If you haven't read by now, the Football Outsider's Almanac (created by the fine folks over at footballloutsiders.com), has given the Chargers an overwhelming DVOA score, and gives us an 87% chance of finishing the regular season with 11 or more wins.  (The 11+ wins category is the high end of the range; they don't put a percentage on how likely a team is to win 12, 13, 14, 15, or 16 games.)

Without committing flat-out plaigarism of their proprietary information, I want to analyze the reasons why they predicted what they have, review some of their few negative comments, and sound off on whether or not another publication predicting a Super season for the Chargers is truly a distraction and detrimental to the Chargers' success.  All of that after the jump.

So let me just get this out of the way right now: I'm biased.  I've been a fan of the Chargers since 1981, and have been a season ticket holder since I moved to San Diego in 2002.  I'm also a big fan of Football Outsiders and thier statistical analysis.  I've been following them since 2005.  So I'm going to be hard-pressed to argue against their prognostications.  But what I want to do here is provide a breakdown to those of you that have either not read the article and are wondering what the heck Kevin Acee is talking about, as well as give those who have read it a place to talk about it with other Chargers fans.

The first thing important to understand about their prediction is that they see the Chargers as a 10-win team from last season.  They're giving us the Ed Hochuli game, and attributing one of our other difficult last-minute losses (might as well just call it "Carolina" and be done with it) to variance--a fancy term statisticians use for "luck".  When you look at it that way, it's not hard to think that the Chargers can improve by a single game going into next season.  But they give us a ton of reasons.

First, while they don't say that LT will come back to the numbers we saw in 2006, they do say that he's not washed up just yet.  They see him having a productive year, including catching passes out of the backfield.  Of course, that makes a great segue into the passing game, which they believe is an unmatched strength for the Chargers.  While they don't come right out and say that the Chargers' pass attack will become even better, they do comment that their pass attack was one of the best in the league, and that was with an oft-injured Antonio Gates, who played hurt most of the season.  While I'm not sure that Gates' return to 100% health will necessitate a better passing offense (unless we have more overall offensive plays, Gates is going to take away receptions from someone, not simply have his added to the mix), I do think the chances of our offense taking a dive is hard to fathom.  (Barring an injury to Rivers, of course.)

The best thing about the prediction is their ability to see that the defense was not what we were used to last season.  While they note that we were not ravaged by injury last season, they know that the quality of the player who was injured is just as important as the quantity.  Of course, we're talking about Shawne Merriman.  They don't seem to think that Ron Rivera's defense will make a big difference compared to Ted Cottrell's (based upon statistical analysis between the games in which they headed up the D), but they do see a major positive effect accompanying Merriman's return.  As we all hope, if Merriman comes back healthy, the entire defense should play at a higher level.  (Personally, I think they're way off with their assessment of Rivera versus Cottrell, but that's just one man's opinion.)  They also take into account Cromartie's bum hip, and say that even a modest improvement (not one that matches 2007's incredible numbers) would make the defense that much better.

The best part is that they don't even spend any time discussing the special teams, other than to briefly give kudos all around, nor our easy schedule, which includes playing the rest of the AFC West 6 times.  The only real negative they come up with is Norv Turner.  They mention his track record of not being able to get his teams to play up to their statistical standard--apparently, he's always fallen short of his expected win total based upon the statistical evaluation of his teams' performances.  They even mention what you might come to expect in January: Norv Turner versus Bill Belichick, Mike Tomlin, or Jeff Fisher, and who you might be willing to trust to outwit who in such a case.  While I can understand this reasoning to an extent (and kudos to them for backing it up statistically), Norv has already beaten Jeff Fisher in the playoffs (see 2007, Titans vs. Chargers Wild Card game), and went toe-to-toe with Belichick in the 2007 AFC Championship game with many of his best offensive weapons either hurt or out of the game entirely.  While I won't claim that Norv is a flawless gameplanner, I do believe that he has done a solid job in the post-season--probably better than I expected.

Overall, looking at the schedule in late July / early August, I have the Chargers going 13-3, with their 3 losses coming on the road against Pittsburgh, the Giants, and the Titans.  But in reality, this team could pretty much fall on their face again and still walk away with the division.  The real determining factor of the Chargers success in 2009 will not be whether they go 11-5, 13-3, or 15-1.  Unless they find themselves in Miami in February, I think all involved would deem it a falling short of expectations.

Of course, what I find really amusing about this prediction is all of the backlash surrounding it by the majority of fan commentary.  Is it really a problem if someone else thinks that the Chargers are Super Bowl bound?  Honestly, I have no problem with high expectations, especially from a fan base.  Here's the bottom line of it for me: is it going to hurt any different if we lose the in the playoffs based upon someone else's prognostications?  Did losing the 2007 AFC Championship Game hurt more because we thought we were going to the Super Bowl back in August of that year?  It didn't for me.  It's the same no matter what.  So let's enjoy a little high hopes before pre-season even kicks off, what do you say?

So that's my first fan post!  I hope you all enjoyed reading it, and will leave a comment or two for me.  Either way, thanks for reading!