Making Extra Money on Over or Unders
Scott Morris | December 12, 2018
A little homework can dramatically Increase Your Winning
Stats in football must be viewed in perspective. One or two big offensive plays or defensive lapses can skew ratios. Some teams may have uncharacteristic lucky games, catch another team playing poorly, or have capitalized on certain unique match-ups.
Median as opposed to mean (average) numbers are usually more revealing. The “median” is the “middle” value in a list of numbers.
Example:
For offense: If you have final scores for team “A” of: 26, 31, 3, 27, and 23 points, the average score would be 22. The atypical number of 3 creates an average that in four out of five contests would be below the other actual offensive outputs.
To find the median, put the scores (or other stats) in numerical order, and take the one in the middle. This would be 26, and is a more accurate indicator of a possible result.
For defense: We use the same methodology. If team “B” gives up 21, 28, 27, 6, and 38 points, the average score would be 24. The median would be 28, which would be a more realistic gauge, to project a defensive performance.
You need to wait until later in the season to have enough tangible data. That would be now.
In 2017, NFL total scores averaged close to 46 points per game. Therefore, if team “A” scored 3 more points per game than the NFL average, and team “B” gave up 5 more points above the average, an odds-maker and/or computer (before considering other factors) would project that if Team “A” plays team “B” they would score 8 more points above the average (3 + 5) of 46, for a projected total of close to 54 points.
For those willing to do the homework, look for number differentials that are substantially different than the game totals.
You should dramatically increase your winning percentage!
Contributed by John Rothschild
(Recent articles at SI, ESPN, Bloomberg News, New York Sports Scene)
Author of Best Selling:
Football Betting Made Easy
Still Time to Order for the Holidays.
