Bowl Pool - Initial Probabilities of winning and Duke's Mayo Bowl eliminations

 OK, we have finally arrived.  This is the moment of truth, or the stretch run, or crunch time – pick whatever analogy you want.  I’ve managed to generate the probabilities for 1^st, 2^nd & 3^rd.  More on that later.

All 3 games were played today, which was nice to see.  A lot of people won points, a lot of people lost points.  At this point, most of that is just a means to an ends.  For example, Scott H. #1 went 3/3 today and won 47 points and who cares?  He is already mathematically eliminated from all places.  However many points you put on teams doesn’t mean a whole heck of a lot at this point.  It’s all baked in.  Your only goal from here on out is to not be eliminated.  I will tell you when you could be.

Often times you will need to root against whatever team you picked.  That’s because your path to one of the places could be blocked by someone that picked the same game as you, but for more points.  I love finding those things.  I have a program that tells you which games are the most important for you to win that I run for the March Madness pool.  I’ll see if I can figure out how to adapt it for the Bowl pool.

For example, I only have 24 points on Pittsburgh in the Peach Bowl.  Doesn’t sound like much, right?  If Michigan State wins, my chances of winning the pool drop 83%, so that’s kind of a critical game for me.  On the flip side, I have 16 points in the Fiesta Bowl on Oklahoma State.  If I lose that game, my odds don’t change much, even though it’s pretty close to the same number of points I put on the Peach Bowl.  It all depends on what other people took and how many points they took them for.

As a result, I can determine what games can knock people out.  More on that later.

One important thing to remember is that my math depends on every game left actually being played.  No guarantees there.  If another game gets cancelled, everything could change.  People that were eliminated may have another chance.  It’s hard to say.  I don’t factor that into the calculations.

Anyway, here are the points rankings:

1. Scott H. #2: 387 (-371)

2. Hutch H.: 365 (-334)

3. Klei R.: 362 (-332)

4. Becky H.: 355 (-288)

5. Daniel E.: 348 (-356)

6. Mark A.: 346 (-347)

7. Michelle L. #1: 340 (-371)

8. Matt N.: 336 (-307)

9. Chad L.: 336 (-335)

10. Josiah T. #1: 334 (-389)

11. Adam O. #3: 325 (-345)

12. Brian K.: 325 (-358)

13. Mike N.: 324 (-378)

14. Larry G. #2: 324 (-441)

15. Pete J. #2: 315 (-382)

16. Josiah T. #2: 313 (-406)

17. Mike W.: 307 (-338)

18. Jason S.: 304 (-333)

19. Adam O. #2: 304 (-366)

20. Adam O. #1: 300 (-370)

21. Michelle L. #2: 296 (-396)

22. Adam O. #4: 292 (-370)

23. Jay H. #2: 290 (-391)

24. Ben S.: 290 (-396)

25. Cam L.: 288 (-342)

26. Pete J. #1: 286 (-411)

27. Dylan B.: 284 (-363)

28. Stefan K.: 273 (-363)

29. Marc R.: 271 (-308)

30. Brad R.: 269 (-331)

31. Ryan W.: 269 (-368)

32. Dan D.: 261 (-327)

33. Amy L.: 257 (-416)

34. Dylan L.: 256 (-381)

35. Weston T. (Shane): 244 (-461)

36. Emily T.: 241 (-441)

37. Ally H.: 239 (-385)

38. Damien R.: 237 (-429)

39. Grant F.: 236 (-446)

40. Brett W.: 235 (-386)

41. Matt M.: 228 (-435)

42. Larry G. #1: 225 (-510)

43. Scott H. #1: 221 (-448)

44. Brent S.: 209 (-331)

45. Adam E.: 208 (-410)

46. Dustin B.: 205 (-380)

47. Lee K.: 191 (-402)

48. Jay H. #1: 162 (-445)

49. Creighton H.: 153 (-524)

50. Tom B.: 134 (-470)

51. Doug L.: 122 (-432)

…and the net points:

1. Becky H.: 67

2. Hutch H.: 31

3. Klei R.: 30

4. Matt N.: 29

5. Scott H. #2: 16

6. Chad L.: 1

7. Mark A.: -1

8. Daniel E.: -8

9. Adam O. #3: -20

10. Jason S.: -29

11. Michelle L. #1: -31

11. Mike W.: -31

13. Brian K.: -33

14. Marc R.: -37

15. Mike N.: -54

15. Cam L.: -54

17. Josiah T. #1: -55

18. Adam O. #2: -62

18. Brad R.: -62

20. Dan D.: -66

21. Pete J. #2: -67

22. Adam O. #1: -70

23. Adam O. #4: -78

24. Dylan B.: -79

25. Stefan K.: -90

26. Josiah T. #2: -93

27. Ryan W.: -99

28. Michelle L. #2: -100

29. Jay H. #2: -101

30. Ben S.: -106

31. Larry G. #2: -117

32. Brent S.: -122

33. Pete J. #1: -125

33. Dylan L.: -125

35. Ally H.: -146

36. Brett W.: -151

37. Amy L.: -159

38. Dustin B.: -175

39. Damien R.: -192

40. Emily T.: -200

41. Adam E.: -202

42. Matt M.: -207

43. Grant F.: -210

44. Lee K.: -211

45. Weston T. (Shane): -217

46. Scott H. #1: -227

47. Jay H. #1: -283

48. Larry G. #1: -285

49. Doug L.: -310

50. Tom B.: -336

51. Creighton H.: -371

Remember when I said that the net points was more important because it more closely signifies your health.  This is where we can see that pretty easily.  11 of the bottom 13 entries in net points are eliminated from all 3 payouts.  6 of the top 7 entries in net points have >10% chance to win something.  That’s a pretty high correlation.

So, there are 14 entries that can not win anything.  Sadly, they won’t be referenced much after this.  Here are the unfortunate 14:

Creighton H.

Damien R.

Doug L.

Dylan L.

Emily T.

Grant F.

Larry G. #1

Larry G. #2

Lee K.

Matt M.

Pete J. #1

Scott H. #1

Tom B.

Weston T. (Shane)

So, I started displaying the probabilities of winning using a matrix last March Madness pool and I kind of like it, so I am going to do it here.  It’s ranked in total chance of winning something:

Entry	1st Place	2nd Place	3rd Place
Becky H.	29.86%	11.14%	6.67%
Klei R.	14.34%	10.46%	8.27%
Matt N.	7.71%	11.48%	9.34%
Mark A.	9.66%	7.10%	5.88%
Hutch H.	5.47%	6.90%	8.05%
Brad R.	3.72%	8.00%	4.14%
Marc R.	6.18%	4.24%	4.57%
Chad L.	3.59%	4.79%	5.57%
Stefan K.	3.27%	3.64%	3.62%
Mike W.	1.94%	3.74%	4.78%
Jason S.	2.14%	3.52%	3.61%
Adam O. #3	2.15%	3.26%	3.33%
Scott H. #2	0.55%	2.34%	4.87%
Pete J. #2	1.86%	2.52%	3.36%
Dan D.	2.01%	2.30%	2.73%
Brian K.	0.89%	2.77%	3.32%
Michelle L. #1	1.08%	2.25%	2.86%
Daniel E.	0.46%	1.28%	2.56%
Adam E.	1.11%	1.39%	1.53%
Cam L.	0.67%	1.34%	1.95%
Ryan W.	0.60%	1.29%	1.65%
Josiah T. #1	0.02%	1.20%	1.53%
Adam O. #4	Initial	0.85%	1.27%
Dylan B.	0.09%	0.79%	0.98%
Ally H.	0.31%	0.51%	0.78%
Brent S.	0.29%	0.36%	0.80%
Adam O. #2	Initial	0.18%	0.63%
Ben S.	0.02%	0.15%	0.42%
Jay H. #2	Initial	0.02%	0.21%
Mike N.	Initial	0.02%	0.21%
Dustin B.	Initial	0.07%	0.15%
Adam O. #1	Initial	Initial	0.12%
Brett W.	Initial	Initial	0.12%
Amy L.	Initial	0.02%	0.07%
Jay H. #1	Initial	0.02%	0.06%
Michelle L. #2	Initial	0.04%	0.01%
Josiah T. #2	Initial	Initial	0.03%
Creighton H.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Damien R.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Doug L.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Dylan L.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Emily T.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Grant F.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Larry G. #1	Initial	Initial	Initial
Larry G. #2	Initial	Initial	Initial
Lee K.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Matt M.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Pete J. #1	Initial	Initial	Initial
Scott H. #1	Initial	Initial	Initial
Tom B.	Initial	Initial	Initial
Weston T. (Shane)	Initial	Initial	Initial

The way to read this is that you want to avoid anything in red.  That means you are eliminated from getting that place.  Once that happens, I will put the team name that knocked you out of that place in the cell.  The other way to read this is that these are the probabilities of winning the places listed.  For example, Beck H. has a whopping 29.86% chance of winning the pool.  She also has an 11.14% chance of getting 2^nd place.  I think you will find that the sum of each column = 100%.

The math behind this assumes that each game is a coin flip (each team has a 50/50 chance of winning).  That obviously isn’t true.  Alabama / Cincinnati is not a coin flip.  I haven’t factored in weights yet.  I could, but I am too lazy to do it.  I always think I will do it, and then I never get around to it.  Honestly, it’s enough to run the stats that I run.

But there are more games tomorrow.  They are pretty nicely spaced and I’m not working tomorrow, so I’m going to update throughout the day.

Here are the eliminations for the Duke’s Mayo Bowl tomorrow:

If North Carolina Wins:

Jay H.#1 is eliminated from 2^nd  & 3^rd place contention.

Jay H. #2 is eliminated from 2^nd place contention.

 

If South Carolina Wins:

Amy L. is eliminated from 2^nd & 3^rd place contention.

Michelle L. #2 is eliminated from 2^nd & 3^rd place contention.

Mike N. is eliminated from 2^nd place contention.

So that’s not much.  No one is going to be knocked out for 1^st regardless of who wins the Duke’s Mayo Bowl tomorrow morning.  All the odds will change once the first game is over, and there will be more eliminations in the 2^nd game, so come back to the blog to see if you are at risk.

You can think of this as a game of poker.  Instead of chips, people have percentage points.  If you are going to be eliminated, you are pushing all your points all in.  Whoever winds up with 100% wins at the end.  However, as games progress, people’s odds will go up and down as games that are advantageous for you or disadvantageous for you finish.  Hopefully, it keeps going up, but it rarely does.  And towards the end, whoever wins will probably have to win a few “must win” games.  It’s a little less important in the Bowl pool than March Madness, but it will probably still happen.

All right, enjoy the Duke’s Mayo Bowl tomorrow morning.  I’ll keep the stats updated throughout the day.

Good luck!!!!!