I've been looking at tons of stats to prepare the Friday Super Bowl preview. One of them was "fumble luck," the percentage of fumbles recovered by each team. As regular readers know, fumble recovery rate will generally revert to league average over time. It's a good way to pick out possible surprise teams for 2008, so feel free to think happy thoughts if you are a fan of... the Baltimore Ravens.
Worst fumble recovery (offense)
Baltimore: 5 of 25 (20%)
Tampa Bay: 4 of 14 (29%)
Jacksonville: 4 of 12 (33%)
Minnesota: 8 of 24 (33%)
Baltimore had the second-lowest fumble recovery rate of any offense since 1978. The only offense with a worse fumble recovery rate? The 2005 New Orleans Saints, who recovered just 4 out of 23 fumbles. Irony alert: We introduced the concept of fumble luck in the New Orleans chapter of PFP 2005, right before that season.
Worst fumble recovery (defense)
Tennessee: 6 of 19 (32%)
New Orleans: 8 of 24 (33%)
Oakland: 6 of 15 (40%)
New York Giants: 8 of 20 (40%)
Best fumble recovery (offense)
Dallas: 11 of 15 (73%)
New York Jets: 11 of 16 (69%)
Green Bay: 14 of 22 (64%)
(Whoops, I had Green Bay's numbers incorrect... 14 recovered, 8 lost, not the other way around.)
Best fumble recovery (defense)
Cincinnati: 15 of 18 (83%)
San Francisco: 9 of 12 (75%)
Tampa Bay: 18 of 28 (64%)
New York Jets: 6 of 10 (60%)
These numbers don't include special teams, or a handful of aborted snaps where the quarterback was able to make a play afterwards, rather than falling on the ball.