FiveThirtyEight’s top stories this week

A [FiveThirtyEight]( email [Popular This Week] Sunday, December 4, 2022 [1. What To Watch For In The 2022 World Cup’s Round of 16]( [WCROUND-4×3]( Ten days before the World Cup began, we tried to predict which group might be the tournament’s Group of Death. In doing so, we discovered that Qatar 2022 contained two of the 14 most difficult groups by average pre-tournament Elo rating among all World Cups dating back to 1970. One of those groups — Group E — contained two of the past three World Cup winners (Spain and Germany), and two teams we labeled as “plucky underdogs” (Costa Rica and Japan). [Read more]( [2. The Hall Of Fame Math For Barry Bonds And Roger Clemens Doesn’t Add Up]( [San Francisco Giants v Atlanta Braves]( They’re baaaaaack. [Read more]( [3. How Americans Feel About Qatar Hosting The World Cup]( [POLLA_1202-4×3]( Welcome to Pollapalooza, our weekly polling roundup. [Read more]( [4. The Ravens’ Pre-Snap Motion Is A Deadly Weapon — But It Might Also Lead To More Penalties]( [Baltimore Ravens v Jacksonville Jaguars]( The Baltimore Ravens were cruising on their first drive Sunday against the Jacksonville Jaguars. Quarterback Lamar Jackson began the game by drilling a laser 20 yards downfield to tight end Mark Andrews for a 25-yard gain. Then the running game got going, and the Ravens offense gashed the Jags for gains of eight and nine yards. Baltimore even had some fumble luck go its way on a play where Andrews fumbled, but the ball was ruled out of bounds at the Jacksonville 30. The Ravens marched down the field to the Jacksonville 10, and on all but one play they pushed an edge they’ve exploited more than any other team in the league recently: They had a man in motion at the snap. [Read more]( [5. Did Redistricting Cost Democrats The House?]( [HOUSE-REDISTRICT-2022-4×3]( The 2022 election for the House of Representatives was so close that if any number of things had gone differently, Democrats might have kept their majority. And one of the biggest things that affected the battle for the House was redistricting — the decennial redrawing of congressional districts’ lines to account for the results of the 2020 census. [Read more]( [6. Does Harry Kane’s Legacy Ride On This World Cup?]( [HARRYKANE-4×3]( In international football, England’s Harry Kane is as stellar as they come. As his team prepares to take on Senegal in the Round of 16 at the 2022 FIFA World Cup, he needs just three more strikes to pass Wayne Rooney’s mark of 53 and become the country’s all-time leading goal scorer. And if the Three Lions win and advance to the semifinals in Qatar — which they also did in Kane’s first World Cup four years ago — Kane will have been captain for the entirety of what is arguably England’s most successful era. [Read more]( [7. The Datasets We’re Looking At This Week]( [The words "data Is plural" written in red on a white background]( You’re reading Data Is Plural, a weekly newsletter of useful/curious datasets. Below you’ll find the Nov. 30, 2022, edition, reprinted with permission at FiveThirtyEight. [Read more]( [8. The U.S. Played To Win Against Iran — And It Worked]( [IR Iran v USA: Group B – FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022]( Christian Pulisic nearly captured the entire story of the United States’ win-or-go-home match against Iran on Tuesday in the second minute, when he took off on a dangerous-looking run forward that came to nothing. But after 37 minutes, seven shots and five chances that generated 0.42 expected goals but no actual goals (while allowing none, none and 0.00 to Iran), Pulisic truly exemplified America’s effort in this match: He put his body on the line to score the goal that would knock Iran out of the World Cup – and send the U.S. to the knockout round. [Read more]( [9. How Either Candidate Could Win Georgia’s Senate Runoff]( [GA-RUNOFF-22-4×3]( Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and Republican Herschel Walker are headed to a runoff in Georgia’s Senate race next week after neither surpassed the 50 percent threshold required by state law to win outright. But will it be a repeat of last year’s runoff — when Warnock and fellow Democratic then-candidate Sen. Jon Ossoff narrowly defeated their Republican rivals? Or are we heading for an election that makes 2021 look like an outlier? [Read more]( [10. The Rams’ Super Bowl Afterparty Turned Into A Historic Hangover]( [Los Angeles Rams v Tampa Bay Buccaneers]( We’ve all seen a team lose football’s biggest game, march into the following season, and then tumble into a ravine. In fact, the post-Super Bowl defeat hangover has happened enough times that the word “curse” is frequently bandied about. Since the AFL-NFL merger in 1970, 15 of 51 Super Bowl losers have missed the playoffs the next season, and 13 have failed to post a winning record. Six have been downright bad, producing six wins or fewer in their follow-up bids.  [Read more]( --------------------------------------------------------------- Weekly Listen [Play]( [Politics Podcast: Has The Threat To Democracy Receded?]( [FiveThirtyEight] [View in browser]( [ABC News]( [Unsubscribe]( Our mailing address: FiveThirtyEight, 47 West 66th Street, New York, NY 10023.