Divide football teams by race, simulate outcome.

January 4, 2012 2:30 PM

We Simulated The NFL White Vs. Black Race Bowl On Madden So You Don’t Have To "Earlier this week, reader Dustin asked who would win between an all-white NFL All-Pro team and an all-black NFL All-Pro team. Mind you, this question was asked without ANY ROOTING INTEREST, and without any hint of RAYCESSNESS. Are we clear on that? Good. BECAUSE WE TOTALLY SIMULATED THAT RACE WAR ON MADDEN TO SEE WHO WOULD WIN."

The results of the game: "WHITE ALL-STARS 28, BLACK ALL-STARS 24."

posted by hot_monster (75 comments total)

It should be noted, that due to salary cap restrictions, one team was forced to take cruddier players.
posted by drezdn at 2:32 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

I got through three quarters of the 'notes' bit at the beginning before realizing that this is not only a stupid idea but an idiotic one.
posted by shakespeherian at 2:35 PM on January 4, 2012

SACKS
No sacks for Black
Five for White

Ah, the big fat white offensive lineman factor.
posted by Hoopo at 2:36 PM on January 4, 2012 [4 favorites]

Deadspin, with the apt subtitle "Sports news without access" -- a Gawker site, I believe, in which one cannot see any content if javascript is disabled.

Somehow, from the sound of it, I haven't missed anything this time around. And I like Madden!

/snark mode off
posted by Celsius1414 at 2:36 PM on January 4, 2012

WOOO! FINALLY WHITE PEOPLE WIN AT SOMETHING!!
posted by furiousxgeorge at 2:39 PM on January 4, 2012 [7 favorites]

"Next on sister site io9, the Elves vs Orcs Race Bowl in World of Warcraft!"
posted by Celsius1414 at 2:39 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

They already have a game for that Celsius.
posted by furiousxgeorge at 2:40 PM on January 4, 2012 [8 favorites]

That's Kotaku you're thinking of. io9 is covering the Stargate: SG-1 vs. Stargate Atlantis game.
posted by griphus at 2:41 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

But they'll simulate it so I don't have to!
posted by Celsius1414 at 2:41 PM on January 4, 2012

"Next on sister site io9, the Elves vs Orcs Race Bowl in World of Warcraft!"

I suspect that long-time Blood Bowl fans are going to make fun of you for this, Mr. World-of-Warhammer-Online-Craft.
posted by GenjiandProust at 2:42 PM on January 4, 2012 [11 favorites]

It's hard to keep track of which is which when you can't read the frakking content.
posted by Celsius1414 at 2:43 PM on January 4, 2012

Whose side would the Vietnamese fight on?
posted by sharkitect at 2:44 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

The Black Team would have no qualified kickers.

Wow, I never would have thought of that, but yeah. Last guy I could think of was the late Reggie Roby, who was a pretty damn good punter.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 2:44 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

White Michael Vick didn't make the team? What a travesty.
posted by Copronymus at 2:45 PM on January 4, 2012 [4 favorites]

Thw winner takes on "others", Latinos, Islanders, the occasional Asian. I suspect the others would win, if Sanchez had a half decent game.
posted by Keith Talent at 2:45 PM on January 4, 2012

Okay, but who would win a war between the My Little Ponies and the Republican presidential candidates? Huh? Huh?
posted by briank at 2:45 PM on January 4, 2012 [7 favorites]

Also interesting was that they had trouble making an All-Black team fit under the salary cap. I don't exactly know what that says ... there's just more black talent in the NFL as a whole?
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 2:46 PM on January 4, 2012

Okay, but who would win a war between the My Little Ponies and the Republican presidential candidates? Huh? Huh?

Dan Savage.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:47 PM on January 4, 2012 [15 favorites]

Okay, but who would win a war between the My Little Ponies and the Republican presidential candidates? Huh? Huh?

Ponies, obviously. They have the magic of friendship, teamwork instead of bickering, and the magic of magic. ;)
posted by usagizero at 2:47 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

Okay, but who would win a war between the My Little Ponies and the Republican presidential candidates?

America.
posted by drezdn at 2:48 PM on January 4, 2012 [33 favorites]

Well, fuck, there goes a year of not clicking on gawkermedia links. Should've known it was deadspin.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 2:48 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

Okay, but who would win a war between the My Little Ponies and the Republican presidential candidates? Huh? Huh?

It depends on whether the terms of the contest are friendship and cooperation or being a dick and sucking up to the rich.
posted by GenjiandProust at 2:49 PM on January 4, 2012

...or having the glossiest hair.
posted by argonauta at 2:53 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

I think WHAT THEY'RE GETTING AT HERE is that American football is a true thinking man's game, like chess.
posted by obscurator at 2:53 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

Okay, but who would win a war between the My Little Ponies and the Republican presidential candidates? Huh? Huh?

Chancellor Puddinghead 2012.
posted by furiousxgeorge at 2:54 PM on January 4, 2012 [5 favorites]

It's a shame about the salary cap limitations because I'd love to see Charles Woodson (in his prime) face off against Aaron Rodgers.
posted by drezdn at 2:56 PM on January 4, 2012

I enjoy both football and chess, but I do not enjoy the month of January, during which sports announcers, in as far as I can understand their strange vernacular, can't seem to tell the difference between the two. The Super Bowl is not a chess match. You can tell because it has footballs in it.
posted by Wolfdog at 3:01 PM on January 4, 2012 [7 favorites]

Considering the context, I love the little clip half way through of the Cowboys fans.
posted by drezdn at 3:03 PM on January 4, 2012

So they arbitrarily shifted people around just to fill empty spots, and then ditched a ton of good black players because of a salary cap? What is left of the original premise (which, admittedly, is a dumb one?)

"Hey guys look, we put the best mostly-white team against a second-string mostly black team and someone won. RESULTS!"
posted by chundo at 3:03 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

Football-chess ain't got nothin' on Da Mystery of Chessboxin'.
posted by Celsius1414 at 3:04 PM on January 4, 2012 [4 favorites]

The clips make it seem like the final play of the game was a fumble recovery by 'Team White' for the game winning touchdown!

Tebow MUST have been involved.
posted by Phreesh at 3:07 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

I took the results as "you can't afford all the good black players".
posted by Dark Messiah at 3:08 PM on January 4, 2012 [5 favorites]

Well, it would be pretty unfair to have one team worth a lot more money compete with another group with much less money.
posted by furiousxgeorge at 3:11 PM on January 4, 2012 [11 favorites]

Having a salary cap in this makes it even dumber than before.

If you want to separate them by an arbitrary line, don't add another arbitrary cut-off point to it. TOO MANY VARIABLES IN THE POT. STEW RUINED. METAPHOR OVER.

Well, it would be pretty unfair to have one team worth a lot more money compete with another group with much less money.

A mock game separated by race lines is definitely where I want fairness to triumph. =/
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 3:13 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

1. Black players are more expensive in aggregate than white players
2. There are more mixed raced, Asian and Pacific Islander players than I expected!
3. Some positions are almost entirely played by white people (kicker); some positions are almost entirely played by black people (defensive tackle)
4. Players have a lot of weird nicknames (Megatron, GRONK)
5. Acronyms R confusing
posted by 2bucksplus at 3:15 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

I'm really having a hard time dealing with the fact people here need to point out this is stupid and flawed. The fact that it's stupid and ludicrous is what makes it funny.
posted by Hoopo at 3:17 PM on January 4, 2012 [4 favorites]

I think Megatron is the best nickname. Some teammate thought he had giant hands like a decepticon apparently.

Some of the other nicknames are even weirder (this was my first year paying attention to football)... one guy is "Law Firm" because he is BenJarvus Green-Ellis. I forget other weird ones.
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 3:18 PM on January 4, 2012 [4 favorites]

A number of years ago I was a developer on a, let's say, very similar football game. A tester was convinced that the new penalty I added support for was only ever being called against black players. It was a very obscure penalty and I don't think you could trigger it intentionally, so it was difficult to prove my innocence, aside from the fact that "race" wasn't something you could query in the code. I'm not sure the tester ever believed me.

On the other hand, there was a library function called GetRandomFloat() that always returned 0. They were probably right to question the things we said were "random."
posted by Sibrax at 3:40 PM on January 4, 2012 [5 favorites]

"Law Firm" because he is BenJarvus Green-Ellis. I forget other weird ones.

I love it. Go Pats!! Welcome to football :)
posted by sweetkid at 3:40 PM on January 4, 2012

Well, it would be pretty unfair to have one team worth a lot more money compete with another group with much less money.

Baseball?
posted by maryr at 3:47 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

for a while I confused the Lions' WR nickname Megatron with Voltron, which I thought would be more appropriate. Seeing as how the latter giant robot is constructed out of five robotic lions.
posted by sharkitect at 4:01 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

um....
Shaun Cody, who's half white, is on the white team because they would have no competent DTs otherwise. .... For the sake of minimizing a brutal black-on-white beating, Cody's on the White team.
posted by msalt at 4:14 PM on January 4, 2012

Now repeat it a thousand times and tell me the winner on average complete with tests of the differences statistical significance.

I do think that this is kind of intetesting, bc even finding that wouldn't mean it's intrinsically race. Maybe black players are older, or younger or there's some unusual gains from one of the two players being on the same team that was basically random. Just finding a difference by race in the unconditional means doesn't mean it's a true measure of the race differential if numerous other chacgertisrics were different also for the white/black team.
posted by scunning at 4:25 PM on January 4, 2012

On the other hand, there was a library function called GetRandomFloat() that always returned 0.

As long as the "0" was chosen randomly, I don't see the problem.
posted by straight at 4:27 PM on January 4, 2012 [7 favorites]

Speaking of chess, I was confusing Haruki Nakamura with Hikaru Nakamura.
posted by MtDewd at 4:29 PM on January 4, 2012

Look, I havent read the link yet, and I doubt I will.

Because I already know the outcome. The winner of the game is easy to pick. It is screamingly obvious. It is Plain To See.

Black guys win.

Why, you ask?

Simple:

Jim Brown.

You know how the first rule of Imaginary Superhero Fight is "Batman Always Wins"? Well, the first rule of Imaginary Sports Match-Up is "Jim Brown Always Wins".

Jim Brown vs Batman, though. That's a stumper.

Nah. Jim Brown.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 4:34 PM on January 4, 2012 [5 favorites]

GenjiandProust: ""Next on sister site io9, the Elves vs Orcs Race Bowl in World of Warcraft!"

I suspect that long-time Blood Bowl fans are going to make fun of you for this, Mr. World-of-Warhammer-Online-Craft."

Up until now I've been polite…
posted by ob1quixote at 4:37 PM on January 4, 2012 [5 favorites]

It's amazing how evenly matched these two teams turned out to be.

That's rather the point of the salary cap in Madden.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 4:40 PM on January 4, 2012

American football is a true thinking man's game, like chess

Despite the fact that the actual execution of the game is brutish and short, the amount of thought that goes into the game is actually far more then any other organized sport. Other sports may engender more complex thoughts in the mind of the spectator, but no other sport requires as much planning, strategy, or player development.
posted by cell divide at 4:51 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

White Michael Vick didn't make the team? What a travesty.

I bet White O.J. Simpson didn't make the team either.
posted by hippybear at 5:03 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

I dont' think I missed this in thread, but doesn't this raise the questiong high:

Are white players overrated in Madden?
posted by Trochanter at 5:13 PM on January 4, 2012

OK, now I read the link and this is horseshit. Limiting the roster to currently active players tells us nothing. I want to see Johnny Unitas being rushed by Lawrence Taylor. I want to see Don Hutson lined up against Deion Sanders. I want to see Ray Guy punting to Devin Hester.

Meh.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 5:23 PM on January 4, 2012 [2 favorites]

Well, the first rule of Imaginary Sports Match-Up is "Jim Brown Always Wins".

Somebody never saw The Dirty Dozen, I see.
posted by Rangeboy at 5:34 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

Honestly I'm surprised to see this one made it here. Been reading Drew's columns for awhile...pretty juvenile at times, but ye gods he makes me laugh.
posted by rhythim at 5:43 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

Well, I thought it was amusing. It could have worked better if they would/could reach back a BIT to the past, like the 80s/90s, then they could have used Scott Case and Jason Sehorn, the last white cornerbacks in the NFL AFAIK. Also, Reggie Roby and Donald Igwebuike as punter/kicker.

What would the NBA version of this exercise look like?

BLACK TEAM:

C HOWARD
PF STOUDEMIRE?
SF JAMES
PG WADE
SG BRYANT

WHITE TEAM

C GASOL
PF NOWITZKI
SF TERKOGLU
PG NASH
SG GINOBILI

If you want to be super-strict, caucasian-through-and-through, then I don't know if Gasol and Ginobili should count, or who the most obvious choices to replace them with if they don't.
posted by mreleganza at 5:52 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

(also, it just struck me as interesting trivia that my white team contains zero American-born players).
posted by mreleganza at 5:55 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

Let me know when they do the NHL.
posted by Homeboy Trouble at 6:11 PM on January 4, 2012

This was amazing. Fitting that even in a simulation, talented black athletes are fucked over by salary cap rules. Go figure.
posted by no regrets, coyote at 6:14 PM on January 4, 2012

Also, Ginobli just broke his hand, but I don't suppose Madden cares about that.
posted by msalt at 6:14 PM on January 4, 2012

If you want to be super-strict, caucasian-through-and-through, then I don't know if Gasol and Ginobili should count, or who the most obvious choices to replace them with if they don't.

well, or Turkoglu either, right?
posted by toodleydoodley at 6:27 PM on January 4, 2012

Turkoglu is ethnically Serbian, Wikipedia tells me. At the risk of broadcasting extreme ignorance/misinformation, I thought that Spaniards and Turks have more North African/Middle Eastern "blood" due to long-ago crusades, something like that.
posted by mreleganza at 6:31 PM on January 4, 2012

"... also qualifies as white ..." should be a sharp reminder that race, if it is anything at all, is a very pervasive cultural signifier. Out of the specific context of this culture, race is, at most, means for self-identification.
posted by clvrmnky at 6:31 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

Regarding the NBA teams listed above, Kevin Love certainly deserves a slot on that roster. But I don't like the exercise anyway, as it arbitrarily dismisses players who don't fit into American racial "standards". If they were good enough to make the list, tell me where Blake Griffin goes, as well as where other international players would fit into the spectrum.
posted by antonymous at 6:44 PM on January 4, 2012

Y'all ever notice how some computer generated, statistically-backed avatars dance like this, but other computer generated, statistically-backed avatars dance like THIS??
posted by tittergrrl at 6:52 PM on January 4, 2012 [5 favorites]

Antonymous, we could make a biracial team too! Griffin, Delonte West, Jason Kidd...

I hear you though. I think this either needs to dismissed or taken light-heartedly, which is my wont. And people keep saying "arbitrary" in this thread, but they explain exactly why they arrived at each decision w/r/t an biracial player or a team switch.
posted by mreleganza at 7:03 PM on January 4, 2012

Somebody never saw The Dirty Dozen, I see.

That's just a movie, silly. It's not REAL, like Imaginary Sports Match-Ups!
posted by BitterOldPunk at 8:19 PM on January 4, 2012 [1 favorite]

Always bet on black.
posted by mazola at 8:29 PM on January 4, 2012

"If you want to be super-strict, caucasian-through-and-through, then I don't know if Gasol and Ginobili should count, or who the most obvious choices to replace them with if they don't.

well, or Turkoglu either, right?"

Under German rules, none of them count as white.

(Also, I kept thinking of the All Blacks.)
posted by klangklangston at 11:43 PM on January 4, 2012

It all makes sense. Obama did the whole recess appointment of Cordray to shift attention from his Mars trip 30 years ago.
posted by unreasonable at 8:05 AM on January 5, 2012 [2 favorites]

[wrong thread fail]
posted by unreasonable at 8:13 AM on January 5, 2012 [2 favorites]

More like [wrong thread succeed], unreasonable.
posted by IAmBroom at 11:20 AM on January 5, 2012 [1 favorite]

Good thing the white team won, or ESPN's "First Take" would devote ten minutes to "Madden Race Bowl: Would Tebow Have Made The Difference?"

I think seeing the rosters of a baseball version would be interesting, since there aren't any racial-positional limitations I can think of, except, off the top of my head, with African-American closers? Even then, you can shift around the relievers. Or catchers, apparently. I had no idea Charles Johnson was retired for so long.

But would the Latin players would get their own team, or just the Hispanic ones? And I think one could barely be able to put together an Asian team. But it would have to be set up so the Blacks play the Whites in the finals. You know, for ratings.

All in all, it would just be funny to see a group of nerdy Sabermetricians having to discuss a touchy issue like race.

Well, it would be pretty unfair to have one team worth a lot more money compete with another group with much less money.

We sort of get this now with pros in the Olympics. The US men's basketball team probably earns a bit more in their day jobs than their opponents.
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 2:19 AM on January 6, 2012

Good thing the white team won, or ESPN's "First Take" would devote ten minutes to "Madden Race Bowl: Would Tebow Have Made The Difference?"

I'd like to see the code for what happens when someone playing Tebow hits the "pray" button. (As well as the code for what happens when someone hits the "pray ironically to make fun of Tebow" button -- hopefully the word SMITE is used as a variable name.)
posted by straight at 9:31 AM on January 6, 2012

ESPN's "First Take"

Why do I punish myself with that podcast? Bayless is an animated corpse with his CAPSLOCK KEY STUCK!
posted by Trochanter at 2:42 PM on January 10, 2012

It was about a quarter past the hour on Monday night, and I thought about tuning in to ESPN and ESPNews, but just knew they'd be talking about Tebow in some way or another. Tuned in to both, and sure enough...

Nothing against the guy, but their obsession with him makes LeBron look ignored last season in comparison. "Is the media overanalyzing Tebow?" "Are we overanalyzing the overanalysis of Tebow?"
posted by TheSecretDecoderRing at 1:36 AM on January 11, 2012 [1 favorite]