In all sincerity, I don’t think I gave Flip enough dap for his 2-12 record this week. On the phone yesterday with Chris and Mike, I told them that I’m just as impressed with a 2-12 week as I would be with a 12-2 one. (Unfortunately, Flip, the win column is not.) The reason of my admiration is that his 2-12 record was such a statistical anomaly.
In the business of sports handicapping, the goal by Sheridan or other line-setters is to create a spread that will generate equal action on either side, so that the house will get paid the 10% vigorish on each losing bet. Thus, the house can expect to earn 5% on the total amount of bets placed. As a gambler, you need to pick 11 games right out of 21 just to break even. Each NFL season, there are 256 games. If you were to pick 128 games correctly and 128 games incorrectly, you would be in the hole 128 * 1.1 * x (where x is the average amount you wagered per game). Now you know why the sports books offer free drinks…
In our league, we don’t have a vigorish (Heck, we don’t even have any stakes). Consider this - if we continued our pickem challenge into our old age and aggregated the totals, I would wager that all of us would be within 1% of picking half the games correctly. This is why Flip’s 2-12 record stands out. Using binomial distribution, there is a 0.64% chance that one would be either 2-12 or 12-2 any given week. That’s only 6 chances out of 1000. With all likelihood, this will be the best and the worst week of any of us has this season.
Just as a fun note: the chances of picking all sixteen games correctly?
.026%
As statistically unlikely Flip’s week was, it is still nearly 25 times more likely than picking every single game right (or, don’t forget, just as impressive, wrong).
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3 comments:
Dav,
I think the calculation you use to determine how much money one would lose if they went 128-128 over the course of the NFL is a little off. You have it as 128*1.1*x (x being the average amount you wager). But in actuality it is something different. Let's say I bet $11 to win $10 on every single game. That puts a total of $2816 into play. Losing half, that takes away $1408. Winning the other half, that gives me back my other $1408 plus $10*128= $1280.
1280 + 1408 = $2688. So the loss for me picking exaclty half the winners is 2816-2688= $128. Which equals a 4.55% vig which is the norm for 11/10 bets winning at 50%. And the more you win, the more vig you pay.
Your equation would give my losses at 128*1.1*$11 = $1549.
Remember, kids, the winner always the vig. Keep this in mind when trying to project your earnings.
I'm going to have to head to the library and check out a couple books to figure out what the heck you guys are talking about...but at the very least I have determined that I shouldn't cash out my investment portfolio anytime soon.
Especially if I'm taking advice from a man who is 4.5 games under .500 after 4 weeks! That means that if he continues this trend he will finish the season 18 games under which means he would have lost...how much?
P.S. I'm never wagering with any of you unless its all in chips at a poker table back home:)
I am just happy this turned into a numbers discussion and not a discussion on how much I blow at picking lines.... at least i am better at fantasy sports, right phil
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