Dallas are a bunch of hacks! FC/FS

Posted in xn--kfs74mzzid01b.com edit by jane on January 7th, 2009

I crunched some numbers in regards to fouls created and fouls suffered. Some of the stuff that came out is pretty inteersting. Namely that Dallas was second only to DC (suprise suprise they were #1) with the most fouls given but also the fewest recieved. I wonder what that says about their wins and loss record?

2003 Regular Season

FC FS
DC 530 Dallas 397
Dallas 509 Colorado 419
Metro 498 SJ 420
LA 494 KC 445
Chicago 491 Columbus 468
Colorado 482 LA 479
Columbus 476 NE 493
SJ 476 DC 520
NE 458 Metro 522
KC 422 Chicago 523

FC/FS
Dallas 1.252116
Colorado 1.150358
SJ 1.133333
LA 1.031315
DC 1.019231
Columbus 1.017094
Metro 0.954023
KC 0.948315
Chicago 0.938815
NE 0.929006

+/- FC
Dallas 112
Colorado 63
SJ 56
LA 15
DC 10
Columbus 8
KC -23
Metro -24
Chicago -32
NE -35

As you can see DC certainly had a well earned reputation for fouling, with 118 more fouls than Fair Play KC. However, it's interesting that they were also near the bottom of the league in fouls suffered, leading them to be exactly in the middle of the pack for FC/FS ratio.

Also on the list you see KC, Chicago, and NE as the bottom three for FC/FS ratio. That's three out of four conference championship participants. However, San Jose is fairly up there. Although they ranked both 8th in the league for fouls commited and fouls suffered. Kind of strange if you ask me. Does that say something about their team speed and style of play?

Interesting topic, Maxim, although I've always had my doubts about how much fouls relates to winning.

I thought I'd take a look at field players and their fouling habits. I excepted goalkeepers because they hardly ever commit fouls (average .03 fc/90, .15 fs/90)

Field players, meanwhile, average 1.51 fouls committed/90, and 1.44 fouls suffered/90. Leading the way in both categories are the forwards and m/f's (per mlsnet), who averaged 1.60 fc/90committed and 1.94 fs/90.

Defenders (and d/m's), unsurprisingly are last in fs/90, at .99, while dealing out 1.49 fc/90.

Surprisingly, midfielders commit almost as many fouls/90, 1.48, while suffering 1.59.

League averages (goalkeepers excepted), are therefore 1.51 fc/90 and 1.44 fs/90, leaving us with (.07*10) .7 f/90, approximately one in twenty, that is not committed against another person.

I've got lists by year, that I found pretty much useless, but since I've got em, I figure I'll post em.

FC/90 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 Total
f,m/f 1.43 1.51 1.50 1.54 1.78 1.67 1.76 1.62 1.60
m 1.34 1.33 1.36 1.40 1.63 1.62 1.54 1.60 1.48
d,d/m 1.41 1.49 1.41 1.44 1.61 1.57 1.55 1.49 1.49
total 1.39 1.43 1.41 1.45 1.66 1.62 1.60 1.56 1.51

FS/90 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 Total
f,m/f 1.72 1.84 1.91 1.75 2.12 2.16 2.22 1.90 1.94
m 1.54 1.60 1.41 1.49 1.64 1.66 1.68 1.81 1.59
d,d/m 0.98 1.02 0.87 0.98 1.16 1.01 0.97 0.93 0.99
total 1.36 1.42 1.33 1.37 1.58 1.53 1.51 1.47 1.44

Fouls Commited per Game (one team)
03 16.12
02 16.28
01 16.49
00 16.89
99 14.46
98 14.07
97 14.32
96 13.85

By and large, the teams that commit a lot of fouls also receive a lot (correlation 0.55).

The two most extreme imbalances:
The 2001 Burn, who commited 17.9 fouls per game and received only 12.8. Deering and Pareja combined for over four fouls per game.

The 1998 Revolution who commited 16.3 fouls per game and received only 11.5, the fewest in league history. That year, Raul Diaz Arce finished fourth in the league in fouls committed.

I was a little surprised to see that Hudson's Miami teams weren't very foul-prone -- both of his DC teams led the league in fouls committed.

The yellow card stuff will give me something to work on now as well. I didn't go back and compare these numbers with points or wins, i'll add those later on.

2002 FC/FS +/-
Colorado Rapids 1.202564103 79
San Jose 1.169712794 65
Dallas Burn 1.143552311 59
D.C. United 1.113122172 50
Los Angeles 1.12039312 49
N.E. Revolution1.089411765 38
Columbus Crew 1.025531915 12
Chicago Fire 0.985386221 -7
MetroStars 0.86407767 -70
Kansas City 0.819004525 -80

2001 FC/FS +/-
Dallas Burn 1.392215569 131
D.C. United 1.108932462 50
Los Angeles 1.069306931 28
MetroStars 1.061643836 27
N.E. Revolution 1.056892779 26
Tampa Bay 1.069252078 25
Colorado Rapids 1.054320988 22
San Jose 1.033766234 13
Kansas City 1.011933174 5
Miami Fusion 0.979899497 -8
Chicago Fire 0.93852459 -30
Columbus Crew 0.894736842 -44

2000 FC/FS +/-
D.C. United 1.163841808 87
MetroStars 1.140384615 73
Dallas Burn 1.128598848 67
Colorado Rapids 1.104562738 55
San Jose 1.114164905 54
N.E. Revolution1.081593928 43
Los Angeles 1.023809524 12
Tampa Bay 0.97309417 -12
Chicago Fire 0.966312057 -19
Miami Fusion 0.955555556 -24
Kansas City 0.929759704 -38
Columbus Crew 0.917127072 -45

1999 1998 1997 1996
FC FS FC FS FC FS FC FS
Chicago Fire 472 463 436 462
Colorado Rapids 505 480 397 415 475 426 394 389
Columbus Crew 398 419 456 503 439 484 415 520
Dallas Burn 504 428 453 413 397 423 417 403
D.C. United 495 450 433 383 478 465 425 472
Kansas City 493 458 466 435 481 407 412 404
Los Angeles 448 446 464 378 464 464 461 415
MetroStars 420 428 453 446 440 503 430 452
N.E. Revolution 457 425 521 369 534 455 514 436
San Jose 500 411 479 468 458 463 515 485
Miami Fusion 482 447 459 447
Tampa Bay 377 430 385 413 417 489 449 410

note: There's something a little bit off with my numbers. I added up the total number of FC and FS for each team and they didn't come out to be the same. I'm going to have to go back and double check if i have the data entered correctly, also there might be a little blip in there in regards to players who were traded. Because shouldn't those numbers leaguwide be equal?

2002 2001 2000
FC FS FC FS FC FS
Chicago Fire 472 479 458 488 545 564
Colorado Rapids 469 390 427 405 581 526
Columbus Crew 482 470 374 418 498 543
Dallas Burn 470 411 465 334 588 521
D.C. United 492 442 509 459 618 531
Kansas City 362 442 424 419 503 541
Los Angeles 456 407 432 404 516 504
MetroStars 445 515 465 438 593 520
N.E. Revolution 463 425 483 457 570 527
San Jose 448 383 398 385 527 473
Miami Fusion 390 398 516 540
Tampa Bay 386 361 434 446

Originally posted by maxim-1
That would seem to make sense in terms of quantifying a certain style of play. Very aggressive, physical teams are going to mix it up a little bit more than teams built on speed or what have you.

Possibly, but it might also be that teams built around speed, teams that are more likely to play direct and not have too much buildup, are going to have more potential interactions with other teams (i.e. more events where you're not just making safe passes around the back or what-have-you); I don't think that fouls for/against are necessarily a sign of physicality, I think there's a chance they have more to do with how involved you are in the game (if I remember correctly, Peter Hirdt said something like this in an article about Hristo Stoitchkov's tendency to tire out as the game wore on).

Yeah the positional thign was what I was going to do next, as well as year by year and overall team ratio. I'm not sure it relates directly to winning, but once I break down the year to years it will be interesting to see if there's any connection. I think that htis is potentially a very important stat because it's about as a discrete event that you're going to find in soccer. Also, because a foul relates directly to a free kick it is directly related to an offensive opportunity whether it be possesive or attacking. Would seem to me, jsut as turnovers are very important in football, this might be along the same lines, of course I'll have to look at more of the data to see if it trends out that way. I don't think it's going to universally say anything, but I think it is a good indicator of certain aspects of a team's play.

Maxim,

I'd guess that the cellar dweller always rises to or the top of fouls committed as their frustration builds. Do you have data for previous years? Is that why the Revs got their now-undeserved reputation?

1999 FC/FS +/-
San Jose 1.216545012 89
Dallas Burn 1.177570093 76
D.C. United 1.1 45
Kansas City 1.076419214 35
Miami Fusion 1.078299776 35
N.E. Revolution 1.075294118 32
Colorado Rapids 1.052083333 25
Chicago Fire 1.019438445 9
Los Angeles 1.004484305 2
MetroStars 0.981308411 -8
Columbus Crew 0.949880668 -21
Tampa Bay 0.876744186 -53

1998 FC/FS
N.E. Revolution 1.411924119 152
Los Angeles 1.227513228 86
D.C. United 1.130548303 50
Dallas Burn 1.0968523 40
Kansas City 1.071264368 31
Miami Fusion 1.026845638 12
San Jose 1.023504274 11
MetroStars 1.015695067 7
Colorado Rapids 0.956626506 -18
Chicago Fire 0.943722944 -26
Tampa Bay 0.93220339 -28
Columbus Crew 0.906560636 -47

1997 FC/FS
N.E. Revolution 1.173626374 79
Kansas City 1.181818182 74
Colorado Rapids 1.115023474 49
D.C. United 1.027956989 13
Los Angeles 1 0
San Jose 0.989200864 -5
Dallas Burn 0.938534279 -26
Columbus Crew 0.907024793 -45
MetroStars 0.874751491 -63
Tampa Bay 0.852760736 -72

1996 FC/FS
N.E. Revolution 1.178899083 78
Los Angeles 1.110843373 46
Tampa Bay 1.095121951 39
San Jose 1.06185567 30
Dallas Burn 1.034739454 14
Kansas City 1.01980198 8
Colorado Rapids 1.01285347 5
MetroStars 0.951327434 -22
D.C. United 0.900423729 -47
Columbus Crew 0.798076923 -105

Maxim -- FC shouldn't equal FS since nobody "suffers" a handball.

Jon -- I'm not sure that the cellar-dweller thing is necessarily related to frustration. If a team is trailing or has less dangerous possession, it's going to end up commiting more fouls.

Chicago Fire
2003 0.938815000 -32
2002 0.985386221 -7
2001 0.938524591 -30
2000 0.966312057 -19
1999 1.019438445 9
1998 0.943722944 -26

Colorado Rapids
2003 1.150358000 63
2002 1.202564103 79
2001 1.054320988 22
2000 1.104562738 55
1999 1.052083333 25
1998 0.956626506 -18
1997 1.115023474 49
1996 1.01285347 5

Columbus Crew
2003 1.017094000 8
2002 1.025531915 12
2001 0.894736842 -44
2000 0.917127072 -45
1999 0.949880668 -21
1998 0.906560636 -47
1997 0.907024793 -45
1996 0.798076923 -105

Dallas Burn
2003 1.252116000 112
2002 1.143552311 59
2001 1.392215569 131
2000 1.128598848 67
1999 1.177570093 76
1998 1.096852300 40
1997 0.938534279 -26
1996 1.034739454 14

Originally posted by beineke
Jon -- I'm not sure that the cellar-dweller thing is necessarily related to frustration. If a team is trailing or has less dangerous possession, it's going to end up commiting more fouls.
An interesting comparison might be looking at Dallas' stats from a couple of years ago where Pareja was counted on for holding schemes. If put head-to-head with last years stats at Dragon Stadium where 'holding' was a myth - it will probably point out more fouls suffered.

Teams that achieve a strong holding midfield will usually suffer more fouls. It becomes very frustrating for opponents when they run around like chickens with their heads cut off - only to be constantly foiled at regaining possession themselves.

Originally posted by beineke
Fouls Commited per Game (one team)
03 16.12
02 16.28
01 16.49
00 16.89
99 14.46
98 14.07
97 14.32
96 13.85

By and large, the teams that commit a lot of fouls also receive a lot (correlation 0.55).

The two most extreme imbalances:
The 2001 Burn, who commited 17.9 fouls per game and received only 12.8. Deering and Pareja combined for over four fouls per game.

The 1998 Revolution who commited 16.3 fouls per game and received only 11.5, the fewest in league history. That year, Raul Diaz Arce finished fourth in the league in fouls committed.

I was a little surprised to see that Hudson's Miami teams weren't very foul-prone -- both of his DC teams led the league in fouls committed.

That would seem to make sense in terms of quantifying a certain style of play. Very aggressive, physical teams are going to mix it up a little bit more than teams built on speed or what have you.

DC United
2003 1.019230769 10
2002 1.113122172 50
2001 1.108932462 50
2000 1.163841808 87
1999 1.111111000 45
1998 1.130548303 50
1997 1.027956989 13
1996 0.900423729 -47

Kansas City
2003 0.948314607 -23
2002 0.819004525 -80
2001 1.011933174 5
2000 0.929759704 -38
1999 1.076419214 35
1998 1.071264368 31
1997 1.181818182 74
1996 1.019801980 8

Los Angeles
2003 1.031315240 15
2002 1.120393120 49
2001 1.069306931 28
2000 1.023809524 12
1999 1.004484305 2
1998 1.227513228 86
1997 1.000000000 0
1996 1.110843373 46

Metro Stars
2003 0.954022989 -24
2002 0.86407767 -70
2001 1.061643836 27
2000 1.140384615 73
1999 0.981308411 -8
1998 1.015695067 7
1997 0.874751491 -63
1996 1.110843373 46

iirc, the 2003 Fire had a significant change in yellow card totals, as opposed to the year previously. I believe it was a chart in the Revs forum that showed relevance of yellow cards and success ratio.

Is there a way to measure wins against changes in total yellow's from year to year?

When your team is giving up more fouls then taking in return, your team is probably spending more time defending in it's own end of the field.

Or something like that. See: Those who play foul are only cheating themselve (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,7973-930009,00.html) by Daniel Finkelstein

NE Revolution
2003 0.929006085 -35
2002 1.089411765 38
2001 1.056892779 26
2000 1.081593928 43
1999 1.075294118 32
1998 1.411924119 152
1997 1.173626374 79
1996 1.178899083 78

San Jose
2003 1.133333333 56
2002 1.169712794 65
2001 1.033766234 13
2000 1.114164905 54
1999 1.075294118 32
1998 1.023504274 11
1997 0.989200864 -5
1996 1.06185567 30

Miami Fusion
2001 0.979899497 -8
2000 0.955555556 -24
1999 1.078299776 35
1998 1.026845638 12

Tampa Bay
2001 1.069252078 25
2000 0.97309417 -12
1999 0.876744186 -53
1998 0.93220339 -28
1997 0.852760736 -72
1996 0.934548855 -140

I think NE's numbers are really interesting. Without comparing these numbers to wins/losses it's hard for me to make conclusions on teams I don't follow as regularly. But I think that NE was consistantly in the plus range until Nicol's first season is really telling.

I was looking at the all-time stats (mlsnet.com has 'alltime' stats from only '96-2002 - I didn't bother adding 2003) and unfortunately I didn't find any huge connection between FC/FS and PCT, or for that matter G/GA. I honestly found that a little suprising. Other than the fact that all-time the Revs had the worst FC/FS and worst alltime record (2002-1996) The seems to be at least some strong indication taht really really bad teams do in fact foul a lot more than they give. Unfortunately that's not exactly news. I still think the FC/FS stat is an interesting one but it's a little frustrating that there wasn't the type of connection I was thinking there would be.

TEAM W L T PCT. G/GA FC/FS
Los Angeles 123 75 16 0.612 Los Angeles 1.4375 N.E. Revolution 1.158863416
Chicago Fire 82 54 15 0.593 Chicago Fire 1.365 Dallas Burn 1.12578125
D.C. United 109 92 13 0.54 D.C. United 1.099150142 San Jose 1.087882307
Dallas Burn 103 95 16 0.519 Columbus Crew 1.072072072 D.C. United 1.08224163
Miami Fusion 56 56 10 0.5 Dallas Burn 1.03880597 Los Angeles 1.080170411
Columbus Crew 99 99 16 0.5 Miami Fusion 0.987951807 Colorado Rapids 1.075440346
Kansas City 94 100 21 0.486 Tampa Bay 0.928571429 Miami Fusion 1.008187773
San Jose 93 104 17 0.474 Kansas City 0.909883721 Kansas City 0.994011976
Colorado Rapids 92 106 16 0.467 N.E. Revolution 0.908675799 Chicago Fire 0.984854687
Tampa Bay 83 98 6 0.46 MetroStars 0.868493151 MetroStars 0.979046462
MetroStars 91 115 8 0.444 Colorado Rapids 0.831578947 Tampa Bay 0.934548855
N.E. Revolution 85 116 14 0.428 San Jose 0.806878307 Columbus Crew 0.922081741

#If you have any other info about this subject , Please add it free.#

Dallas are a bunch of hacks! FC/FS

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