Super Bowl MVP Predictions

Photo by Keith Allison

As mentioned on Sunday, we used Football Mogul to predicts the results of Super Bowl XLVI by simulating the game 100,000 times. We also recorded the MVP of each game.

Odds are that it will go to a quarterback. But there's a 48.7% chance of someone else taking home the MVP trophy.

Player	MVP Chance
Tom Brady (NE)	31.6%
Eli Manning (NYG)	19.7%
Wes Welker (NE)	5.9%
Rob Gronkowski (NE)	5.7%
Aaron Hernandez (NE)	4.7%
Victor Cruz (NYG)	4.6%
Hakeem Nicks (NYG)	4.1%
Ahmad Bradshaw (NYG)	3.4%
BenJarvus Green-Ellis (NE)	3.4%
Deion Branch (NE)	2.6%
Jason Pierre-Paul (NYG)	2.1%
Vince Wilfork (NE)	1.2%
Brandon Jacobs (NYG)	1.8%
Mario Manningham (NYG)	1.4%
Jerod Mayo (NE)	0.9%
Justin Tuck (NYG)	0.9%
Osi Umenyiora (NYG)	0.8%
Kyle Arrington (NE)	0.7%
Antrel Rolle (NYG)	0.6%
Lawrence Tynes (NYG)	0.5%
Devin McCourty (NE)	0.5%
Danny Woodhead (NE)	0.4%
Chad Ochocinco (NE)	0.3%
Jake Ballard (NYG)	0.3%
Stephen Gostkowski (NE)	0.3%
Stephen Hoyer (NE)	0.2%

Note: This simulation assumed that Gronkowski is at 90% because of a high ankle sprain. If he's 100% healthy, his chance to win the MVP will be higher than Wes Welker's.

I'm amused by the 1-in-500 chance that Brady gets injured and Hoyer leads the Pats to their 4th Super Bowl victory.

I'm a bit surprised that Julian Edelman didn't make the list, as the only guy that's playing on offense, defense and special teams. He could conceivably get a receiving TD, a return TD, and a "Pick 6".

Related article: Football Mogul Predicts Super Bowl XLVI

Do Be Evil

Photo by Tangi Bertin on Flickr

This is the day that Google went evil. At least in my mind.

I realize that Google has done many things over the years that could be assessed as evil. But today is the first day where I caught them presenting themselves publicly as evil for all the world to see.

The first ad I saw this morning was one for Google's new "Good To Know" initiative.¹

This ad campaign tells me that it's a good thing that Google remembers everything about me
and tells it to all the web sites that I visit, so that I don't have to "re-introduce" myself to each web site. The comparison is made to a friendship, where it would be a waste of time if you had to remind your friends of your name, age, interests, personality, etc. -- every single time you met up with them.

As Mitt Romney might say, "web sites are people too, my friend".

An ad campaign like this, where you try to convince the world that your questionable practices are actually good for them, is one of the biggest signs that a company has gone full evil.

See, for example, the recent ad campaigns about fracking. I was on the fence about fracking until I saw that millions of dollars were being spent to get me to think that it is lets us drill for shale gas "safely and responsibly".

"Orwellian language," as George Lakoff says, "points to weakness." Google realizes that keeping every iota of personal information in order to maximize their revenue is bad. It goes against their policy of "Don't Be Evil". This is new. That is, Google's public acknowledgement is new. Google (or at least a senior exec inside Google) thinks that Google has joined the ranks of evil uber-corporations and needs to start acting like one.

When I woke up this morning, I wasn't too worried about the info Google keeps on me. I admit it's annoying that almost every single web page I visit is trying to sell me things that I *just bought online*. But annoying isn't evil.

:(

¹ As an aside, I must give props to the subtle naming of this initiative: a name that subconsciously implies that it is good that Google knows so much about you. I bet they spent at least six figures on cognitive science consultants to come up with this one.

The NFL's "Worst" Pass Defenses

In tonight's 45-7 drubbing of the Broncos by the Patriots, I have to admit that the 2nd half was pretty boring.

Here's what I did see that was interesting:

CBS put up a graphic showing that the best teams in the NFL this year also had the worst pass defenses. This wasn't the first time I had seen this stat trotted out as "proof" that the Packers, Saints and Pats have horrible pass defenses.

Team	Won	Lost	Pass Yards Allowed Per Game	NFL Rank
Green Bay Packers	15	1	301.2	32nd
New England Patriots	13	3	283.0	31st
New Orleans Saints	11	5	266.7	30th

Well ... duh.

Teams that win most of their games are often playing with the lead. That means that their opponents are playing from behind. Teams trying to catch up have to pass more. And teams that pass more get more pass yards.

Furthermore, these three teams have the three best QBs in the NFL. With Brady, Brees and Rodgers leading your passing attack, it doesn't take very long to score. And teams that pass use up less time on the clock. That gives opponents of these teams even more opportunity to rack up passing yards.

The problem with Passing Yards is that it's an absolute stat, not a rate stat. So circumstances that cause a team to pass more will make it look like they are "better" passing teams.

To show that good teams allow more passing yards, I took the free version of Football Mogul and created a universe where every team had the exact same players on defense. And then I used the "Simulator Tool" to simulate the 2011-2012 one hundred times, to look at the impact that a team's offense has on their passing yards allowed:

Team	Wins	Pass Yards Allowed Per Game
Great Teams	13 - 16	259.7
Good Teams	10 - 12	257.2
Average Teams	7 - 9	244.3
Bad Teams	4 - 6	240.1
Horrible Teams	0 - 3	241.6

As you can see, the better teams allow more passing yards. Using passing yards allowed to measure a football defense is like using double plays to measure a baseball defense. Counterintuitively, bad teams turn more double plays, simply because they allow more base runners, and you need someone on base to turn a double play.

If the talking heads really wanted the truth, they would show this:

Team	Won	Lost	Opponent Passer Rating	NFL Rank
Green Bay Packers	15	1	82.2	11th
New England Patriots	13	3	84.7	16th
New Orleans Saints	11	5	88.1	24th

Alas, saying that the Patriots have an "average passing defense" doesn't make for eye-catching on-screen graphics. So for now we'll have to continue to hear about New England's incompetent secondary.

Decoding With A Twist

A puzzle I sent to a friend today. Thought it up while trying to get out of bed.

Cain's 999 Plan Is A Job Killer

As a small business owner, I just need to take a moment to talk about how horrible Herman Cain's "999" tax plan is.

"999" is catchy phrase that sounds simple. And since my business spends about $45,000 each year just complying with tax law (in order to literally stay out of jail), "simple" would be an improvement.

The problem is, "999" doesn't make my taxes simpler. It actually will cost me a lot more to calculate my taxes, appease the I.R.S., and stay out of jail. The third "9" in "999" is an entirely new national sales tax. Herman Cain wants 9% on top of everything I sell. And it's not a value-added tax, it's a straight sales tax. So, if I buy computer parts for $900 and then sell them computer for $1000, I owe the Cain Administration $90. That's 90% of my margin, before I even pay for other taxes or expenses.

The Christian Science Monitor reports that Cain's plan eliminates the ability to treat labor as a business expense. So let's imagine that my small company earns $500,000 making software, and spends $50,000 on capital (like computers) and $400,000 paying five employees. Under "999", I pay an all-new 9% sales tax on my $500,000 of sales. Then, because I can't deduct the $400,000 of labor cost, I pay a 9% corporate tax on that. As a small business owner, I have to declare corporate "profits" as personal income, so I pay another 9% on the $450,000 that I didn't spend on capital equipment. Finally, my employees have to pay a 9% income tax on the $400,000 that I pay them. And when they spend that $400,000, they pay another 9% for the new national sales tax. So, Cain's "999" plan has added $189,000 in brand new taxes for a company that only sells $500,000 worth of stuff. And all those taxes are in addition to all my other taxes like property taxes, local business taxes, excise taxes and state sales taxes. Herman Cain has single-handedly turned a profitable small business with five employees into a money-losing business; one that will shut its doors and fire everyone within the first year of his presidency.

"999" is a great plan if you want to shut down every small business and force those employees to go work for large corporations or the government. It's the end of small business, and the end of innovation. It's the fastest way I can think of to turn American into a Third World Nation.

Furthermore, "999" is a lie. Rich Lowrie, Cain's Senior Economic Advisor, says that the "this is an attempt to shift the tax burden away from production and towards consumption, to balance the load. This taxes everything once but nothing twice.” As you can see above, if I earn $1,000 in revenue by selling a computer, that $1,000 is taxed multiple times before it ends up in the hands of my employees. And thanks to an all-new national sales tax, that money is taxed again when they spend it.

And the idea that this shifts taxes "away from production and towards consumption" is bullshit. Labor (paying someone to "produce" something) is now taxed three times. But buying capital equipment (consumption) is only taxed once.

As for the national sales tax, once you add another tax, it never goes away. The average American currently loses 44% of their paycheck to taxes. Just using back of the envelope math, it would appear that Mr. Cain's '999' plan would reduce this tax burden to about 27% (9% + 9% + 9%). But he isn't actually reducing taxes. That 44% figure includes property taxes, state income taxes, gasoline taxes, excise taxes, state sales taxes, etc. When all is said and done, it's likely that an average American, earning about $40K per year, will end up losing more than 50% of that to taxes under Cain's plan.

So, he wants to increase taxes on the middle class, and further decrease taxes on the wealthy. In other words, he wants to continue down the path we've been following for the last 30 years of taxing the middle class and transferring it to the top 1%. And in the process, it doesn't simplify the system. In fact, for small business owners like myself, he makes it significantly more complicated, and more costly, to comply with -- something that will undoubtedly lead to more layoffs and more unemployment.

Honesty

I feel a bit weird talking to a Customer Support person, whom I'm pretty sure is India, but wants me to call him 'Aaron'.

Why does FedEx (and every other company that outsources their phone banks to India) think it's necessary to pretend that I'm talking to someone in Texas?

My experience so far is that the overseas customer support folks are as nice, as knowledgeable, and as well educated as the ones I used to talk to in the U.S.

It makes sense that this would be the case. In the United States, phone support pays worse than fast food. But in India, they've probably got college graduates answering the phones.

My problem is just that I don't like being lied to. My computer monitor was made in China. It's outlandishly affordable and of pretty high quality. So I'm not complaining. So if U.S. companies aren't lying to me about where my computer is manufactured, why do they have to lie to me about who I'm talking to on the phone?

Obama's "Failed Stimulus"

I'm getting sick and tired of everyone referring to Obama's "failed stimulus".

But what really bugs me is that almost no one is bothering to point out that the stimulus actually prevented the Second Great Depression.

The vast majority of economists agree that the economy needed stimulus, funded by deficit-spending.

And they were right.

(In looking at that graph, note that Obama signed the 'Recovery Act' in February of 2009).

I understand that the recovery wasn't as strong as that flouted by Obama's advisers when they were trying to pass the bill. I get it. Either the economists were wrong. Or they over-stated their case in order to get the legislation passed. Just like Colin Powell "over-stated" the evidence for WMDs, and President Bush "over-stated" the need to give $1 trillion to Wall Street in September of 2008 with no strings attached.

If McCain had won, he surely would have signed a large stimulus bill in his first month in office, just like Obama did. And it would have had similar results to the bill Obama signed.

And every Republican would have been touting the brilliant policy signed by President McCain in order to pull us out of the Bush Tailspin. The only reason everyone with an '(R)' next to their name hates the stimulus so much is because it was done on Obama's watch.

(And of course we'd be in better shape now if Bush had signed a similar bill before leaving office, instead of borrowing from the next generation to write a big check to Wall Street).

Even three years after the death of Lehman Brothers, conservative publications like The Economist are still recommending "short-term stimulus and medium-term deficit reduction". In other words, the 2009 stimulus was too small.

Can we step back from the political bickering for a minute to actually think about what's best for the country? The GOP isn't stupid. They know the economy needed stimulus, and still needs stimulus. But they also know that if the unemployment rate stays above 9%, they might beat Obama in 2012. If it wasn't hurting real people, I would applaud the ingenuity of this strategy.