Jets Have A 4.74% Chance Of Securing The #1 Pick

Our friends over at numberFire were kind enough to run some simulations for us regarding the possibility of the Jets securing the #1 overall selection in the NFL draft. Everyone knows how much of a fan I am of Mariota and if we did secure that selection, that's who I'd be drafting. However the point of this article is not to debate who we'd take with the #1 overall pick, the simple fact is having that selection really opens up possibilities.

How do numberFire come up with these percentages? That was my first question and they explained:

Using our internal efficiency metrics we calculate each team's chances of winning every game throughout their schedule. Then we simulate the NFL season thousands of times to determine the probability that each team will have the worst record in the NFL.

It's as good a model as any. So as things stand here are the odds:

1. Oakland Raiders - 59.62%
2. Jacksonville Jaguars - 16.98%
3. Tampa Bay Bucs - 10.16%
4. Tennessee Titans - 7.92%
5. New York Jets - 4.74%
6. Washington Redskins - 0.30%
7. New York Giants - 0.28%

It speaks volumns to how bad the Oakland Raiders are that they have a 60% change of finishing the season with the worst record. I can only imagine that the simulation had them losing their final four games. They have the 49'ers Chiefs, Broncos and Bills. All very difficult games, although they did beat Kansas for their sole win this season. So just for arguments sake, I asked them to run the simulation again but doctor it so the Raiders won this weekend and everyone else lost. If that happens here are the odds:

1. Oakland Raiders - 28.82%
2. Jacksonville Jaguars - 28.52%
3. Tampa Bay Bucs - 18.84%
4. Tennesee Titans - 12.10%
5. New York Jets - 10.04%
6. Washington Redskins - 1.06%
7. New York Giants - 0.62

So that shows just how quickly the lanscape changes if Oakland win this weekend and everyone else loses. So to dig a little deeper, lets take the five teams who are mainly in the running and look at their schedule for the rest of the season.

Oakland Raiders: vs 49'ers, @Chiefs, vs Bills, @Broncos

Jacksonville Jaguars: vs Texans, @ Ravens, vs Titans, @ Texans

Tampa Bay Bucs: @Lions, @Panthers, vs Packers, vs Saints

Tennesee Titans: vs Giants, vs Jets, @Jaguars, vs Colts

New York Jets: @ Vikings, @ Titans, vs Patriots, @Dolphins

Now obviously all these football teams are bad football teams. I fully expect the Raiders to go 0-4 the rest of the season and secure the #1 overall pick. The Titans probably have the best chance of winning football games with games against the Giants, Jets and Jaguars. However any of these teams could beat any of the other teams who are struggling, seems obvious but it's worth noting.

I don't expect us to have the #1 overall pick but if I had to guess, I'd say we have a good chance of finishing the season 2-14 and finishing with the #2 overall pick this season.

Thanks again to numberFire for running the numbers for us.