NBA Best Bets of the Day (12/2)
Alex Christenson
Here are my DVOA projections for 2024, updated from the season forecasts in FTN Football Almanac 2024.
For those new to these ratings, you can find an explanation of DVOA here. Note that there’s a big difference between DVOA and projected DVOA. The DVOA ratings that appear on the website during the season are based on the actual play-by-play that happens during the season, with no future projection whatsoever. The numbers here are a forecast, with offense, defense, and special teams DVOA all projected separately using a system based on looking at trends for teams going back to 2012. My system starts by considering the team’s DVOA over the past three seasons and, on offense, a separate projection for the starting quarterback. Then I look at a number of other variables which suggest when a team will be better or worse than would otherwise be expected due to standard regression towards the mean. Factors include major offseason personnel changes, coaching experience, recent draft history, age and combined tenure on the offensive line, and certain players returning from injury (or, in the case of these updates, certain players getting injured in the preseason).
The numbers I present here are exactly what the projection system spit out. As I say every year: “A few of them will look strange to you. A few of them look strange to me.” As always, the offensive projections come out in a wider range than defensive projections because offense performance tends to be easier to predict (and more consistent from year to year) than defensive performance.
I’ve also done a new full playoff odds report simulation based on these updated DVOA projections, and I’ve added the playoff odds and Super Bowl championship odds to the table below. At the start of a new season, our simulation is very conservative about the average number of wins and losses expected for each team. I’ve made a change this year to get a spread of win totals that is much closer to what you’ll see in the betting markets. We also use a “dynamic” playoff odds simulation. Each time it plays through the season, it adds 1.5% to the DVOA of every winner and subtracts 1.5% from the DVOA of every loser before moving on to the next week’s games. This reflects the fact that DVOA projections are just estimates, and actual performance during the season gives us better knowledge of how good or bad teams really are.
In the book and in many of the interviews I’ve done promoting it, I’ve noted that eight of our top 12 teams were from the AFC. That means that all eight of these teams could hit their projections and none of the other teams could overperform, and we would still have to leave one of those teams out of the playoffs. This is no longer the case because I had to make an executive decision about Haason Reddick’s holdout in New York. Based on very negative reports about Reddick’s return, I considered him gone from the Jets, which drops their defensive projection to fifth and their overall projection to 14th. With Reddick, they would be second on defense and 12th overall.
The odds of getting the No. 1 pick listed below (and listed on the playoff odds report page) do not incorporate traded picks.
| TEAM | TOTAL DVOA |
RK | MEAN WINS |
OFF. DVOA |
RK | DEF. DVOA |
RK | S.T. DVOA |
RK | SCHED | RK | NO. 1 PICK ODDS |
PLAYOFF ODDS |
S.B. WIN ODDS |
| SF | 20.6% | 1 | 11.2 | 16.9% | 1 | -4.2% | 7 | -0.5% | 24 | 2.3% | 4 | 0.0% | 82.5% | 16.9% |
| BAL | 17.7% | 2 | 11.0 | 7.7% | 8 | -6.7% | 3 | 3.4% | 1 | -0.4% | 21 | 0.1% | 79.1% | 11.5% |
| KC | 15.2% | 3 | 10.8 | 9.5% | 5 | -6.1% | 4 | -0.4% | 19 | -1.0% | 24 | 0.1% | 80.9% | 10.7% |
| HOU | 13.5% | 4 | 10.1 | 8.9% | 6 | -2.7% | 8 | 1.9% | 3 | 1.9% | 5 | 0.3% | 70.1% | 7.4% |
| BUF | 11.9% | 5 | 9.6 | 9.6% | 4 | -0.9% | 11 | 1.4% | 4 | 4.1% | 1 | 0.5% | 60.2% | 5.3% |
| MIA | 10.9% | 6 | 9.7 | 12.5% | 2 | 1.3% | 18 | -0.4% | 17 | 1.9% | 7 | 0.5% | 62.4% | 5.1% |
| DET | 10.7% | 7 | 10.0 | 6.0% | 10 | -4.5% | 6 | 0.2% | 11 | 1.3% | 9 | 0.3% | 66.7% | 6.7% |
| DAL | 10.1% | 8 | 10.2 | 2.8% | 11 | -7.1% | 2 | 0.2% | 10 | -0.9% | 23 | 0.3% | 72.5% | 7.1% |
| CIN | 7.2% | 9 | 9.8 | 8.5% | 7 | 1.2% | 17 | -0.1% | 14 | -2.3% | 29 | 0.6% | 61.3% | 3.9% |
| GB | 6.4% | 10 | 9.3 | 9.7% | 3 | 2.3% | 23 | -1.1% | 30 | 1.4% | 8 | 0.6% | 56.3% | 3.7% |
| CLE | 5.4% | 11 | 9.1 | -2.1% | 19 | -8.1% | 1 | -0.6% | 25 | 0.5% | 14 | 0.9% | 50.5% | 2.5% |
| LAR | 4.5% | 12 | 8.9 | 7.4% | 9 | 0.5% | 16 | -2.3% | 32 | 2.5% | 3 | 1.0% | 48.2% | 2.5% |
| SEA | 3.4% | 13 | 9.0 | -0.5% | 16 | -1.8% | 10 | 2.1% | 2 | 0.9% | 11 | 1.0% | 49.4% | 2.4% |
| NYJ | 2.9% | 14 | 8.7 | -2.1% | 18 | -5.4% | 5 | -0.4% | 18 | 1.1% | 10 | 1.5% | 44.9% | 1.9% |
| NO | 2.4% | 15 | 9.5 | 2.7% | 12 | 0.3% | 15 | 0.1% | 12 | -3.8% | 31 | 0.7% | 59.6% | 2.8% |
| JAX | 1.6% | 16 | 8.6 | 2.4% | 14 | 1.8% | 19 | 1.0% | 5 | 0.6% | 13 | 1.7% | 43.6% | 1.7% |
| TEAM | TOTAL DVOA |
RK | MEAN WINS |
OFF. DVOA |
RK | DEF. DVOA |
RK | S.T. DVOA |
RK | SCHED | RK | NO. 1 PICK ODDS |
PLAYOFF ODDS |
S.B. WIN ODDS |
| PHI | -0.4% | 17 | 8.7 | 2.6% | 13 | 3.3% | 27 | 0.4% | 9 | -1.6% | 27 | 1.3% | 48.8% | 1.8% |
| TB | -1.2% | 18 | 8.7 | 1.9% | 15 | 2.2% | 22 | -0.8% | 28 | -1.5% | 26 | 1.3% | 45.6% | 1.6% |
| MIN | -3.1% | 19 | 8.0 | -2.7% | 20 | -0.1% | 13 | -0.6% | 26 | 0.7% | 12 | 2.6% | 35.1% | 1.0% |
| ATL | -5.0% | 20 | 8.5 | -1.0% | 17 | 3.6% | 28 | -0.5% | 22 | -4.3% | 32 | 2.3% | 42.2% | 1.0% |
| TEN | -6.2% | 21 | 7.5 | -4.7% | 22 | 0.0% | 14 | -1.5% | 31 | 0.3% | 16 | 4.5% | 27.6% | 0.4% |
| LV | -7.3% | 22 | 7.4 | -8.4% | 27 | -0.7% | 12 | 0.4% | 8 | 0.0% | 20 | 3.9% | 26.2% | 0.4% |
| PIT | -7.4% | 23 | 7.3 | -4.4% | 21 | 2.0% | 20 | -1.0% | 29 | 0.4% | 15 | 4.4% | 22.6% | 0.4% |
| NE | -9.5% | 24 | 6.6 | -11.7% | 29 | -2.6% | 9 | -0.4% | 21 | 3.0% | 2 | 7.0% | 16.3% | 0.2% |
| ARI | -10.1% | 25 | 6.8 | -6.7% | 26 | 3.2% | 26 | -0.3% | 16 | 1.9% | 6 | 6.0% | 18.4% | 0.3% |
| CHI | -10.5% | 26 | 7.0 | -6.4% | 25 | 3.7% | 29 | -0.5% | 23 | 0.3% | 17 | 6.2% | 21.1% | 0.2% |
| IND | -10.6% | 27 | 6.8 | -4.9% | 23 | 4.9% | 31 | -0.8% | 27 | 0.1% | 19 | 8.0% | 19.5% | 0.2% |
| DEN | -13.3% | 28 | 6.6 | -6.3% | 24 | 7.7% | 32 | 0.7% | 7 | -0.6% | 22 | 7.8% | 16.5% | 0.1% |
| LAC | -13.6% | 29 | 6.7 | -9.4% | 28 | 4.9% | 30 | 0.8% | 6 | 0.1% | 18 | 8.7% | 18.2% | 0.1% |
| CAR | -13.8% | 30 | 7.0 | -11.8% | 30 | 2.1% | 21 | 0.1% | 13 | -3.7% | 30 | 7.1% | 22.1% | 0.2% |
| NYG | -15.6% | 31 | 6.4 | -12.6% | 31 | 2.9% | 24 | -0.1% | 15 | -1.1% | 25 | 9.5% | 15.9% | 0.1% |
| WAS | -16.9% | 32 | 6.4 | -13.4% | 32 | 3.1% | 25 | -0.4% | 20 | -1.9% | 28 | 9.4% | 15.6% | 0.1% |
In general, our forecast each year will “project” the playoffs to look very similar to the playoffs from the year before. (Obviously, we’re projecting probabilities here rather than a clear dichotomy where certain teams are playoff teams and other teams are not.) That’s especially the case this year. Our “official” projections have only three new teams in the playoffs: Cincinnati, Seattle, and New Orleans.
- AFC divisions: Baltimore, Miami, Houston, Kansas City
- AFC wild cards: Buffalo, Cincinnati, Cleveland
- NFC divisions: Detroit, Dallas, New Orleans, San Francisco
- NFC wild cards: Green Bay, Seattle, Los Angeles Rams
Remember that some of the teams at the bottom of our projections are going to surprise and make the playoffs. Two years ago, the New York Giants had the worst projected DVOA in the league and they made the playoffs anyway. (There’s a reason Brian Daboll won Coach of the Year!) Last year, the Houston Texans were ranked 31st going into the season. Another thing I’ve talked about a lot in the preseason is that we have to assume that rookie quarterbacks will be bad. It’s very likely that at least one of the teams with a rookie quarterback will be much better than this. That includes Indianapolis, where Anthony Richardson is effectively a rookie. I expect that team to be Chicago, but I might be wrong.
The biggest changes between the book and this table belong to the Atlanta Falcons (moving up thanks to the Matthew Judon trade and the Justin Simmons signing), the New York Jets (moving down thanks to the Haason Reddick holdout) and the New England Patriots (moving down due to the Judon trade). A few other small changes are due to various differences in projected starting lineups. Minnesota doesn’t move much with the change from J.J. McCarthy to Sam Darnold as projected quarterback, which I know will be a surprise to many.
A quick note for FTN subscribers: the DAVE stats currently posted represent weighted DVOA at the end of last season. We will start updating 2024 DAVE (which combines preseason projections with in-season data) after Week 1 games, beginning Monday morning.
