A new football season is under way, and it won’t be long before someone, somewhere makes the claim that “a good defense beats a good offense” or, more broadly, that “defense wins championships.”
You’re bound to hear this claim made again and again, and many people apparently believe it. But does it hold up to statistical scrutiny?
In the current issue of Chance, statistician Scott M. Berry of College Station, Texas, describes his effort to investigate this claim. He concludes that, in general, the quality of the offense matters more than the quality of the defense in determining a game’s outcome.