I’ve been spending the past few weeks on a blurb hunt for Net Gains, WHICH YOU CAN PRE-ORDER HERE. You’re gonna like the way you look (at the book and see the names and quotes from certain people), I guarantee it.

Here’s what I wrote at ESPN this week:

-Can Erik ten Hag turn Manchester United around?

The average Premier League game features 188 possessions, or 94 for each side. That number varies from Leeds at the top with 103, and Manchester City at the bottom with 82. The style you play can affect how many transition opportunities there are, but even with the most controlled team the Premier League has ever seen, there are still 82 moments per match where possession switches from one team to the other. And although Ten Hag's general approach shifted from Utrecht to Ajax, he kept an emphasis on these moments.

"The one thing that is always present is that his teams -- for Dutch standards! -- are very strong in moments of transition," Elias said. "Rest defense is always very well-organized and when the ball is won he goes very direct. Ten Hag explicitly mentioned this in a mid-2017 interview: He wanted Ajax to play much more directly after winning the ball."

-Can we learn anything by looking at how Premier League teams performed with certain players on and off the field?

Leading the list? It's a pair of unanimously beloved strikers in Arsenal's Lacazette and Newcastle's Chris Wood! Per 90 minutes, Arsenal are plus-1.69 goals better with Laca on the field than with him off it this year. He almost literally does not score goals; over the past year, the Frenchman ranks in the bottom 1 percentile for non-penalty goals per 90 minutes (0.1) among strikers in Europe. However, he's super-active off the ball -- pressing, picking off passes and winning tackles -- and he's involved in a bunch of possessions that lead to shots, even if he's not the one taking or converting them. At the very least, he has the profile of a player who can help his team win without scoring. He's out of contract at the end of the season, and he'll be 31 soon, but he'd still make a useful -- and likely affordable, because of his lack of goals -- backup striker for a team with European aspirations.

Go forth and prosper, all. Talk to you next week.