Sports Parity

[The Real Buffalo Joe]

I think the answer for least is obviously NBA. 

[row_33]

NFL has the most parity

 

the average number of division champion repeats since this format started,  with very limited playoff spots, is barely 3 a year, even with the dominance of Peyton and Brady and Rogers

 

took 13 years before the NFC South had a repeat winner in Carolina

 

edit:  updated the spreadsheet for the last few years, it's 3 a year

 

 

 

sitting here in Toronto i can forgive myself for a lack of perceived parity when the Yankees and Red Sox are both balling this year....

 

the less accurate one.....

 

Edited July 5, 2018 by row_33

[KD in CA]

5 minutes ago, The Real Buffalo Joe said:

I think the answer for least is obviously NBA. 

 

Not much question about that.  The inmates run the asylum at the NBA but apparently that's how the masses like it so the owners are happy to let it continue while the money rolls in.  NFL fans would go ballistic if the same two teams met in the SB four straight years.

 

I think the NFL has found the best balance of what I'll call 'off season' competition in terms of draft, FA, salary cap rules.  Only problem is they changed the on-field rules so much to favor the passing game, you have a league of have-QB or have not-QB.  They need to fix that.

[SoCal Deek]

What I found interesting within the chart, is that if not for this past season (when Jacksonville and the Rams broke thru) there were/are quite a number of teams that have been completely shut out of the Division Titles for over a decade.  And this is with Divisions that only have four teams. If you take out the first and last year of the Chart you find that EIGHT Teams: Buffalo, Detroit, Cleveland, LA Rams, Oakland, Tennessee, and Tampa over the fourteen years from 2003 through 2016 all failed to win their Division even once.  That's some pretty amazing futility!

[BigDingus]

NBA for sure right now, but typically college football ranks up there for least parity.

Especially since you can pick & choose your opponents, and the top teams get top recruits, and the cycle goes on & on & on. Alabama has won how many Championships the past decade? And how many other D-1 schools really have a legit shot? About 1% or less...

[Orlando Buffalo]

NBA is the worst for parity and I am an NBA season ticket holder of a non contender. the money is huge and too many players can make 8 million a year as the 3rd player off bench. But NCAA football sued a federal court for the right to deny the lesser leagues a shot at the title. UCF should have had a shot this year but were denied despite having a better resume than Alabama-though I truly think Alabama would have beat them. 

[row_33]

 

4 hours ago, SoCal Deek said:

What I found interesting within the chart, is that if not for this past season (when Jacksonville and the Rams broke thru) there were/are quite a number of teams that have been completely shut out of the Division Titles for over a decade.  And this is with Divisions that only have four teams. If you take out the first and last year of the Chart you find that EIGHT Teams: Buffalo, Detroit, Cleveland, LA Rams, Oakland, Tennessee, and Tampa over the fourteen years from 2003 through 2016 all failed to win their Division even once.  That's some pretty amazing futility!

 

The fun thing is that although the experts know 3 teams repeat on average, with the Pats being one of them, they apparently predict 6 or 7 to repeat every year.:

 

 the list of starting QBs the last 20 years in the SB shows how competitive the NFC has been. Theories can vary as to why...

 

and this is a sport that most devotedly hands the worst teams first crack at the best talent coming from college.

 

almost 20 years of failing to reach the playoffs, not even by a total fluke, is really bad, but when another team has almost totally dominated the division all you can do is hope for a wild card.

 

 

Edited July 6, 2018 by row_33

[GunnerBill]

7 hours ago, SoCal Deek said:

What I found interesting within the chart, is that if not for this past season (when Jacksonville and the Rams broke thru) there were/are quite a number of teams that have been completely shut out of the Division Titles for over a decade.  And this is with Divisions that only have four teams. If you take out the first and last year of the Chart you find that EIGHT Teams: Buffalo, Detroit, Cleveland, LA Rams, Oakland, Tennessee, and Tampa over the fourteen years from 2003 through 2016 all failed to win their Division even once.  That's some pretty amazing futility!

 

Actually if you are counting from 2003 it is 9 because the Jets haven't either. They did in 2002 but so did Oakland.  

[SoCal Deek]

2 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

 

Actually if you are counting from 2003 it is 9 because the Jets haven't either. They did in 2002 but so did Oakland.  

Good catch and so assuming we’re both right it shows that the NFL has had way less recent parity than most people perceive that it does. Once again it probably comes down to those teams that wallow in the QB desert ever searching for the promised one.

[row_33]

1 hour ago, SoCal Deek said:

Good catch and so assuming we’re both right it shows that the NFL has had way less recent parity than most people perceive that it does. Once again it probably comes down to those teams that wallow in the QB desert ever searching for the promised one.

 

no, the NFL has huge parity compared to the other sports

 

parity doesn't guarantee every team can win it all, it just shows year in and year out it is the most likely to have a different champion or playoff assortment

 

every year a team that was horrible seems to rise to a playoff spot, the Rams were last year's prize

 

 

[GunnerBill]

1 hour ago, SoCal Deek said:

Good catch and so assuming we’re both right it shows that the NFL has had way less recent parity than most people perceive that it does. Once again it probably comes down to those teams that wallow in the QB desert ever searching for the promised one.

 

The NFC has had a lot more than the AFC in recent years. The AFC had a decade and a half of Brady and Manning (with a chunk of Big Ben thrown in as well).  While Rodgers and Brees are also all worldly talented their organisations have not been as good at fitting structures around them that allow them to win and so while they have normally been at worst competitive neither has approached domination.  

 

Since the second Patriots Superbowl in 2004 the AFC has sent only 5 different teams and only 4 different starting Quarterbacks to the Superbowl:

 

Brady, Manning (with two teams), Ben, Flacco

 

In the same time the NFC has sent 10 different teams to the Superbowl and 13 different starting Quarterbacks:

 

Delhomme, McNabb, Hasselbeck, Grossman, Manning, Warner, Brees, Rodgers, Kaepernick, Wilson, Newton, Ryan, Foles (of whom only Wilson and Eli have been twice).

 

[row_33]

19 minutes ago, GunnerBill said:

 

The NFC has had a lot more than the AFC in recent years. The AFC had a decade and a half of Brady and Manning (with a chunk of Big Ben thrown in as well).  While Rodgers and Brees are also all worldly talented their organisations have not been as good at fitting structures around them that allow them to win and so while they have normally been at worst competitive neither has approached domination.  

 

Since the second Patriots Superbowl in 2004 the AFC has sent only 5 different teams and only 4 different starting Quarterbacks to the Superbowl:

 

Brady, Manning (with two teams), Ben, Flacco

 

In the same time the NFC has sent 10 different teams to the Superbowl and 13 different starting Quarterbacks:

 

Delhomme, McNabb, Hasselbeck, Grossman, Manning, Warner, Brees, Rodgers, Kaepernick, Wilson, Newton, Ryan, Foles (of whom only Wilson and Eli have been twice).

 

 

for most of the years since around 1980 the NFC has had more strong teams than the AFC, makes it harder to repeat with the way football goes natrually

 

i'm old enough to remember the 80s and early 90s when the AFC went to the air show while the NFC built monster D's in Chicago, NY, Dallas, Washington, San Fran to go with good or great O's... maybe that was wish fulfillment

 

 

Edited July 6, 2018 by row_33

[SoCal Deek]

5 hours ago, row_33 said:

 

no, the NFL has huge parity compared to the other sports

 

parity doesn't guarantee every team can win it all, it just shows year in and year out it is the most likely to have a different champion or playoff assortment

 

every year a team that was horrible seems to rise to a playoff spot, the Rams were last year's prize

 

 

I guess one man's parity is another man's disparity! The observation that I made was on the utter lack of success by the 'bottom' eight or nine teams, none of which even won their own Division  in the last more than a decade... let alone made the playoffs or the Super Bowl.  That is pretty amazing when you consider that each Division only has four teams.

[row_33]

47 minutes ago, SoCal Deek said:

I guess one man's parity is another man's disparity! The observation that I made was on the utter lack of success by the 'bottom' eight or nine teams, none of which even won their own Division  in the last more than a decade... let alone made the playoffs or the Super Bowl.  That is pretty amazing when you consider that each Division only has four teams.

 

shows how lousy those 8 or nine teams were run

 

too bad they don't relegate down to the bottom of the ocean for teams run like that

 

 

 

couldn't even compete in a pro-parity sport

 

[agilen]

Interesting take on parity from WaPo....

https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/wonk/wp/2018/07/06/championship-inequality-in-major-league-sports-looks-a-lot-like-income-inequality-in-the-u-s-economy/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.5ebcca25685d&__twitter_impression=true

[OldTimeAFLGuy]

16 hours ago, SoCal Deek said:

I guess one man's parity is another man's disparity! The observation that I made was on the utter lack of success by the 'bottom' eight or nine teams, none of which even won their own Division  in the last more than a decade... let alone made the playoffs or the Super Bowl.  That is pretty amazing when you consider that each Division only has four teams.

 

...or maybe the whole thing is a parody............