espn Analytics on Saturday's B1G game...
- Thread starter MtNittany
- Start date
I’m surprised Colorado didn’t get a few % in there …
Or Alabama or Georgia.I’m surprised Colorado didn’t get a few % in there …
I can't quite figure out what the FPI is doing with this...they've got Oregon higher than us, but have us with the advantage in this game. I guess they are giving us an HFA bump.
Either way, this game is just another example of the FPI being pretty questionable...there is no way that a good power rating would diverge this far from the market at this point in the season.
Either way, this game is just another example of the FPI being pretty questionable...there is no way that a good power rating would diverge this far from the market at this point in the season.
What would you say if one of our own is a big deal with ESPN College Football?
onwardstate.com
Penn State Alum Amanda Gifford Reflects On Journey As ESPN Executive
Gifford shared how her Penn State experience led her to work at ESPN for over 20 years.
onwardstate.com
A friend's daughter is on the same career path in Atlanta. Been w/ TBS for almost 15 years now. I'll forward it to him.What would you say if one of our own is a big deal with ESPN College Football?
Penn State Alum Amanda Gifford Reflects On Journey As ESPN Executive
Gifford shared how her Penn State experience led her to work at ESPN for over 20 years.
I would say......is Paul Finebaum as much of a doosh in person as he appears on your network?What would you say if one of our own is a big deal with ESPN College Football?
Penn State Alum Amanda Gifford Reflects On Journey As ESPN Executive
Gifford shared how her Penn State experience led her to work at ESPN for over 20 years.
Have no idea what you wrote but it looks like we have a bigger piece of the PIE.
It’s the week after Thanksgiving. Very little is slim right now.So you are saying we have a slim chance to win?
Oregon does not have the BWI coaching staff. Gives PSU an advantage.
I'm wondering if they take travel into account since teams travelling further do seem to perform worse?
I would agree that it is surprising to see PSU favored, but most places basically have this as a one score game for Oregon which is close to a coin flip.
FPI = football power index. It's ESPNs tool for rating teams by perceived strength and not a ranking system based on merit (doesn't really take record into account, but wants rank the teams according to who is best). If Team A is ranked higher than Team B, then Team A should be a favorite in the game. Erial is saying that Oregon is ranked higher and should be a fav, but their "analytics" tool is predicting PSU to have a better chance.
I would personally doubt a computer analytics program would factor in travel for a neutral game, but I guess it's possible.
FWIW, I've tracked an angle (trend maybe?) in the "Sports Betting" thread about B10 teams performing poorly this season when travelling 2+ time zones. Very well may be due to variance in a small sample size, but it was consistent throughout the season. I doubt ESPN is using this as a parameter too.
Ken Pomeroy has 5 options for his games when he runs his ratings...Home, Away, Neutral, but also "semi-home" and "semi-away". I wonder if FPI is doing something along those lines and giving us a small bump due to the travel, but not a full HFA.
Anyways, the FPI being about 13-14% off from the market in a game this big should really raise some red flags on their model/methodology...just not realistic at this point in a season in a market this big.
Yeah, maybe OR qualifies as semi-away due to distance and PSU as semi-home? Pretty sure that Billy Walters factored in travel distance (he published a number of his methods in his book). 3.8% still seems like a bigger edge than I would expect from semi home/road
Any chance that ESPN analytics would actually factor in other rating services in addition to FPI? Sagarin?
Just emailed some buddies who used to work on analytics for ESPN. They believe that it is travel distance that is slightly changing the odds.
The betting market...the "no vig" line on this one would put Oregon as about a 60% favorite to win, while the "ESPN Analytics" (which from my understanding is just their FPI) is putting it as a ~46% chance of Oregon winning. There is no way that the line is 14% off (60% - 46%) in a high-profile game this deep into the college football season.
Because the betting market would never be that far off on a game like this..."Vegas" would go out of business if they were that bad at setting lines. It's just a massive difference right now (and hence a reason to question what the heck the FPI is doing to be that far off of the market line).
Why is FPI wrong? Maybe the other analytics are wrong. Do betting analytics serve a different purpose? I want to believe FPI. Do you?
Ok, I understand. FPI is wrong. Whatever Vegas stuff you’re talking about is right.
It does. At Pinnacle, Oregon is a -179 favorite on the money line. PSU is a +150 dog. Using a no-vig calculator, this implies odds of 61.6% on Oregon, and 39.4% on PSU. So, I rounded down and estimated that they are about a 60% favorite.
Looking at it another way, from 1980 to 2023, there were 984 NCAAF games with a line of 3.5. The underdog won 369 (or 37.5%) of those games.
Last edited:
So you’re using a calculator to figure out fair betting odds. The FPI is the fair betting odds. I think you placed a bet and are concerned because the FPI is making you nervous.
You thought wrong...I haven't played anything on our game. But I can assure you that the FPI is not the fair betting odds...you'll get a much better indicator using the closing line to find the "fair betting odds".
I've never paid much (or really any) attention to the FPI, but this just made me question how good it actually is, since it's shocking that it would hang a number this off from the betting market.
The betting market odds are to make money. They push betting in a direction to make money, and they can change quickly. I wouldn’t trust those odds even after putting them through a calculator. Stat wise, PSU should be very competitive with Oregon. PSU‘s FPI 54% win probability is not outrageous. Nor would odds in favor of Oregon. I think this game is difficult to predict.
I would trust the betting market way before I would trust any sort of analytics from ESPN. If any professional sports bettor felt that PSU was legitimately a 54% favorite and the betting lines imply a 40% underdog, they would be max betting (although limits are low right now) and this line would move.
Which is why I feel the Oregon -3.5 line is a little low even though they’re playing at a neutral site. I hate when the wise guys try to sway action so they can capitalize. I’ve bet on horses that were 6-1 walking into the gate, end up winning the race and the final odds come in at 2-1. Talk about a gut punch.
Get unlimited access today.