Lock It In: 76'ers v. Pelicans
We're in New Orleans tonight as the 76'ers face the Pelicans and I have the 76'ers taking this and I like the 76'ers ML (at -155): here's why.
I use three point percentage in my Predict model to help increase my model score, and I've found that a team's three point percentage is a great indicator -- but not the only one -- of whether they'll win a game. To judge effectiveness of a team's three point percentage on whether they win, I've put together an interesting graph that shows us the final score spreads for both the 76'ers and the Pelicans against their three point percentages. The idea here is that if a team has a positive final score spread it means they won the game, and we can judge by how much they win once the final score spread goes positive. The converse is also true: we can determine whether a team lost a game by looking at their negative final score spreads, and we can do this all as a function of their three point percentages. Take a look for yourself: there is a strong relationship between final score spreads and three point percentages, which means three point percentages is a great predictive variable for a Predict model.
Not only can we see the positive relationship between three point percentage and final score spread but we can also observe that Philadelphia is more sensitive to this relationship -- i.e., as Philly's three point percentage increases the final score spread of their games increases more rapidly as compared to the Pelicans. The 76'ers also tend to win their games when their three point percentage is at or greater than 36%. The Pelicans have a harder time: they usually end up winning as the three point percentage gets to 39 or 40%.
To be clear, we're not implying any causation here. There are a variety of factors that influence whether a team wins but when we find a predictive variable that has a strong relationship to a team winning (or losing) it serves as a nice indicator of where we might expect a game to go.
With this in mind let's take a look at last season's performance and see what we might expect from both teams tonight. Philly averaged almost 38% for their three point percentage made while the Pelicans averaged only 34%. We also see that Philly's overall effective field goal percentage (EFGP) was higher than the Pelicans, at 54.5% versus 53.8%.
Finally, my Predict model for the winner, which is currently the #1 model on Pine, has Philly winning 75.23% of the time but if you take the Philly ML on DraftKings they'll pay you out at -155, an implied probability of 60.78%. This means that taking the Philly ML tonight gives you a 14.5% edge. For those reasons, I'm locking in Philly tonight!
We're in New Orleans tonight as the 76'ers face the Pelicans and I have the 76'ers taking this and I like the 76'ers ML (at -155): here's why.
I use three point percentage in my Predict model to help increase my model score, and I've found that a team's three point percentage is a great indicator -- but not the only one -- of whether they'll win a game. To judge effectiveness of a team's three point percentage on whether they win, I've put together an interesting graph that shows us the final score spreads for both the 76'ers and the Pelicans against their three point percentages. The idea here is that if a team has a positive final score spread it means they won the game, and we can judge by how much they win once the final score spread goes positive. The converse is also true: we can determine whether a team lost a game by looking at their negative final score spreads, and we can do this all as a function of their three point percentages. Take a look for yourself: there is a strong relationship between final score spreads and three point percentages, which means three point percentages is a great predictive variable for a Predict model.
Not only can we see the positive relationship between three point percentage and final score spread but we can also observe that Philadelphia is more sensitive to this relationship -- i.e., as Philly's three point percentage increases the final score spread of their games increases more rapidly as compared to the Pelicans. The 76'ers also tend to win their games when their three point percentage is at or greater than 36%. The Pelicans have a harder time: they usually end up winning as the three point percentage gets to 39 or 40%.
To be clear, we're not implying any causation here. There are a variety of factors that influence whether a team wins but when we find a predictive variable that has a strong relationship to a team winning (or losing) it serves as a nice indicator of where we might expect a game to go.
With this in mind let's take a look at last season's performance and see what we might expect from both teams tonight. Philly averaged almost 38% for their three point percentage made while the Pelicans averaged only 34%. We also see that Philly's overall effective field goal percentage (EFGP) was higher than the Pelicans, at 54.5% versus 53.8%.
Finally, my Predict model for the winner, which is currently the #1 model on Pine, has Philly winning 75.23% of the time but if you take the Philly ML on DraftKings they'll pay you out at -155, an implied probability of 60.78%. This means that taking the Philly ML tonight gives you a 14.5% edge. For those reasons, I'm locking in Philly tonight!
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