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Bills and Steelers historically "lucky" according to FiveThirtyEight article


Big Turk

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Point differential isn't a very good measure in football. Not enough games to have an adequate sample, gross disparities in strength of schedule (what division in playing the NFC East this year?), etc, etc.

In MLB: 162 games ... it's a damn good indicator of which teams are "better" or "worse" than their records would tell us.

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There aware 8 or 9 games played.  One game can skew things a lot and this is low sample size for this kind of analysis.  From watching the games the bills have been the better team in their wins and have dominated at times although the score did not reflect that at the end of the game.  
 

don’t let this worry you.  It’s kind of useless

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38 minutes ago, Mickey said:

Is there any stat, too ridiculous, too irrelevant and too insanely picayune for even the most OCD afflicted numerical fetishist to embrace?

 

 

What are the odds that there's a significant and measurable degree of certainty that this bore the tone of a challenge?

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I realize some very talented statisticians work at 538.  And I know their game predictions are pretty good.  But if their model says the Bills should have 4.7 wins, their model is wrong. 

 

We didn't get 7 wins off of unearned turnovers or weird bounces.  We outplayed our opponent 7 times this year.  Sometimes I watch a game and feel like the better team lost.  I never had that feeling so far watching the Bills this year.  

 

I think it's interesting 538 attributes the Bills good record to luck rather than to a flaw with their "Pythagorean expectations."  They can't possibly believe their predictive model is perfect, can they?  

 

 

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31 minutes ago, hondo in seattle said:

I realize some very talented statisticians work at 538.  And I know their game predictions are pretty good.  But if their model says the Bills should have 4.7 wins, their model is wrong. 

 

We didn't get 7 wins off of unearned turnovers or weird bounces.  We outplayed our opponent 7 times this year.  Sometimes I watch a game and feel like the better team lost.  I never had that feeling so far watching the Bills this year.  

 

I think it's interesting 538 attributes the Bills good record to luck rather than to a flaw with their "Pythagorean expectations."  They can't possibly believe their predictive model is perfect, can they?  

 

 


I agree. Statisticians are an interesting breed. Dealing with them when I’m doing budgets is particularly interesting as they base their view of what I will do across the entire organization (this is in my last life). I consistently outpaced the many but that was never factored in. 
 

I fought it tooth and nail to no avail. That’s just the way they work...and I understand it...but don’t agree with it. 

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3 minutes ago, TroutDog said:


I agree. Statisticians are an interesting breed. Dealing with them when I’m doing budgets is particularly interesting as they base their view of what I will do across the entire organization (this is in my last life). I consistently outpaced the many but that was never factored in. 
 

I fought it tooth and nail to no avail. That’s just the way they work...and I understand it...but don’t agree with it. 

 

I feel like they are really good at getting the science down for that 90-95% of situations, but can't (due to mathematical models) account for nuance. The Bills have played significantly better than their point differential.

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3 hours ago, Artful Dodger said:

The Bills have an extremely competitive quarterback who is capable of willing the team to victory.  Is that a measurable statistic?

 

The Bills are "lucky" that Josh Allen is their quarterback.

Yup, good thoughts! There's just some things you just can't measure.

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18 minutes ago, Reader said:

 

I feel like they are really good at getting the science down for that 90-95% of situations, but can't (due to mathematical models) account for nuance. The Bills have played significantly better than their point differential.

The NFL is the worst sport to try and use simple math with since the season is too short and one game can skew numbers so much ala Titans game. In baseball simple numbers mean much more. 

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33 minutes ago, Reader said:

 

I feel like they are really good at getting the science down for that 90-95% of situations, but can't (due to mathematical models) account for nuance. The Bills have played significantly better than their point differential.


‘Nuance’ isn’t included in statistical science. Just saying. 😃 

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4 hours ago, Artful Dodger said:

The Bills have an extremely competitive quarterback who is capable of willing the team to victory.  Is that a measurable statistic?

 

The Bills are "lucky" that Josh Allen is their quarterback.

this !

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