Chart Party and Pretty Good: Fascinating and New Sports Commentary
By KATHERINE MCDONOUGH ‘19
In a previous issue of The Milton Paper, I wrote an article about one of my favorite games, Scorigami. Fans of Scorigami play it by looking for final scores of recent NFL games never before scored in the league. Those who read the article may remember that the creator of the famed Scorigami is SB Nation video producer Jon Bois. Bois, in my opinion, is one of the best sports content creators at this time, and I implore all of you to invest some time in exploring his works.
Two of Bois’ most popular series, found on SB Nation’s Youtube channel, are Chart Party and Pretty Good. I first discovered Bois through Chart Party, specifically his video “The Browns Live in Hell,” a video that explores how it is statistically impossible for the Browns, who at the time had won a total of 2 of their last 48 games (I also cannot believe that statement is real), to be that horrifyingly terrible. The video demonstrates the best of Chart Party. “The Browns Live in Hell” combines a statistical nerd with the humorous failure of the Browns. Bois did not create this mixture between statistics and sports; statistics have been, from the beginning of any organized sport, a measurement for a given player or teams’ performance throughout a season. However, unlike most people, Bois uses statistics to demonstrate the sheer absurdity of some sports. According to Bois, he spends hours upon hours analyzing data from official statistic websites to create his unique graphs. The detail in these graphs play an important role in making Chart Party so appealing. This detail can be seen in the photo above, where Bois personally documented, all 46,377 punts made in the NFL since 2000 for his Chart Party video titled “The search for the saddest punt in the world.” The figure points every punt by season on the x-axis, by field position on the y-axis, and by week within the season on the z-axis. These details can be seen in greater depth within the video. Bois’ commitment to finding generally absurd topics through statistics gives Chart Party an angle of sports analysis that few other commentators commit to.
Bois’ other series, Pretty Good, tells, according to Bois’ description of the series, “the true stories that are pretty good.” Pretty Good stays consistent with the aesthetic of Bois’ videos that make them decisively his: the graphics that, even if they are taken from video released this year, have a distinctly 2007-esque energy; the “ken burns” filter transitions between graphics; the smooth jazz in the background of the transitions; and, most distinctly, Bois’ narration throughout. While Pretty Good doesn’t stick to just sports stories, its most defining episodes tell the stories of defining sports moments that go overlooked. Bois’ Pretty Good episode titled “WHY DO I CHOOSE THIS FOR A LIVING?” explores the sport of poker, which I, prior to watching this episode, was unaware could be classified as a sport. The video chronicles the incredible stress, stakes, and oftentimes, ridiculousness of professional poker with statistics and personal storytelling, a trademark of a Pretty Good video.
Bois’ commentaries allow me to watch sports in a new light through a statistical lens. Bois walks a very fine line between sports commentator and original creator. His inspiration from statistics and storytelling brings an audience that, as he describes, “[doesn’t] even really follow sports.” That audience is a big part of the reason I respect and admire Bois so much. Through his original and stylistic aspects to his videos, he introduces a new audience to the wonder that is sports. And, for those who already do follow sports, his commentary introduces a new lens with which to absorb the media. If you have a couple free minutes this weekend, I recommend to both sports-lovers and sports-haters alike to invest some time in an episode of Chart Party or Pretty Good.
Taken from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9H9LwGmc-0&list=PLUXSZMIiUfFSe4gpc8PLDECqViWi-2we3&index=12 Aka “The search for the saddest punt in the world”