on). |
4 |
100.0(8/8 – 0/8) |
7 |
 |
(Lost to NYG) PHI=>DET gives Washington a boost. |
15 |
72.7(8/11 – 3/11) |
8 |
 |
(Beat SF) The fall isn’t Pittsburgh’s fault, but they need to play some quality opponents. With the possible exception of Seattle in two weeks, they don’t appear to have the most impressive schedule coming up. New England in Week 14 looks to be their most serious test. |
1 |
100.0(6/6 – 0/6) |
9 |
 |
(Beat CIN) Seattle might be gaining some consistency again. It’ll be interesting to see which victories in the ARI=>SEA=>CIN=>BAL=>ARI loop reappear in the graph from the loop shrinking. I’m betting SEA=>CIN and BAL=>ARI will reappear at the least. |
11 |
75.0(3/6 – 0/6) |
10 |
 |
(Beat DEN) Jacksonville helps themselves quite a bit with their victory over Denver, and with Oakland’s win over Cleveland. Jacksonville had a great offensive scheme, one that matched up perfectly with Denver’s weakness. |
20 |
75.0(6/8 – 2/8) |
11 |
 |
(Lost to IND) Houston falls from their loss to Indianapolis. They basically got leapfrogged by other teams that had managed to form long beatpaths. |
5 |
83.3(5/6 – 1/6) |
12 |
 |
(Beat DET) Holy crap, what was that? Is Philadelphia that good, or is Detroit that bad? Detroit can’t be that bad, can they? This is the final NFL East team. The NFC East and the AFC South are now fully ranked in the first twelve slots. The NFC South and the AFC West aren’t ranked yet at all. |
22 |
60.0(6/10 – 4/10) |
13 |
 |
(Lost to GB) San Diego isn’t looking very good, but they’ve had a tough schedule. Their victory over Chicago is still looking relatively quality, although it’s getting worse as Chicago continues to lose. |
9 |
66.7(4/6 – 2/6) |
14 |
 |
(Beat ARI) Baltimore is freed up from their loss to Cincinnati, which helps them rise. |
21 |
70.0(2/5 – 0/5) |
15 |
 |
(Lost to PIT) No big penalty for losing to a team with no beatlosses, but neither of their beatwins look all that impressive anymore since ARI=>SEA disappeared. |
2 |
66.7(2/3 – 1/3) |
16 |
 |
(Lost to JAC) Denver gets protected from falling further by Oakland’s victory over Cleveland. I wasn’t able to see this game but it looked pretty awful. They had a three-and-out on their first possession due to a penalty, and then it was like they just never got the ball back again. There are intimations that “certain players” in Denver are playing out of position, but I’m not smart enough to know who that means. I saw a clip where DJ Williams looked completely confused, but for all I know it’s the type of defense where if one player plays out of position, it makes another player look bad. Anyway, it’s maddening because for the last few years, Denver’s DL was actually pretty good – their run defense was fine, it was just their pass rush that sucked. Run defense is a lot more important. |
12 |
57.1(4/7 – 3/7) |
17 |
 |
(Beat STL) The top-ranking NFC South team is ranked first! … in the second half of the rankings. |
26 |
66.7(2/3 – 1/3) |
18 |
 |
(Lost to PHI) Oh, how the mighty have fallen! Ha ha. Okay that was a joke. |
6 |
50.0(5/10 – 5/10) |
19 |
 |
(Beat ATL) Carolina has a lot of play in their ranking right now – beaten by a team that might actually be pretty good, victorious over two teams that appear awful. |
16 |
50.0(2/4 – 2/4) |
20 |
 |
(Lost to DAL) I don’t understand their crazy loyalty to Grossman. Didn’t Chicago pass up some really good quarterback talent in the draft, too? |
19 |
42.9(3/7 – 4/7) |
21 |
 |
(Beat MIA) I’m imagining this team will continue to jump all over the lower half of the rankings as it continues to find its identity. |
30 |
33.3(1/3 – 2/3) |
22 |
 |
(Lost to BAL) The beatloop took away a lot of data for Arizona and the Cards fall fast. |
7 |
30.0(0/5 – 2/5) |
23 |
 |
(Lost to TEN) The Saints rise on the loss, mostly because the teams they have lost to are looking better than they did before. |
31 |
0.0(0/4 – 4/4) |
24 |
 |
(Beat MIN) Kansas City manages to scrape a small beatpath together. |
29 |
22.2(2/9 – 7/9) |
25 |
 |
(Lost to NE) It seems like it will be a long season of Buffalo playing very good teams. |
23 |
0.0(0/6 – 6/6) |
26 |
 |
(Lost to NYJ) I think Miami will be one of those teams I’ll have difficulty finding saying anything about this season, much like Green Bay last year. |
25 |
0.0(0/7 – 7/7) |
27 |
 |
(Lost to TB) I don’t know what the deal is with this team – they’re still talented, aren’t they? Maybe the competition has just been pretty stiff? They were about on Denver’s level last season, but they look significantly worse now. |
28 |
0.0(0/7 – 7/7) |
28 |
 |
(Beat CLE) I’m thinking Oakland’s victory over Cleveland could become a higher quality win later in the season. |
27 |
16.7(2/12 – 10/12) |
29 |
 |
(Lost to OAK) Cleveland has a double whammy this week – losing to Oakland hurts, but Cincinnati losing to Seattle and thus losing credit for defeating Baltimore hurts even more. Cleveland, at the moment, gets almost no advantage for defeating Cincinnati. |
8 |
7.7(1/13 – 12/13) |
30 |
 |
(Lost to KC) Detroit looks worse, which makes the beatloss hurt more, and losing to Kansas City certainly didn’t help, either. |
18 |
7.7(1/13 – 12/13) |
31 |
 |
(Lost to SEA) Way too low for this team, but that’s what an early beatloop from inconsistency will do to you. They should rebound soon though. |
17 |
9.4(0/16 – 13/16) |
32 |
 |
(Lost to CAR) Meanwhile, Atlanta remains mired in last place. It seems like a comfortable fit for the time being. |
32 |
0.0(0/16 – 16/16) |
Interesting how one close game can change the graph and standings. I saw the Baltimore/Arizona score, and was a little sad, since I thought it would be nice to see Arizona have a good year for once. Had Arizona won, the beatloop wouldn’t have been established, and it would have pushed Pittsburgh up in the rankings due to their beatpath over Arizona. But it didn’t happen, and this is what we get. I’m sure there are several other close games that would’ve drastically changed the graph, but that one jumped out at me due to the beatloop.
I am really confused how 8/9 > 8/8. One of us fell asleep during 4th grade math class.
Unless you count beatloops as half wins? Maybe? The power rankings confuse me. Are you just going by wins and ignoring losses?
OK, I did some more reading and found somewhat of an explanation. It’s all pretty irrelevant, but it’s at the very least interesting.
Beatpower doesn’t weigh into rankings. It’s a relic of an older system, but people are interested in it so I leave it up.
Re: Grossman–Nobody is sticking by him anymore. The last supporters ditched him after the Dallas game (myself, I left after the KC game
). The word so far is that Griese will be starting on Sunday. But, with all the injuries on defense, it might not matter.
As for not drafting a QB–the Bears drafted 31st, so unless you would say they should have traded up for Quinn, they didn’t pass on either of the first rounders. That means they passed on the second rounders–Kevin Kolb, Trent Edwards, the guy Detroit took, etc. I wouldn’t necessarily put my future in any of them at this point, and certainly not over the prospect of getting Greg Olsen (who I think will be a good NFL TE, at least). But it does look like the Bears will draft a QB this year…unless Orton puts it together.
As for the Rams, the answer is Orlando Pace. He got injured in the first game, and is out for the year. With him, the blocking is passable, which makes the offense dangerous (with the talent they have at the skill positions). Without him, the blocking has been atrocious.
Ha… I love that I have regulars that’ll answer my implicit questions.
I would have taken Kolb if I were them, as I think he’s going to be pretty good.
For the last two years, Beatpaths always had my G-men way too low. Now, with a 1-2 record, we are the 4th best in the league!
(It won’t last.)
You are obviously a Denver Broncos fan from looking at previous and current paths. Just one small example look at week three power poll, you have a novel Broncos and one liners for the rest. This paths are favorable for other teams.
You are absolutely correct! Your observational skills astound me.
But what I like about the beatpaths is that the ranking is going to be the same even if the person doing it is a Broncos (or Browns, or Packers, or whatever) fan. Sure, the Broncos get the longer writeup, but they’re not any higher in the rankings because of it.
OK, so the Steelers haven’t played a hard schedule thusfar, but the team they beat this past week was way better than the other two. So the previous first place was suspect, but the fall to eighth is moreso.
According to the quality of opponents thus far, the teams Pittsburgh have beaten haven’t proven themselves to be very good. But the reason for Pittsburgh’s fall is less because Pittsburgh has “fallen”, and more because other teams have leapfrogged them.
Just gotta chime in that I’m another broncos fan, and it’s cool that you’ve got a mountain-time-zone bias to balance out 99.9% of the rest of football websites. Also, about beatloops, have you seen any groups of three teams that habitually form beatloops, the way that broncos fans tend to think of NE => IND => DEN => NE as “rock, paper, scissors” ?
By the way I’m glad to see you’re back this year, your site is one of the ones I browse every week along with pro-football-reference.com and footballoutsiders.com, love the charts and the comments, some of your readers really know their stuff.
Have fun this week. Does the system explode if there are 38 beatloops by Week 4?
Ehhehehe… it never explodes, but y’all might not believe me on that given the graph results if CIN beats NE.
Since you seem to be around, I guess I’ll ask you.
The AFC North v NFC West has shown to be quite a mess. Every team (save for the hapless Rams) has defeated and lost to another team in their division. Beatloops are everywhere, so I just have a question regarding beatflukes.
Without removing beatflukes, we have
Sea=>SF=>Ari=>Sea
Pitt=>Cle=>Bal=>Ari=>Pitt
Pitt=>SF=>Ari=>Pitt
Looking at these two, I see that Arizona’s win over Seattle could be a beatfluke due to Seattle having an alternate path via Sea=>Cin=>Bal=Ari. Also, Arizona’s win over Pitt could be a beatfluke due to Pitt=>SF=>Ari.
But if you look at the second loop, Baltimore’s win over Arizona could be considered a fluke due to Ari=>Sea=>Cin=>Bal.
Once you announce one beatfluke, it can eliminate the chances of another beatfluke, which if you announced that beatfluke first, would eliminate the ability of the first beatfluke. It’s like the beatfluke matrix or something.
So my question is, how do you determine what order you find beatflukes in? If you say that Ari>Sea is a beatfluke, then you lose the ability to say that Bal>Ari is a beatfluke, and vice-versa. Frankly, from a subjective standpoint, I’d say Ari>Sea and Ari>Pitt are the true beatflukes, but I’m wondering if you have a tried and true formula to determine it.
And as a Pats fan, if Cinci beats NE, I’ll have much more to be concerned about than what beatpaths may say.
I’ve actually decided to not go the beatflukes route this season. Two years ago it seemed like the added “accuracy” made it worthwhile, but last season, the added accuracy was almost negligible. Beatflukes make the graphs more vertical, but it also means more extreme shifts in the power rankings, and I ended up deciding that I liked gentler power ranking shifts from week to week… so we’re going the more vanilla approach this season.
However, when I do do beatflukes, I don’t consider them until the beatloop questions are resolved. I find all beatloops (to take game matchups out), then apply beatflukes (to put them back in), then find all beatloops again.
This week there are only going to be four beatloops. Your two SF=>ARI loops, plus CAR/ATL/HOU and CHI/KC/SD. Since ARI=>PIT is already taken care of in the SF beatloop, that PIT=>CLE=>BAL=>ARI=>PIT beatloop doesn’t actually exist.
ARI=> SEA doesn’t exist because it was taken out in another beatloop.
So as it stands right now, the three beatflukes would be ATL=>HOU, ARI=>SEA, and ARI=>PIT, which would leave only one beatloop leftover (the CHI/KC/SD loop).
As for habitual beatloops… it seems like the NFC West is one big snarl every year! They just seem to have Seattle figured out, even though Seattle tends to really well outside of their division while the other teams don’t.
OK, I think that makes sense. I’ll take a look at it later tonight. Thanks for the response!