Rounding out the end of the season, the Revolution had a moderately easy schedule. Games 21 through 26 were either at home or away to poor opposition, but matchday 28 produced a surprise win away to Toronto FC. Looking closer at the numbers, Jones played just 14 minutes here - so can be given little real credit for the result.



To close the season, games 29 to 34 were played with Jones (from the Montreal game, the 2–1 win against the Red Bulls was without him). These produced some pretty poor results vs weak Philadelphia and Chicago teams, alongside a likely unexpected home loss to Montreal. The season closing away win to NYCFC met expectations also.



So from briefly reviewing the 2015 fixtures, what have we learned from this exercise? From the calculations, Jones believed that in 2015 he was worth an additional 0.9 points per game. From the fixture list, I can’t see any games where he has won the team additional points on his own.

Maybe the away win to Toronto FC, but he only played 14 minutes. And this is why there are difficulties with looking at points added in soccer. There are so many variables to look at. From thinking about this problem, I have the following:

Too few lineup changes in a game (maximum of 6).

Low scoring, therefore difficult to look at goal difference with or without.

Opposition teams need to be adjusted for their strength.

Matches need to be adjusted for location of the game.

Your team lineup needs to be adjusted for strength (for example, a second, more important player may have been missing while he was out, therefore influencing the result also).

Free rider problem - you could probably put me in the New England team and I’d come out with a positive points added total despite being the worst player on the field.

Considering the nature of MLS having varying levels of player talent within the squad - a player quality metric needs to be created to reasonably assess most of the above. This is something I’m going to try and develop in the future, likely a top-down model similar to that of GoalImpact.



So to conclude, although Jermaine Jones is a good player, it’s difficult to attribute an extra one point a game to him. There are a variety of factors that need to be considered that I showed above. Sadly for his contract negotiations, this isn’t great news. For New England though, I’m happy that they have recognized his true value for the 2016 season, and hope they can get him back on a reduced deal.