UEFA Champions League Group Strength: Which Champions League group is the toughest? Ian Graham of Decision Technology’s Football Blog investigates.

Defensive Passer Rating – 2011 Strength Of Schedule: CHFF’s Kerry Byrne computed every team’s 2011 passing strength of schedule based on the passer ratings allowed by their opponents in 2010.

Adjusting Playoff Stats Part III — 30 Post-Merger Stars: The latest from Back Picks on adjusting historical players’ playoff stats for the quality of competition faced.

Rays v Tigers: Common Opponents: Tangotiger does a little strength-of-schedule tinkering with Tampa and Detroit, computing their W-L vs. common opponents in equal proportions.

The 2011 Pittsburgh Pirates Have Thrived Despite Middling Stats: As the WSJ’s Carl Bialik notes, a great deal of Pittsburgh’s surprising 2011 performance seems to be unsustainable.

Against the top NBA defenses, Derrick Rose was the tops: Ball Don’t Lie’s Kelly Dwyer writes about the fact that Derrick Rose ruled the top defenses in 2011.

Who Ruled the Top Defenses in 2011?: At Basketball-Reference, Neil Paine asks: Which players excel against the best defenses, and which ones get their numbers by feasting on the weakest Ds?

Crude Team Ratings at the All-Star Break: From Walk Like a Sabermetrician, Patriot’s 1st-half “Crude Team Ratings”.

Who Played the Hardest Defenses? Adjusting playoff stats by competition Part I: At Back Picks, ElGee looks at the quality of playoff defenses faced by MVP candidates in their primes (a similar concept to this BBR post from 2010.)

MLS Remaining Schedule Difficulty at the Third-Way Point: Who has the toughest and easiest remaining schedules, via Sounder At Heart.

Adjusting For Opponent In The 2011 MLB Season: Jeff Sullivan of Baseball Nation analyzes BP’s strength of opponent metrics for individual batters and pitchers.

Are All Divisions Created Equal? Team WAR (2002-2010): Jon Shepherd of Camden Depot uses WAR to determine how many extra wins Baltimore would have if they weren’t in the AL East.