Wins, Losses & "Wins"
by PSU_Buch on Oct 4, 2011 10:55 AM EDT
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PrintI am seeing a trend developing here based on Penn State's performance in games and the fan/media reaction to it. I believe we need to add a new item to the traditional W/L columns for Penn State. You will have your self-explanatory Wins and Losses, but add "Wins" (always written with quotation marks and accompanied by air quotes when brought up in conversation) - W/L/"W."
"Wins" are games where PSU finishes with more points than its opponent (so Wins) that are treated as Losses by everyone who follows or covers the program. So for example:
Penn State fans are again calling for Jay Paterno's head after this week's "Win" at Indiana to open conference play.
This season, Penn State's adjusted record would be 2-1-2, which explains why a 4-1 winning record using the less accurate, traditional system is actually a losing record for the Lions.
In this age of sabermetrics and advanced statistical analysis, I believe it is time to move beyond the staid, time-worn methods of tracking Penn State's record to better reflect the result of each game, not just the final score.
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This actually exists.
I know this is a joke, but such data kind of exists in Football Outsiders’ adjusted score metric.
http://www.sbnation.com/ncaa-football/2011/8/3/2341404/2011-penn-state-nittany-lions-football
Yea, Bill's metrics are pretty good
And do a good job showing what Team A should do against Team B, and adjusting records accordingly.
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by Jeff Junstrom on Oct 4, 2011 12:17 PM EDT up reply actions
We'd need the opposite as well
The “Moral Victory” where you come up just a few points short but didn’t get blown out as bad as expected. The “L+” to balance the “W-”. We could also have a “M” for “Meh” where the game was so uninteresting that no one really cares whether it was a win or a loss. PSU wouldn’t need it but a team like Duke or Indiana or somewhere where football is just a pleasant pastime until basketball finally starts.
"Illegitimus non Carborundum!" (Don't let the bastards wear you down)
A crude proxy for what you're talking about is our record Against the Spread (ATS)
After all, there are losses, and then there are “losses,” like perhaps, what happened against Illinois last year.
Penn State is a woeful 0-5 ATS this year. (See how long it takes to toss a coin and have it come up tails five times in a row.) I think that helps demonstrate that the team is not competing at the level penn state fans (and the gambling public) expect.
I wouldn't trust old rooster me neither.
Which adds to the mystery
of how in the hell we are now -4 against Iowa. I know the Vegas wise guys aren’t trying to lose money, so what gives??
"I don't think you can progress in this game unless you know about the past."
-Silas Redd
Good question,
I don’t know that I can answer it, but here are my guesses.
1. Iowa also really, really sucks. Focusing on PSU, we probably tend to over-emphasize how bad our team is this year compared to the rest of the B1G. After the game on Saturday, I said that PSU is the third worst tema in the conference, but I doubt we actually finish in 9th place.
2. The computers (i.e. the computer models) play a big role in making the lines, and the computers like us. The computers don’t remember what happened against Iowa last year or in 2008. They don’t assume that the Iowa coaches own our coaches. They just look at yards per play for/against each team and similar stats and come up with a predicted outcome. PSU looks better than Iowa right now from the computers perspectives.
3. Penn State is more of a public team than Iowa, and so casual fans and casual bettors will instinctively take PSU b/c they like PSU more than Iowa. This seems like the best reason for why the line keeps moving, but honestly I have no idea why people are taking Iowa at this point.
I wouldn't trust old rooster me neither.
sorry, why people are taking PSU at this point.
Iowa +155 on the moneyline seems like a great bet, though obviously I can’t take that.
I wouldn't trust old rooster me neither.
I expect the total to be quite low too.
With it being a home game for PSU, I’m not shocked at a relatively close point spread if you figure the total will be low….I just thought it would be the other way.
I’m on Iowa, Pitt, and Oklahoma so far….BOOO me :(
Unortunately, knowing your team well as a gambler can bring out some tough choices (if you’re willing to make them). I’m 2-1 in my career against PSU…If I was 67% in my career overall, I’d be a happy (rich) man. I’m not proud of doing it, but this one seems to easy to pass up.
This line could do some boogying this week if it is announced we roll with one QB.
"my dad says Michigan used to be good"
I think the o/u is 44.
We discussed the line at length last night when recording the joint podcast with BHGP. I must have said “I don’t know where Penn State’s points are going to come from” about 20 times. The BHGP guys say their defense is kind of bad, and don’t really defend the deep pass well. I’m not sure that really helps PSU — we haven’t hit many of those passes lately.
Also I just realized that I said something totally wrong about Chaz Powell catching an opening bomb against Iowa as if it happened last year, which it obviously didn’t. Crap. Booze.
by Chris Grovich on Oct 4, 2011 1:53 PM EDT up reply actions
i woulda guessed mid-high 30's
and still banged under
the under has been magic this year in PSU games
my book doesn’t issue under and moneyline until day before game
"my dad says Michigan used to be good"
my Iowa buddy also says
their defense is atrocious…matching up well with our O
6-4 anyone?
"my dad says Michigan used to be good"
I read this as
Penn State is more of a pubic team than Iowa…
I suppose we’ll find out which is more generally genital this weekend.
There is no truth except the final score.
I’m seeing the same thing with the Steelers this year, you would think they’re 0-4 the way people talk about them. For both teams I think it’s part of the same syndrome, because of success in the past it’s like people think they should win every game 51-0. But I suggest going back and googling individual game results from 20 – 30 years ago, you will see plenty of underwhelming final scores against mediocre opponents. I also recommend reading the Football Letter, I know the one from the Temple game talks about all the single-score victories over Temple in the past.
Joe Paterno Apologist
To me the Indiana game was a disappointing win while Temple was on the fence.
I also agree with the idea of moral victories the “loss” someone suggested. For example, last year I consider the way we fought back and almost beat Sparty to be a “loss” and actually gave the team fairly good grades all around. That was one of the few times I’d been proud of Penn State in a loss (of course I wasn’t feeling that way in the third quarter, but by game’s end I sure was). Meanwhile, beating an Indiana team by 6 points that was at one point trailing 24-0 to North Texas felt like a loss although I was sort of glad they at least won.
So basically, Hollow Victories?
***Official Supporter of Jay Paterno***
James Franklin for Head Coach, 2012
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