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Does Clemson’s impressive win change anything?

March 16, 2011 / John Paulsen

The Clemson Tigers were impressive last night in their 70-52 rout of UAB. In Monday’s bracket column, I picked Clemson to beat UAB, but to lose in the first round against West Virginia. Since they won so impressively, I decided to take another look at the updated Sagarin and Pomeroy numbers to see if they changed my opinion of the game.

Below is a table with the updated numbers, including updated spreads from World Sports Exchange.

#	Team A	Team B	Sag Adv	Pom %	Spread
3	UT-San Antonio	Alabama State	6.9	73.1%	-3
4	USC	VCU	5.4	71.5%	-4
5	Ohio State	UT-San Antonio	27.0	99.0%
6	George Mason	Villanova	-2.1	49.7%	-1
7	West Virginia	Clemson	1.4	48.9%
8	Kentucky	Princeton	13.9	90.3%	-13
9	Xavier	Marquette	-2.1	47.3%	-2.5
10	Syracuse	Indiana State	13.4	90.2%	-12
11	Washington	Georgia	8.1	73.1%	-5.5
12	North Carolina	LIU	13.5	91.1%	-17.5
13	Duke	Hampton	25.2	98.6%	-23
14	Michigan	Tennessee	1.1	56.9%	+2
15	Arizona	Memphis	8.8	78.8%	-5.5
16	Texas	Oakland	10.5	87.9%	-9.5
17	Cincinnati	Missouri	0.9	56.5%	PICK
18	Connecticut	Bucknell	10.6	84.5%	-10
19	Temple	Penn State	1.2	50.7%	-2.5
20	San Diego State	Northern Colorado	14.5	93.4%	-15.5
21	Kansas	Boston University	23.2	97.5%	-22.5
22	UNLV	Illinois	-0.7	47.5%	-2
23	Vanderbilt	Richmond	2.8	56.8%	-2.5
24	Louisville	Morehead State	12.5	88.1%	-9.5
25a	Georgetown	USC	3.1	56.0%
25b	Georgetown	VCU	8.6	76.2%
26	Purdue	St. Peter’s	17.6	93.0%	-14
27	Texas A&M	Florida State	-0.1	48.8%	-1
28	Notre Dame	Akron	14.5	92.0%	-14
29	Pittsburgh	NC-Asheville	18.1	95.1%
30	Butler	Old Dominion	1.5	50.2%	+2
31	Kansas State	Utah State	-0.7	40.4%	-2.5
32	Wisconsin	Belmont	3.7	60.8%	-5
33	St. John’s	Gonzaga	-0.2	47.7%	-1.5
34	BYU	Wofford	12.4	85.9%	-8.5
35	UCLA	Michigan State	-1.7	44.4%	+1.5
36	Florida	UC-Santa Barbara	11.6	89.3%	-12.5

Looking at yesterday’s numbers, West Virginia’s Sagarin advantage dropped from 2.4 to 1.4, while the Pomeroy % dropped from 52.7% to 48.9%, so clearly the Tigers’ win last night had an effect.

This game is now officially a toss-up, but I’m still going to go with West Virginia. Clemson is 0-4 this season against Top 25 Sagarin teams and WVU is #19. Plus, Clemson has to fly to Florida and turn around and play on Thursday at 12:15 PM ET, which is the first game of the day.

However, those of you in pools that reward upsets may want to give Clemson a hard look. Before trouncing UAB last night, the Tigers were poised to pull the upset against North Carolina in the tournament before falling in overtime. I’m worried about the quick turnaround to an early game, but they’re playing good basketball right now and this is a very tight game. Given the seed disparity (5/12), it is probably worth rolling the dice on Clemson in a pool that rewards upsets.

College Basketball, External Sports, March Madness

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Panthers leaning towards Cam Newton?

March 16, 2011 / Anthony Stalter

Unless it’s a ruse created to lure teams into trading up, all signs point to the Panthers selecting Auburn quarterback Cam Newton with the No. 1 overall pick according to the Charlotte Observer.

Carolina sent six representatives to Auburn’s Pro Day and will attend a private workout by Newton in Alabama on Wednesday. With Blaine Gabbert’s Pro Day coming up on Thursday, the Panthers should have a good idea as to whom they will be selecting with the top pick next month. There have been reports that the injury concerns surrounding the top defensive linemen in this year’s draft have scared the Panthers off, so maybe they’ve narrowed their wish list down to Newton or Gabbert.

Of course, there are rumblings that the Vikings and Bills are interested in Newton as well, so maybe a trade is in order. The Panthers don’t have a second round pick this year, so they may want to trade down in order to regain that selection. If they do trade down, Gabbert, LSU cornerback Patrick Peterson or even Georgia receiver A.J. Green become possibilities for the Panthers depending on how far they fall.

As of right now, this is still a cat and mouse game. The Panthers want to do their due diligence when it comes to scouting prospects, but they also don’t want to make their intentions obvious. If they have a couple of prospects rated close to each other, maybe they wouldn’t mind trading down, acquiring more picks and still landing a player at the top of their board.

External Sports, NFL, NFL Draft

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Miller only worried about beating Shalorus at UFC 128

March 16, 2011 / Staff

HeavyMMA.com writes that Jim Miller isn’t worried about title shots. His only concern is beating the dangerous Kamal Shalorus at UFC 128.

Mixed martial arts is a sport prone to speculation. We wonder who would win imagined match-ups across weight classes, how good an emerging young talent will be in two or three years, and where a win will put a certain fighter in the divisional pecking order.
Heading into UFC 128 this weekend, lightweight Jim Miller is the focus of some of that speculation, as he puts his six-fight winning streak and top 5 standing in the division on the line against WEC convert Kamal Shalorus. Many wonder whether a win, coupled with Dennis Siver’s upset win over George Sotiropoulos last month in Australia, would vault the Whippany, New Jersey native to the top of the list of contenders in the 155-pound division.
Miller is not one for wondering what it all would mean. He has one focus heading into his second UFC fight in his home state: earn a victory over Shalorus. The rest, he believes, will sort itself out.

Read the full article.

External Sports, UFC, WEC

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Were the owners more flexible in negotiations than players?

March 15, 2011 / Anthony Stalter

Jim Trotter of SI.com wrote a great piece about the breakdown of the NFL labor talks and in the article, he writes that the owners felt they were more flexible in the negotiations than the players were.

Owners also argue they were more flexible in the negotiations than the players. On Friday the two sides were $640 million apart on the 2011 salary cap number; the NFL offered to split the difference. The union, however, would not move from its best offer of an additional $137.5 million a year for four years without a detailed accounting of each team’s books, a demand it had requested as early as May 2009. Says Pash, “In November ’09 we asked for an 18 percent rollback, and we didn’t get that either. Demands that you make before your first-ever face-to-face bargaining session might not be where you end up two years later.”
Ultimately, players contend that the owners initiated the standoff, so the burden of proof rests with them. “Not once have the players asked for more money during this negotiation,” Brees said on Friday. “Past players sacrificed a great deal to give us what we have now, and we will not lay down for a second to give that up.”
It may come down to a court to decide if they have to.

Because of the media blackout, there’s not a whole lot of information available on this labor dispute. Of course the owners are going to feel like they were more flexible, as I’m sure the players felt like they were more than fair with their demands. We the fans and media can only go off of what certain people tell us because we weren’t in the meeting rooms.

That said, there’s a real possibility that the union overplayed its hand here. They knew they had an advantage in talks once Judge David Doty ruled that the owners couldn’t use the $4 billion from renegotiated TV contracts to fund their lockout. The players then figured that if they decertified and their case went in front of a judge, they always had Doty (who has ruled often ruled in the players’ favor when it comes to previous NFL cases) in their back pocket.

Thus, when the owners came to the table with a last-second proposal on Friday before the lockout, the players wouldn’t budge on their offer. But they may have screwed themselves because Judge Susan Nelson will oversee their case, not Doty. So while they still could wind up winning big, they may have bypassed a decent offer and a way to end this charade before the CBA expired last week. Instead, they decided to go to court and now here we are.

When the dust finally settles on this issue, I wonder which side will have more regret: the owners for not opening their books (even though they did agree to show the players five years worth of aggregated league wide profitability information), or the players for not taking that last-second proposal last Friday.

External Sports, NFL

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2011 March Madness: Sagarin & Pomeroy data for the first round

March 15, 2011 / John Paulsen

Looking for updated numbers? Click here.

If you’ve read my annual March Madness bracket column or if you are a stathead in general, you’ll know what the title of this post means. If you don’t, check out my column and come back.

Here are the first 36 matchups representing the First Four and the first round of the NCAA Tournament. The Sagarin advantage represents the spread in Jeff Sagarin’s predictor ratings. If the number is positive, it means that Team A is the Sagarin favorite. If the number is negative, then it means Team B (and the lower seed) is actually the favorite.

The Pomeroy % represents the chances that Team A will win the game according to Ken Pomeroy’s Pythagorean calculation.

Over the last four years, teams with a 2+ point advantage in Sagarin’s “predictor” rating have won 156 of 198 games (78.7%). Over the last two years, if a team had at least a 65% expected win rate according to Pomeroy’s Pythagorean calculation, they won 61 of 76 games (80.2%).

I’ve also included the spread for the game at the World Sports Exchange. Oftentimes the spread is very close to the Sagarin spread.

#	Team A	Team B	Sag Adv.	Pom %	Spread
1	NC-Asheville	Arkansas-Little Rock	4.5	69.2%	-4
2	UAB	Clemson	-3.4	34.4%	+4.5
3	UT-San Antonio	Alabama State	7.0	73.6%	-4
4	USC	VCU	5.3	70.7%	-4.5
5	Ohio State	UT-San Antonio	26.8	98.9%
6	George Mason	Villanova	-1.8	50.5%	-1
7a	West Virginia	Clemson	2.4	52.7%
7b	West Virginia	UAB	5.8	68.0%
8	Kentucky	Princeton	13.5	89.6%	-13
9	Xavier	Marquette	-2.1	47.4%	-2
10	Syracuse	Indiana State	13.9	91.0%	-11.5
11	Washington	Georgia	8.3	73.7%	-5.5
12	North Carolina	LIU	13.2	90.6%	-17.5
13	Duke	Hampton	25.1	98.6%	-22.5
14	Michigan	Tennessee	1.1	57.2%	+1.5
15	Arizona	Memphis	8.6	77.7%	-6
16	Texas	Oakland	10.5	87.8%	-9.5
17	Cincinnati	Missouri	1.0	56.9%	PICK
18	Connecticut	Bucknell	10.5	84.3%	-10
19	Temple	Penn State	1.2	51.1%	-2.5
20	San Diego State	Northern Colorado	14.5	93.4%	-15.5
21	Kansas	Boston University	23.0	97.4%	-22.5
22	UNLV	Illinois	-0.5	48.4%	-2
23	Vanderbilt	Richmond	2.6	55.9%	-2
24	Louisville	Morehead State	12.8	88.5%	-9.5
25a	Georgetown	USC	3.1	56.0%
25b	Georgetown	VCU	8.3	75.5%
26	Purdue	St. Peter’s	17.2	92.6%	-14
27	Texas A&M	Florida State	0.0	49.2%	PICK
28	Notre Dame	Akron	14.7	92.2%	-13
29	Pittsburgh	NC-Asheville	17.9	94.9%
30	Butler	Old Dominion	1.2	48.8%	+2
31	Kansas State	Utah State	-0.8	39.7%	-2
32	Wisconsin	Belmont	3.8	61.4%	-4.5
33	St. John’s	Gonzaga	-0.4	46.9%	-1.5
34	BYU	Wofford	12.6	86.3%	-8
35	UCLA	Michigan State	-1.5	45.0%	+1.5
36	Florida	UC-Santa Barbara	11.4	88.9%	-12.5