This weekend is the divisional round of the NFL playoffs, which means the Colts, Chargers. Saints, and Vikings are back in action after their bye week. This has me really excited because I am a huge football fan and I love watching the playoffs. I watch every second that I can, and one trend I feel has been developing the last few years is that the teams 
with the bye week generally struggle in the playoffs. Now this was just how it appeared to me, I had no facts to support this feeling so I decided to do a little digging and came across some things I found very interesting.
I decided to start my digging with the 2005 season, that’s when I can really remember this trend starting to develop. Since the start of the 2005 playoffs (which actually started in January of 2006) a total of 16 teams have had a bye week during the first round of the playoffs, not including this year. Those are the top 2 seeds in each conference and since they wouldn’t play each other until the conference championship game, that means 16 divisional round games for these teams. In those 16 games the home team, that had the bye, has a record of only 7 wins against 9 losses. Forget winning Super Bowls, they are having trouble just getting to the next round.
And speaking of the Super Bowl, you may be wondering how many of those 7 teams that got to the conference title game fared. Well, only 4 of them went on the play in the Super Bowl and only 1, ONE, was able to win it. That’s right, that means 3 of the last 4 Super Bowl winners were not a top 2 seed with a first round bye.
Now you might be wondering why teams place so much importance on the bye week. There are two reasons. One, you get to play at home. Given the choice, every team in the league would choose to play at home in their stadium in front of their fans and not have to travel. And two, its an opportunity for players to get healthy. The NFL season is long and grueling, and even players that don’t miss a game having nagging injuries and lingering soreness and they would love a week off to rest and heal a little.
So what’s the explanation for the lack of success these teams seems to be having in the playoffs. Well its simple…momentum. After an extra week of rest they have to face a team coming off a victory that is confident, had game action the previous week, has their timing down, and trusts each other on the field. No matter how you prepare during your bye week game speed, timing, and trust absolutely cannot be simulated on the practice field, but they can be lost by taking time off.
I can talk about his until I am blue in the face and can’t even see my computer screen, but as long as there is an NFL, teams will continue to fight for that bye week, and why not, it has obvious advantages. But recent history suggests that not getting it isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
How about during the regular season? How many teams win off the bye then? I would like to see that stat.
Otherwise I don’t see a correlation.
I don’t know exactly what kind of correlation you are looking for. I was writing specifically about the post season, the figures I gave have absolutely nothing to do with the regular season bye week. Bye weeks during the regular season were put in place to give players and coaches a rest in the middle of a long and grueling season that can beat you up mentally and physically. There are typically several games remaining after a regular season bye, and the game after the bye is not a “lose and your season is over” scenario as it is in the playoffs.
My article was meant to point out that the teams who tend to have the most playoff success are the ones who go into the playoffs on a hot streak and are able to keep it going. I think the easiest way to do that is to keep playing. Take a look at this year’s Cowboys team. No team was hotter at the end of the regular season and they kept it going with the throttling they gave the Eagles last weekend. Now they are heading into Minnesota feeling great and with tons of confidence. This doesn’t guarantee them a victory, but they have to be feeling pretty good about the way things are going. Minnesota on the other hand, aside from their last game, struggleg a bit down the stretch and have had two weeks to sit around and think about it. But again, this doesn’t guarantee the outcome of any game, the game still has to be played out on the field. Its just a trend I noticed developing in recent years, and its a trend specifically based on playoff performance and so I don’t see why a connection needs to be made between regular season and playoff bye weeks.
I think there is defiantly a correlation. If you think about it Peyton Manning hasn’t played a full game in almost a month. Look at the past few teams to make it to the Super Bowl (Cardinals, Giants, Steelers etc etc) They were teams that got ‘hot’ at the end of the season and were able to carry it into the playoffs. I laughed my ass off when I found out the Colts were not going to try for the perfect regular season. They are 0-3 in recent playoff games when they have already earned a bye week going into the playoffs. Plus, to further refute Adam’s need for a correlation, a bye week during the season is entirely different than the playoffs. A bye during the season gives you two weeks to plan for your next opponent (which should give you some advantage in the matchup) while a bye week during the playoffs you are uncertain of who your next opponent is. So the only real advantage (other than having a first round bye of course) is to rest hurt players.
Here are your stats Adam:
Home teams playing after a bye.
Wins 169,losses 120 for 58.5%.From the regression they were expected to win by an average of 2.9 points,they won by 3.0 points.
Compare this to home teams playing having played the previous week.
Wins 1815,losses 1304 for 58.2%.Expected margin of victory was 2.6 points,actual was 2.5.
There appears to be absolutely no advantage for home teams playing after a bye compared to their counterparts who did not have a bye week.
Away teams playing after a bye.
Wins 126,losses 141 for 47.2%.Expected margin of defeat was 1.7 points,actual was 0.8 points.
Compared to away teams playing having played the previous week.
Wins 1298,losses 1853 for 41.2%.Expected margin of defeat was 2.7 points,actual was 2.6 points.
A couple of points here.Firstly,the sample of bye week road teams had,on average slightly easier games than the control sample.Thus the 47% to 41% difference shouldn’t be taken entirely at face value.However,the bye sample was expected to lose by an average of 1.7 points and it did almost a whole point better than that,losing by just 0.8 points.
Away teams as a whole look as though they may benefit from a bye.So I looked at various types of matchups,starting with away teams who went on the road as favourites.I used my regression equation to define the favoured team in the game and looked at away teams with a 55% or better chance of winning.The 55% was chosen to try to eliminate closer matchups where there could be greater doubt as to who was the favoured team.
Away teams playing after a bye who have a 55% chance or better of winning the game.
Wins 58,losses 14 for 80.6%.Expected margin of victory 6.0 points,actual 8.7 points.
Compare this to away teams playing having played the previous week who have a 55% chance or more of winning the game.
Wins 423,losses 201 for 67.8%.Expected margin of victory 5.7 points,actual 6.0 points.
Again a few points.The regression equation,which remember does not factor in an advantage for bye weeks,appeared to pick out two very similar groups before the fact.It expected each group to win by an average of about 6 points.(The Vegas line for both groups was similarly close).
The group that had not had a bye week performed pretty much as expected.However,the bye week group did considerably better than either Vegas or the regression expected,winning by almost 3 more points than expected on average and posting 81% of wins compared to 68% for the control.
To test if the effect was repeatable and not the result of a couple of freak seasons,I split the away favourites playing after a bye sample in two at the year 2000 and the effect was present in both groups (although sample size issues were obviously now present).
Conclusion.
Favoured teams going on the road after a bye week appear to overperform by almost a field goal.This effect is largely absent in all other types of matchups.
*note this is information copied from an NFL stat site.
Graeme,
Perfect, that is the data I am looking for. You have just proven that a bye is definitely detrimental to a team.
In playoff situations a team with a bye has a losing percentage, in away situation a team with a bye has a losing percentage, and in a home situation the team with a bye has a slight edge.
So Ryan your theory that a bye is bad is pretty accurate.