Let the NBA Back in Seattle, But Not Who You Think

The case for the Clippers to leave Los Angeles for Seattle

 by Dylan Ackerman

In the last couple of weeks, like many Americans, I find myself intrigued with happenings in the NBA. Unlike most people following basketball, however, my interested has nothing to do with anything happening on the court. I am not completely sure how – perhaps my love of Starbucks, perhaps my desire to see Macklemore get a team back, or perhaps my general nostalgia for the west coast – but I find the possible move of an NBA franchise back to Seattle extremely enticing.

As a result, I was as interested as anyone with the decision by the NBA owners against the proposal to move the Sacramento Kings to Seattle. Obviously for fans in Seattle, the decision is a blow to the head. Personally, I actually see the recent decision as an opportunity to propose an idea I had in high school. After I looked at the numbers more closely, I realized what I once thought was a crazy idea can actually work, so here it goes.

The Kings are not the team that should move to Seattle. Instead, I propose a different franchise moves to all-too-long basketball-less Key Arena. What team?

The Los Angeles Clippers.

Now I know at first the thought seems ridiculous. The idea of a team leaving Los Angeles alone seems stupid, especially when the alternative moves a team out of Sacramento, a city one tenth LA’s size and with no other major sports franchises. But I promise, give the numbers a chance, and you’ll why shipping Chris Paul and crew north is the best move for the Clippers, for Seattle, and even for the NBA. Let’s put the puzzle pieces together.

Puzzle Piece Number One: Seattle Basketball

When the Sonics left for Oklahoma City in 2008 they were the 28th most valuable team in the NBA. They had a payroll of just over 36 million, without major financial trouble, but also without much recent success on the court. Five years later, they’ve jumped to the number 12 most valuable team, and with superstar Kevin Durant leading the way are a formidable force and title contender.

Why does the team that left Seattle matter? For starters, we see why the city is a tad angry, and why they want a new team so badly. When the Sonics announced the move, I remember friends from Seattle reacting to the news with exclamations of “Oklahoma F%&*ing City?!” only to see a cherished franchise thrive in a new city. People attack LeBron for leaving Cleveland when he did, but the entire franchise leaving hurts a bit more. Looking back and realizing they took the 19-year-old Durant with them, Seattle fans can only shake their heads and ponder what could have been.

If the Clippers come to Seattle, the city not only gets a basketball team, but a contender as well. If they are willing to take the somewhat hapless Kings, even with what is sure to be a high draft choice this June, they should obviously welcome a good team with open arms. As hungry as Seattle fans are for basketball, they are probably the easiest group to convince, and getting the Clippers would be Christmas come early.

The first major roadblock for Seattle would be the city’s ability to support them the Clippers. Compared to that of the team that left Seattle in 2008, the current Clippers’ payroll is almost double, at about $70 million compared to $36 million. The Clippers payroll is also more than $15 million above that of the Kings, the originally proposed move. Even if fans are excited for a new team, if the move doesn’t make financial sense it obviously can’t happen. So does it?

Looking at other teams’ payroll and revenue figures around the NBA, the answer appears to be yes. The Clippers current revenue (about $108 million annually) is behind that of the Spurs ($135M), the Thunder ($127M), the Trailblazers ($117M), and the Cavaliers ($128M), all team that play in markets smaller than Seattle. In addition, in the case of the Cavs and Blazers, the market is not only smaller, but the teams are not as good as the Clippers. Seattle only needs revenue figures at or greater than current numbers for the current Clippers team, something that seems at least plausible given these figures, especially considering (one can at least assume) fan interest will be high.

The other consideration in revenue is not only the media market size, but also the capacity of the stadium, as teams need to sell tickets as major revenue source. The Key Arena, the proposed interim home of an NBA team, is slightly smaller than the Staples Center, where the Clippers currently play. It is also a few thousands seats behind Portland’s Rose Garden and Cleveland’s Quicken Loans Arena. This may be the best arguments against the move, but misses a few key points. The first is that a few thousand seats would not likely cripple the teams finances given revenue from media coverage. The second, and most important fact, is that part of the proposal to move the Kings was to build a new arena. The Key Arena was never proposed as a permanent home of an NBA franchise, so its capacity is significantly less relevant. If investors are willing to build a house for the Kings, they would almost certainly extend the same offer to the Clippers, who are at least worth spending the money on.

Puzzle Piece Number Two: The Clippers

So if this proposal looks good for Seattle, how does it look for the Clippers?

Though the Clippers would leave the second largest city and media market in the country, my proposal is actually in their best interest as well. Leaving Southern California for Washington State gives the Clippers their own city, and may even boost revenue figures by lowering competition for coverage and fans.

The Clippers are a good team, and in a few years they could be a great team, and someday soon, they could very possibly be NBA champions. Yet even if that happens, they will be second place in their own city.

This may sound harsh, but as someone who lived in Los Angeles for nineteen years, I can promise that it is true. The Lakers have and always will be the city’s team. Part of this is history, as the Lakers manage to contend much more frequently than the Staples Center’s other inhabitants. Looking to the roof and seeing the Lakers sixteen Championship banners next to the Clippers zero sends a powerful message, even with the latter’s recent promise. It would take incredible success by the Clippers along with a decade or likely more of failure by the Lakers to significantly alter this balance. The season that just ended provides a near perfect case in point.

Despite loading up last summer in an attempt at another dream team, the Lakers season was never good. Not once did they make headlines as potential playoff threat, and they limped into the playoffs in the number seven spot. When they did fans were ecstatic over a feat that would have been considered failure at the beginning of the season. The Clippers by contrast, were a solid playoff team the entire season, but the only times I opened my browser and saw them on the front page of the LA Times was when they beat the Lakers. In the first season ever where Lob City swept Showtime, the Clippers still could not carve out their own identity. The comparisons are constant between the teams, and even in a season where the Clippers were clearly superior, Los Angeles remains Lakers’ territory.

The Clippers deserve a city and a fan base that they can call their own, which simply will not happen (at least in my lifetime) as long as they compete with the Lakers. Even if the Purple and Gold fail to bounce back from this season or to rebuild for a few years and during this fallow era the Clippers manage to hoist the O’Brien Trophy, long-term loyalties won’t sway. At best, the Clippers could control the city for a season or two, but I cannot image such a shift being more than fleeting, as one season of competitive basketball for the Lakers would push the Clippers back to number two.

The greatest advantage the Clippers have in LA is the massive media market the city offers, but I have to question the benefits of this market when the other local team dominates it so thoroughly. The greatest argument for staying may be that with a good up and coming franchise, the Clippers are only beginning to tap into all the city can give them financially. To an extent that is true, the turnaround just since the Chris Paul trade has been incredible in terms of the team’s value as well as their revenue, but the turnaround also aids my earlier point. Even with this huge turnaround the Clippers are not pulling the revenue one would expect given the size of their hometown. They are a big market team with small to medium market revenue, which can and should change.

Lastly, if the Clippers really worry about leaving Hollywood behind, history indicates it may be a good idea. In football, the Rams and Raiders both left LA in the early 1990s, and both had successful season in their new hometowns. The Rams analogy is particularly poignant, as the team left for a market significantly smaller then Seattle, and within five years had successfully built “the greatest show on turf”, beating the Titans in the Superbowl. Someone may argue that revenue sharing in the NFL had as much to do with this as anything but to believe a revenue sharing scheme is the only cause is a mistaken. Revenue sharing matters, but so does the ability to put together a viable product, which the Clippers have done. As the Rams did on the football field in the 1990s, the Clippers can do on the court now, and leaving LA will only help them.

 Piece 3: Convincing the NBA

So if it works for the team in question and the city in question, all that’s left is convincing the rest of the NBA. For the Kings deal, many people pointed out how the NBA stood to gain significantly, but what about the Clippers proposal? Partially due to many of the factors that make it a good move for the team and the city, the proposal move supports the interests of the NBA as well.

In this case, what helps the Clippers (more revenue) helps the entire league as well. If the team isn’t capitalizing on the benefits of a large market, neither is the league. The opportunity to open up a new market without leaving an old one is rare in sports, but the NBA has one such opportunity with this proposal.

In the age where every major sports league has some sort of revenue sharing system, the entire league benefits from opening up a new market. In the proposed move, the NBA is able to open up Seattle with the presence of a franchise there while seeing minimal losses in Los Angeles. The Lakers will continue to dominate their market, and could expect to only continue to build off their current $197 Million in annual revenue. The Clippers currently pull $108 million annually, a figure that could increase if they no longer compete with the Lakers, even if the market itself is smaller. This does seem plausible, especially given my earlier comparison of Clippers revenue to that of the Spurs, Thunder, the Trailblazers, and the Cavaliers. All currently have higher revenue than the Clippers while playing in smaller markets than Seattle.

The NBA benefits from opening up a new market. At present the LA and Seattle markets together bring $305 million but entirely from Los Angeles. There is $305 in revenue from LA and $0 from Seattle. If the Clippers move to Seattle, it is reasonable to assume they will continue to pull at least $108 million. Looking at the revenue of worse teams in smaller markets (Cavaliers, Trailblazers, etc) I am willing to assume that the current Clippers team playing in Seattle would make significantly more revenue than they currently due under the Lakers’ shadow in Los Angeles.  It is also more than reasonable to assume that Lakers’ revenue figures will continue at their present numbers, if not rise as well as fans who used to watch the Clippers will switch to the Lakers for their basketball. Given these considerations, it is generally reasonable to predict that total revenue as far as the league is concerned will increase if the Clippers move to Seattle. At worst, revenue figures will not fall. In the worst case the league gets $108 million in Seattle and $197M in Los Angeles, but it is very plausible that both these figure will rise.

 Putting the Puzzle in Motion

So if the numbers work for everyone, what will it take to put this idea in motion? If everyone wins, why hasn’t this been discussed, much less acted on, already?

Well, perhaps the biggest difference between the Kings and the Clippers is also the most important: one team is up for sale and the other is not. Donald Sterling has owned the Clippers for more than three decades, sticking with them through all of the awful years to earn the title of longest tenured NBA owner. It seems unlikely that he will want to finally cut ties with them now, which means that he has to decide to move the team.

But again, the move may be in his best interest as well. His team and the NBA both benefit, so as the owner of the that team he certainly sits to benefit as well. While he may not want to sell the team outright, he may be able to attract some of the investors interested in the Kings to the Clippers in order to finance the move and improve the situation of his team. Obviously, these investors sit to benefit from the move. The only aspect where they are worse off with the Clippers as opposed to the Kings would be complete control, but considering that the Clippers have more demonstrated success, having a good investment in an already well run team may be worth ceding or sharing some control.

Unfortunately, this idea is not one I expect to see implemented any time soon, although I do often wonder why Los Angeles has two teams while Seattle has none and why the Clippers do not try to leave. The recent attention brought to Seattle and the NBA may provide the best chance for this proposal. If I were Donald Sterling or the team of Seattle investors, I for one would look to move the Clippers north. Maybe, just maybe, they will realize it’s a good idea and do just that.

Dylan Ackerman took this small break from sabremetrics to weigh in on the Seattle Basketball drama. Until researching this article, he didn’t know the name of the Larry O’Brien trophy.

Champions League Semifinal Preview

by Karthik Sastry

It’s amazing how quickly the world football landscape can change. On April 9, at the end of 90 minutes in a tense second leg at the Westfalenstadion in Dortmund, it appeared an un-fancied Malaga side might secure a place in a triple-Spanish semifinal at the expense of the impressive but wasteful hosts. The headlines could have written themselves: could it be that the Spanish footballing hegemony, so clear in international competition, was inescapable at the club level as well? Two dramatic stoppage-time goals for the home side, however, halted that narrative before it got off the ground. Less than three weeks later, after a tantalizing draw pitted Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund, the top two German sides of the past several years, against Spanish titans Barcelona and Real Madrid respectively in the ultimate competition for club-level supremacy, the Bundesliga representatives emphatically responded with 4-0 and 4-1 victories. Now it is the Germans who are making the more convincing claim to represent the strongest footballing nation in Europe as a Bayern-Dortmund final looms.

Perhaps this interpretation is somewhat presumptuous as both Barcelona and Madrid have incredibly strong home records, neither having lost a game on their home ground in either La Liga or European play this year (more precisely Barca has drawn once in league play and twice in continental play, Madrid twice in each). They might also recall a history of great European comebacks by Spanish sides, including Deportivo La Coruna’s famously overcoming a 1-4 deficit to A.C. Milan at the San Siro, the largest deficit overcome in the Champions League era, and the Catalans’ own defeat of the Rossoneri after a 0-2 away loss in this year’s Round of 16. For the neutral fan, each second leg clash will feature a real possibility of an un-missable, historic reversal and, regardless of the outcomes, some extremely high quality play. Here’s a quick a preview of what to watch for in these week’s matches:

Bayern vs. Barcelona

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First leg recap: There was some pre-match anticipation that Bayern Munich, who lead the Bundesliga with an average 63.8% possession in matches, would attempt to beat Barcelona (who have, unsurprisingly, an even higher 69.2% figure in La Liga) at their own short-passing, ball-control game. Instead, the Bavarians happily conceded 66% possession to the visitors, only to play a devastating counter-attacking style that exposed all of the Catalans’ defensive frailties. On the break, the creative troika of Franck Ribery, Thomas Muller and Arjen Robben made chances for themselves and lone forward Mario Gomez. When Bayern did get their entire team forward, during their rare spells of long possession or set plays, three times they converted their aerial superiority, present in all areas of the pitch (having won 73% of headers), into goals. Barcelona had plenty of time on the ball, but, unsettled by the Bavarians’ physical approach, could offer no answer.

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Key to the second leg: Javi Martinez’s tackling. In the first leg, the physical midfielder, acquired from Basque club Athletic Bilbao for a reported  €40 million ($52 million) this past summer, was tasked with making life uncomfortable for Andres Iniesta and largely succeeded, preventing the Catalan maestro from controlling the match’s tempo alongside his partner Xavi Hernandez. Martinez actually did not have the most tackles in the match, an honor won by his own partner in the center of the pitch, Bastian Schweinsteiger, but the midfielder’s focus on disruption over all else was notable—he completed only 23 passes in the match, less than any starting outfield player on either side other than forward Mario Gomez (substituted off at 71’), but successfully made six tackles and committed six fouls (twice as many as any other player on the pitch). Very likely, Martinez was following specific instructions to shut down Iniesta from his manager Jupp Heynckes, as he averages only 2.7/1.7 domestically and 3.7/1.3 in Europe for those same statistics this year. If Barcelona finds its attacking rhythm at the Nou Camp, the team is perfectly capable of finding four goals against any side in the world; again, it will be up to Bayern’s Spaniard to impose himself in the middle of the pitch.

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Prediction: If Bayern played a physical, counter-attacking game at the Allianz, they will most certainly do the same to a greater extent at the Camp Nou. Barcelona’s thinly stretched defense will also be even frailer without suspended left-back Jordi Alba. That said, it is difficult to imagine that a fitter Lionel Messi, who termed the defeat in Munich “the low point in [his] career,” and his teammates will allow themselves to be humiliated equivalently at home. A low-scoring draw seems likely; a complete turnaround would require a miraculous, but not inconceivable, Messi performance.

Dortmund vs. Madrid

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First leg recap: Dortmund came out of the gates strong and found an early lead when Robert Lewandowski thumped home from Mario Gotze’s well-placed right-side cross. A poor back-pass by center-half Mats Hummels, which immediately led to a Ronaldo tap-in, seemed to let Los Blancos back into the match, but the Germans found another burst of quality at the beginning of the second half to open up a 4-1 lead, with all four goals ultimately coming from the imposing Lewandowski. Dortmund actually had only three more shots on target than the visitors (7-4) and a significantly smaller amount of possession (46%-54%), but succeeded in imposing their blisteringly quick tempo upon a Madrid side more interested in patient build-up play.

 

Key to the match: Mesut Ozil’s Movement. In Dortmund, Madrid manager Jose Mourinho somewhat surprisingly selected Mesut Ozil, Xabi Alonso, Sami Khedira and Luka Modric in the same team. Perhaps the decision, which forced Ozil to move to a less comfortable position on the right flank, was motivated by the necessity of Angel Di Maria’s unavailability, but it also signaled an intent to play a calmer game with, essentially, four central midfielders. The strategy, however, was unsuccessful. Dortmund’s pressing prevented Madrid from finding its rhythm in the center of the pitch, and Ozil, though he did see enough of the ball to complete 47 passes, five more than his Champions League average, had a very small influence on proceedings from his wide position.

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For the second leg it appears that Sami Khedira, who played a full 90 minutes this weekend against cross-town rivals Atletico, will be dropped to the bench, allowing Ozil to move back to his favored central role. The German’s preferred move is to drift toward the flanks as a balance to teammates, including Cristiano Ronaldo and Angel Di Maria, who enjoy doing the opposite; the beauty of this strategy is that is immensely confusing for opposition holding midfielders and fullbacks, who must switch responsibilities lest they be dragged horribly out of position. In the first leg, Dortmund’s double-pivot of Ilkay Gundogan and Sven Bender were allowed to challenge Modric and Khedira directly relatively far up the pitch, and then subsequently make adventurous breaks forward (Gundogan actually had three successful dribbles in the match, one less than Marco Reus and equal with Ronaldo). Ozil, at his best, can unsettle Dortmund’s defensive midfield duo, creating space not only for himself but also Modric and Alonso behind him, freed from the constant pressure, and Ronaldo and Di Maria (potentially) on the wings.

Prediction: Mourinho stated his intent in the pre-match press conference to “try different players and a different system” in the second leg. If he can choose a side better equipped to play at a high kept tempo, then Los Blancos have a very strong chance to put goals on the board. That said, scoring three without conceding or winning by four or more otherwise is a tall task against a usually disciplined Dortmund defense. A reasonable outcome would be a one or two goal Madrid victory, insufficient to prevent the Germans from advancing.

All statistics taken from WhoScored.com

Ooooh, Robin Van Persie!

by Satyajeet Pal

For Arsenal fans, each sight of Robin van Persie scoring a goal is a reminder of the talent Arsene Wenger let slip away last summer. Yet for Manchester United fans, there has been no better spectacle than watching the Flying Dutchman play this season right where he left off.

He has been short of nothing but spectacular for the Red Devils through the first half of the season and has been worth every penny of his ₤24 million ($38.7 million) transfer free from the Gunners plus his ₤250,000-a-week wages. Let’s take a look at exactly what RvP has meant for Manchester United this season:

 Van Persie has been exactly the striker Sir Alex Ferguson hoped he would be, continuing his goal scoring streak from last season. So far this season, van Persie has scored 27 goals in 36 combined Premier League and Champions League appearances (24 from 31, and 3 from 5, respectively), for a whopping average of 0.75 goals per appearance. This is down from a season-high of 0.78 goals per appearance through mid-January following a spell of a few goalless games in March.

 For comparison, last season at Arsenal he had 37 goals in 48 appearances and 30 goals from 38 appearances in the Premier League. Last year, in all competitions, the forward had an average of 0.77 goals per appearance. Both these figures represent a sizeable jump from his career average of 0.46 goals per appearance (including the most recent two years of his career).

 Even after receiving his huge contract from Manchester United, van Persie’s performance (at least in terms of goals) has not seemed to dropped off at all. In fact, he seems to have become an even more prolific scorer after his move to United. What’s impressive about his goal scoring tally this year is that it hasn’t dropped off despite the talent that surrounds him. In his last season at Arsenal, van Persie scored 39.4% of his side’s goals and Theo Walcott was the next leading scorer with 11 goals. This season he is scoring 34.6% of his team’s goals; Wayne Rooney is the second leading scorer with 13 and Chicharito with 11. No matter who is around him, RvP seems to be getting his chances and very often converting them.

 It’s hard to argue that van Persie doesn’t deserve the PFA player of the year again after his stellar season last year. Luis Suarez and Gareth Bale are in the discussion but van Persie has maintained his high level after switching teams last summer and has led Manchester United to the Premier League title this season. He has slotted in well with all the playmakers around him, Rooney, Kagawa, Carrick, and Valencia, producing the goals (often game-winning) for his team. The Red Devils will look to continue their dominance this weekend as they take on Robin van Persie’s old club, Arsenal.

 Data from whoscored.com

Why You Won’t Win Your March Madness Pool (Part 3)

By Max Kaplan

This is part 3 of my March Madness bracket series. In part 1, I showed that Florida was the best team to pick to win it all. In part 2, I explained how to choose the rest of your Final Four depending on your pool size and skill.

First, I’d just like to express my frustration at a fellow Princeton publication: The Princeton Tiger. While we may all be able to relate to this list of March Madness excuses, number 5 (“I’m no sheep”) is precisely the best strategy to win your pool. Actually, it is the very misconceptions of people like this that makes the strategy of choosing undervalued picks possible.

Now on to the rest of the bracket.

March Madness is set up so that each round is worth the same number of points. This is not quite true. If you correctly choose the national championship, by definition you correctly chose them in every other round too, thus doubling the importance of every subsequent round. This is precisely why the first two posts focused on picking the Final Four, where most brackets are won and lost.

However, there are two instances where this may not be the case. First, maybe no one picked any of the Final Four teams correctly (see 2011). Second, you could play with rules that give extra points for upsets. Sure, everyone wants to be ahead after two rounds and to have chosen this year’s VCU, but a much simpler strategy leads to an optimal first two rounds. The following is the best strategy ALWAYS but it probably won’t change the final outcome unless…

Everyone’s Bracket Gets Destroyed

When everyone’s bracket gets destroyed (while somewhat rare), you just need a few more wins than everyone else to walk away with the prize. So here’s my advice: pick all the favorites. Yes, all of them.

You: But Max, didn’t you just tell us to choose undervalued upsets?

Max: Yes, choose an undervalued winner, runner-up, and semifinalists depending on how big your pool is. But unless points are given for upsets, choose the favorite in every other game.

In my bowl confidence column from January, I discovered that people tried to pick upsets to differentiate themselves from the pack. In the end, I found that if you just chose the favorites and ranked them by how much of a favorite they were, you would end up in the 90th percentile without doing anything.

The same concept applies to March Madness. People think that they are smarter than the seeding. They choose upsets to get ahead of the curve. If you get two out of five major upsets (like Florida Gulf Coast and La Salle), it feels like a win. But you could have gotten 3 out of 5 if you had chosen all the favorites, and favorites have a higher chance of winning subsequent rounds too.

Case in point:

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Are you serious? Without upset points, there is no reason to believe Florida and Florida Gulf Coast are almost even money.

This year, if you had chosen only the higher seeded teams in the first two rounds, you would have 44 points (multiply by 10 for ESPN’s point system).  That would be good enough for about the 87th percentile. If you include games where the betting favorite was the higher seed (ex. Minnesota), you could do even better. This is how you differentiate yourself in the case of Upset City. Choose the favorite.

Now, you may ask. Why doesn’t this strategy work for the entire bracket? In short, it does. By choosing the favorite in every game, you guarantee yourself a very high percentile. However, unless you are in a very small pool, you will not win. One person will luckily get more upsets than misses and win. But choosing the favorite in every game for a very small pool is probably the best strategy. Of course, seed may not indicate the favorite in the Elite Eight and later: Ohio St would have been favored over Gonzaga.

Strategy: Choose the betting favorite all the way up to the Elite Eight.

The Upset Points Pool

This is my favorite league and it is the easiest one to gain an advantage, and as you saw above, you could make it into the high 80th percentile for regular pools. Yahoo’s upset points rule is as follows. You get the regular amount of points for every round PLUS the difference of the seeds if you correctly choose an upset.

For example, if you correctly choose an 8 seed over a 9 seed. You get 1 point. If you correctly choose the 9 seed you get 2 points (1+1). Therefore, to break even in the long run, the 9 seed only needs a 33% chance to win to make it a worthwhile gamble. Without loss of generality, you can apply this to every other first round upset.

Breakeven Probability of Upset to make it worthwhile
9 seed – 33%
10 seed – 25%
11 seed – 17%
12 seed – 13%
13 seed – 10%
14 seed – 8%
15 seed – 7%

Under almost all circumstances, these are worthwhile bets regardless of the teams playing. However, this is a simplified version because it isolates the first round. As you reach later rounds, the seeds become closer together (usually high seeds) and the rounds become more valuable regardless of seed. Because of this, it isn’t prudent to choose upsets for the entire bracket.

So where is the cutoff? A full survival analysis would lead to the exact answer. But you are already so ahead of the curve, you have already reached a point of diminishing returns. The point should probably be before the Elite Eight because choosing a correct team would net you 7 points and the upsets are probably not likely enough to make up for that.

A good rule of thumb is to pick your Sweet 16, then have every other high seed be upset in the first round. If you have a two low seeds playing each other in the second round, choose the one who was more likely to win the first game. You will make a killing in the first round. Guaranteed.

Strategy:  same Final Four, only betting favorites for Elite Eight and Sweet 16, only upsets for first 2 rounds

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In my final article in the series, I will talk about the probability of the perfect bracket and actually comb through this year’s numbers to see how well my strategies performed (will perform).

Please comment below your thoughts. Especially if you have any ideas about what we should cover in the future. And please like us on Facebook too.

Why You Won’t Win Your March Madness Pool (Part 2)

By Max Kaplan

In part one, I showed that Florida, a 3 seed, was the best pick for your bracket even though they are not the best team in the tournament. The next step is to choose your other Final Four teams. Before moving on to the rest of the bracket, I added a few bullet points to the bottom of the previous post to help explain why Florida was the best choice.

A Quick Aside

March Madness is set up so that most people feel like they have a chance (and therefore are talented) until the very end. And then when their team loses…they say they saw it coming….87% had Gonzaga moving on.

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Go Big or Go Home except when it’s Small

After choosing your undervalued winner, there are only 2 additional factors (beyond being over or undervalued) that you should consider before filling out the rest of your Final Four: pool size and expertise.

Depending on these two factors, you should adjust your amount of risk. By risk, I mean upsets that are more likely to happen than the nation thinks (like Florida). For any round, you just compare betting lines, expert projections, etc. to the national averages (ESPN, Yahoo).

Pool Size

I will break down pool sizes into 4 arbitrary categories for simplicity: small, medium, large, and massive.

Small (5-15 people)

This is your conventional pool with friends just for fun. Chances are that you would be the only one to pick Florida and your fate would be tied to them. But maybe you don’t need to take that risk. Since they’re all friends, the best strategy is simply to ask all of the people in the pool who they’re picking to win. People love talking about themselves and they won’t figure out that they are actually helping you win. In this way, you don’t even need to extrapolate from the national averages. If all 9 people choose a 1 seed and you are the 10th, choose the best alternative. It’s that simple. This strategy would probably lead you to Florida (or a 2 seed) this year.

As for the rest of the bracket, 2 sub-outcomes could happen. Florida (or whatever your team is) wins, so you win. Or Florida loses. If a favorite (like Louisville) wins instead, you lose. If there is a surprise winner (which is not improbable as there is almost a 50% chance a 3 seed or greater wins), then it comes down to the rest of your bracket. You would probably win anyway if Florida lost in the finals or Final Four since most people had Florida lose by the third round. If Florida implodes right away, now you are at equal footing and still have the other 3 Final Four spots to win.

In a small pool, it is not worth taking huge risks. Remember, a risky strategy (as long as they are good risks) leads to a higher upside but also more incorrect picks on average. So you’ll probably want to be pretty chalky (consisting of mostly favorites) beyond your champion pick. Hence, my final four was Florida, Louisville, Indiana, and Ohio State.

Strategy: 2 or 3 seed to win and chalky rest of bracket

Medium (15-50 people)

A medium sized pool is usually an organization or a company. You still usually know most of the participants but can’t walk around finding who everyone else chose. It is also probable that 1-2 other people picked Florida too. Now, you not only need Florida to win, but you also need to beat those couple other people.

How do you beat those few people? This is a tough decision. You should just do the same chalky picks as in a small group, since you treat it as a new “Florida wins” group with 2-3 people. You no longer have to take risks to stand out from this small crowd. Everyone else who chose Florida probably took some more risks as well, while you should just choose the favorites as often as possible to maximize odds.

Strategy: 2 or 3 seed to win and chalky rest of bracket

Large (50-500 people)

Now, you can expect dozens of people to pick Florida as well. How do you differentiate yourself from them? Well, you choose another highly undervalued pick as your other finalist and put all your eggs in a Michigan State (for example, another 3 seed)-Florida final basket. It is the only way to differentiate yourself while improving your odds. As the pool size increases, keep taking risks from the top down. You should choose undervalued picks for the other Final Four spots too. Maybe Wisconsin and Butler? You get the picture.

Strategy: Perfectly predict the final with neither team being a 1 or 2 seed. Pick other lower seeded Final Four teams as the pool size increases.

Expertise

Choosing a Louisville-Indiana final is not very smart. There is a high likelihood that you can perfectly predict the final and still lose the league. As the rest of your league gets more knowledgeable (for instance, the Princeton Sports Analytics group), you have to take more risks just as you would for a larger group.

Notice how all of this requires no knowledge of basketball. You might think this ruins the excitement of choosing your own picks. This is completely not the case. You can still choose which upsets (as long as they are good risks) and can brag when you predicted the 3 or 4 seed of your choice to make it to the Final Four.

The next post will deal with how to choose the first couple rounds (the next step) and the probability of a perfect bracket.

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Why You Won’t Win Your March Madness Pool (Part 1)

By Max Kaplan

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A couple months ago, I wrote an article that showed how to perform better in bowl confidence pools than 90% of all participants by just following the simple strategy of following the consensus of the nation (by either Yahoo averages or betting lines).

To be successful, you didn’t need to know who was playing or who was better. You didn’t need to pick upsets and you didn’t even need to predict the outcome.

Here, I will try to find a similar strategy for college basketball

The basic underlying theory should apply to March Madness as well. You should not try to predict the outcomes of the games to maximize your chances. Logically speaking, why would you be able to better predict the outcomes of basketball games better than the other millions of brackets? ESPN alone has 8,145,000 entries. And guess what? Most of them think they are above average too. Now that the first (second?) round is done, about 95% still have their national champion pick still alive and probably feel even more confident. Unless you have insider information (and those coaches, athletes, and others that do are not allowed to gamble by NCAA regulations), there is no reason to think you can win your pool with a game-by-game approach.

In each pool, there is only one winner. Presumably, the whole point of making a bracket is to win the pool for bragging rights, since I would never in a million years dream of even thinking of doing anything in the proximity of gambling underage. Therefore, you should play your opponents as opposed to your own bracket, much like in poker.

In essence, you can neither control nor accurately guess 67 probabilistic results, but you can adjust your predictions relative to your competition. You just need to find where others are making probabilistic blunders.

For example, I am very knowledgeable about the Big Ten and the Ivy League because I have a rooting interest in the two. However, the biggest gaff (and the most common mistake) that people can make is overrating their own teams. This is the case for an alma mater, the league that they play in, and, more generally, popular teams that you see on television (Duke, North Carolina, etc). It is because of this that I consciously chose fewer Big Ten teams to succeed than I would have preferred. In a pool of Duke grads, it wouldn’t be very smart to chose Duke to go all the way.

Now you may ask, so what? How can this help me win?

Below is a chart of all teams with a greater than 1% chance of winning according to betting lines (historically, betting lines are very good at predicting outcomes).  It finds the difference between the % of people that chose each team to win the national championship and the adjusted (so that the percentages add up to 100) betting lines should show which teams are under and overvalued.

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7 out of the 8 favorites to win the title are overvalued. People like choosing favorites. The lone exception is Florida, who has 7 to 1 odds but was chosen by only 2.7% . The betting lines have Florida as 3rd, while the bracket entries have Florida as 9th. This is why I chose Florida to win it all.

Below are the same percentages sorted by Yahoo % instead of betting line. The top 7 most popular picks on Yahoo are all overvalued. This may be because we round up high percentages. Notice that Louisville is both the consensus best team and most overvalued. There is a very high chance that a 1 or 2 seed wins the tournament. Because of this, we assume that there is almost no chance that anyone else can win it. However, the chances are more than the 13% that is given by Yahoo users.

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Winning your pool almost always comes down to choosing the winner. While Florida is still not the favorite to win the tournament, you are trying to outdo your peers. For instance, if you chose Louisville, you would still most likely need to correctly guess the other finals team as well as 3 or 4 Final Four teams in order to win the pool. Winning your pool suddenly shifts from choosing 6 games correctly (round of 64 to finals) to 11 or more. Choosing an undervalued team increases your odds of winning a pool even if it means you are less likely to choose the champion.

If the betting data existed publicly for every round (and please comment below if you can find something like this), this would be the best strategy to fill out the entire bracket and we would likely end up with a very high national percentile.

I will continue this search for the winning bracket later this week, where I will look beyond just choosing the national champion.

[Late Edit:]

3 Implications of Choosing an Undervalued Team like Florida

1. The betting line gave Florida an 8.7% chance to win it all. I needed the betting line to be fairly accurate in order to compare it with the picks on Yahoo. In reality, I could have used Nate Silver’s or any other “expert” model as the baseline. But historically, betting lines have been the best. The reasoning is as follows. If someone could consistently create a model that could forecast games better than the betting line, they would just bet on that team and make boatloads of money. The line would shift until it is no longer profitable. Oh, and they wouldn’t publicly release the profitable model either. Free Market 1, Experts 0.

2. Notice that it is much easier to lose money choosing the wrong team than it is to make money choosing the right team. Louisville was -15.7% and Indiana was -6.3%. Just like in poker, it is much much easier to squander your money than it is to profit.

3. So choosing Florida (+6%) gives you an 8.7% chance of being in the top 2.7% of brackets. With all else being equal, this choice alone gives you an average national percentile close to 56%. However, choosing an underdog is a risky strategy and it leads to more disparate outcomes. You will win your pool more than average but also be far less likely to finish in other high percentiles (below 97th). It is somewhat an all or nothing strategy. However, winning should be the only outcome that matters.

NCAA Tournament 2013: Round of 64 Picks for Friday’s Games

By Chad Horner

Yesterday, I posted my picks for the tournament games that will be played tomorrow; I’m back with my picks for Friday’s games.

Once again, I encourage you to join our Tournament Challenge group and compete against our writers and readers!

On to the picks.  As with yesterday, games appear in the order that they will be played.

(2) Duke Blue Devils over (15) Albany Great Danes

(5) Wisconsin Badgers over (12) Ole Miss Rebels

The Rebels are peaking at the right time, and their fast-paced style of play is something that the Badgers aren’t used to seeing in the Big 10.  However, in four games against tournament teams this year with more than 66 possessions (the midpoint between the Rebels’ (71) and Badgers’ (62) averages), Wisconsin is 3-1, beating Michigan, Illinois, and Cal, and falling to Creighton.  If Ole Miss manages to control the pace, which I don’t expect to happen, Wisconsin still has a good chance.  I’m going with the Badgers here, but it’ll be closer than people expect.

(8) North Carolina State Wolfpack over (9) Temple Owls

Full disclosure: I am an avid NC State fan.  However, this is a great matchup for the Wolfpack.  The Owls have a mediocre defense, and I don’t see them stopping NC State from going for at least 75 or 80 points.  The Pack’s two biggest weaknesses are forcing turnovers and preventing opponents from getting offensive rebounds; Temple doesn’t turn the ball over very much anyway, and they don’t do a good job of offensive rebounding.  I don’t see them being able to take advantage of any of the holes in NC State’s game.  The Wolfpack should win comfortably.

(2) Miami Hurricanes over (15) Pacific Tigers

(7) Creighton Blue Jays over (10) Cincinnati Bearcats

Since knocking off Marquette in overtime back in January, Cincinnati has played 7 games against the tournament teams from the Big East – they’re 1-6 in those games, with the one win coming at home against Villanova.  There was a point in time this season when they were playing like an elite team, but that was a long time ago.  Creighton – the best shooting team in the country – should be able to overcome the Bearcats tough defense.

(13) Boise State Broncos or La Salle Crusaders over (4) Kansas State Wildcats

Kansas State’s opponent, and my confidence in this pick, hinges on the outcome of tonight’s First Four matchup between Boise State and La Salle.  I really like the Broncos’ chances of upsetting Kansas State.  They’ve proven that they can beat, and compete, with top teams away from home – they defeated Creighton on the road, and lost on the road to Michigan State, UNLV, and San Diego State by a combined 9 points.  I can’t trust La Salle as much, although they have beaten VCU on the road, and defeated Butler and Villanova at home as well.  Either way, this is mainly a pick against a Kansas State team that I find incredibly overrated.  Unlike whoever their opponent will be, they do not have a single impressive road win this season – yes, technically they defeated Florida on a neutral court, but the game was played in Kansas City.  I feel very good about the Broncos’ chances of pulling off the upset, and pretty good about the Crusaders’ as well.

(1) Indiana Hoosiers over (16) James Madison Dukes or Long Island University Brooklyn Blackbirds

(10) Colorado Buffaloes over (7) Illinois Fighting Illini

Colorado has two strengths that match up particularly well with weaknesses in the Illini.  First, they have a strong shooting defense.  When is the last time Illinois shot over 45.3% from the field?  January 5th!  Over two months ago!  They’re also in the bottom 100 in the country in terms of defensive rebound rate, while Colorado is in the top 100 in offensive rebound rate.  It’s a good matchup for the Buffaloes, and I expect them to advance.

(2) Georgetown Hoyas over (15) Florida Gulf Coast Eagles

(2) Ohio State Buckeyes over (15) Iona Gaels

(8) North Carolina Tar Heels over (9) Villanova Wildcats

Each of these teams has seen drastic improvement over the second half of the season, and both are coming into the tournament playing their best basketball of the year.  Villanova relies on free throws for points more than any other team in the country, by a lot.  Unfortunately for the Wildcats, the Tar Heels don’t foul people!  Without the points from free throws that they normally rely on, I expect Villanova to fall to  North Carolina to win this one.

(3) Florida Gators over (14) Northwestern State Demons

(10) Oklahoma Sooners over (7) San Diego State Aztecs

This has to be one of the least enticing matchups of the first round.  It should be quite a defensive struggle.  Although the Aztecs have a great defense, Oklahoma has proven they can beat a great defense, two of them actually: Kansas and OK State.  I think it’ll be very close, but I’ll go with the Sooners here, more on a hunch than anything else.

(10) Iowa State Cyclones over (7) Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Both teams have elite offenses according to Kenpom – Notre Dame 12th, Iowa St. 8th – but they do it in very different ways.  Iowa State is 34th in the nation in adjusted tempo, Notre Dame is 320th.  There aren’t any teams in the Big East who play at a pace faster than the Cyclones, except for DePaul, the worst team in the league.  How did Notre Dame do against the Blue Demons of DePaul?  They beat them twice.  But both games went to overtime.  I don’t think that bodes well for them here.  The Cyclones will be able to control the pace, and that will allow them to be victorious.

(1) Kansas Jayhawks over (16) Western Kentucky Hilltoppers

(11) Minnesota Golden Gophers over (6) UCLA Bruins (From earlier post)

At first glance, this seems like an obvious pick based off of the way the teams will match up inside – the Gophers are first in the country in offensive rebound rate, while the Bruins are 267th in the country in defensive rebound rate.  Tons of second chances for Minnesota right!?  Well, yes.  Unfortunately that doesn’t always seem to matter.  The Golden Gophers have played 3 teams this season – Florida State, Illinois, and Northwestern – who do a worse job than UCLA of preventing their opponents from getting offensive rebounds, and yet they are only 3-3 against these teams.  So why pick them anyway?  Well, all of that aside, they’ve just played better than UCLA has this season, and the Bruins just lost Jordan Adams, who has been their best offensive player (sorry Shabazz), for the rest of the year.