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Posted (edited)

Who do we need to win and lose this week?

first off Oakland to lose

 

Baltimore over Miami

Seattle over Houston
Detroit over Pittsburgh
Kansas City over Denver
Indianapolis over Cincinnati
Rams over NE in NE :w00t:
Edited by ShadyBillsFan
Posted

first off

 

Oakland

We want Oakland to win? Explain this strategy

 

I'm pretty sure we want NE to win so they can lock up the AFC East and keep our strength of schedule as a good factor when it comes time for Wild Card voting.

Posted (edited)

Keeping things conservative, I picked wins against the Saints, Chargers, Dolphins (x2), and Colts. Which gave us a 48% chance of making the playoffs. If we win those AND add just one victory against the Raiders, Jets, Chiefs or Patriots (x2), it says we have a >95% of making the playoffs.

 

Nice :beer:

Edited by Dorkington
Posted (edited)

We want Oakland to win? Explain this strategy

 

I'm pretty sure we want NE to win so they can lock up the AFC East and keep our strength of schedule as a good factor when it comes time for Wild Card voting.

I posted what I thought it was obvious, then I edited it for clarity when I added the full list

 

I guess I was wrong in my assumption.

:beer:

Edited by ShadyBillsFan
Posted

Yup. Not too soon. Early, but not to soon. (The purpose here is to collect the various statistically-based playoff likelihood projection systems, not a more generic power rating.) fivethirtyeight.com updates immediately after each slate of games. And right now they have the Bills at ...

 

... projected at 9.6 wins. And chances of making the playoffs at ...

 

... 63 %

 

Sunday night's game (Steelers) will have at most a minimal effect.

 

Here's the most interesting part: their ELO rating (their version of a power rating, but given the site very objective/statistically based) has the Bills 10th overall, 4th in the AFC (NE, KC, PIT). There's a pretty big gap right now between the Bills and the 5th team in the AFC, the Broncos. I know we started 5-2 in 2011 as well, but given the poor performance of some of our clear wildcard competitors, I can't recall us being this well positioned after 7 games in a long, long time.

Posted

Yeah, I definitely feel like this is different from 2011. Biggest thing working in our favor is we beat two of our biggest wildcard competitors (Denver and Oakland). I dont want to get ahead of myself here but I do like our chances.

Posted (edited)

And interesting to see the odds of each game going forward on 538. The Bills right now are underdogs in just 3 of the remaining 9 games (Pats X 2, KC on the road). We're 1 point faves vs. New Orleans at the Ralph; I wouldn't like our chances in New Orleans, but as always the Saints are an entirely different/worse team on the road. We're also slim faves on the road (1.5 points) vs. the Chargers, and that's one that really worries me.

 

Of course it won't play out game-by-game as projected, but the bottom line is 538 is right - we'll be clear favorites in about 3 of the remaining 9: Jets on Thursday, (but Thursdays are always more of a crapshoot than Sundays, particularly on the road - this one will be huge if we want to gain a little separation), Colts at home, Dolphins at home. As I mentioned, 2 games - Chargers on the road and Saints at home - are almost toss-ups, and right now 538 has Dolphins on the road as a third toss-up (I feel pretty good about that one right now). And then we're clear dogs in those 3.

 

Win the 3 we're supposed to, and win 2 of the 3 that project as near toss-ups, and even if you lose the 3 clear underdog games if my arithmetic is good, that's 10 wins ...

Edited by The Frankish Reich
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