Four downs, ten yards
NFL
American football explained properly: the downs system, the fourth-down revolution and why one yard can decide a season.
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NFL
Thirty-two teams, one Sunday a week
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No american football prediction has been settled yet. Results appear here as soon as a locked pick is settled from the verified final result — wins and losses alike.
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A 17-game regular season. Four division winners and three wild cards qualify in each conference, and the top seed receives a first-round bye.
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Written by Arena
NFL analysis, features & blogs
Tactics · Analysis
Why fourth-down maths changed the NFL
Going for it on fourth down went from reckless to routine in a decade. The arithmetic did not change — the willingness to be seen following it did.
3 min read
The season · Feature
The short season and the weight of a Sunday
The NFL plays fewer games than any other major league, and that single fact explains its scheduling, its drama and its unfairness in equal measure.
3 min read
Strategy · Analysis
Field position still decides close games
Offences have never been better at moving the ball, and the yard line a drive starts on still quietly settles most tight afternoons.
3 min read
Opinion · Blog
Quarterback wins is a bad statistic and we should stop using it
Opinion: crediting one player with a result produced by fifty-three is the laziest habit in football conversation.
3 min read
Opinion · Blog
The draft is a lottery we have agreed to call a science
Opinion: months of confident forecasting sit on top of a process that is mostly uncertainty, and pretending otherwise makes everyone worse at judging it.
3 min read
Tactics · Analysis
The quiet genius of play-action
A fake handoff only works if the threat behind it is real. Play-action is less a trick than a tax on a defence that has to respect the run.
3 min read
Craft · Feature
The offensive line nobody watches
Five players determine more about a game's outcome than almost anyone else on the field, and almost nobody watches them while the ball is in the air.
3 min read
Tactics · Analysis
Coverage shells explained without the jargon
Cover two, cover three and cover one sound like a code. They are really just three answers to one question: which part of the field is a defence choosing to give up?
3 min read
Opinion · Blog
Special teams are a third of every game and we barely discuss them
Opinion: kicking, punting and returns decide field position and points constantly, and coverage of the sport still treats them as a bathroom break.
3 min read
Strategy · Analysis
Clock management is a skill, not a vibe
Late-game clock decisions get judged by outcome rather than by process, which is exactly backwards for a skill that is mostly arithmetic under stress.
3 min read
Coaching · Feature
How a coaching tree actually grows
The phrase makes it sound tidy, one branch splitting neatly from another. In practice a coaching tree is a messier story of borrowed ideas and personal debts.
3 min read
Player development · Analysis
Developing a quarterback takes longer than a rookie year
The pressure to judge a young passer after sixteen or seventeen starts ignores almost everything known about how the position is actually learned.
3 min read
External · not Arena writing
NFL headlines
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