Fans and the media tend to underrate the role that luck plays in an NFL season. They all look at the newspaper standings, and figure that the won-lost records pretty much tell the story. A 10-6 team was playoff caliber. A 6-10 team has a lot of work to do to be competitive this year.

That’s not always the case. In fact, every season the offensive and defensive stat rankings help expose teams who are better or worse than the standings make it seem. Here are a few quick examples.

You know the Detroit Lions were bad last year. They finished 3-13 for the season, ranked 22nd in the NFL on offense, and 28th in on defense. There are only 32 teams in the league, so that makes sense. Bad stats, bad record. But, there’s a team that finished 27th on offense and 32nd on defense that finished with a .500 record. There’s another team that finished 26th on both sides of the ball, but posted a 7-9 mark in the standings.

Do you think the stats are going to lift themselves up to match the record this year? Or, do you think the teams are likely to fall back in the standings to match their production?

History makes it clear that it’s usually the latter. Anybody that reached or approached the .500 mark with horrible stats had to be catching a lot of breaks. You just can’t be one of the worst teams on offense, one of the worst on defense, but average overall. Luck really can warp perceptions in a short 16-game season.

For the record, here are the teams matching those earlier numbers:

Detroit: 3-13 record, 22nd on offense, 28th on defense

Tennessee: 8-8 record, 27th on offense, 32nd on defense

San Francisco: 7-9 record, 26th on offense, 26th on defense

Sure the Titans were better after Vince Young took over later in the season. Will Tennessee pull off miracles again this year? Their young talent is going to have to really produce for San Francisco to threaten for the Wildcard, as frequently last year they couldn’t move the ball or stop people.

There just wasn’t that big a difference within this subset of teams last year.

It’s true on the other end of the spectrum too. The New England Patriots just missed going to the Super Bowl after a regular season where they ranked 11th on offense and 6th on defense. The Jacksonville Jaguars finished 10th on offense and 2nd on defense. That’s better in both areas! These teams met each other head-to-head in the next to last week of the season. The game went down to the wire, with the Pats ending up on top 24-21 when the final gun sounded.

So how did these stats translate into wins and losses? New England was a few plays away from the Super Bowl, while Jacksonville finished 8-8 and missed the playoffs

Heading into the 2007 season, you should obviously be thinking of the Jaguars as a bigger threat to do damage than your typical .500 caliber team.

Here’s a brief list of potential reversals of fortune using this sort of statistical analysis:

Nominees to be better in 2007: Jacksonville, Pittsburgh (8-8 despite ranking 7th on offense and 9th on defense), and Dallas (9-7 despite ranking 4th on offense and 13th on defense).

Nominees to be worse in 2007: Tennessee, San Francisco, the NY Jets (10-6 despite ranking 25th on offense and 20th on defense.

Be sure you handicap early season action on how good or bad these teams really are rather than short term illusions from last year’s standings. But a caveat here…

Some teams and coaches tend to outplay their stats, because they are opportunistic, they create turnovers, and they have good special teams. Other teams can look good between the 20’s but the big plays elude them and special teams hurt them. And obviously the personnel changes from year to year, teams age, and young talent matures.

But this form of analysis can give you some food for thought.

We’ll preview some Thursday college football tomorrow. Have a great night.