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Study Hall: College Football, Its Stats and Its Stories
Study Hall is an accessible, enjoyable look at the world of college football through the eyes of coaches, writers, and numbers geeks. The first of its kind, this book explores college football's current events, numbers, and tactics from a number of perspectives. It is an attempt to bridge the gap between the analytical side of the game and its real-life application. So many of us love this ridiculous sport; Study Hall gives us ways to love it even more. Table of Contents 1. It's Personal 2. An Ungovernable Mess 3. The Case for Computers 4. You, Me, and Stats 5. We Meet Again, Mr. Wizard 6. Coaches vs. Stats 7. The New Box Score 8. Advanced Stats 101 9. College Football's Curveball 10. QBs and the Passes They Throw 11. Sometimes Cliches Are Cliches for a Reason 12. The 'Spread Offense' Meme Dies 13. Beating, And Becoming, Goliath
304 pages, Paperback
First published July 31, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
September 22, 2013
BillC wrote a preview for every one of 125 FBS teams this year over at SBNation, vying quite candidly to become the Bill James of college football. Statistical innovations with which he is affiliated include F/+, PPP, and Success Rate, as well as the general movement towards opposition-weighted numbers. His essay to launch this year's season, "It's Personal: Why we love the silly, irrational, ridiculous, beautiful world of college football" was one of the finest pieces regarding my favorite game I've ever read(*):
http://www.sbnation.com/longform/2013...
We hang around, join arms, and sing the alma mater after the game. We think we're trying to set an example for others, but really we just do it because it feels good and we don't want to leave the stadium yet. We eventually make the weary walk back uphill for liquids, brownies and some general lingering. We are hoarse, tired and dehydrated. Some have to make a two-hour drive east or west to get home.
Maybe you grew up in a large metropolitan area, where pro football is king. Maybe you attended a school that was smaller or more prestigious (and less football-inclined). Or maybe you simply grew up in an area of the country that doesn't give a damn about college football. You may like pro football more than college - plenty do - but you aren't me. When you grow up in an area obsessed with this sport, and when you take in the collegiate game day experience enough, it becomes a large portion of your identity, more than perhaps any other sport in this country. You cannot fathom another way to spend autumn Saturdays. You get nervous when friends announce they're getting married in September. Cracking open a beer at 8:00 a.m. is, on Saturdays, completely defensible. Driving 12 hours round trip for a big conference game? Not only logical, but necessary. NFL fans who say things like "Well, I don't really follow college football..." make you question both their integrity and their morals. You perhaps cannot justify some of college sports' shadier dealings, but you believe there is enough good to outweigh the bad, and it is difficult to imagine what might change that.
NFL fans who say things like "Well, I don't really follow college football..." make you question both their integrity and their morals. i could not agree more.
so i was expecting a lot from this book, but felt kinda let down (then again, for $12, not so much). maybe i just expected my Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets to get more than two lines, one relegated to a footnote. i started the book still soaking wet from watching us beat UNC at the Flats a.k.a Historic Grant Field at Bobby Dodd Stadium (NCAA's oldest continuously-used facility, where I've been a season ticket holder since my freshman days back in 1998), voice gone, reveling in a 3-0 start and what looks like the best GT team since at least 2009...but I digress. There's a lot of emphasis on interviews of other writers and coaches (primarily coaches who shot their bolt in the last decade---you'll not find Mr. Saban quoted here at any length), but these quips are used haphazardly and without great effect. Connelly is best when basing his conclusions on deft use of innovative stats, and many of his best contributions shine through in the form of tabular data. I was hoping for quite a bit more insight from chapter 13, "Beating and Becoming Goliath", particularly more detail on recruiting at academically intense schools (obviously of relevance to my Engineers) and player/scheme development. Protean offenses like that of Jim Grobe's at Wake Forest are dealt with in summary fashion---yes, we all know Riley Skinner led to adoption of a pass-heavy attack after years of the wishbone, but how? what pressures did this put on an O-line and wideout corps recruited for a ground game? etc.
The best chapters are 7 and 8, "The New Box Score" and "Advanced Stats 101". Here, Connelly plays to his strengths, deftly analyzing several big games from the past lustrum replete with oodles of insight. His arguments for counting sacks against passing yards (already done in the NFL), looking past time-of-possession, and the need to account for tempo are clearly and convincingly presented. Lots of good data here.
Also, I learned that the Colorado School of Mines' team is the "Orediggers."
(*) Diane Roberts did us all a service with her "Game of Tribes" a fortnight later:
http://www.oxfordamerican.org/article...
During a 1960 road trip, John Steinbeck observed: “Sectional football games have the glory and the despair of war, and when a Texas team takes the field against a foreign state, it is an army with banners.” By “foreign state,” Steinbeck means Arkansas. Or Louisiana. But it could as easily be a team from a couple of counties away. When Georgia and Georgia Tech played for the first time, in 1893, it was like the Orange Order marching down the Garvaghy Road or the
Kosovars versus the Serbs: Georgia fans hurled rocks from a newly plowed field at Yellowjacket players...It’s not that Michigan or Minnesota or Arizona or Oregon isn’t just as crazy for college ball as the next ESPN-U subscriber, it’s just that the South, the land of the Hatfields and the McCoys, has this highly developed vocabulary for “us” versus “them.” Who the hell are we? If you tailgate in the Grove, the answer is, of course, flim-flam, bim-bam, Ole Miss, by damn! At Georgia Tech, you’re a helluva helluva hell of an engineer! even if you majored in economics. In Gainesville, when the Pride of the Sunshine marching band plays the theme from Jaws, you extend your arms, one on top of the other, palms facing, and slowly move your hands together and apart, affirming your Gatordom. This is your tribe; these are your people; you belong to a nation with invisible borders.
ahhhh, good stuff.
http://www.sbnation.com/longform/2013...
We hang around, join arms, and sing the alma mater after the game. We think we're trying to set an example for others, but really we just do it because it feels good and we don't want to leave the stadium yet. We eventually make the weary walk back uphill for liquids, brownies and some general lingering. We are hoarse, tired and dehydrated. Some have to make a two-hour drive east or west to get home.
Maybe you grew up in a large metropolitan area, where pro football is king. Maybe you attended a school that was smaller or more prestigious (and less football-inclined). Or maybe you simply grew up in an area of the country that doesn't give a damn about college football. You may like pro football more than college - plenty do - but you aren't me. When you grow up in an area obsessed with this sport, and when you take in the collegiate game day experience enough, it becomes a large portion of your identity, more than perhaps any other sport in this country. You cannot fathom another way to spend autumn Saturdays. You get nervous when friends announce they're getting married in September. Cracking open a beer at 8:00 a.m. is, on Saturdays, completely defensible. Driving 12 hours round trip for a big conference game? Not only logical, but necessary. NFL fans who say things like "Well, I don't really follow college football..." make you question both their integrity and their morals. You perhaps cannot justify some of college sports' shadier dealings, but you believe there is enough good to outweigh the bad, and it is difficult to imagine what might change that.
NFL fans who say things like "Well, I don't really follow college football..." make you question both their integrity and their morals. i could not agree more.
so i was expecting a lot from this book, but felt kinda let down (then again, for $12, not so much). maybe i just expected my Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets to get more than two lines, one relegated to a footnote. i started the book still soaking wet from watching us beat UNC at the Flats a.k.a Historic Grant Field at Bobby Dodd Stadium (NCAA's oldest continuously-used facility, where I've been a season ticket holder since my freshman days back in 1998), voice gone, reveling in a 3-0 start and what looks like the best GT team since at least 2009...but I digress. There's a lot of emphasis on interviews of other writers and coaches (primarily coaches who shot their bolt in the last decade---you'll not find Mr. Saban quoted here at any length), but these quips are used haphazardly and without great effect. Connelly is best when basing his conclusions on deft use of innovative stats, and many of his best contributions shine through in the form of tabular data. I was hoping for quite a bit more insight from chapter 13, "Beating and Becoming Goliath", particularly more detail on recruiting at academically intense schools (obviously of relevance to my Engineers) and player/scheme development. Protean offenses like that of Jim Grobe's at Wake Forest are dealt with in summary fashion---yes, we all know Riley Skinner led to adoption of a pass-heavy attack after years of the wishbone, but how? what pressures did this put on an O-line and wideout corps recruited for a ground game? etc.
The best chapters are 7 and 8, "The New Box Score" and "Advanced Stats 101". Here, Connelly plays to his strengths, deftly analyzing several big games from the past lustrum replete with oodles of insight. His arguments for counting sacks against passing yards (already done in the NFL), looking past time-of-possession, and the need to account for tempo are clearly and convincingly presented. Lots of good data here.
Also, I learned that the Colorado School of Mines' team is the "Orediggers."
(*) Diane Roberts did us all a service with her "Game of Tribes" a fortnight later:
http://www.oxfordamerican.org/article...
During a 1960 road trip, John Steinbeck observed: “Sectional football games have the glory and the despair of war, and when a Texas team takes the field against a foreign state, it is an army with banners.” By “foreign state,” Steinbeck means Arkansas. Or Louisiana. But it could as easily be a team from a couple of counties away. When Georgia and Georgia Tech played for the first time, in 1893, it was like the Orange Order marching down the Garvaghy Road or the
Kosovars versus the Serbs: Georgia fans hurled rocks from a newly plowed field at Yellowjacket players...It’s not that Michigan or Minnesota or Arizona or Oregon isn’t just as crazy for college ball as the next ESPN-U subscriber, it’s just that the South, the land of the Hatfields and the McCoys, has this highly developed vocabulary for “us” versus “them.” Who the hell are we? If you tailgate in the Grove, the answer is, of course, flim-flam, bim-bam, Ole Miss, by damn! At Georgia Tech, you’re a helluva helluva hell of an engineer! even if you majored in economics. In Gainesville, when the Pride of the Sunshine marching band plays the theme from Jaws, you extend your arms, one on top of the other, palms facing, and slowly move your hands together and apart, affirming your Gatordom. This is your tribe; these are your people; you belong to a nation with invisible borders.
ahhhh, good stuff.
August 24, 2017
Must-read for anyone that's ever had a love affair with college football and wanted to pinpoint exactly just *why* it's so damn gripping. A great intro to advanced statistics as well with plenty of real-world examples.
August 17, 2021
I really wanted to like this book. I think I probably would dig this guy’s work on a more episodic basis.
August 15, 2016
As a huge college football fan (UGA) and fan of Bill's site on the internet, I have no real excuse why it took me so long to read this book. I should have read it before. It's a great book and the stats are very helpful in allowing the average fan to see the game differently. The stories mixed in and the anecdotes from players, coaches and others associated with college football make the book that much more enjoyable. I would recommend this book to any passionate football fan or to anyone who likes to read great sports writing.
August 21, 2013
An entertaining, wide-ranging look at not just the state of college football statistical analysis, but of the game as a whole. Highly recommended for any fan.
September 5, 2014
Even if you're familiar with a lot of the statistical stuff, the stories in the book still make it well worth the read.
June 15, 2024
Love Bills work and this was almost like a love letter to college football and statistical analysis.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews