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We Crunched The Numbers On 2021’s Best (And Worst) Teams

As we look back on the highs and lows of 2021’s sports calendar, it’s tempting to crown certain teams as the best — or worst — in all of sports, not just their sport. That’s been difficult to do across the pro sports landscape … until now. We here at FiveThirtyEight made a concerted effort […]

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The NFL Keeps Chugging Along Through The Chaos, On And Off The Field

sara.ziegler (Sara Ziegler, sports editor): At this point in Week 15, I was expecting the only game outstanding to be tonight’s Vikings-Bears game, which we could blissfully ignore. But instead, we still have four games left: The regularly scheduled Monday Night Football game is joined tonight by the Raiders-Browns game, which was moved from Saturday, […]

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Are The Falcons The Best Bad Team Ever?

If an NFL team is what its record says it is, the Atlanta Falcons aren’t bad. At 6-7, they’re tied for second place in the NFC South, one of five 6-7 teams vying for the seventh NFC playoff spot. FiveThirtyEight’s Elo predictions give the Falcons only a 12 percent chance of making the postseason, but […]

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We Remain Baffled By The NFL’s So-Called Contenders

sara.ziegler (Sara Ziegler, sports editor): Fortunes swung wildly during Week 14 of the NFL season, with a few games making a big dent in some teams’ playoff hopes while boosting others. Three games gave us combined swings in playoff probability for the two teams involved — according to the FiveThirtyEight model, naturally — of more […]

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