μ · EP 009 · July 14, 2026

The Striker Who 'Found a New Level' Almost Never Really Did

tl;dr

Jude Bellingham and Erling Haaland both beat their own expected goals by a wide margin in one season, then gave most of it back the next. Tested across 5,498 player-seasons in six European leagues, the chances a player gets are a stable trait, r = 0.80 year over year, while whether he outscores them is close to a coin flip, r = 0.07. One player in the sample never reverts: Lionel Messi.

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