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The O/D Ranks Linemaking Art
Copyright 1997, SportsMaster Stan
Stan has been called many things over the years -- the "Giant Coin To be Flipped", the "Genius without a Brain", "Chef Extraordinaire"
and so on. After today's little treatsie on using O/D Ranks to create
a line for NFL games, you may have a more apt description -- devious.
The basic O/D ranks are offensive yards, rushing yards, passing yards,
and the defensive equivalent of those same three categories. Stan
is content to focus on the rushing and passing, since these are an accurate
enough reflection of your basic abilities (or lack thereof). There is
aside to be added, which is that years of sometimes fruitless
research has confirmed one glowing truth in my mind, which is that
in the National Football League, Home teams need to run to win,
Away teams need to pass. Many SportsMaster angles pop up with these
basic tenets. While it's certainly preferable to do a bit of both, the fundamental
theory is that home teams like to control the ball and physically dominate,
while the away team needs some sudden strikes to get the homeboys off their
"home field high". This point is saliently factored in to the artistic purity
of creating lines with nothing more than 4 measly stats per team.
If you have the SportsMaster for Football software, you can simply click
on the O/D Ranks icon and it will pull up a screen conveniently sorted
by this week's matchups displaying the O/D ranks for the two teams. If you
are making the "brave journey" without SportsMaster dig around in the newspaper
for the ranks. Now, you simply grade each team as being either "good",
"average" or "bad" in the categories of rushing offense, passing offense,
rushing defense, passing defense (much like the SportsMaster Profiles)
using this breakdown...ranked 1-10 is good, 11-20 is average, 21-30 is bad.
Then you compare one team's rushing offense versus the opponent's rushing defense,
passing offense vs passing defense and vice versa.
Here's how you score it --
Away Rushing (away rushing offense vs home rushing defense)
"good" (off) vs "bad" (def) award 7 points to the away team.
"good" vs "average" award 3 points
"average" vs "bad" award 3 points
"bad" vs "good" award -3 points
Away Passing (away passing offense vs home passing defense)
"good" vs "bad" award 8 points to the away team.
"good" vs "average" award 4 points
"average" vs "bad" award 4 points
"bad" vs "good" award -4 points
Then you add the two scores together, which gives you the "Away Line Value".
Now, we turn to scoring the home team --
Home Rushing (home rushing offense vs away rushing defense)
"good" vs "bad" award 8 points to the Home team.
"good" vs "average" award 4 points
"average" vs "bad" award 4 points
"bad" vs "good" award -4 points
Home Passing (home passing offense vs away passing defense)
"good" vs "bad" award 7 points to the Home team.
"good" vs "average" award 3 points
"average" vs "bad" award 3 points
"bad" vs "good" award -3 points
Add the rush value to the pass value and then add 3 (for home field advantage)
and you get the "Home Line Value".
Finally, compare the "Away Line Value" with the "Home Line Value" to get
the O/D Ranks Line. You can then compare this projection to the
actual line, and when it disagrees by a significant amount, favor the team
that the O/D ranks likes. How well does this work o'Stanislaus of "Slumgullion Omelette" fame (and cooking buffs should note that the $1 Million Cookoff where Stan has the old wink wink nudge nudge understanding with the folks over at Pillsbury is now accepting entries) you ask...anticipating this question I cranked out another little program to go through five years and see. A couple of rules first though -- I only looked at games played in weeks 5 through 12 since these tend to be the heart of the season and less likely to be effected by "situational factors" (eg a meaningless last game of the regular season ala the 49ers have in the past taken a "dive" by bringing their starters out at the end of the first quarter), and I was looking for the games where the O/D Line was more than a touchdown away from the actual line...here's the results:
Type TD+ away from the line
Home Favorites 7 - 2
Home Dogs 33 - 19
Away Favorites 2 - 3
Away Dogs 42 - 22
Total 84 - 46 (64.6%)
Obviously we are heavily relying on the underdogs at this "stratosphere difference range" (the above 130 games are for five years at eight weeks per year or roughly three plays per week), but that's no problem for Stan the Tampa Bay loyalist. While this method is easy to criticize, and fairly whimsical (eg being ranked 21st instead of 20th can make a big difference) the basic design is very sound -- look for mismatches in skills between two teams. The reason for waiting till week 5 to start is you frankly want a team to have played at least four times (hopefully 2 at home, 2 away) before you get too worked up over the rankings. The O/D Ranks can also be predictive at lesser levels (I look for at least a Field Goal Difference -- 3 pts) and here you'll find many more favorites to back if you're more comfortable in the "giving" role.
So, keep this in mind over the next few weeks and we'll be back in late September, where "by the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes."
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