Is the "Alabama Hangover" real?

[Hannibal Lecter, MD]

For the last few years fans, writers, and hopefully opposing teams have considered Coach Nick Saban's Alabama teams to be a physical bunch.  Certainly this is Saban's goal, one that he tries to impart to his players each season, to be the team that the opposition dreads playing.  Every player dominating their man on every play for every game of the season.  "Make their ass quit" so to speak.

With this physicality it's been widely supposed that opposing teams leave the gridiron battered and bruised after facing the Tide.  So it seems like a reasonable question to ask - Is the "Alabama Hangover" real?  That is, do teams struggle the next couple weeks after playing the men in Crimson?

I put together this data for the 2008-2010 seasons.  I looked at each opponents record for their two games prior to playing Alabama and their two games following.  Obviously there are a lot of variables mixed in other than the oppositions game with Bama, but the physicality of the Tide is the one common factor each time.  So I think it's a fair supposition that given a large sample, both correlation and causation can be shown.

****"Alabama Hangover Study" -- Examination of SEC opponents records two games before and after playing the Tide****
****Auburn ignored since final game of regular season

	2008
Game	Opponent	Previous 2	Post 2
1	Arkansas	2-0	0-2
2	Georgia	2-0	2-0
3	Kentucky	2-0	1-1
4	Ole Miss	1-1	2-0
5	Tennesse	1-1	0-2
6	LSU	1-1	1-1
7	Miss State	1-1	1-1
	Totals:	10-4	7-7
	Win %	71.4%	50%

	2009
Game	Opponent	Previous 2	Post 2
1	Arkansas	1-1	2-0
2	Kentucky	1-1	1-1
3	Ole Miss	1-1	2-0
4	South Carolina	2-0	1-1
5	Tennesse	1-1	2-0
6	LSU	2-0	1-1
7	Miss State	1-1	1-1
	Totals:	9-5	10-4
	Win %	64.3%	71.4%
	2010
Game	Opponent	Previous 2	Post 2
1	Arkansas	2-0	1-1
2	Florida	2-0	0-2
3	South Carolina	1-1	1-1
4	Ole Miss	2-0	0-2
5	Tennesse	0-2	1-1
6	LSU	1-1	1-1
7	Miss State	2-0	1-1
	Totals:	10-4	5-9
	Win %	71.4%	35.7%
	Total 2008-2010
	Totals:	29-13	22-20
	Win %	69%	52.4%

[Hannibal Lecter, MD]

Sorry for the messy data.  Any hints for cleaning copying/pasting from an Excel spreadsheet?

[SUPERCOACH]

Interesting.

[SUPERCOACH]

Sorry for the messy data.  Any hints for cleaning copying/pasting from an Excel spreadsheet?

There is a table tag but you would have to hand format it I think.  But... excel can save as HTML so there might be a way to go from HTML to BBC table.  Let me see...

[SUPERCOACH]

Sorry for the messy data.  Any hints for cleaning copying/pasting from an Excel spreadsheet?

There is a table tag but you would have to hand format it I think.  But... excel can save as HTML so there might be a way to go from HTML to BBC table.  Let me see...

I found this web site that will convert from an HTML table to SMF Code, which is what we need here.  Click here for link

I am happy to help if you need me too.

[Hannibal Lecter, MD]

I attached the file, SC.  Play around with it if you'd like.  You're welcome to alter my post to clean up the data.

[BAMAWV]

Always knew it-- could never prove it. BTW, this goes way back in football history. Not just a recent phenom. Also interesting would be the rest of the country's hangover after an SEC game. I'll bet that proves out as well! Another dimension would be to look at the team's stats other than just W/L. For instance margin of victory with -7 or -17 indicating a loss after playing the Tide or SEC.

[SUPERCOACH]

I attached the file, SC.  Play around with it if you'd like.  You're welcome to alter my post to clean up the data.

Done.  Thanks for taking the time to do this research.  I am going to put this post on the blog.

[Hannibal Lecter, MD]

I attached the file, SC.  Play around with it if you'd like.  You're welcome to alter my post to clean up the data.

Done.  Thanks for taking the time to do this research.  I am going to put this post on the blog.

Cool beans.  Thanks for the help.

[jtide]

I have also noticed that after the arrival of Saban that almost every game there is a slew of the opponents players going down with injuries, with very few Bama injuries. (knock on wood)  I wonder how those stats would compare, Bama vs. opponents in-game injuries?  (counting even those where a player just has to sit out a play)

[Coach Hank Crisp]

I know I have had an Alabama Hangover on Sunday mornings after ballgames in the past. 

[Hannibal Lecter, MD]

I know I have had an Alabama Hangover on Sunday mornings after ballgames in the past. 

Those Alabama Slammers or Yellowhammers are known to "beat the hell out of you" on occasion.

[Hannibal Lecter, MD]

I guess I expected a little more response from this thread.   

What do you folks think?  Do you think it's enough data to make a conclusion?  Any suggestions on what I could do to make it more substantial?

[SUPERCOACH]

I appreciate the effort that went into the research.  I think the sample is large enough to see a definite trend, but more data points would make it irrefutable.  Unfortunately we don't have more data points unless you go back into the Shula years, which would really defeat the whole purpose.  So I was thinking of ways that we might be able to extract more information from the 42 games that we have.

One idea would be to not just consider win/loss records.  With a large enough sample that would be perfectly sufficient.  But with a small sample the randomness of the schedule could skew the results.  For example, it is very unlikely that Florida would have beaten LSU this year even if they had played them first and Bama second.  Also, look at aTm and Arkansas.  Arkansas actually won that game (barely) but I bet their performance suffered because of the game a week earlier.  So maybe instead of the win loss record we could come up with some other statistic to use, like average margin of victory.  A win by a touchdown would be a +7 data point, while a loss by a field goal would be a -3 data point, etc.  This would sort of amplify the data set.

Another idea would be to also factor in the point spread, but I would be very surprised if we could find historical betting lines easily.  Do the same thing, but a 10 point win when they where a 14 point favorite would actually be a -4 data point.  The only problem with this approach is that the point spread is based entirely on opinion, and those perceptions (right or wrong) will directly influence the outcome.  But this would really tell you if the team underperformed, at least compared to the perception of where the team should be.

Another idea is that we could include a few games from this year now that we are a little deeper into the season.  We could also include non SEC opponents.

Just some thoughts.  I think you are definitely onto something.

By the way, I meant to tweet a link to this the other day but I don't think I ever did.  I will go do that right now.

[Hannibal Lecter, MD]

BTW, I went back and added 2011 and 2012 to this calculation.  I changed the criteria a little (mostly b/c I'd forgotten what I did before - not to skew the data), but I looked at the 2 (calendar) weeks before and after SEC teams play Alabama.  I took their record against any SEC teams that they played in those weeks, ignoring OOC opponents (i.e. cupcukes).  Sorry for the mess, but I think you can get the picture.  SEC opponents are winning 13% less often during the "Alabama Hangover" period.

Game   Opponent   Previous 2   Post 2
1   Arkansas  1-2       5-2
2   Georgia   2-0   1-0
3   Kentucky   0-1   2-2
4   Ole Miss   2-2   4-4
5   Tennessee   2-5   1-4
6   LSU   3-2   4-2
7   Miss State   4-1   4-6
8   Florida   4-0   0-4
9   Missouri   1-0   1-1
10   South Carolina   2-1   2-2
11   Vandy   0-1   0-1
12   TAM   2-0   1-0
         
         
   Totals:   23-15   25-28
   Win %   60.5   47.2

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