NFL MVP 2015: Predicting Odds for Award's Top Candidates

The NFL MVP race has boiled down to two superstars who are impossible to compare.

A typical year by his standards, Aaron Rodgers led the Green Bay Packers to another NFC North crown by tossing 38 touchdowns and just five interceptions. Playing sports' ultimate glamour position, the quarterback always receives the benefit of the doubt in the ballots.

Yet Houston's J.J. Watt presents stark opposition to the status quo. The earth-shattering defensive end registered 20.5 sacks, forced four fumbles, returned an interception and a fumble to the house and even collected three receiving scores. 

Nowhere in the rules does it say an offensive player must win the prestigious award, so Watt could become the first defender since Lawrence Taylor in 1986 to take home the hardware. The voters are probably too set in their ways to make such a bold call, but it certainly deserves some close examination.

Player	Predicted Odds
Aaron Rodgers, QB, GB	1-2
J.J. Watt, DE, HOU	5-1
Tony Romo, QB, DAL	20-1
Tom Brady, QB, NE	45-1
DeMarco Murray, RB, DAL	75-1
Peyton Manning, QB, DEN	90-1
Le'Veon Bell, RB, PIT	100-1

The Case for Aaron Rodgers

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Rodgers represents the best offensive option. While Tony Romo averaged more yards per attempt, he'll lose votes to running back DeMarco Murray, who tallied 2,261 yards from scrimmage. Le'Veon Bell and Antonio Brown face the same quandary of arguably not being his own team's most valuable player.

As for Tom Brady, Andy Dalton averaged an identical 7.04 yards per attempt while completing 0.1 percent more of his passes. You can't stink for one-quarter of the season and still be considered MVP.

Peyton Manning labored too much down the season, ending his candidacy with a four-interception dud against the Cincinnati Bengals in Week 16. And since everyone takes such studs for granted, it's tough for a legend to get any attention after regressing from a record-setting 2013.

If an offensive player deserves the award, it's Rodgers. Although he trails Romo in completion percentage, yards per attempt and quarterback rating, some more complex stats point to Rodgers' supremacy. Allow FiveThirtyEight's Neil Paine to explain:

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According to adjusted net yards per attempt (ANY/A), which tries to synthesize conventional stats (including sacks) in a more rigorous way than the NFL’s outmoded passer rating formula, Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers has easily been the most effective passer in football this year (Romo is third behind Rodgers and football god Peyton Manning). As far as team stats go, ANY/A is a pretty reliable indicator of how efficient a passing offense has performed. Although it uses the same batch of QB stats the NFL’s been tracking since the late 1960s, ANY/A corresponds extremely well to team scoring (it has a correlation of 0.85 with points per game this season) and tracks even better (correlation: 0.89) with expected points, which attempts to filter out the effects of defense, special teams and field position on an offense’s scoring output.

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Football is too much of a team sport to not affect individual numbers, so Romo's sterling offensive line and run-heavy offense cemented his climb up those basic efficiency rates. Not that the Dallas Cowboys would be fine without him, but the Green Bay Packers are in much worse shape without their star passer.

So Rodgers hovers over the offensive field, but why above Watt? Not to endorse this rationale as sound analysis, but it's what those in power are probably thinking: He plays quarterback. He's an awesome quarterback. The 12-4 Packers are playing postseason football this weekend while the Texans watch from home.

By his standards, it wasn't a transcendent year. In fact, his completion percentage and yards per attempt dipped from an injury-shortened 2013, which voters may remember when picturing Green Bay without their signal-caller. 

Without Rodgers, the Packers are irrelevant. With him, they're a perennial Super Bowl contender. Doesn't that coincide with the "most valuable" signifier?

The Case for J.J. Watt

He's incredible at football. That's why. If your answer to "who was 2014's best player?" is Watt, then he deserves the darn MVP.

After Watt concluded the season with three sacks and a forced fumble against the helpless Jacksonville Jaguars, Houston Texans wide receiver Andre Johnson offered his endorsement to ESPN.com's Tania Ganguli:

Grantland's Bill Barnwell, a more objective source than Watt's teammates, gave Watt the narrow edge:

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He’s simply more dominant over the competition at his position than Rodgers is at his. It’s tougher to see that, because there’s not a traditional, widely used number (like sacks) that can represent Watt’s value, but that freakishly high hits total tells you just how frequently he gets into the backfield and takes down opposing quarterbacks. I can imagine a quarterback playing better than Rodgers has this year. The only reason I can imagine a 3-4 defensive end playing better than Watt has in 2014 is because I saw Watt play better in 2012.

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The Texans didn't make the playoffs, but what more could Watt have done short of taking regular snaps on both sides? Lifting Ryan Fitzpatrick and Houston's No. 24 passing offense proved out of his power. 

Also, they didn't stink. They won nine games, a year removed from notching just two victories. Besides,  the real question should be how much value the player delivered, regardless of playoff status.

Say one believes Houston wins four games with a replace-level defensive end and Green Bay wins eight with a replacement-level quarterback. That makes Watt more valuable by one victory. Unfortunately, there's no football metric to measure that.

Predicted Winner: Rodgers

Chris Graythen/Getty Images

The NFL doesn't possess Major League Baseball's Wins Above Replacement (WAR) equivalent to measure their contrasting contributions on an even playing field. Without a true way to properly compare their value, how does one decide who is most valuable?

Enough common stats don't exist to properly portray a defender's true value. A large portion of football fans follow NFL action through fantasy football leagues that only require them to draft defensive teams rather than individual players. 

It's no wonder quarterbacks and running backs have swept the award for the last 29 years. Those are the household names with the easily understandable stats. They regularly touch the ball, while any lineman will spend several plays lost inside the trenches.

When a decision is tough to make, people usually opt for the easy choice. Picking the quarterback on the playoff team is the easier call, even if the pass-rushing monster on a 9-7 squad actually derived more value.

Whether it's the right call or not, Rodgers will win his second MVP trophy.