Did the team's bounty system cause more injuries to opponents? The numbers don't back that up.
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Did the New Orleans Saints injure more players?
The data-driven answer is a resounding "no." The Saints appear to have injured far fewer players over the 2009, 2010 and 2011 seasons. The numbers are striking. From 2009 to 2011, the Saints injured, on average, 3.2 opposing players each game. The rest of the teams in the league caused, on average, 3.8 injuries per game. This difference is highly statistically significant, or in other words, it would hold up in a court of law or a fancy academic journal. In each year of the bounty program, the Saints injured fewer players than the average for the league. In 2009, the Saints injured 2.8 players a game, and other teams injured on average 3.8. In 2010, it was 3.5 and 3.6, and in 2011 it was 3.3 and 3.8.
The Saints' behavior on the field was certainly aberrant, but positively so. Only one other team, the San Diego Chargers, injured fewer opponents per game over this entire time frame (3.1 injuries). Of the 32 teams, the Saints injured the third fewest in the 2009 season, the 15th fewest in 2010 and the third fewest in 2011. Might this record be linked to the Saints' being too weak or cowardly to respond to the bounties? Certainly not. Lily-livered players don't win Super Bowls.
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The NFL's case against the players should require documentation that the Saints injured significantly more players than average. They did not. The evidence, then, suggests that the Saints' story is consistent with a scenario in which the Saints players admirably ignored their coaches on bounty hits. Because no NFL player ever wins an argument with a coach, one can understand why the players might not have protested. But the data show that the bounty system is unlikely to have influenced their play.
Kevin Hassett is director of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute, where Stan Veuger is an economist and research fellow. Neither is a Saints fan.