This week's visualization can be found at https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-nations-best-punter-is-changing-the-game/. It displays the distance traveled by punts by Matt Araiza, as well as the number of punts at each distance and those compared with the national Football Bowl Subdivision average in the 2021 season. I believe this graphic is a really unique way of displaying distance and allows a viewer to easily compare this player’s attempts with the national average. Each punt is displayed by an orange semicircle, starting at 0 yards and ending at the yards traveled. The bottom line, from which each semi-circle begins and ends on, starts at 0 yards and ends at 90 years. This line does help with understanding how far each punt went. The graphic displays the number of punts at each point by making the thickness of the line thicker to display more punts landing at that distance. The comparison of the orange lines displaying Araiza’s punts can be easily compared with the black national average line, so the graphic does help display the overall message of Araiza being one of the best punters in the league.
This graphic can be difficult to understand if looking at specific details. I personally find the thickness of the lines to be a little difficult to distinguish between. The difference between the 5 punts line and 3 punts line is not very significant, especially when they are placed together with all the other lines. Many of them overlap and make it difficult to determine how many punts were made at which distance. It may be easier to understand if the lines were colored slightly different along with the thickness changes. The large circles at the end of each semicircle contribute to the confusion, as they also overlap and may cause certain lines to look thicker than they are.