The worst team in each year by Score% Differential

[SeahawkFever]

I did a post where I listed the teams with the best Score% Differential in each season since 1941.

Well here are the teams that finished dead last in each season by the stat:

2023 Panthers
2022 Colts
2021 Texans
2020 Jaguars
2019 Dolphins
2018 Cardinals
2017 Browns
2016 Bears
2015 Titans
2014 Titans
2013 Jaguars
2012 Chiefs
2011 Rams
2010 Cardinals
2009 Rams
2008 Lions
2007 Rams
2006 Raiders
2005 49ers
2004 49ers
2003 Cardinals
2002 Cardinals
2001 Bills
2000 Browns
1999 Browns
1998 Eagles
1997 Chargers
1996 Saints
1995 Jaguars
1994 Oilers
1993 Colts
1992 Patriots
1991 Colts
1990 Patriots
1989 Cowboys
1988 Chargers
1987 Falcons
1986 Buccaneers
1985 Bills
1984 Oilers
1983 Oilers
1982 Colts
1981 Colts
1980 Saints
1979 Lions
1978 Colts
1977 Buccaneers
1976 Buccaneers
1975 Saints
1974 Falcons
1973 Oilers
1972 Eagles
1971 Bills
1970 Patriots
1969 Steelers
1968 Falcons
1967 Falcons
1966 Falcons
1965 Steelers
1964 Broncos
1963 Jets
1962 Titans
1961 Redskins
1960 Cowboys
1959 Redskins
1958 Packers
1957 Cardinals
1956 Eagles
1955 49ers
1954 Redskins
1953 Colts
1952 Texans
1951 Yanks
1950 Colts
1949 Bulldogs
1948 Yanks
1947 Colts
1946 Lions
1945 Steelers
1944 Card-Pitt Team
1943 Dodgers
1942 Lions
1941 Rams

The team with the best record who is the worst statistically in its year is the 1988 Chargers who had an easy schedule and went 6-10 with three wins that were within one score.

The team that the formula finds to be the single worst since 1941 is the 1991 Colts.

Also, the 1956 Eagles who went 3-8-1 hold the record for highest winning percentage by a team with the worst record in the NFL.

[Brian wolf]

Surprised the 1963 Jets were the worst considering they finished 5-8-1? Of course with Dick Wood at QB, the offense could be feast or famine. Weeb Ewbank was looking to build the offensive line before worrying about skill positions.

Weeb has been criticized for being a cheap GM, which has merit but the Jets lost a million dollars in 1963, trying to transition from the Wismer years in the Polo Grounds to their new home in Shea, and Weeb was determined to keep costs down while looking for hungry, talented players to complement the huge signing of Namath. Paid off well, though deferring to the Mets at Shea was always a thorn in their side.

Its crazy how much the Colts declined once Bert Jones got hurt in 1978. I had never heard of Bill Troup. Not even from John Maxymus' book about QBs ...

[Ten Minute Ticker]

The 1991 Colts being the worst of the worst does not surprise me one bit. Rarely mentioned as one of the worst teams in NFL history, but should be. They were awful in every respect.

[SeahawkFever]

The 1991 Colts being the worst of the worst does not surprise me one bit. Rarely mentioned as one of the worst teams in NFL history, but should be. They were awful in every respect.

They were awful in every respect indeed.

They 91 Colts had a rather bad season out of Jeff George for the time. Sort Pro Football reference by passer rating and he'll come out as the 20th best passer by passer rating, and he comes out as 29th by adjusted net yards per attempt.

They had a running game that produced only 3.3 yards per carry (Eric Dickerson was a great player obviously, but he was not good this year from the looks of it).

Their offense had no player reach 900 yards from scrimmage in a 16 game season, and they scored 143 points; only 8.9 per game, and fewer than Washington Redskin kicker Chip Lohmiller scored by himself that season.

Their kicker Dean Biasucci made only 57.7% of his kicks, worse than all regular kickers except Mike Cofer of San Francisco.

In addition to their NFL worst offense, the 91 Colts had the third worst defense in the NFL by points allowed, and they allowed both the third highest average of yards per carry, and of passer rating, as well as fourth by adjusted net yards per attempt.

Notably the Colts had no defensive players with more than five sacks, and allowed the fifth most passing touchdowns despite being thrown on the least of any team in the league by a margin of 46 pass attempts.

What makes the 91 Colts stand out when my statistic is calculated out that leads to them falling to the bottom of the barrel though is their schedule.

If you looked up the schedules of the other teams that put up awful seasons statistically, you could at the very least say that most of them were handed a very hard schedule; often one of if not the hardest in the year they played.

The 1991 Colts schedule of opponents averages out to a win percentage of 0.504125; the exact same as the 1991 Eagles and 1991 Redskins who both had much better seasons that year, and tied for the 11th hardest schedule that year out of 28 teams if we take opposing win percentages at face value.

Admittedly, if we averaged out the schedules by average opposing score% differential (the last step in the calculation of the formula), the Redskin schedule comes out as easier than the opposing record would suggest (24th out of 28), and easier than the Colts' schedule (17th out of 28), but the Colts schedule lands somewhere towards the middle and they played terribly either way.

[JameisBrownston]

Can't believe there's a team out there that was worse than the 77 Bucs and Card-Pitt. Those Colts really were that bad though, especially the first half of their season.

[Ten Minute Ticker]

Their offensive line was a complete mess. George was sacked 56 times.

In a 1-15 season, they only had two games decided by a touchdown or less - one a win and one a loss. It makes their range of possible records from 2-14 to 0-16. Even the '76 Bucs did better than that. They had three games decided by a touchdown or less, so they could have theoretically finished 3-11 if they got lucky and everything broke right.

Eric Dickerson was a headcase. Some of it understandable given how horrific the line was. Some of it being Dickerson at his self-aggrandizing worst.

"We're 28th in the league in rushing. I'm like a caged-up animal here. A tiger, a lion, a horse, whatever, I'm caged. There is nothing I can do. There is no hole; there is no place to run," Dickerson said after the Colts were 0-8.

A lot of truth in that ... except DIckerson had already been suspended by the Colts the season before and would be suspended for a total of eight games in 1990 and 1991. He wasn't exactly creating harmony behind the scenes.

Not to say the Colts' putridness was Dickerson's fault. He was just part of the scene.

The 1991 Colts are the culmination of when Jim Irsay (GM at the time) gets too much decision-making power. Well-intentioned though he is, he can't leave well enough alone and usually makes things worse in his stab to make things better. Oddly enough, one exception was trading for Dickerson in 1987 in the first place, which did briefly give the Colts a jolt of relatively short-lived respectability.

It's no accident that the Colts' salad years in Indy are when he ceded power to Bill Polian. It's no accident that Indy has largely eroded since then with Irsay re-asserting his influence. That's how you get farcical situations like Jeff Saturday being named coach out of nowhere.

Given how bad 1991 was, one could make a decent argument that what Ted Marchibroda did in morphing the Colts into a 9-7 team in 1992 was almost as good as what he did for the Baltimore Colts from 1974-75 ... if only it would have lasted. Those 1992 Colts won six games by a touchdown or less and would basically be exposed again in 1993 ... unlike the mid-70s Colts who had some staying power.