The Jacksonville Jaguars

[Wacca Pilatka]

Agreed.  Incredibly unprofessional.  I expected so much more of nfl.com and the NFL Network than what it has become.  You would think that if it represents 32 teams, it wouldn't relentlessly try to tear some of them down.

[KenFSU]

Whoa, Ken, that's pretty interesting.

Thanks Peej!

I really enjoyed your reponse, and you've got some great suggestions here! Unfortunately, I put the analysis together as a fun side project in my home office, and most of the suggestions would require far more time and resources than I have at my disposal

Let me briefly answer your questions...

-Did you look at day of week and time of day for the games. I imagine some of that effect can get conflated with the nationally-televised binary variable, but that is one that I would initial think to have some effect.

Yeah, I looked at time of day (I was really curious to see if the 4:15 games drew any differently than the 1:00 games, which didn't appear to be the case), as well as the day of week. And you're absolutely right. When you see correlation between increased attendance and Monday Night Football games, for example, it's damn near impossible without quality polling data to say definitively whether it's because a) the game is on national television, b) there's an evening start time, or c) the game falls on a Monday. With a sample so small some of these variables would be perfectly collinear, so there's almost got to be some best guess judgement calls going on. You could probably break down some dummy variables even further, time permitting, and get an even better idea of what's going on, but unfortunately, the time just wasn't there.

-I am always so curious about the national games. It does seem anecdotally that more people are interested in attending them. Do you think this is due to simply the fact that they are televised more widely, or because of why they were scheduled to be nationally-televised in the first place (division rival game, replay of the prior season's super-bowl, two teams that are expected to be good before the season)? I feel like there are so many factors that go into the nationally-televised game. Perhaps its a desire to be part of the event, or to fill the seats to project a better image of the Jags nationally, or the reasons discussed above for which the network wants to televise it nationally.

Same on this one. I'd love to see some polling data on it, because especially in Jacksonville, it's really hard to say. For example, on one hand, I think people want to go to these nationally televised games to show how great Jacksonville's fans are. But then you have that super weird Jacksonville thing too where if the game isn't going the Jags way by halftime, 40,000 people just randomly leave. There have been a handful of Monday Night Jags games in recent years where the stadium is almost completely empty toward the end of the game, which seems counter intuitive to the civic pride explanation. Civic pride certainly plays a part, but my best guess is that those with heavy civic pride are attending most games regardless, and that the attendance boost from nationally televised games probably comes from the fringe, non-hardcore fans who just want to be a part of the big thing going on in the city that day.

-For winning percentage, is "seasonal" the end-of-season or the season to that point?

I tested a variety of different measures here. Winning percentage on the season can be a little misleading, simply because a 1-0 Jaguars team that fluked into a win to start the season would register as a more winning team than a 15-1 team who destroyed their competition all year. Likewise, for opponents, an eventual Super Bowl winner who loses their first game (0%) would register lower than a one-win (1-15) team that the Jags play on the last day of the season. Quick, dirty, and ad hoc, but in addition to current-day winning percentage, I settled on testing winning percentage over last 10 games (which, for opponents, was pretty close to winning percentage on the season, actually). Like I mentioned, I also tried to test a few momentum based variables as well (record for last three games, did the Jags win their previous game, did the Jags win their previous home game, etc.), as well as a variable for previous season winning percentage and a dummy variable for a winning/losing previous season. I'm sure there's an even better way to weight this variable, but I had a really rough time finding a correlation between any of these home team winning variables and attendance that would suggest that people come to Jags games when the team is winning who otherwise wouldn't if the team were losing.

-Do you have anything like pre-season rankings in there, or some variable that measures the "hype" (media coverage, big pickups/trades, etc)?

None, unfortunately. The rough model that I came up with only accounted for half of the variation in game-to-game attendance. I would guess that these factors, though difficult and time-consuming to quantify, would definitely factor in. Even harder to factor in, but probably what you're referring to here overall, is overall local attitude toward the team, both on the field, and as a stable fixture in Jacksonville. I've noticed, for example, that the city's fanbase has a tendency to turn on the team, both in spending and in attitude, whenever relocation rumors pick up steam (even if they are false). It's quite sad to see.

-I would think it might be more telling to measure the relative popularity by a weighted variable (fan base, population in home market, merchandise sales, local fans even [I bet you could get data on that]) rather than ranking. I would expect that to give this variable more resolution.

Absolutely agree. Using the Harris Poll was another quick and dirty shortcut that could likely be done much better (and most certainly has) using a bigger, more thorough data set than I was able to compile.

-I don't know about removing 3/4 of the 2009 season from the equation. Perhaps an additional dummy variable thrown in so that you could differentiate what you believe to be an outlier, but there is still differences between the data for those 6 games that might be of interest. Plus, those games were coming off a very bad season, so your trailing-10 percentage may actually show some movement in addition to the "recession" variable.

Fantastic suggestion. I'm going to look into this.

-I wonder, does your seasonal normalization for economic effects also remove any annual effects from changes in the team (hype, pre-season rankings, previous season record, hirings/firings, etc)? If every game is normalized by the average attendance that season, then there would be nothing to show for changes between seasons, right?

Aside from the win/loss variables that I spread between over adjacent seasons, you're correct. I'm fairly confident that changes in mean season attendance are influenced first and foremost by economic factors. For example, if you plot mean season attendance for the last few years versus the unemployment rate in our MSA, it's like looking in a mirror. Unemployment goes up, attendance goes down. Unemployment drops, attendance increases. But there are definitely outside factors (such as the Jags relatively historic offseason, for example) that would influence mean attendance for the 2013 season as well.

This is good stuff. You should do it for every season AND every team

As a numbers nerd, such a study would be amazing fun. But also an amazing amount of work. I'm going to try doing a journal search tonight, however. I could almost guarantee that someone has already done something similar, with better resources and more data.

Would be a fun crowd-sourcing project too with a large group of people.

If quality polling could be conducted, we could probably paint an even better picture of what truly influences Jags attendance.

[spuwho]

Don't read nfl.com. 

Rather than being a vehicle for promoting and providing info on all 32 teams and advancing the NFL as a whole, it's become an ESPN-like cesspool for promoting the glamour teams and ridiculing the less glamorous.

What strikes me is the unprofessionalisum in sports writing. They changed some of the wording, but the first version of the Jaguars offseason forecast said "the Jaguars are a hot mess" and "Caldwell and Bradley has inhereited these hot messes." I was like "WTF? HUH? that doesnt even make sense." They eventually took that second sentence out. It is not even possible to enjoy reading sports media unless you are one of the "elite" teams. Otherwise they take a jab at you any way they can. And if you Jacksonville, youre just screwed either way. I really do the majority of my reading on Jaguars.com BUT i completely avoid the comments section. WTF is the purpose of  a comments section anyways? If it were up to me, the website would not have one. They have the fan forums for that crap.

When I lived up north I recall some of the grousing around all of the darling press Carolina and Jacksonville were getting. They were expansion teams, they were winning and for awhile people thought how cool it would be if we had an expansion bowl. That did not go over very well with some well established teams in the NFL. Especially those who were going through massive turnovers in personnel through free agency and the draft. There was a little resentment that 2 small market teams got to get a pick of everyones litter while they continued to work the draft.

Now that Carolina and Jacksonville have lost their expansion glimmer, no one is going be "nice" for no reason.

If the Jags turn it around (and they will eventually) and the wins stack back up, I can assure you the press will fall back in line and you won't see the stuff shoveled out. Look what happened to the relocation talk? It just moved on.

I can remember when Green Bay's future was in doubt and they started playing games at Milwaukee Municipal. For 2 years the press was ringing it up that Green Bay might have to move. They upset a lot of people with that bad press.

The solution to bad press is easy peasy. Just Win.

The only team in the NFL that gets a free shake in the press is the Dallas Cowboys. Regardless of their record they always garner promotional press. Geez, even when they hit 8-8, the headliners are positive.

[comncense]

I think DuvalDude posted a version of the rumored helmet a few days ago. I saw one of my friends on Facebook post this today.

[I-10east]

I liked the teal helmet one that blizz01 posted earlier better on page 240. To me it makes no sense in altering actual the primary logo (which is a gold black-spotted jaguar with teal tongue, eyes, and nose) for a gold sketched 'novelty T-Shirt-like' logo; I would be shocked if that comes to fruition.

[spuwho]

If the new helmet uses a teal-black flip flop paint, it would always look fresh and unique from every angle.

Just a thought.  Can you render a 3D image of a helmet with flip flop paint?

[duvaldude08]

Don't read nfl.com. 

Rather than being a vehicle for promoting and providing info on all 32 teams and advancing the NFL as a whole, it's become an ESPN-like cesspool for promoting the glamour teams and ridiculing the less glamorous.

What strikes me is the unprofessionalisum in sports writing. They changed some of the wording, but the first version of the Jaguars offseason forecast said "the Jaguars are a hot mess" and "Caldwell and Bradley has inhereited these hot messes." I was like "WTF? HUH? that doesnt even make sense." They eventually took that second sentence out. It is not even possible to enjoy reading sports media unless you are one of the "elite" teams. Otherwise they take a jab at you any way they can. And if you Jacksonville, youre just screwed either way. I really do the majority of my reading on Jaguars.com BUT i completely avoid the comments section. WTF is the purpose of  a comments section anyways? If it were up to me, the website would not have one. They have the fan forums for that crap.

When I lived up north I recall some of the grousing around all of the darling press Carolina and Jacksonville were getting. They were expansion teams, they were winning and for awhile people thought how cool it would be if we had an expansion bowl. That did not go over very well with some well established teams in the NFL. Especially those who were going through massive turnovers in personnel through free agency and the draft. There was a little resentment that 2 small market teams got to get a pick of everyones litter while they continued to work the draft.

Now that Carolina and Jacksonville have lost their expansion glimmer, no one is going be "nice" for no reason.

If the Jags turn it around (and they will eventually) and the wins stack back up, I can assure you the press will fall back in line and you won't see the stuff shoveled out. Look what happened to the relocation talk? It just moved on.

I can remember when Green Bay's future was in doubt and they started playing games at Milwaukee Municipal. For 2 years the press was ringing it up that Green Bay might have to move. They upset a lot of people with that bad press.

The solution to bad press is easy peasy. Just Win.

The only team in the NFL that gets a free shake in the press is the Dallas Cowboys. Regardless of their record they always garner promotional press. Geez, even when they hit 8-8, the headliners are positive.

Now that is true. When you win they shut up, but you have to admit, Jax gets  a little extra kick in the head when their down. Carolina has been stinking it up since their superbowl run and to be honest, I have not heard the constant, literally bashing that we get. At all. When the pathners were 2-14 and had the leagues worst offense, it wasnt constantly ran in the ground. Actually had I not looked it up, I would not have known that had the leagues worse offense a few years ago. Theres definately a HUGE bais when it comes to Jax. Hell Kansas City was 2-14 and they have so much "hope" for next season and the cardinals are predicted to make the playoffs after having the leagues worse offense. We can go all day about this, which is why I usually kept these kinda things to my self. They honestly dont bother me as much any more, it just bubbles up sometimes when I get tired of the garbage. And to be honest, 3 super bowl titles wont change how they feel about this franchise. It will shut them up, but theyll be on stand by waiting on us to slip. Even when we first got the franchise they hated our guts, they just couldnt find anything negative say. Theyve wanted us to fail from day one. So anything negative that comes from Jax they are going to pounce it.

[Shwaz]

Love the matte black helmet! Saw those on Missouri last year and really liked them. Here's a couple more renderings floating around -

[spuwho]

And to be honest, 3 super bowl titles wont change how they feel about this franchise. It will shut them up, but theyll be on stand by waiting on us to slip. Even when we first got the franchise they hated our guts, they just couldnt find anything negative say. Theyve wanted us to fail from day one. So anything negative that comes from Jax they are going to pounce it.

The general feedback up north when they announced the new franchises was total shock when Jacksonville was on the list. Charlotte, people knew, but Jacksonville? Many people didn't even know where it was in Florida. Serious, even today, most people know where Tampa, Orlando and Miami are, but for the most part, outside of Florida, very few people know where Jacksonville even is.

That is still in force today as the media, most of which were alive when those choices were made, DO have a bias about the First Coast.

As the years pass, those biases will dissipate as a new generation of fans (and media) grow up not knowing anything different.

Other than old timers, who cares that the Colts left Baltimore? Al Michaels might mention it on SNF, but no one really cares anymore.

[duvaldude08]

Well I dont care about anything right now. I just got my season ticket renewal package with the poster and car decal in it! I am tingly all over right now. The new logo looks awesome. Ive added the poster to the shrine in my "man cave" and Ive already put the decal on my car. 

[Wacca Pilatka]

The general feedback up north when they announced the new franchises was total shock when Jacksonville was on the list. Charlotte, people knew, but Jacksonville? Many people didn't even know where it was in Florida. Serious, even today, most people know where Tampa, Orlando and Miami are, but for the most part, outside of Florida, very few people know where Jacksonville even is.

Out of all the infamous remarks in Woody Paige's legendary column from 1997, the most striking to me was and always will be when he called Jacksonville "the only city in Florida without a beach."

[I-10east]

Well I dont care about anything right now. I just got my season ticket renewal package with the poster and car decal in it! I am tingly all over right now. The new logo looks awesome. Ive added the poster to the shrine in my "man cave" and Ive already put the decal on my car. 

Yeah, I got mine also. I like the poster, but I'm gonna have a hard time finding a frame (with plastic cover) that will fit it since it's so awkwardly long lengthwise in relation to how short it is in height. (33 X 17) LOL

[I-10east]

Serious, even today, most people know where Tampa, Orlando and Miami are, but for the most part, outside of Florida, very few people know where Jacksonville even is.

If you don't have any relation with a city, you are more than likely aren't gonna know where it's located. I'm so sick and tired of the 'I don't know where a city is located' as if it's a damn indictment of a city. Dionne Warwick may 'Know her way to San Jose' but right off the bat without using google maps, I dunno where the hell it is; Is that an indictment of SJ? No.

[duvaldude08]

Well I dont care about anything right now. I just got my season ticket renewal package with the poster and car decal in it! I am tingly all over right now. The new logo looks awesome. Ive added the poster to the shrine in my "man cave" and Ive already put the decal on my car. 

Yeah, I got mine also. I like the poster, but I'm gonna have a hard time finding a frame (with plastic cover) that will fit it since it's so awkwardly long lengthwise in relation to how short it is in height. (33 X 17) LOL

yeah me too. All my other posters are in a frame. I put it with tape for the time being. Im hoping and stubmle across a poster frame in the store or online that fits.

[KenFSU]

Out of all the infamous remarks in Woody Paige's legendary column from 1997, the most striking to me was and always will be when he called Jacksonville "the only city in Florida without a beach."

A bit of fun context:

The Denver Post
Yo, Jags: It's time to hit the road, Jack
January 4, 1997
Section: Sports
Page: F-01
Woody Paige

Jacksonville Jaguarss? What league are they in?

When did the NFL start letting USFL teams participate in the playoffs? Did I miss something? Or, are the Jags from that goofy World League or the Continental Basketball Association? After the Broncos dispense with these Jaguarss today, do they face the Barcelona Bobcats or the Birmingham Power & Light?

In the postseason the Denver Broncos are supposed to be playing the Cleveland Browns or the Oakland Raiders or the Buffalo Bills. The opposition should have an Al Davis or a Terry Bradshaw or a Bruce Smith to get riled about. There should be a 30-year rivalry and a playoff history and a spitting disgust for the other team. There should be bad blood and revenge and a suck-it-up sensation.

How do you get worked up to play somebody called Jacksonville with a bunch of nobodies?

Who wants to hurl insults and snowballs at Jaguarss?

Mark Brunell is the quarterback. I give up.

Jacksonville? Is that a semi-pro team or a theme park? Isn't Jacksonville the only Florida city without a beach?

This is the playoff game Denver has been waiting for?

The Broncos go 13-3, yet are forced by the league to play kissyface with Jaguarss. Bring on Pittsburgh - a mean team with meat on the bone.

When the Broncos reach the Super Bowl, skeptics will just say: "Oh, but they beat Jacksonville."

Wasn't Jackson (Miss.) State available?

Oh, I remember Jacksonville now. Expansion team. Been around for a couple of years. I get the Jacksonville Jags confused with the Carolina Panthers, or is it the Carolina Jags and the Florida Panthers? Isn't that the hockey team the Avalanche beat?

I looked it up, and the Jaguarss did win six of their last seven regular-season games, against the likes of Baltimore (twice), Cincinnati, Houston, Seattle and Atlanta. That sounds like a Nebraska schedule. And the Jags squeaked into the playoffs on a quirky missed field goal by Atlanta. The Broncos didn't face such cupcake foes, except for Baltimore and Cincinnati and Seattle, and they marched into the playoffs cremating, for example, Chicago and Minnesota.

Who do these upstart Jaguarss think they are, anyway, coming to Mile High Stadium, where the Broncos haven't lost this season and only once ever in the playoffs? They must think they belong here, but they will learn.

"I told you back before the season began that Jacksonville was going to be a playoff contender," said Adam Schefter, the self-proclaimed, know-it-all pro football expert employed by The Post.

I don't recall that specific statement. I do know that when Jacksonville beat the Broncos in the final exhibition, I said something like: "The Jags are awful. They should have Anita Bryant at middle linebacker."

In Jacksonville, the Broncos put up 17 points early and retired. John Elway played two series Aug. 23, and the rest of the starters lasted about a quarter. But Jaguarss coach Tom Coughlin acted as if his team had just won the Super Bowl. "It was a helluva victory. We played great in the second half to come back and win it."

As if the Broncos were serious.

The conference must be really down this year for Jacksonville to make the playoffs.

Jacksonville reportedly has the No. 1-ranked passing game in the NFL. Wait until the Jaguarss try that stuff at Mile High Stadium. And the Jags bring back center Dave Widell, who was a nice player and swell talk-show host in Denver in his day.

This is easy. It will not be a Jag War.

The tanned, rested and ready Broncos will invalidate the Jaguarss. Instead of "The Drive" and "The Fumble,"

Denver-Jacksonville will be known as "The Blowout." The Broncos are favored by 14. Not enough.

This is where you get off, Jaguarss. No way, no (Natrone) Means.

Broncos 31, Jags 10.

Can we get a legitimate NFL team in here next Sunday.

And, the aftermath:

LA Times
Jaguars Can Wad Up This Story
JACKSONVILLE 30, DENVER 27
January 05, 1997|STEVE SPRINGER

DENVER â€" Pro football players make hundreds of thousands, sometimes million of dollars. Their fortunes, their reputations and their endorsement possibilities depend on the success of their teams. A trip to the Super Bowl can make a career.

So it is truly amazing that, time after time, players will point to a newspaper article as their source of inspiration for a big game.

Such was again the case Saturday. When Denver Post columnist Woody Paige referred to the Jacksonville Jaguars as the "Jagwads," it became a battle cry for the team. The story was posted on the bulletin board in the team's Mile High Stadium locker room and seven or eight players mentioned the column after Saturday's 30-27 victory over the Denver Broncos as a major rallying point.

"Everybody reads the paper," Jacksonville defensive tackle John Jurkovic said. "We all went to college, so at least the capability is there."

Said running back Natrone Means: "They stuck it in our face. Now they are going to have to live with it."

Good thing for Jacksonville that Paige wrote what he did. Otherwise, the Jaguars, despite playing for a slot in the AFC title game in only their second year, apparently would have come into Saturday's game uninspired.