NFL

Last week:  2-1  (posted only at the RX)

I am very excited to be in a challenging spot this time of year with a losing record. Not happy, but excited. The last couple years I was way ahead at this juncture but now I get to try to pull out of a 9-11 start (before the 2-1 last week) and see if I can get to at least 53 or 54%. I'll probably only have 25-30 more plays the rest of the year so looking for a 60%+ performance in the final couple months.

Documented forum record

Career:  332-263-19  (55.8%) ATS

2002:  58-47-4  (55%)
2003:  32-23-1  (58%)
2004:  58-64-1  (48%)
2005:  48-34-3  (59%)
2006:  34-29-3  (54%)
2007:  34-24-4  (59%)
2012:  31-19-2  (62%)
2013:  26-11-1  (70%)
2014:  11-12-0  (48%)  -$740.....ROI:  -5.9%

Career breakdown:
Sides:  321-257-19  (56%).....avg line:  -108
Teasers:  11-6-0  (64%).....avg line:  -106


Introducing something I've been working on all season. It's a unique calculation I created to evaluate each team's offensive and defensive production. I've never seen anybody utilize this type of analysis. It may work, may not, but we'll find out one way or the other. It takes out a lot of the "fluff" that goes into the final score of a game and leaves us with a more accurate view of a team's performance to date.

I went through the play-by-play of every game, 3153 possessions through Week 10, and applied my calculations by converting the data to create a point spread adjustment. This allows me to create my own line for each game. For now, I'm going to display the point adjustment values for each team on offense and defense year to date:


OFFENSE

1		Denver	9.49
2		Green Bay	9.09
3		Indianapolis	8.13
4		New Orleans	7.72
5		Kansas City	5.82
6		San Diego	5.73
7		New England	4.97
8		Pittsburgh	4.19
9		Dallas	2.98
10		Seattle	2.83
11		Baltimore	2.61
12		Miami	1.31
13		NY Giants	1.19
14		Atlanta	0.75
15		Washington	0.12
16		San Francisco	-0.04
17		Arizona	-0.46
18		Detroit	-1.20
19		Cleveland	-1.30
20		Chicago	-1.35
21		Philadelphia	-2.07
22		Houston	-2.43
23		Carolina	-2.79
24		Cincinnati	-3.10
25		Tennessee	-3.99
26		St. Louis	-4.58
27		NY Jets	-5.45
28		Minnesota	-5.62
29		Buffalo	-5.86
30		Tampa Bay	-7.18
31		Oakland	-9.14
32		Jacksonville	-10.04

The corresponding number represents the amount of points the offense is better or worse than an average team. Now for the defense:


DEFENSE

1		Detroit	8.37
2		Miami	7.15
3		Buffalo	6.50
4		Arizona	5.53
5		Denver	4.20
6		Philadelphia	3.32
7		Cleveland	3.13
8		San Francisco	2.98
9		Baltimore	2.53
10		Minnesota	2.46
11		Kansas City	1.66
12		Houston	1.44
13		Seattle	1.29
14		Indianapolis	0.59
15		Jacksonville	-0.46
16		Dallas	-0.59
17		NY Jets	-1.01
18		Pittsburgh	-1.14
19		NY Giants	-1.33
20		Cincinnati	-1.33
21		Green Bay	-1.43
22		New England	-1.59
23		St. Louis	-2.61
24		Tennessee	-3.16
25		Washington	-3.23
26		Carolina	-3.45
27		Oakland	-4.10
28		Chicago	-4.33
29		New Orleans	-4.80
30		Tampa Bay	-4.93
31		San Diego	-5.24
32		Atlanta	-7.11

Here's where we see the amount of points the defense is better or worse than an average defense except the numbers are opposite; a positive number indicates how many fewer points the defense allows and a negative number shows how many more points allowed.


OVERALL

1		Denver	13.69
2		Indianapolis	8.73
3		Miami	8.46
4		Green Bay	7.66
5		Kansas City	7.48
6		Detroit	7.17
7		Baltimore	5.14
8		Arizona	5.07
9		Seattle	4.12
10		New England	3.38
11		Pittsburgh	3.05
12		San Francisco	2.94
13		New Orleans	2.92
14		Dallas	2.39
15		Cleveland	1.83
16		Philadelphia	1.25
17		Buffalo	0.64
18		San Diego	0.49
19		NY Giants	-0.13
20		Houston	-0.99
21		Washington	-3.11
22		Minnesota	-3.16
23		Cincinnati	-4.44
24		Chicago	-5.67
25		Carolina	-6.23
26		Atlanta	-6.35
27		NY Jets	-6.46
28		Tennessee	-7.15
29		St. Louis	-7.19
30		Jacksonville	-10.50
31		Tampa Bay	-12.10
32		Oakland	-13.24

A basic example of how this would work is if you take the bookend teams, Denver and Oakland, and they played each other you would add the difference of the two point adjustments which, in this case, is the most extreme situation of 27 points (rounded). Add in home field advantage of roughly 3 points and you would get Denver at -30 at home and -24 in Oakland. Ironically, (and probably coincidentally), they just played in Oakland last week and the Broncos won 41-17....by 24 points. Of course, the data would have been slightly different before last week's games but you get the idea.

It remains to be seen how predictive this is going to be. I can vouch for the accuracy and theory behind the calculations but you never know how things will pan out until you send it out on the battlefield. How you apply the data matters a great deal as well and I will be adding some more detail to get the final line predictions. It took me all year to catch up the data after I brainstormed the idea around Week 2 or 3 and just finally got things up to date. I kept a snapshot of the numbers for each week starting in Week 4 (after the teams had three games) so I'm able to go back and produce a line for each game from the past seven weeks and see what I can figure out.

I ran out of time this week to do an analytical rundown of every game like I had planned but should have that firing next week. Until then, here's a quick list of my plays this week. These plays are not based on the work above but rather strong and proven situational analysis which I feel should usually overrule statistical analysis when applicable, at least in this league. I would use the above work for games I did not have a strong situational angle on, or use some kind of balance of several different styles of handicapping. Time doesn't allow for write-ups:


WEEK 11

Cincinnati +7 -110  ($550 to win $500)

Tampa Bay +7 +105  ($500 to win $525)

Oakland +10 -105  ($525 to win $500)

Indianapolis -3 -103  ($515 to win $500)




Futures - Regular Season wins

Denver o11.5 +105  ($2500 to win $2625)
New England o10.5 -155  ($2500 to win $1613)