Once again London Fletcher was snubbed for the Pro Bowl. This is unjust, so let's take just a moment to be perfectly clear about how good London Fletcher really is. By a key index, London Fletcher is the best tackler in the NFL. Period.
Last year London Fletcher was one of the best, if not the very best linebacker. This year, at age 36, his play did not drop off.
I learned a new statistic this year, Tackle Factor (TF). TF is a way to grade on a curve. Some positions (linebacker) make more tackles than others (cornerback). Thus, to know how good a tackler someone is we want to know more than how many tackles they have -- we want to know how many tackles they make for their team relative to the typical player at their position.
This is precisely what TF tells us -- the ratio of a player’s proportion of his team’s tackles compared to what is expected at his position. Thus, TF is perhaps the best index of tackling ability.
And this brings us to the point: London Fletcher leads the NFL in Tackle Factor. London has a TF of 1.61.
To put this in context, the average NFL linebacker would be expected to have a TF of 1. Elite linebacker Ray Lewis has a TF of 1.29, and elite linebacker Lance Briggs a 1.15 -- both well above 1, yet well below the mark set by London. Incidentally, both Lewis and Briggs made the Pro-Bowl, even though London not only has a higher TF, but more sacks and more interceptions.
London Fletcher is the man. He's a good person, great leader, and perhaps the best tackler in the NFL. Pro Bowl voters don't seem to get that. But truth is truth, so let the truth be stated loud and clear.
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