[personal] RE: [Husker] USC-Nebraska odds

[Steve Reichenbach]

The lines are pretty accurate predictors of games, but are set to
equalize bets (and so reflect the weighted predictions of thousands
of people).

Computer ratings systems are designed to predict relative strengths
and the best ones seem to be able to beat the lines at predicting.

Here are some online samplings of the spread (if I read them right):

10.2 http://homepages.cae.wisc.edu/~dwilson/rsfc/rate/matthews.txt (?)
12.0 http://powerratings.com/cfootball.htm
12.7 http://members.cox.net/wclaassen/2006season.htm (?)
13.7 http://www.bornpowerindex.com/ (?)
14.2 http://www.lazindex.com/CFD1A.htm (?)
16.4 http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/fbt06.htm
16.7 http://home.att.net/~keepers.football/wsb/html/view.cgi-html2.html
18.0 http://www.virtual-elrod.com/files/forecast.htm
18.5 http://www.bornpowerindex.com/ (?)
19.1 http://mysite.verizon.net/res6oxy8/id12.html
22.0 http://www.jhowell.net/cf/cfpred.txt
22.1 http://members.aol.com/powerrater/col-foot.htm
(?) May not include home-field

One site (which has USC as 22pt favorites) lists the odds of USC
winning straight up as .828.

Of course, because so few scores are available from this year, many
of these programs may be using last years scores, which would favor
USC.  So, we might be able to tell more about this year's NU team
than the scores so far this year indicate.

Still, these objective predictors aren't encouraging about NU's
chances.  None of the best computer ratings have USC lower than
third and none of them have NU higher than 14.

NU is a decided underdog, but it would be a huge win for the team
--- thrusting them into the BCS race --- and the program --- giving
Callahan a win over one of the best respected coaches on his home
field with two weeks to prepare, which is much more to show recruits
than hopeful expectations based on his pro coaching experience.

With respect to betting, I was confident that NU would beat the
line against La Tech (about 28 points), which they did.  The line
this week is about 18.5.  Most of the computers think that the
Huskers will do better than that.  So do I.  I think the Husker
offense will score some points and I don't think the defense will
give up a high scoring game.


> Date: Mon, 11 Sep 2006 12:07:20 -0700 (PDT)
> From: Travis Stephens <stephenstravis1 at yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: [personal] RE: [Husker] USC-Nebraska odds
> To: Sklarbodds at cox.net, husker at tssi.com
> 
> Hi
>    
>   If you feel that Michigan is not overrated and agree that Michigan belongs in the Top 10 in both polls then NU has to be ranked 11th.  As far as I'm concerned Michigan has been overrated since 1997.
>    
>   Travis
> 
> Skylar Dodds <Sklarbodds at cox.net> wrote:
>   SRL> 3). Beaten Michigan- maybe the most overrated team in the Top 20 of both polls.
> 
> There were / are a lot of people who don't agree with that statement,
> that's clearly your own opinion.
> 
> 
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