Department of Misleading Stats: Turner Edition

Just a quickie post here. I don't mean for this to turn into Hate On Norv Turner Night, but the MNF guys just ran a graphic showing that Norv Turner and Philip Rivers have the fifth most wins (45) of any coach/QB tandem in the NFL the past five years. Well, guys, who else is there?

Bill Belichick/Tom Brady: 50 wins

Mike Tomlin/Ben Roethlisberger: 49 wins

Sean Payton/Drew Brees: 48 wins

Tom Coughlin/Eli Manning: 46 wins

Norv Turner/Philip Rivers: 45 wins

Gary Kubiak/Matt Schaub: 40 32 wins

And that's it. There haven't been any other steady coach/QB combos in the NFL for the past five years. Here's another wrinkle. Over the last five years, Schaub has missed 10 games with injuries. His career record with the Texans is 32-32, so he could have been expected to win half of those games had he played, which would have put him at 45 wins, tied with Philip Rivers. So basically what that graphic really said is that Turner/Rivers is (best-case) the second-worst steady tandem over the last half-decade.

I think that Philip Rivers is a fairly decent quarterback, even though it looks like he's throwing a shot put when he passes. My whole point is that sometimes a little context is necessary when they show us statistics like that. There's often a lot more to the story than meets the eye.

[Major edit: I just realized that I had used the Texans' overall win total for the past five years, not just the games that Schaub had won. But my point still stands.]

Five Quick Stats #1: Norv Turner Is Not a Terrific Football Coach

On the Monday Night Football pregame show, Ron Jaworski just asserted that "Norv Turner is a terrific football coach." That doesn't pass the smell test, but let's look a little deeper.

Stat #1: Norv Turner is the longest-tenured coach in NFL history with a career losing record. He's 103-112-1 in 14 seasons. He's 4-4 in the playoffs.

Stat #2: In those 14 seasons, he's made the playoffs four times. In one of those playoff seasons (2008), his team finished 8-8.

Stat #3: This one indicates to me that even his talents as an offensive coordinator are overrated and that his success at Dallas was a result of having overwhelming talent at his disposal, rather than his genius as a coach. In his three years as Dallas's OC, they finished in the top ten in points and yards every season. In his four years as OC at San Diego, Miami, and San Francisco, his teams never finished in the top ten. Only three times in his tenure as a head coach have his teams finished in the top ten in yards.

Stat #4: In 2010, his Chargers pulled off the incredibly impressive feat of finishing first in the NFL in total offense and defense and still finishing 9-7 (and missing the playoffs).

Stat #5: Turner doesn't even produce good head coaches. Of the five eventual head coaches who worked for him as an assistant, only Mike Martz (53-32) had a winning record. The other four (Cam Cameron, Mike Nolan, Ray Rhodes, and Ron Rivera) had a combined record of 59-102-1.

Jaws is a smart guy, and I'm sure he knows most of these things. I understand the need to try to make a game pitting the 4-7 Chargers against the 4-7 Jaguars more appealing, but I hope they don't strain credulity quite so much next time.