Preseason Team Rankings

I have now published my preseason projections for this year's NFL offenses and defenses so it is time to go through the mathematical gymnastics to create overall rankings and predict win totals for each team. The ranking of teams is done in the straightforward manner of subtracting the points allowed against an average team (defense) from points scored against an average team (offense) to get the Net Difference. I then map the net difference into win totals. This process puts the Packers on top with an estimated 13 wins and the Rams to repeat at the bottom with (a sadly still better) 3 wins.

After I put my rankings together I wanted to do a check and see what the true expert in my household thought. My 9-year old son looked through my list and decided that he better do his own list, because mine had too many obvious errors in it. He rationalized each of his own win predictions (though he seemed to be smiling a bit too much when he gave HIS Chargers 13 wins) and did not hesitate to proclaim mine wrong where we disagreed. In fairness to him, I now present his predictions next to mine, and at the end of the season we will see who has been more accurate.

Team	Offense	Defense	Net Difference	Wins	Son
Green Bay	26.4	18.2	8.2	13	8
Dallas	26.8	18.9	7.9	12	10
San Diego	28.3	20.3	8	11	13
Indianapolis	25.6	19.1	6.5	11	13
Minnesota	26.2	19.6	6.6	10	12
Pittsburgh	24.8	19	5.8	10	10
New Orleans	27.4	21.2	6.2	10	13
Houston	25.9	20.2	5.7	10	7
New England	25.9	20.2	5.7	10	9
Philadelphia	23.8	18.8	5	10	10
NY Jets	20.9	16.8	4.1	10	8
NY Giants	25.7	21.2	4.5	9	8
Baltimore	23.6	20.1	3.5	9	10
Arizona	23.1	19.7	3.4	9	9
Denver	21.8	18.8	3	9	9
Cincinnati	20.6	18.6	2	8	9
Tennessee	22.9	21	1.9	8	8
Washington	21.6	21.1	0.5	7	5
Carolina	20.8	20.4	0.4	7	5
Chicago	20.9	20.9	0	7	4
Atlanta	22	22.3	-0.3	7	7
San Francisco	19.7	20.1	-0.4	7	8
Buffalo	19.3	20	-0.7	7	5
Miami	21.2	22.4	-1.2	6	4
Jacksonville	22.3	24.2	-1.9	6	6
Seattle	19.5	21.3	-1.8	6	3
Tampa Bay	19.7	22.5	-2.8	6	4
Detroit	19.4	23.4	-4	5	4
Oakland	19.2	23.8	-4.6	5	3
Kansas City	18.4	24.2	-5.8	4	2
Cleveland	16.8	23.2	-6.4	4	5
St. Louis	17.7	24.5	-6.8	3	2

We both agree that the Falcons are due to come down this season, dropping to 7 wins and see the Broncos headed for an additional win this year and a likely playoff birth. We have some serious disagreements though with my data projecting the Saints to come down to 10 wins while he has them repeating their 13 win performance and I have Houston winning 10 while he has them at 7.

The question now is what should the stakes be for the bet? Leave a comment or get me on Twitter @BenAlamar with ideas.