You Can Learn A Lot About America From Each State’s Internet Search History

America’s fifty states have a lot in common, but if their internet search histories are any indication they also have significant differences. Estately ran hundreds of search queries through Google Trends to determine which words, terms, and questions each state was searching for more than any other. The results ranged from mildly amusing to completely disturbing. No doubt this information will come in handy for anyone trying to decide which state they want to buy a home in, especially for those curious how their potential neighbors spend their time online. The results on the map above are just the tip of the online search iceberg. Check out what other search queries each state performed more of than any other in the list below…

ALABAMA:  FOX News / God / Impeach Obama / Jesus / Jessica Simpson / Obama Is The Antichrist / Polka  / Satan

Analysis:  It’s a fire and brimstone kind of state, but with a soft spot for pretty blondes.

 

ALASKA:   Adult Friend Finder / AR-15 / Bestiality / Bird Watching / Couch Surfing / Mail Order Bride / Pull Tabs / Sarah Palin

Analysis:  It’s awful lonely up north.

 

ARIZONA:  Conjugal Visits / Hippies / Scorpion Sting / How are babies made?

Analysis:  Things you’d overhear on an Arizona hippie commune:  “I have to reschedule my conjugal visit because have to see a doctor about this scorpion sting.

 

ARKANSAS:  Atkins Diet / End of Days / Lap Band Surgery / Learn to Read / Walmart Jobs

Analysis:  In 2013, Arkansas was declared the most obese state in America, and evidently they did something about it because in 2014 they’re now the second most obese.

 

CALIFORNIA: Alcoholics Anonymous / Bros Before Hos / Dandruff Cure / Food Poisoning / Google Glass / Kim Kardashian / Meat is Murder / Paris Hilton / Pokemon / Rogaine / What does Siri look like?

Analysis:  California has a variety pack of issues.

 

COLORADO:  CrossFit / Marijuana / Paleo Diet / Rocky Mountain Oysters / Tim Tebow

Analysis:  Nobody jumps on the latest trends like Colorado.

CONNECTICUT:  The Dave Matthews Band (band) / Hearing Voices / Pepperidge Farms / Wu-Tang Clan (rap group)

Analysis:  Wu-Tang Clan and The Dave Matthews Band exchange Pepperidge Farms gift baskets during the holidays.

DELAWARE:  Delaware, Joe Biden, What Is Delaware?

Analysis:  Delaware is the only state that’s aware of Delaware.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA:  Congressional Investigation / Lobbyist Jobs / C.I.A. / Hillary Clinton / Ronald Reagan / Republican Party / Democratic Party
FLORIDA:  Alligator Wrestling / Botox / Eyebrow Piercing / Hulk Hogan / Juviderm / Lice / Mazda Miata / MDMA / Obamacare / Stand Your Ground / Swingers / Viagra / What is sarcasm?

Analysis:  The only thing surprising about Florida’s search history is that it wasn’t even weirder. 

GEORGIA:  Athlete’s Foot / Butt Implants / Cooking Crack / Divorce / Spanx / Weave / What is tofu?

Analysis:  In the end, homemade crack and a new butt just aren’t enough to save a marriage.

HAWAII:  Buddha / Cock Fighting / North Korea / Rastafari Movement / Slam Poetry / Spam Recipe

Analysis:  When you live within range of North Korea’s nukes it’s important to find distractions. 

IDAHO:  Bigfoot, Caramel Corn, Potato, Unicorns,

Analysis:  It’s a great state for imaginary creatures hungering for carbs.

 

ILLINOIS:  Burrito / Deep Dish Pizza / Dennis Rodman (idiot) / Golf Injury / Oasis (band) / Pizza / Racist Jokes / Thin Crust Pizza / “Workaholics” (TV show)

Analysis:  In Illinois, you get a free racist joke with the purchase of a large two-topping pizza. 

 

INDIANA:  Avon / Creationism / Communism / Diabetes / I have a rash /Jared Fogle (Subway spokesman) / Pacifism

Analysis:  Indiana is a conflicted state.

IOWA:  Bacon / Corn / County Fair / Drake (sadly, not the rapper) / First Amendment / Gay Marriage

Analysis:  A lot of young corn farmers toil all year long, anxiously awaiting the day Drake will perform at the local county fair… or else they’re just looking into the academic opportunities at Drake University.

KANSAS:  Hoof and Mouth Disease / “How I Met Your Mother” (TV show) / Toupee

Analysis:  Looks like Kansas finally has something to put on its travel brochures.

KENTUCKY:  Black Friday / Bowling / Creed (band) / Demonic Possession / Lyrics to Happy Birthday / New Year’s Resolution / Obama Is the Antichrist (tied with Alabama) / Whores

Analysis:  In Kentucky, a common New Year’s resolution is to refrain from staring at prostitutes speaking in tongues when out bowling.

LOUISIANA:  Alligator Hunting / Channing Tatum / “Golden Girls” (TV show) / Paternity Test / Pope Francis

Analysis:  Channing Tatum is the child’s real father!!!

MAINE:  Cat Pics / How to roll a joint / Growing Marijuana / Michael Flatley’s “Lord of the Dance”

Analysis:  Maine is ideal habitat for lonely cat owners who are also stoners.

MARYLAND:  Crabs / David Hasselhoff / “House of Cards” (TV show) / Kickball / National Football League / Skate or Die / What is Twitter?

Analysis:  David Hasselhoff? Is Maryland America’s Germany?

MASSACHUSETTS:  Canadian Men / Eyebrow Waxing / George Costanza / Hangover Cure / Muppets / PCP / Tinder / Yoga

Analysis:  If you can land a date with one of the much coveted Canadian men in Massachusetts, be sure to take him to the premier of “The Muppets Take PCP”. The Oscars buzz is real. 

 

MINNESOTA:  Football / Hipster / Personal Injury Lawyer / Rollerblading / Synchronized Swimming / Women’s National Basketball Association

Analysis:  Let’s see how this compares to Wisconsin…

 

MICHIGAN:  Knock-Knock Jokes / Little Caesars / Omelette / Taco Bell / Topless Bar / Where do babies come from?

Analysis:  A first date in Michigan consists of meeting for fast foot and telling each other knock-knock jokes.

 

MISSISSIPPI:  Candy Crush / Codeine / Dog Fighting / Lose Weight / Making Crack / Tupac Is Alive / Twerking / What is Instagram?

Analysis:  What happens in Mississippi stays in Mississippi, and it’s definitely for the best that Mississippi doesn’t know how to post photos of it on Instagram.

MISSOURI:  Family Circus (comic) / Nelly (rapper)

Analysis:  Missouri’s wifi must have gone out sometime in 2002. 

MONTANA:  Bill O’Reilly (TV host) / Gun Rights / National Rifle Association / Meth

Analysis:  So that’s how they use the internet in Montana…

NEBRASKA:  Jazzercise / Shuffleboard

Analysis:  The state’s new tourism slogan is “Come for the shuffleboard, stay for the Jazzercise”

NEVADA:  Bitcoin / Breast Implants / Gamblers Anonymous / Great White (band) / Guy Fiery (TV chef) / Online Poker / Quiet Riot (band) / Tattoo Removal

Analysis:  The shallow hedonism that was the 1980s is alive and well in Nevada.

NEW HAMPSHIRE:  Cats / Ellen Degeneres (TV host) / Fireworks / Free Kittens / Live Free or Die / Ron Paul

Analysis:  You can pet New Hampshire’s cats when you pry them from their cold, dead hands!

NEW JERSEY:  Bon Jovi / Britney Spears / Cure for Baldness / Girdles / New Jersey Jokes / Pantaloons / Six Pack Abs / Teletubbies / Thumb Wrestling

Analysis:  In New Jersey, nobody makes fun of your belly or bald spot when you’re the local thumb wrestling champ.

NEW MEXICO:  Frito Pie / Juggalos / Peyote / U.F.O.

Analysis:  Hopefully the U.F.O.s are just hear to abduct the Juggalos and they leave the Frito pie alone.

NEW YORK:  Bail Money / Bed Bugs / Bill Maher (comedian) / Darwinism / Fur Coats / George Michael (singer) / Hangover Remedy / Marrying Cousin / Propecia / Sniffing Glue

Analysis:  The saddest day in a New Yorker’s life is the day you raise bail money by selling your fur coat. 

NORTH CAROLINA:  Barbecue / Charles Barkley’s Golf Swing / White Snake (band) / Your Mama Jokes

Analysis:  People are just having a real nice time on the internet in ol’ North Carolina

NORTH DAKOTA:  Aliens / Chewing Tobacco / Curling / Fergie (singer) / Figure Skating / Mötley Crüe

Analysis:  They party differently in North Dakota.

OHIO:  Lebron James / Libertarian / P90X / Raccoon Hunting / Weight Watchers

Analysis:  A lot people in Ohio wondering what the Weight Watchers points are for a grilled raccoon.

OKLAHOMA:  Atheism / Benghazi / Miley Cyrus / Noodling / Obama Muslim / Pat Robertson / PT Cruiser

Analysis:  For anyone looking to make a coffee table book of anti-Obama stickers on the bumpers of PT Cruiser, the state to do it is Oklahoma. 

OREGON:  Allah / Sex / Spork

Analysis:  Somebody needs to go and check on Oregon.

PENNSYLVANIA:  Back Shaving / Beer / Competitive Eating / Eagles (band) / Freedom / Furries / Heroin / Jello Wrestling / Madden NFL (video game) / Malt Liquor / “Married With Children” (TV show), Major League Baseball / National Hockey League / Online Dating / Oxycodone / Partying / Taylor Swift (singer) / What is ketchup?

Analysis:  Might be time for the other state’s to organize an intervention for Pennsylvania.

RHODE ISLAND:  Andre the Giant / Beer Pong / Blumpkins / How to roll a blunt? / MSNBC

Analysis:  So is Rhode Island is just one big college fraternity?

SOUTH CAROLINA: The Benghazi Attack / Golf / Hootie & the Blowfish (band) / Nudist Colony

Analysis:  After a long day of golfing, the remaining members of Hootie & the Blowfish like to take off their clothes, watch some FOX News, and complain about Darius Rucker’s solo career. 

SOUTH DAKOTA: Nickelback

Analysis:  Just Nickelback. 

TENNESSEE:  Elvis Presley

Analysis:  Elvis left this earthly realm 37 years ago, but don’t tell that to Tennessee.

TEXAS:  Are dinosaurs real? / Are zombies real? / The Bill of Rights / Boogers / Calf Implants / Can dogs talk? / Chupacrabra / Curves International (company) / Do I have herpes? / Does beer make you fat? / Government Mind Control / How to cook meth? / How to sell your soul to the Devil? / Justin Bieber (singer) / Krunk / Meth Recipes / Porn / Purple Drank / Rodeo / Snake Bites / Tacos

Analysis:  Texas asks a lot of questions, has a worrisome level of interest in crystal meth, and probably a sore that should be looked at by doctor, but the Lone Star State also has a boatload of tacos. So many delicious tacos. 

UTAH:  The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints / Def Leppard (band) / Demolition Derby / Girls Gone Wild / Global Warming Hoax / Jay Leno / Kama Sutra / Laser Hair Removal / Magic Tricks / Mustaches / Star Trek / Star Wars / Twinkie / Tinder / Twilight (book series) / Weird Al Yankovic (singer) / What is the internet?

Analysis:  Utah spends too much time on the internet. 

VERMONT:  Kale Recipe / Annie Lennox (musician) / “The Daily Show” (TV show) / Gwar (band) / Poetry / Phish (band) / LSD / Stephen Colbert

Analysis:  Perhaps it’s not surprising that Vermont is also the whitest state in America.

VIRGINIA:  Barney & Friends (TV show)/ Blackeyed Peas (music group) / Che Guevara / Evolution / Farmville / Shakira (singer)

Analysis:  Virginia, I love you, you love the Blackeyed Peas, this is why we can’t be a family.

WASHINGTON:  Circumcision / Dungeons & Dragons / Gluten / Judas Priest (band) / Non-Alcoholic Beer / Pho, Quinoa / Rachel Maddow (TV Host) / Unicorn Tattoo / Happy Hour /

Analysis:  At dinner parties in Washington state, it’s customary to follow the quinoa course a gluten-free dessert. After that, everyone retires to the library for a non-alcoholic beer and a casual conversation about circumcision. 

WEST VIRGINIA:  Anarchy / Belly Button Piercing / Cat Videos / Conspiracy Theories / Ferrets / Ghosts / How to make moonshine? / Infected Piercing / Meat Loaf Recipe / Methadone / Nancy Grace / Scabies / Second Amendment / Steroids / Vampires / Who let the dogs out?

Analysis:  If U.S. states were competing in “The Bachelor”, West Virginia would be the first to not receive a rose. 

 

WISCONSIN:  Beanie Babies / Green Party / Log Rolling / Menthol Cigarettes / Mike’s Hard Lemonade / Oprah’s Book Club / Survival Shelter

Analysis:  Wisconsin knows full well that in the event of an economic collapse, dollars will be replaced by a currency of cigarettes, alcohol, and Beanie Babies. 

 

WYOMING:  Ann Coulter / The Constitution / Crank / Rush Limbaugh / Sheep / Socialism

Analysis:  Not a fun state to be a liberal alpaca farmer.

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SUMMER IN MARQUETTE  

 

Obama Expands Field for Sports

as Political Refuge

By Margaret Talev May 22, 2014 12:00 AM ET Bloomberg

438 Comments Email Print

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Photographer: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

President Barack Obama with the players, coaches and executives of the Super Bowl XLVIII champion Seattle Seahawks and their coach Pete Carroll in the East Room of the White House on May 21, 2014 in Washington, DC.

Facing angry veterans, an uphill climb for his party in this year’s elections and a possible sanctions war with Russia, President Barack Obama is turning to a time-tested safe harbor for U.S. presidents: sports. 

Obama is making a week of it, celebrating games large and small. A day after feting the National Football League champion Seattle Seahawks at the White House, Obama is going to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York, today to promote tourism and economic development. 

He started the week by dropping in on co-ed Little League players at a neighborhood recreation field in Washington, tossing a ball and posing for photos. 

“Sports-related events become wonderful escapes for presidents who have a lot of things going wrong,” said Ari Fleischer, former President George W. Bush’s press secretary who now works as a sports media consultant. “They typically don’t lend themselves to partisanship or controversy, they’re an enjoyable getaway, and that might be one of the reasons there’s been an increase in them on the president’s schedule.” 

Sports teams have been showing up at the White House since the mid-19th century administration of Andrew Johnson, who invited baseball clubs to the executive mansion starting in 1865. And baseball dominated presidential attention through much of the 20th century. President William Taft, who saw 14 baseball games while in office, started the tradition of the commander-in-chief throwing out a season-opening first pitch in 1910, according to the baseball-almanac.com.

Ruth’s Donation

Babe Ruth, one of baseball’s most famous sluggers, got personal visits with presidents, both sitting and future. In 1921, he stopped in at the White House for an audience with President Warren G. Harding. In 1948, near the end of his life, he took part in a ceremony as he donated the manuscript of his autobiography to Yale University. Receiving it for the school was the captain of Yale’s baseball team, George H.W. Bush, who became the 41st president of the U.S. 

The connection to baseball was even deeper for Bush’s son and Fleischer’s former boss. George W. Bush, the 43rd president, was part owner of the Texas Rangers baseball team before running for office.  

Football’s entry as a tool for burnishing presidential images emerged over recent decades.
President Richard M. Nixon was known as a fanatical football fan. At that point, presidential homages were delivered by telephone to the locker rooms of championship winners. Nixon, though, used the phone for more than congratulations. He famously called Washington Redskins coach George Allen before a 1971 playoff game against the San Francisco 49ers to suggest a play. Allen used it, according to a history compiled by NFL Films. Washington lost yardage on the play.

Reagan’s Tradition

The first Super Bowl winning team brought to the White House, according to NFL Film, was the 1979 Pittsburgh Steelers, invited by President Jimmy Carter as he geared up for an ultimately losing 1980 re-election battle with Ronald Reagan. It was Reagan who then initiated the tradition of annually inviting the Super Bowl champions to the White House when he hosted the 1986 New York Giants.  

The inaugural honor would have gone to the 1985 Chicago Bears, whose White House ceremony was canceled because of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, the NFL Films history says. All seven crew members perished when the Challenger disintegrated minutes into its flight in January, 1986.
Obama, who calls Chicago home, stepped in to belatedly honor that Bears team at the White House in 2011. He reached into the past again last year to hold a ceremony for the 1972 Miami Dolphins, the only NFL team to compile an undefeated record for the season.

Expanded Field

Obama, 52, an avid basketball fan and golfer, has expanded the scope of the spotlight presidents put on athletes. 

Soccer teams, men’s and women’s professional and collegiate basketball teams, hockey teams and NASCAR champions all have been accorded the White House treatment by him.  

Obama has also given Super Bowl Sunday interviews with the network broadcasting the NFL championship and appeared each year on sports cable channel ESPN to reveal his picks for the National Collegiate Athletic Association basketball tournament. He even took U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron to an NCAA tournament game in 2012 in Ohio before a state dinner. 
'
Flanked by Seattle’s first Super-Bowl-winning squad yesterday, Obama talked about a sports team exceeding expectations with a reference to his own story. 

“As a guy who was elected president named Barack Obama, I root for the underdogs,” he said. “Seeing folks overcome the odds excites me. But it also excites me when you see the whole being greater than the sum of its parts.”

Presidential First

Obama’s stop at the baseball hall of fame in Cooperstown will mark the first visit by a sitting president to the shrine. It coincides with the attraction’s 75th anniversary celebration. It also comes as Obama is unveiling a tourism pitch as part of his strategy to promote job creation in ways that don’t require support from Congress, where Republicans routinely block his initiatives. 

Jeff Idelson, president of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, said Obama chose the site because “we are considered a beacon for tourism in the region and nationally, and there’s nothing that speaks more to Americana than baseball.” 

The hall of fame draws nearly 300,000 visitors a year, the chief engine behind $160 million a year for Otsego County’s economy. Idelson said “baseball and the Oval Office have a long relationship,” and “if he’s coming to talk about the presidency and baseball, that’s pretty wholesome.”

Transcending Politics

Baseball and sports in general allow presidents to connect with a wide swath of Americans -- to transcend partisanship while appealing to a base that leans male and conservative, two areas where Obama tends to fare poorly, said Ron Briley, author of several books on baseball and politics. It’s also a potential distraction from sagging poll numbers, he said. 

“When your approval ratings are that low, if you can try and identify yourself with Cooperstown, baseball, teams winning the Super Bowl -- you’re identifying with winners,” he said. Cooperstown “really has some of that Norman Rockwell appeal, not locking the doors, a small town, a charming place. 

‘‘As a kid growing up, if I couldn’t talk to my father about anything else, you might say, ’Well, what do you think about the Braves this year, do you think they have a chance?’ he said, referring to Atlanta’s baseball team. ‘‘It’s a safe topic.” 

It’s not clear Obama can translate that into any concrete advantage, though, as he seeks to boost Democrats’ fortunes before November’s elections. 

Fleischer said this week’s string of sports-related events is probably a happy coincidence for Obama and one that won’t make any difference other than comforting him through tough times.
“I see zero political advantage to any of it,” he said. “It just doesn’t work that way. I just look at it as a respite.” 

To contact the reporter on this story: Margaret Talev in Washington at mtalev@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Steven Komarow at skomarow1@bloomberg.net Joe Sobczyk, Don Frederick

L-I-V-I-N

Brad Pitt Tosses A Beer To Matthew McConaughey Upon Realizing They Are Neighbors

1. Matthew McConaughey was in New Orleans when his family started pointing in the direction across the street and he wondered why.

 

2. Oh. That’s because BRAD PITT was standing on the balcony across from them.

 

3. Just two normal dudes.

 

4. Chitchatting from across the way, as two normal guys who aren’t anything but normal do.   

 

5. But then Brad thought Matthew might be thirsty. So, he threw him a beer.

 

6. Oh yeah, he threw that beer.

 

7. Yes, that beer got thrown.

 

8. It got thrown real good.

                         

9. And then Matthew enjoyed that beer (see, beer in hand). Oh yeah and Drew Brees was there too.

    

 

MONDAY MOANIN

Happy 69th Birthday to the Who's Pete Townshend!

HAPPY FRIDAY:

MACKINAC ISLAND EDITION

Sponsored by Paul LaFond aka Peppy, aka Peppy LaJackass, aka Pepsi aka
 Pepsi Mandarich

WHAT THEY'RE SAYING IN DETROIT

Detroit Lions' only hope? 

An emergency manager

Detroit Lions former running back Barry Sanders announces tight end Eric Ebron (North Carolina) as the 10th overall pick in the first round of the 2014 NFL draft by the Detroit Lions during the 2014 NFL draft at Radio City Music Hall. / Brad Penner/USA TODAY Sports

By Stephen Henderson
Detroit Free Press 

5/12/14

I was startled to pick up the phone Friday and hear NFL commissioner Roger Goodell’s voice on the other end:

“Stephen, can you tell me a little about this emergency manager law there in Michigan? How’s that working out?”

Have you got the right number, commissioner? Mitch Albom. Drew Sharp. Dave Birkett. Those are your guys, right? 

“Yeah, normally. But I need someone who’s watched this emergency manager situation pretty closely.”

It’s hit or miss, I guess, commissioner. When local government officials spend years fouling up finances or management, state government sends an all-powerful EM to straighten things out. Sometimes it works. Other times, it just ushers in the inevitable, like with the bankruptcy here in Detroit.

“But the idea is to take dramatic, swift action to reverse a long-term negative trend, right?”

Sure.
“And the costs, are they reasona—”

Sorry to interrupt, commissioner. But where are we going here? You running for governor or something? 

“No, I’m thinking about your NFL franchise there in Detroit.”

The Lions. Or the Loserly Lions, as we call them. The Feeble Felines. Or the Lie-downs.

“Exactly. Enough’s enough. We’ve watched this team swirl the drain for 60 years. No Super Bowls. Almost no playoff wins. Revolving-door coaching and management. It’s time for league intervention, Stephen.

“I’m going to appoint an emergency manager for the Lions.”

Whooooaaa. Really? Are you serious? 

“Serious as third and 35. It’s time for something drastic and dramatic — a real change in direction that I don’t think can come from current management. Don’t you see the parallel? Detroit government needed an outsider to inject a whole new way of thinking about the city’s problems. This NFL franchise needs the same thing. A turnaround specialist with no ties to the sorry past, no local allegiances to worry about, and a cutthroat, win-at-all-costs attitude.”

That sounds pretty good. But where’ve you been? We’ve been suffering for decades in this city. I’ve told my 10-year-old son, who’s just learning the game and becoming a fan, that he’ll likely go his whole life without seeing a Lions Super Bowl — just like his dad.

“Last week’s draft really sealed it for me. The way this league works, the worst teams get the best draft opportunities. That’s how we make it possible for teams to go, pretty quickly, from worst to first. For you guys, that should be working out most years because your record’s so bad. This year, you had the 10th overall pick. But what did you do with it?”

We chose a tight end. 

“Yeah, you chose a tight end! On a team that has two young tight ends already. On a team whose defense is bottom third in the league for pass yards, rush yards and turnovers.”

It did make me wonder whether someone had slipped LSD into the general manager’s coffee. 

“That reminds me, Stephen. I need to make a note: It may be time to extend the league’s substance-abuse policy to front-office personnel. Anyway, no one picks tight ends in the top 10. No one. It’s lunacy. It’s only happened a few times in the last quarter century, and even then, it was on teams that were already pretty good — which you’re definitely not. This happens over and over again in Detroit. Opportunity gets blown. Bad records pile up. I don’t think we can just ignore this anymore.”

OK, so let me push back a little bit. The Ford family owns this team. As in Henry Ford, the creator of the middle class. They’re corporate good guys around here. They’re super-loyal to the city and to the people who play for them, and they even moved the team back downtown after three decades in the suburbs. Wouldn’t appointing an emergency manager disrespect them? 

“Maybe. And you’re right — this is a league of owners. And it’s about money, which the Lions make plenty of. But isn’t the game supposed to be about the fans? Isn’t it supposed to give everyone the sense that, come September, you’ve got at least a reasonable hope that your team will get to the playoffs, and someday, to the Super Bowl? You said it yourself, Stephen. You don’t even have hope that your 10-year-old son will see a Lions Super Bowl. Aren’t you sick of it?”

Without a doubt. But we have had a lot of great players come through here. I always figured, eventually, it’ll work out. 

“Right. Won’t happen. Think of the great players who’ve seen their careers die there in Detroit. Herman Moore. Lomas Brown. And of course, Hall of Famer Barry Sanders. Those guys deserved to be on teams that could win something. They certainly didn’t deserve all the competitive futility and incompetence they endured.”

Yeah, Sanders looked pitiful on draft day, sidling up to the microphone on behalf of the team and announcing that they were using the 10th pick on a tight end. I half-expected him to grab the mic, and say: Whaaaaaat?!?! C’mon, man! 

“He should have. And I should have acted a long time ago to stop this. I won’t sit on my hands any longer, though. I’m interviewing candidates now. People who have helped teams like New Orleans, Seattle, even Carolina climb out of the cellar and get to the Super Bowl.”

I guess things can’t get any worse for us. 

“Don’t get carried away, Stephen. You could be a Cleveland Browns fan.”

MONICA APPROVES

MEANWHILE, IN DETROIT . . .

Bob Wojnowski

Lions draft pick is another head-scratcher

 

• 

The Lions made Eric Ebron the No. 10 pick in the first round. (Elsa/Getty Images)

1 / 15

 

The obsession continues, whether you like or not, whether it makes sense or not. The Lions are determined to make their offense special and make Matthew Stafford comfortable and elite, apparently at any cost.

 

Martin Mayhew spent a big resource and a considerable amount of credibility on an odd and dubious pick Thursday night. With his selection of North Carolina tight end Eric Ebron at No. 10, Mayhew just pushed his chips back into the same pile, the one in front of his quarterback.

It’s not a popular pick or even a logical pick — unless Stafford and the new coaching staff make it work. The Lions desperately need cornerbacks but passed on Michigan State’s Darqueze Dennard and Virginia Tech’s Kyle Fuller (Dennard fell all the way to No. 24). They need help on both sides of the ball, but while others teams were wheeling, Mayhew wasn’t dealing. He was content to sit where he was, making the Ebron pick quickly, long before the allotted 10 minutes were up.

“He’s absolutely an impact player,” Mayhew said. “He’s a difference-maker. He’s a matchup nightmare as a tight end.”

At 6-4, 250 pounds, Ebron indeed might be all that. He caught 62 passes for 973 yards last season and became the first tight end since Vernon Davis in 2006 to be drafted in the top 10. His talent is unique and his credentials are excellent, and the plan is for him to be a receiver-tight end playmaker like the Saints’ Jimmy Graham.

But once again, we have to demand: How many pieces must the Lions collect for Stafford to become a consistently productive winner? There’s no doubt they needed another receiver beyond Calvin Johnson and Golden Tate, and that’s why they were so enamored with Sammy Watkins. As expected, the price for Watkins was too high, as the Bills gave up first- and fourth-round picks just to jump five spots to the Browns’ No. 4.

Obsessed with offense

Mayhew was right to resist that temptation, but man, he simply cannot resist the temptation for toys to prop up his offense. I understand the draft is just getting started and he’ll have opportunities to take defensive players in the second, third and fourth rounds, and he will. But listening to Mayhew and offensive coordinator Joe Lombardi talk about the matchup problems Ebron can create, it was easy to slip into the haze of past mistakes.

The previous GM (rhymes with Chillin’) was always looking for receiver mismatches with top picks. Mayhew has been a better drafter, but displays some troubling tendencies. Since Stafford was taken No. 1 in 2009, the Lions have used high picks on tight ends (Brandon Pettigrew, Ebron), running backs (Jahvid Best, Mikel Leshoure) and receivers (Titus Young, Ryan Broyles), with little to show for it.

The Lions pile up yards, but do they ever establish a solid base of power on either side of the ball? Nope. Mayhew said he stuck to his draft board, and when he didn’t get calls from teams interested in moving up, he went with a player he considered an elite talent. I get the strategy, and there’s no sense scouting and analyzing if you don’t stick to what your eyes tell you.

Bucking the trend

But do you find it curious all the other teams in the division — and most of the top teams in the league — selected defensive players in the first round, some thought to be pegged for Detroit? The Vikings took linebacker Anthony Barr, the Bears took Fuller and the Packers took safety Ha Ha Clinton-Dix.

 

Mayhew defended the choice of offense, while acknowledging plenty of work to do elsewhere.

“On defense, we were right in the middle of the pack in points allowed — 15th,” Mayhew said. “Offense was 13th in points scored. There’s this perception there’s this huge gap between our offense and our defense, and it’s not that big a gap.”

 

They have another good player on offense now, after making it through their 16th consecutive first round without drafting a cornerback. Ebron had two major life changes Thursday, proposing to his girlfriend on top of the Empire State Building, then landing with the Lions, where he’s expected to have a large and immediate role.

 

New coach Jim Caldwell was beaming and suspects his quarterback will do the same, as the Lions keep trying to give Stafford every chance to be better.

 

“When you talk to Matthew Stafford, he’ll say you can never have too many weapons,” Caldwell said. “This just adds another weapon for us.”

 

Another big chip pushed into the pot, the essence of going all-in. They said they wanted an instant-impact guy, and that’s what Ebron must be. The strategy is unchanged, for better or worse. The Lions have built around their quarterback and their offense, and they’re not interested in turning back now.

Bob.wojnowski@detroitnews.com

NOW & THEN:

NFL DRAFT WAR ROOMS

Coach Scooter McLean & Scout Jack Vainisi in the late 50s.

 

 

 

Lombard & Company War Room in the 60s.

 

 

 

Today

 

 

MORE DRAFT DAY FUN



HAPPY DRAFT DAY

How NFL teams ignore basic economics and draft players irrationally

VOX.COM

Updated by Joseph Stromberg on May 7, 2014, 1:00 p.m. ET @josephstromberg joseph@vox.com 54

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Data shows that trading up to take Robert Griffin III was a terrible idea. Al Bello/Getty Images        

The NFL draft begins on Thursday. In the football world, it is a huge deal.

For non-football fans: this is when NFL teams select college football players to add to their rosters, the new players awkwardly hold up jerseys with the number one on them, and football fans everywhere freak out. The worst teams are given the highest picks, and if they want to improve, they need to use them as shrewdly as possible.

Teams that succeed — like the Seattle Seahawks, winners of this past season's Super Bowl — tend to build their rosters heavily through the draft, and merely supplement their drafted talent through trades and free agency. NFL executives invest huge amounts of time and resources into scouting players and ranking them, hoping to draft stars in the first round and solid contributors later on.

But here's the thing: despite years of data, most NFL teams still have no idea how to work the draft most effectively.


It's not their imperfect player evaluation, but something more basic — their refusal to follow the principle of risk diversification. That's the conclusion economists Cade Massey and Richard Thaler came to after analyzing fifteen years of draft data in a series of papers — and it's still true, despite recent changes to the wages rookies are paid.

Draft picks can be traded, and the success of any one player picked is highly uncertain. Because of that, their data says that in the current trade market, teams are always better off trading down — that is, trading one high pick for multiple lower ones — but many teams become overconfident in their evaluation of one particular player and do the exact opposite: package several low picks for the right to take one player very early.

"There are one or two teams out there that philosophically follow this idea," says Massey, who serves as a draft consultant with several NFL teams that he can't disclose. "But in my experience, teams always say they're on board with it in January. Then when April rolls around, and they've been preparing for the draft for a long time, they fall in love with players, get more and more confident in their analysis, and fall back into the same patterns."

A babyfaced Eli Manning: not worth what the Giants gave up to get the first pick. Photo by Chris Trotman/Getty Images

1) It's just not worth it to trade up

The first analysis Massey and Thaler did was to compare what teams are willing to pay to pick higher (in terms of extra draft picks packaged as part of a trade) with the value they ultimately get out of doing so, in terms of player production.

To calculate how much teams pay to trade up, they looked at 1,078 trades made between 1990 and 2008. The trades work something like this: a team will trade the 16th and 32nd overall picks, say, for the 5th overall pick. They might also include picks from next year's draft.
Massey and Thaler graphed all trades, which let them assign a relative value to each pick in the first five rounds of the draft:

Massey and Thaler 2012

The most important thing about this graph: the curve is very, very sharp in the first round (picks 1 through 32). That means teams think the very top picks are extremely valuable: the value of the 10th pick is only about half that of the first pick.

Now, it's worth pointing out that for years, most teams followed something called "The Chart," which assigned theoretically fair point values to each pick in the draft for trade purposes. Since 2008, many teams have smartly stopped treating "The Chart" as gospel, and the curve has become slightly less steep.

But Massey says it still hasn't flattened out to anything near where it should be, in terms of the actual value derived from the players picked.

He and Thaler figured this out by calculating the odds that the first player picked at any given position will perform better — in terms of the number of games he starts in his first five seasons — than the second player drafted at that position. This is relevant because a team will often trade up when they identify a player they prefer at a needed position: they need a wide receiver, and a few highly-rated ones are available, but they trade up because they're certain one is much better.
But the data says that teams just aren't very good at figuring out when this is true. On average, the chance that first player will start more games than the second one picked at his position: 52 percent. Compared to the third, it's still only 55 percent, and compared to the fourth, it's merely 56 percent.
the chance that the first player picked at a position will start more games than the second is just 52 percent

These numbers suggest that moving up eight picks (the average distance between the first and second players at the same position) should cost a small amount, since you're only increasing the odds of a getting a more productive player by four percent or so. But as the steep curve shows, teams pay a ton to move up, especially at the top of the draft.

"It's basically a coin flip," Massey says, "but teams are paying a great deal for the right to call which side of the coin."

One recent trade epitomizes this point — and shows that even in the post-"Chart" era, teams still overvalue the highest picks. In 2012, the Washington football team traded the 6th pick, the 39th pick, and their first round picks in 2013 and 2014 to the St. Louis Rams so they could move up four spots and take Robert Griffin III — a player they were certain was a once-in-a-lifetime quarterback — with the second overall pick.

Just two years later, the trade already looks pretty shortsighted. That's not because Griffin is a bad player (he's almost one of the few that might make a crazy trade like this seem worthwhile), but because the odds of getting a great player with one high pick are so much lower than getting one with four high picks. 

The team would've been better served sitting tight and just drafting the next-best quarterback (Ryan Tannehill) and using the other three picks on much-needed players. Or they could have waited and drafted a quarterback this year — say, Johnny Manziel — when they would've had the 2nd overall pick themselves if they hadn't made the trade.

2) It really pays off to trade down

Philip Rivers: just part of the valuable package the Giants gave up to take Eli Manning. Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images
 

Given that teams, on the whole, are  irrationally willing to pay a lot to trade up, smart teams can reap huge benefits by trading down. Even staying put and drafting from your original spot, the researchers' analysis shows, is not a good strategy.

For each pick in the first round, they calculated all of the different two-pick packages a team could've gotten by trading down, based on the historical data (a team with the first pick, for instance, could get the 2nd and 181st picks, or the 14th and 15th picks, or any combination of picks in between that provide the same sum value).

teams are imperfect talent evaluators, so having two later picks is better than a single early one
Then they calculated what teams get out of these picks on average, in terms of the number of starts a player provides in his first five years and the number of Pro Bowls he's voted to. (They included Pro Bowls to counter the criticism that their analysis ignores the unique impact of superstar players solely available in the first few picks.)

Again, the data was unequivocal. On average, trading down and getting two players gave a team five more starts per season and slightly more total Pro Bowls.

You could chalk this up to the simple fact that more players start more games, but it's more than that. Even if you imagined that the team trading down could only keep the better one of the two players it drafted, it'd still get slightly more total starts and the same number of Pro Bowls. The truth is that teams are imperfect talent evaluators, so having two later picks is better than a single early one. Risk diversification at work.

3) Players picked lower are cheaper

All of these reasons to trade down don't even include the fact that players picked later in the draft get paid lower salaries, because the NFL collective bargaining agreement sets wages for the first few years of players' careers based on their draft slot. Saving money matters because all teams have to abide by a hard salary cap — this year, it's $133 million — so paying less to draft picks means more is left over for veteran players.

For every single spot in the draft, the researchers compared the amount of salary paid to a player with the value a team gets from him on the field. (For this analysis, they used a more sophisticated metric for value: they looked at the average statistical production yielded by a player taken at that spot of the draft between 1994 and 2008, then converted that into dollars, based on what teams paid a player with that level of production on the free agent market on average).

In the graph below, the red line is the actual salary paid to a player picked at each spot, the green line is the average performance provided, and the blue is the difference — the money you save drafting someone at that spot instead of having to pay more for a veteran free agent who'd play at a similar level.
Massey and Thaler 2012
The blue line peaks around pick 33, the start of the second round — making it the sweet spot in the draft. If you had to make one pick, this is where you'd get the most bang for your buck, because there's a pretty good chance of getting a productive player and he won't command a particularly high salary. But since you can get multiple picks by trading a single high one, maximizing value means moving down into round two (picks 33 through 64). 

One caveat is that the salary data comes from picks made under the old NFL collective bargaining agreement, which paid players picked in the top 10 considerably higher salaries then they get currently. But the salaries for picks from 10 onward have barely changed — and because trading down is so much more fruitful, Massey says the argument still applies for the first round as a whole.

4) Teams that trade down more often win more games

The most straightforward piece of proof for all this analysis is the fact that trading down and amassing more pick value — in terms of the blue line in the graph above — correlates with more wins on the field.

Massey and Thaler came to this conclusion by looking at the number of wins a team had in any given season between 1997 and 2008, and the total value of all picks they'd made in the previous four years (the amount of time, on average, a rookie is under contract for).

They found that one standard deviation in pick value translated to 1.5 more wins per season on the field. Sure, it's a small sample size, and there's a lot of chance and other factors built into the system — a coach's strategy, for instance — but trading down correlates with a significant amount of victories, given that there are only 16 games in a season.

So why don't more NFL teams follow this advice?

Baltimore Ravens GM Ozzie Newsome knows how to draft. Photo by Rob Tringali/SportsChrome/Getty Images
 

If all teams took note of these findings and corrected their behavior, the principles would no longer apply. Teams would be much less interested in trading up, so the lucrative market for trading down would evaporate.

Why hasn't this happened? One answer is a widely-known psychological bias called the overconfidence effect. As people are given more information, the accuracy of their analysis often hits a ceiling, but their confidence in it continues to increase.

As people are given more information, the accuracy of their analysis hits a ceiling, but their confidence in it continues to increase

This tendency has been demonstrated in all sorts of areas, from bettors picking horses to psychologists making diagnoses. It's not hard to imagine that NFL general managers — who are given scouting reports on players that cover everything from their body fat percentage to their home life — fall victim to the same sort of overconfidence and, as Massey said, "fall in love" with certain players.

There's also the fact that the sports world as a whole tends to glamorize superstars — leading many to disproportionately attribute a 53-player roster's success to one or two highly drafted players. For a struggling GM, it might seem much easier to trade up and land a guaranteed superstar than patiently fill a roster with competent players.

The problem, though, is that there are no guaranteed superstars — and Thaler and Massey have found that, given a long enough timeframe, no teams are any better at accurately evaluating prospects than others. Sure, a GM might hit a hot streak over the course of a few drafts, but long-term, they estimate that 95 to 100 percent of the difference in teams' odds of striking gold with any one pick is driven by chance.

So the key isn't drafting better — it's just drafting more.

As Cassey noted, there are a few teams out there following his philosophy. In a recent interview, Eric DeCosta — assistant GM of the perennially-successful Baltimore Ravens — dropped a hint about the identity of one of them:

We look at the draft as, in some respects, a luck-driven process. The more picks you have, the more chances you have to get a good player. When we look at teams that draft well, it’s not necessarily that they’re drafting better than anybody else. It seems to be that they have more picks. There’s definitely a correlation between the amount of picks and drafting good players.