Contract Allocation between Playoff Teams and NFL Underachievers

In a Few Words

Looking at NFL contracts between 2013 through 2018, here is a comparison of which positions are prioritized by the 8 teams reaching the divisional playoffs compared to the 8 teams with the lowest win percentage each year over the six year period.

Positive numbers represent the Contender salary differentials while negatives represent Pretender differentials.

Keep in mind, the table is not saying that Safeties make more in total salary than QBs, it's telling us how much more players at each position make playing for playoff contenders compared to teams in the bottom 8.  

Contending Teams' Position Priority

• Contending teams pay 8% more for their total Offense and 4% more for their total Defense
• Safety:  25% premium compared to the teams finishing in the bottom 8
• Quarterback:  24%  
• Tight End: 13%
• Linebackers: 8%
• Offensive Linemen: 2%
•  Wide Receivers: 1%

Bottom 8 Teams' Position Priority

• Cornerback: 16% premium paid by cellar dwellers compared to contending teams.
• Running Back: 5% 
• Defensive Line: 4%

While salaries fluctuated over the years in terms of spend depending on which teams made the playoffs or were cellar dwellers, the strongest trends are pretty consistent over the 5 year period of the analysis.

In More Words

I don't think it was surprising to learn playoff teams pay more for their QBs compared to teams finishing at the bottom.  The validity of that position being critical should be universally acknowledged.  But that Safeties, based on the premium teams who make the playoffs will pay for that position compared to the teams in the bottom 8 places, was a bit of a surprise.  Based on our analysis, safeties have the most value to winning teams.  

Cornerbacks are critical to every defensive game plan but clearly, lower performing teams overestimate the value of these players.  According to Sportac, the aggregate record of the teams with the 10 highest Corner salaries have a combined record of 30-58-1 with only two teams having winning records (NE and MIN).  Remove those two winners and the aggregate record of the remaining 8 (MIA, WAS, NYJ, ARI, ATL, JAC, NYG and TEN) drops to 17-54-1.  Zoinks!

Capital management is critical for success in any business however, it doesn't seem as though this strategy has been as firmly embraced by every sports franchise given some of the bad contracts that have been written.  In the NFL it would seem that, given the nature of the specificity of each position, there would be more uniformity in the value of players, especially with the availability of contract details to the average person with online access.  When trying to understand why the good teams stay good and the bad teams stay bad, one explanation could easily be the inability of the struggling teams to successfully copy what the winning teams do.  While I would have to believe every franchise would use its tremendous resources to field a competitive team each year, we know that is not true by poor performance of certain teams, year after year.  

Football is a tough sport both physically and mentally.  Because of this, it seems more difficult for new ideas to seep in because of reliance on tried and true methods.  Not to mention getting the combination of someone who knows the game from an X's and O's AND an analytical perspective is difficult.  But, the slow road to embracing non-traditional data in football seems to be speeding up as more teams bring on analytical staff to help them process data they can use to be competitive over the long term.  The information discussed in this article is just the tip of the iceberg.  Let's hope teams find a balance where data analytics can be brought in to support traditional general management to elevate the league as a whole. 

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