luckadjusted

Week 2 2019 · September 15, 2019

No FTN charting for this game (drops and interception-worthy throws are not modelled).

Bills at Giants, Week 2 2019: who deserved to win?

The Bills beat the Giants 28–14, but it was a coin flip: replayed with the way both teams played, the Bills win 5 of 10. Luck ran their way: kicks alone were worth 3.5 points to the Bills.

Before kickoff it was a pick’em. The biggest swing (Q1, 1:39 left): the Bills converted 3rd & 10, worth 10 points of win probability to the Bills.

Final

Buffalo Bills 28
New York Giants 14

September 15, 2019 · MetLife Stadium · Closing line: Bills −1

Luck index +45 Bills lucky · −45 Giants

Each team’s own plays from this game, resampled into new drives 4,000 times: with the way both teams actually played, how often does this performance win? How the replay works

Ten replays. Bills win 5, Giants win 5.

  1. 1 BUF 38 NYG 13
  2. 2 BUF 22 NYG 6
  3. 3 BUF 22 NYG 10
  4. 4 BUF 23 NYG 16
  5. 5 BUF 37 NYG 34
  6. 6 BUF 33 NYG 35
  7. 7 BUF 20 NYG 26
  8. 8 BUF 19 NYG 29
  9. 9 BUF 19 NYG 34
  10. 10 BUF 7 NYG 31

Three other ways to ask

Each answers a different question, so none of them replaces the replay above.

The closing betting line, turned into a probability. What everyone knew before the game.

The line plus what this game showed, weighted by how much one game can tell. It stays close to the line because one game says little.

Every kick, fumble bounce, drop, conversion and judgment call redrawn; everything else fixed. The narrowest view of luck.

How 4,000 replays ended

Bills win 55% of them, Giants 45%, counting the 5% still level after regulation as half each. The line is what actually happened: Bills by 14.

Show as a table
Final margin in the replaysShare of replays
Bills by 17+13.5%
Bills by 9–1615.8%
Bills by 1–820.8%
Level after regulation4.9%
Giants by 1–819.5%
Giants by 9–1613.6%
Giants by 17+12.0%

Where the luck was

Take the luck out

The final margin was Bills by 14. Remove the luck, one kind at a time, and it becomes Bills by 8.5.

Each row takes one kind of luck out of the margin. Color shows which team it helped. Luck shares are the fitted ones (how much of each component is luck).

When it happened

Giants’ chance of winning

As low as 0% and as high as 76%. Numbers mark the biggest luck moments, listed below.

nflfastR’s in-game win probability. It ignores the betting line, so it starts near even. Shaded above the middle while the Giants were ahead in it, below while the Bills were.
#WhenWhat happenedWin probability forNext drive
1 Q1 9:45 The Giants were stopped on 3rd & 103rd & 4th downs · 27% expectedFalse Start on the Giants (T.J. Jones), 5 yardsPre-snap flags · no snap history yet +6% BUF NYG: Punt
2 Q1 1:39 The Bills converted 3rd & 103rd & 4th downs · 29% expected +10% BUF BUF: Touchdown
3 Q2 8:32 Offensive Holding on the Bills, 10 yards, wiping out the playJudgment calls +7% NYG NYG: Missed field goal
4 Q2 1:54 A. Rosas missed 48-yard field goalKicks · 75% expected for him, 0 of 0 from 45+ before +5% BUF NYG: Turnover
5 Q2 1:38 The Bills were stopped on 3rd & 33rd & 4th downs · 54% expectedUnnecessary Roughness on the Bills, 15 yardsJudgment callsNeutral Zone Infraction on the Giants (Markus Golden), 5 yardsPre-snap flags · 1 flag in 60 snaps before, position avg 1 per 249 +6% NYG BUF: Punt
6 Q3 10:04 Offensive Holding on the Giants, 10 yards, wiping out the playJudgment calls +5% BUF BUF: Punt
7 Q4 13:05 The Giants converted 4th & 23rd & 4th downs · 59% expected +5% NYG NYG: Touchdown
8 Q4 11:17 Illegal Blindside Block on the Bills (Dawson Knox), 15 yardsJudgment calls · 0 flags in 44 snaps before, position avg 1 per 253 +5% NYG NYG: Turnover on downs

Missing players

Key players (usually on the field for half the snaps or more) who missed this game or part of it, valued by position and quality. The same players are missing in every replay, so this counts as luck in points only.

  • Sterling Shepard (NYG WR), out · 0.6 pts
  • Taron Johnson (BUF CB), out · 0.4 pts

Adjust the assumptions

Disagree with how much of a fumble bounce or a pass interference call is luck? Change it and the coin-flip replay reruns in your browser.

Only coin-flips re-rolled

Bills 92% · Giants 8%

Final margin
Bills by 14
Luck in points
5.5 for the Bills
Luck-adjusted margin
Bills by 8.5
Replay with same day's form
Bills 55% · Giants 45% unchanged: why
How much of each is luck?

0% treats it as skill, 100% as pure luck. The tick is our fit.

What counts

We tested momentum on 19,000 lucky breaks and found none, so it's off by default. Why

Flip a play

Force the other outcome, in this game and in every replay: a made kick becomes a miss, a stop becomes a conversion, a flag goes the other way.

About these numbers

Play-by-play and win probability from nflfastR via nflverse; kicks valued against each kicker’s own record; drops and interception-worthy throws from FTN charting (not available for this game); injuries from snap counts and injury reports. No FTN charting for this game (drops and interception-worthy throws are not modelled).

Methodology and validation · All Week 2 2019 games · Bills · Giants

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