Based on full team analysis, last pre season i called blues & bombers to be the 2 biggest improvers of the season & called bulldogs & saints to be the 2 biggest disappointers, which turned out to be fairly accurate. Using the same assessment method, this year I name the bombers to be the biggest improvers & the cats to be the biggest disappointers. best bets available now IMO = Cats to miss top 4 @2.36 on betfair. Its a good bet, the cats arent the next big thing, the ageing warriors rallied successfully for one last crack. Bombers to make the 8, also @2.36 on betfair. Another good bet for a multitude of reasons. Equal money on both, if only 1 bet gets up you're still in minor profit, If both bets get up it's 136% profit. Both bets seem safe to me & much better than bank interest Another good bet = Giants to not get the wooden spoon @4.10. Sheeds & co are shrewd enough with strategy to snag enough wins to avoid the spoon IMO. Also, an interesting exercise where I paper traded with head to head bets on each team for the past few seasons, the 1 team who consistantly register a profit if you backed them every game are North Melbourne. The 2 teams that register the biggest losses on average are the Crows & Pies. The only explanation I can come up with is supporter base, North are much unloved, they must be always @longer odds than they really should be, while crows & pies both have huge supporter bases & must always be shorter priced than they deserve to be. making it good value to back North often & back against Crows and pies often. Even if pies & crows finished the season on 35 wins between them & North only win 7 games, returns on the 16 collects would exceed the outlay on the 50 losses, I wouldnt have believed it without tracking it to know. Another good value bet is taking the roughie at the long odds for 1st quarter lead, some grounds have a greater scoring end bias than others, but essentialy the 1st quart lead, majority of the time, go to whoever wins the toss & with rare exception always pick the predominant scoring end of the ground. So taking 3.00 on the roughie for 1st quarter lead is like getting 3's on a 50-50 coin toss as far as Im concerned. If you have a good live feed & fast net connection, you can wait for the toss & place your 1st Q bet on the winner, during that 1-2 minute window before bets are suspended. & finally... having tasted a few sweet quarter quads in the past, if you ever bet on quarter quads, selection # 1 = home team by 1-12 pts 2 = home team by 13-24 pts etc. 9 = away team by 1-12 pts 10=away team by 13-24 pts etc. Take into account the scoring end bias, most punters pick a team to steadily improve throughout the match, eg: 1-2 / 2-3 / 3-4 / 4-5, that's where the majority of the money in the pool is at, if that's how it eventuates, which is rarely, the quad pays little anyway. If you take a serious look at results, it's clear the average game doesnt progress like this. If the coin toss winner is the roughie, who I'll call away side, the winning margins are likely to be close to 9-10 / 1-2 / 1-9 / 2-3, If the coin toss winner is the fave, (home side), the winning margins look more like = 2-3 / 1-2 / 3-4 / 2-3. Similar half time and full time scores, but scores at quarters 1 & 3 differ greatly, such is the scoring end of the ground bias. Im interested in hearing any other well reasoned tips, GL on the punt this season, perhaps we can put together a little syndicate chasing quad jackpots at some point
Another one I heard of recently is that the home team very rarely loses more than 4 or 5 times in a row (I think I was told only once or twice in the last several years it has happened). But as they keep losing their odds get longer and you can cover the previous loses until the win comes by the 4th or 5th. I keep meaning to check this theory out but haven't got round to checking the historical evidence yet or tracking the odds on it, so it could be another crackpot theory
Most welcome FSB, Let me know if u need any data, i've kept plenty records old style, am still more comfortable with pen & book than spreadsheets, guess that's a give away for us over 40's heh @kk, the home team bias was profitable for 4 years, right up to 3 years ago when the bookies finally clued onto it, now the home team advantage seems fully factored in to starting prices. 1 factor the bookies havent yet jumped aboard on is days rest, in times past, footy was a saturday affair, nowdays they play anyday, I looked through the past 2 years results for massive upsets where winners payed $3.50 or better, just under 80% of the time, when these anomolies occured, the unexpected winner was coming off 8 days rest against the defeated fave coming off 6 days rest. I attempt to understand this by assuming in todays hard footy that the extra 2 days recovery time = a bigger advantage not accounted for in the betting.
That last observation's valid for the next 2 years only, by then, bookies will learn to factor it into their equations. ;-)
Gold, thanks heaps fidelsfinger. Should have this is the donors section but oh well, still might encourage people to sign up and donate seeing some of the great advice going around. Really appreciate the info and analysis
Gutsy bet leaving the cats outta the top 4, but definitely has merit. Pies and cats sides are not as strong as last year for different reasons so might load up on multis around hawks/blues going all the way. Although Blues need Jamieson up and running to challenge for me. The favorite bet each weekend is Boyd for most touches. He is the master of the 10m scrubber kick out of the pack and when you are on they're gold. Cant agree on the Giants not winning the spoon though. Absolute morals I would've thought. And not relevant to this site but load up on Rory, of the golfing kind, to win at Augusta. He's right on the verge of a Tiger like run.
IMO - The cats to not make the 8 has some merit, but pretty gutsy. I can't see Essendon making the 8 and I think GWS to get the wooden spoon is a lock. Just my opinion though. Some great info in your article though fidelsfinger!
Many will be seduced by Boyds pre season form, but born 1982, so aged 30 this year, can we honestly expect him to improve on his previous season? I challenge anyone to find me 1 single example out of thousands in the history of footy where a 30 y/0 has improved on his prior best average. I'm confident it's never happened and never will. Anyone, especially midfielders, born 1983 (yes Judd included) or earlier, has already reached & passed their prime, there's no improvement left. History shows we can't expct them to improve on their previous best.
Probably be the only one and I only know that cause I was just looking at his stats but still. There's always an exception to prove the rule
@ NTS, Cats might scrape the 8, but not the top 4, was my prediction, Bombers will easily make the 8 & @ better than even money, safe bet that. & last year i won a bet declaring murphy would outscore judd, i based that on judd passing his prime & murphy approaching his, this year murphy will further outscore judd, yet the nostalgic disagree. Nostalgia can blind the best of us, in any measurable sport we must concede the current champs out do the former. Times show our swimmers swim faster & runners run faster times than past champions. but in sports not easily measured, we are seduced by nostalgia, unwarranted. In the 95% of sports that can be measured, the modern exceed the old every time, better training techniques & nutrition etc = better performance & speed. But if you took a poll, on who would win, in their prime, Ali versus tyson, all would go with Ali nostalgia, but they'd be wrong. Bradman versus whichever modern cricketer you care to name, again the nostalgic would be wrong. Yes if Ali or Bradman were to come forward in time & benefit from modern training, they'd be competitive, or if Tyson or Waugh were to go back in time & concede the modern advantages, different outcome perhaps, but in general, old versus new, modern always wins, regardless of illusions of nostalgia.
The Prime age doesnt apply for rucks, seems to be the exception, Critical for midfield, born 83' or earlier is out for me in midfield, i'll tolerate 82' for def & forwards, even 81' for rucks. Not to say the likes of Judd & Boyd will be dismal failures, Just noting we can't, at their age, expect them to improve on their last seasons averages.
Pretty confident Gaj will still be arguably the games best player after this season. He's from the same draft as Judd so presuming he's the same age. But to agree with you, that doesn't necessarily mean he will improve on his last 5 years work. It would be pretty big ask to expect that. My comment on Boyd wasn't that he would improve it was just that as a punt he does get a hell of a lot more crap stats than any of the other high posession winners. Has 30 on a quiet day. The other player who defies all age question marks is Adam Goodes. Seriously he's never been a favorite of mine but I do like good footy and that freak just doesn't seem to be aging. He's gotta slow down at some stage surely. But as a rule yeah do agree ff they do seem to peak around the 26 mark.
<blockquote>Quote from fidelsfinger on March 15, 2012, 18:48 I challenge anyone to find me 1 single example out of thousands in the history of footy where a 30 y/0 has improved on his prior best average. I'm confident it's never happened and never will. </blockquote> Without looking at the records Gary Ablett snr would probably go close
<blockquote>Quote from fidelsfinger on March 15, 2012, 18:48 Many will be seduced by Boyds pre season form, but born 1982, so aged 30 this year, can we honestly expect him to improve on his previous season? I challenge anyone to find me 1 single example out of thousands in the history of footy where a 30 y/0 has improved on his prior best average. I'm confident it's never happened and never will. Anyone, especially midfielders, born 1983 (yes Judd included) or earlier, has already reached & passed their prime, there's no improvement left. History shows we can't expct them to improve on their previous best. </blockquote> What about points on the board regardless of improvement ?
Will check on Gaz senior, I wonder how his scores would've been if we had fantasy footy then? & re points on the board? not sure if you mean Boyd & Judds past accomplishments, they are top class champions no question, or if you mean what if they maintain or come close to maintaining their averages without bettering them? In which case I'd rather find players I expect improvement from, who'd be better value as far as bang for your buck goes.
Love your work mate, particularly like the North Melbourne stat. It reminds me of the Australian cricket team. Betting against them over the last few years has been pretty lucrative as people seem to pour money into them, regardless of form leading up to it. Which as you point out, is very supporter base driven, people effecting the odds through their emotion alone, giving the shrewd backer better odds for it.
@BlueBeliever - Good get re Cox 2011 but in fairness he did benefit from a scoring change for rucks and probably also a rule change (sub rule).