Bleacher Report - Articles by Mark Myers

Serie A Power Rankings and Championship Index: Jan. 30

Mark Myers — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 05:51:21 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Championship Index for Italian Serie A as of January 30.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on their performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0 and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average goal differential in a series of neutral-field games played between the two sides.

The Championship Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will finish the season at the top of the table.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season while taking into account team strength, home-field advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Championship Index
Inter Milan	0.00	94.55
Juventus	-0.33	1.03
Roma AS	-0.46	4.41
Milan AC	-0.67	0.00
Fiorentina	-0.69	0.01
Atalanta Bergamo	-1.30	0.00
Sampdoria Genoa	-1.42	0.00
Udinese	-1.42	0.00
Napoli	-1.45	0.00
Palermo	-1.62	0.00
Catania Calcio	-1.65	0.00
Livorno	-1.70	0.00
Parma	-1.76	0.00
Genoa FC	-1.76	0.00
Lazio Roma	-1.82	0.00
Torino AC	-1.85	0.00
Siena	-1.89	0.00
Reggina	-1.96	0.00
Empoli AC	-2.07	0.00
Cagliari	-2.46	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

EPL Swap Meet: Four Games Tonight Impact Promotion and Relegation

Mark Myers — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 04:03:27 -0500

I wish I had pulled this together sooner so I could put together a full write up. But a quick dispatch will have to suffice.

There are four matches taking place tonight with major implications for the respective promotion and relegation battles in the Championship and the Premiership.

First, in the Championship, Stoke visit Charlton in a battle between two teams near the top of the promotion fight.

Stoke have their doubters; but according to my EPL simulator, their effort so far is the second strongest in the league (behind West Brom). If they can hold form, they should be able to catch Bristol City on points and bypass the promotion playoff.

Charlton have the pedigree to rise into the second spot on the table. But can they do it? So far they haven't done much to distinguish themselves from the rest of the teams near the top.

The bot favors Charlton by a slim margin and only due to home-field advantage. If Charlton fail to capitalize tonight, Stoke could slip out by six points with most of its remaining away games against the bottom of the table.

Even a draw would suit Stoke as it would maintain status quo while crossing a tough road match off their open schedule.

Up in the EPL, Fulham visit Bolton in a match critical to both teams. Fulham is on the mat but not quite done. In order to avoid being sent down, they obviously have to bypass some teams on the table.

Bolton is within range. But a win tonight by the Wanderers would put them nine points above Fulham—thus dwindling the pool of teams the Cottagers could reasonably hope to catch.

For Bolton, this is not only an opportunity to bury Fulham. It's also a chance to clear themselves (at least temporarily) of the pack of six fighting to avoid the third relegation spot.

With six teams all within two points of each other, it will be important to take the points where they can get them.

The bot gives Bolton a 50 percent chance of taking three points tonight and doing so would be an important step toward avoiding relegation.

The remaining two matches have similar stakes. Wigan play at Middlesbrough and Sunderland host Birmingham. All four of these teams are in the "Gang of Six" fighting to avoid the third relegation spot.

For any of them, taking the three points will not only help move them up in the pack; it will also have the prophylactic effect of keeping the other team in place.

I'll be looking forward to seeing the results come in tonight.

Mark Myers is mad scientist/sports geek behind ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

Perfect Inspiration: Why the 2007 Patriots Deserve the Accolades

Mark Myers — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 01:10:54 -0500

Admit it, you didn't want them to do it. Neither did I, quite honestly.

As a Steelers fan, it was tough watching the Patriots go undefeated this year. I don't think you will find many fans outside of the New England fan base who can honestly say they enjoyed watching the Pats march through their schedule this year.

But there comes a time when you just have to give credit to a team that deserves it. And the Patriots deserve it in good measure.

No matter what happens in the Super Bowl, this season has been historic and impressive. And if they do what almost everybody thinks they will do on February 3, it will be hard to deny that they are the greatest team since the merger and perhaps of all time.

But what does it all mean exactly? How can you define this sort of achievement?

One way is to look at how likely it was to have occurred. So, considering that ChanceBot v0.9.4.2.nfl is due for retirement, I thought it would be fitting to fire up the bot one last time to look at the undefeated season.

I was surprised to find that, on the whole, the bot rates the Patriots only three or four points better than the next highest rated team—the Colts. On the other hand, thinking through how the ratings are calculated, it eventually made sense

In order to prevent blowouts from skewing the rankings, the bot ignores spreads over 21 points. And we all know that early on in the season, the Patriots were slicing teams for big points.

Then something happened. Their games became a bit more competitive.

Wins by four points over Indianapolis, and three points over Philly, Baltimore, and the Giants made them seem mortal again. (Heck, even their win by a "measly" 10 points over the Jets was a bit unexpected.)

So while their rating seemed low, it wasn't necessarily unreasonable. I decided to run the simulations with the ratings as-is.

The process was pretty simple. I erased every result from the season and reran the complete season 30,000 times—checking after each simulated season to see if the Pats had gone 16-0.

I found that if the season-ending ratings are accurate, the odds against a perfect season by the Patriots were a steep 140:1.

Allowing for the possibility that my ratings were off, I started rerunning the simulations. I adjusted the Patriots up by a field goal, then a touchdown then a full 10 points. Even at 13-point favorites over the Colts (more against other teams) the odds against perfection were 7.6:1.

No matter how I sliced it, the odds were against the Patriots going 16-0.

But here we are. They did it.

So I am left to consider that there was something else at work. And that something is, in my opinion, what makes this accomplishment very special and something we can all appreciate.

You can boil excellence down to two factors: skill and execution.

Are the Patriots so much better skill-wise than the rest of the league that 16-0 was a fait accompli? Are their physical talents so superior that victory was guaranteed no matter how sloppy their performance?

In both cases the answer is "No."

They are a very skilled team. That's obvious. But as the games against the Colts, Eagles, Ravens and Giants showed, they were capable of losing.

Only they didn't .

They went out every week and performed. Some weeks better than others; but always good enough to win.

This was not a team of high school players going undefeated against 10-year-olds. This was a team of professionals playing other professionals and winning every time.

Doing that requires more than just exceptional ability at blocking, running, tackling, throwing and catching. It requires focus, determination, and consistency. These are traits that all of us strive for in our own lives. They aren't unique to athletes.

It used to be that we looked to sports for inspiration. And despite the scandals permeating almost all sports these days, I think most of us still do.

While few people will ever perform in an arena as competitive as the NFL, we all have the ability to excel in our own way.

Whether we are students, working professionals, business owners, artists, or full-time parents, we all have things we are trying to achieve through the application of our own skills.

So for my money, if you are still looking to sports for some inspiration, the Patriots are an odds-on favorite.

Congratulations to the Patriots and their fans for an amazing season.

PS: Go Giants.

NBA Power Rankings: Jan. 24th

Mark Myers — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 00:28:54 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Playoff Index for the NBA as of January 24.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on their performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0, and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average point differential in a series of neutral-court games played between the two teams.

The Playoff Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will make the playoffs.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season while taking into account team strength, home-court advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Playoff Index
Boston	0.00	100.00
Detroit	-3.52	100.00
LA Lakers	-4.12	97.92
Dallas	-4.65	97.83
San Antonio	-4.71	95.73
Phoenix	-4.93	98.25
New Orleans	-4.93	98.03
Orlando	-5.99	99.97
Utah	-5.99	65.96
Golden State	-6.67	63.72
Denver	-6.88	70.12
Toronto	-6.90	99.49
Washington	-7.05	98.01
Houston	-7.19	43.71
Portland	-7.42	67.81
Cleveland	-8.96	96.59
Atlanta	-9.80	61.51
Sacramento	-10.20	0.91
Chicago	-10.45	35.06
Indiana	-10.88	52.69
Philadelphia	-11.61	10.46
Charlotte	-11.83	7.19
Memphis	-12.10	0.00
Milwaukee	-12.32	11.45
New Jersey	-12.37	26.66
LA Clippers	-12.69	0.00
New York	-13.36	0.92
Seattle	-14.97	0.00
Miami	-15.25	0.00
Minnesota	-15.45	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

Ligue 1 Power Rankings: Jan. 23rd

Mark Myers — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 14:13:41 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Championship Index for League 1 Orange as of January 23.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0. All remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average goal differential in a series of neutral-field games played between the two sides.

The Championship Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will finish the season at the top of the table.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season, while taking into account team strength, home-field advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Championship Index
Lyon	0.00	85.81
Nancy	-0.33	5.37
Bordeaux	-0.59	7.27
Monaco	-0.65	0.31
Nice	-0.70	1.00
Caen	-0.81	0.15
Valenciennes	-0.83	0.07
Paris SG	-0.93	0.00
Lille	-0.94	0.00
Strasbourg	-1.02	0.00
Lorient	-1.03	0.01
Marseille Ol.	-1.03	0.00
St. Etienne	-1.06	0.01
Lens	-1.10	0.00
Rennes	-1.17	0.00
Toulouse	-1.20	0.00
Le Mans	-1.23	0.00
Sochaux	-1.37	0.00
Auxerre	-1.49	0.00
Metz	-2.19	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

English Premier League Power Rankings: Jan. 22nd

Mark Myers — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 07:27:30 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Premiership Index for Barclay's Premiership as of Jan. 22.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0 and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average goal differential in a series of neutral-field games played between the two sides.

The Premiership Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will finish the season at the top of the table.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season, while taking into account team strength, home-field advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Premiership Chances
Manchester United	0.00	74.24
Liverpool	-0.49	0.14
Arsenal	-0.62	24.04
West Ham United	-0.81	0.00
Everton	-0.88	0.03
Portsmouth	-0.92	0.00
Chelsea	-0.93	1.54
Tottenham	-1.03	0.00
Manchester City	-1.10	0.00
Aston Villa	-1.29	0.00
Blackburn	-1.67	0.00
Wigan Athletic	-1.82	0.00
Newcastle United	-1.87	0.00
Sunderland	-2.14	0.00
Middlesbrough	-2.15	0.00
Reading	-2.15	0.00
Bolton	-2.16	0.00
Birmingham	-2.25	0.00
Fulham	-2.28	0.00
Derby County	-3.21	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com.

Scottish Premier League Power Rankings: Jan. 22nd

Mark Myers — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 06:42:50 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Premiership Index for the Scottish Premier League as of January 22.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on their performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0 and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average goal differential in a series of neutral-field games played between the two sides.

The Premiership Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will finish the season at the top of the table.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season while taking into account team strength, home-field advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Premiership Chances
Glasgow Rangers	0.00	80.98
Celtic Glasgow	-0.19	19.02
Dundee United	-1.20	0.00
Motherwell FC	-1.22	0.00
Caledonian Thistle	-1.23	0.00
Hibernian	-1.32	0.00
Hearts of Midlothian	-1.51	0.00
Falkirk FC	-1.53	0.00
Aberdeen FC	-1.68	0.00
Kilmarnock FC	-1.73	0.00
St. Mirren	-2.01	0.00
Gretna	-2.56	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

Movin' On Up: Which Championship Teams Will Qualify for Promotion?

Mark Myers — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 14:32:21 -0500

With the English football season heading into its second half, the relegation battle at the Premier level is taking shape.

Recent articles by Andrew McNair and Felix Tang provided a good look at the teams fighting to stay up.

But which teams from the Championship are likely to replace those relegated from the Premier League?

As you might have guessed, I fired up the ChanceBot.com simulation engine to take a look. (Actually, I'm launching First Division simulations on my site this weekend, and this is an early look at the data.)

As most readers know, there are two paths to promotion from the Championship. The top two spots on the table are promoted directly to the Premier League, while positions three through six qualify for a playoff to determine the third team promoted.

Qualification for the direct route is strongly solidified by West Bromwich, who have an 80.88 percent chance of finishing at the top of the table and a 97.77 percent chance of finishing in either of the top two spots.

Overall, West Bromwich look very good. The simulator shows an average point total of 87.68, which is a full 12 points beyond the third highest projected total for the year. Short of a collapse, West Bromwich will be moving up.

The only other team with a significant chance of catching the Baggies is Bristol City. The Robins have a 14.56 percent chance at taking the top slot and a 75.85 percent chance of finishing first or second.

Bristol City are projected to finish the year with 81 points. So despite their current one-point lead over Watford, they should be well positioned by season's end.

Behind the top two, Charlton and Stoke each maintain an outside chance of making the second spot, and the pair should be considered the most likely to secure positions in the four-team playoff.

The simulations show Charlton winning the playoff 24.05 percent of the time. Coupled with their 16.78 percent chance of making the No. 2 slot, Charlton's overall promotion odds are a fairly healthy 40.83 percent.

Stoke does not look quite so good. Despite qualifying for the playoff over 62 percent of the time (in the simulations), they won barely 10 percent of them—losing out mainly to Charlton.

Other teams looking good to make the playoff are Watford, Ipswich, Cardiff and Plymouth. With six teams fighting for four spots, the chase for the last spot should go very deep into the season.

Overall the promotion odds look like this (as percentages):

    * West Bromwich 97.77
    * Bristol City 75.85
    * Charlton 40.83
    * Stoke 21.01
    * Crystal Palace 15.87
    * Ipswich 15.65
    * Watford 11.96
    * Cardiff 8.74
    * Plymouth 4.72
    * Burnley 2.59
    * Hull 2.57

The big question over the next few weeks will be whether Bristol City can lock themselves away in the top two and leave the other contenders to fight it out in the playoff.

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

Home Improvement: Which EPL Teams Get the Biggest Boost from Their Own Pitch?

Mark Myers — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 16:41:59 -0500

While reading Andrew McNair's excellent piece on British football stadiums I couldn't help but geek out a little.

If you have read a few of my articles here at BleacherReport.com, you'll know I'm a sports geek of the highest order. So when Andrew started mentioning specific venues as providing enhanced home-field advantage, my first thought was "I should measure this."

The question in my mind (and this may differ from the focus of Andrew's article) is which venues provide their team the biggest boost, as opposed to those most likely to see a victory by the respective home team. This distinction may be a bit complicated to tease out because it can be hard to separate the home team from the home venue.

Is it tough to win at Old Trafford because it is Old Trafford, or because that's where Manchester United plays?

So how to do it? Well fixtures like the EPL, which follows the home-away double round robin format, offer a clear and easy method of sorting it all out (at least for games within the league). Simply put, it hinges on calculating how much better a team does at home than on the road.

Over the course of a season, the average disadvantage of the road games will equal the average home-field advantage for the league. So, by removing the the 'away-disadvantage', we can isolate the advantage gained on the home pitch. (If you would like an explanation of the detailed math, you may email me.)

Using data from 2000/2001 through 2006/2007 (sorry, full seasons only), I determined the average home-field advantage for each team that played in the EPL in at least four of the seasons covered. The results are given below and the values are given in goals per game. Average home-field advantage for the EPL over the period was 0.4 goals per game.

Team	HFA
Portsmouth	1.06
Fulham	0.68
West Ham	0.65
Arsenal	0.61
Tottenham	0.59
Everton	0.58
Newcastle	0.51
Bolton	0.44
Liverpool	0.43
Chelsea	0.39
Southampton	0.39
Manchester United	0.37
Aston Villa	0.36
Birmingham	0.35
Middlesbrough	0.32
Charlton	0.25
Blackburn	0.21
Manchester City	0.13
Leeds	-0.04

My first instinct with a table like this is to look at the top and bottom rows to see if they check out. Unfortunately, both jump out for discussion.

First, how could Elland Road be that bad? Surely the numbers presented aren't in agreement with its reputation as a tough venue. Perhaps Leeds draws enough of its own fans on the road to effectively cancel the home-field advantage of other teams. That would skew downward the measure of their home-field advantage.

Even though these are my numbers, I'm not convinced that Leeds would do just as well to play its home games in an empty stadium (which is what the calculated home-field advantage suggests.)

Secondly, Portsmouth's value is very high. Looking at their performance this year the term 'regression to the mean' comes to mind. When I recalculate this at the end of the current season, the advantage measured should be more reasonable.

But aside from the two outliers, the table seems pretty fair.

Now, for some honorable mentions going to teams that (while not making the cut of four seasons at the premier level) show very good home-field advantage.

Norwich, Sheffield United, and Wolves all had advantages of 0.9 or better. Bradford and Crystal Palace were also strong.

On the other end of the spectrum, dishonorable mentions go to Sunderland, Coventry Wigan, and Leicester (with Sunderland ranking worst). These were the only four teams aside from Leeds to show a negative home-field advantage.

And to answer an earlier question of mine: It appears that it's tough to win at Old Trafford because that's where Manchester United plays.

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

Bundesliga Power Rankings and Championship Index (1/16/2008)

Mark Myers — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 13:13:50 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Championship Index for the Bundesliga.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0 and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average goal differential in a series of neutral-field games played between the two sides.

The Championship Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will finish the season at the top of the table.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season while taking into account team strength, home-field advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Championship Index
Bayern München	0.00	80.43
Bremen	-0.30	18.40
Hamburg SV	-0.70	0.88
Leverkusen	-0.73	0.29
Schalke 04	-1.22	0.00
Bochum	-1.32	0.00
Frankfurt Eintracht	-1.41	0.00
Hannover 96	-1.44	0.00
Dortmund	-1.59	0.00
Karlsruher	-1.73	0.00
Hertha Berlin	-1.73	0.00
Stuttgart	-1.84	0.00
Cottbus	-1.92	0.00
Nürnberg FC	-1.94	0.00
Duisburg	-2.06	0.00
Wolfsburg	-2.11	0.00
Bielefeld	-2.23	0.00
Rostock	-2.27	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

ChanceBot Simulations: NBA Power Rankings and Playoff Index

Mark Myers — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 12:12:27 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Playoff Index for the NBA.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on their performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0, and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average point differential in a series of neutral-court games played between the two teams.

The Playoff Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will make the playoffs.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season while taking into account team strength, home-court advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Playoff Index
Boston	0.00	100.00
Detroit	-3.04	100.00
LA Lakers	-4.06	98.98
Phoenix	-5.11	97.82
Dallas	-5.26	97.16
San Antonio	-5.28	95.80
New Orleans	-6.37	92.43
Utah	-6.42	66.52
Orlando	-6.59	99.65
Denver	-6.82	71.58
Toronto	-7.05	98.26
Portland	-7.07	79.07
Golden State	-7.15	63.68
Washington	-7.23	97.21
Houston	-7.86	36.32
Atlanta	-9.66	72.04
Cleveland	-10.11	78.22
Indiana	-10.88	44.23
Sacramento	-10.96	0.65
Chicago	-11.33	22.46
New Jersey	-11.35	55.04
Philadelphia	-11.49	10.45
Milwaukee	-12.10	15.70
Charlotte	-12.17	6.50
Memphis	-12.91	0.00
LA Clippers	-14.01	0.00
New York	-14.32	0.22
Seattle	-14.97	0.00
Miami	-15.06	0.02
Minnesota	-16.51	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

ChanceBot Simulations: EPL Power Rankings and Premiership Index

Mark Myers — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 01:08:44 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Premiership Index for Barclay's Premiership.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0, and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average goal differential in a series of neutral-field games played between the two sides.

The Premiership Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will finish the season at the top of the table.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season while taking into account team strength, home-field advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Premiership Index
Manchester United	0.00	75.5
Liverpool	-0.51	0.42
Arsenal	-0.62	22.2
West Ham United	-0.78	0.00
Chelsea	-0.88	1.8
Everton	-0.89	0.02
Portsmouth	-0.96	0.00
Tottenham	-1.14	0.00
Manchester City	-1.15	0.01
Aston Villa	-1.23	0.00
Blackburn	-1.63	0.00
Wigan Athletic	-1.79	0.00
Newcastle United	-1.94	0.00
Sunderland	-2.01	0.00
Reading	-2.13	0.00
Birmingham	-2.14	0.00
Bolton	-2.14	0.00
Fulham	-2.14	0.00
Middlesbrough	-2.20	0.00
Derby County	-3.13	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

ChanceBot Simulations: NBA Power Rankings and Playoff Index

Mark Myers — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 02:27:26 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Playoff Index for the NBA.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0, and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average point differential in a series of neutral-court games played between the two teams.

The Playoff Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will make the playoffs.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season while taking into account team strength, home-court advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Playoff Index
Boston	0.00	100.00
Detroit	-3.54	100.00
LA Lakers	-6.00	97.26
Phoenix	-6.33	98.69
San Antonio	-6.83	97.31
Dallas	-7.37	96.00
Orlando	-7.59	99.80
New Orleans	-7.86	94.42
Denver	-8.10	83.47
Golden State	-8.62	71.45
Utah	-8.92	46.48
Washington	-9.07	90.87
Toronto	-9.10	93.38
Portland	-9.26	76.87
Houston	-9.60	37.24
Atlanta	-11.59	63.57
Cleveland	-11.95	67.60
New Jersey	-12.05	70.79
Indiana	-12.15	49.39
Chicago	-12.47	27.31
Philadelphia	-12.63	23.98
Sacramento	-12.74	0.75
Milwaukee	-13.92	11.73
Memphis	-13.96	0.04
Charlotte	-15.19	1.43
LA Clippers	-15.64	0.01
Miami	-15.83	0.09
Seattle	-16.22	0.00
New York	-16.76	0.07
Minnesota	-18.18	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

ChanceBot Simulations: NHL Power Rankings and Playoff Index

Mark Myers — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 01:51:31 -0500

The table below shows ChanceBot.com's Power Rankings and Playoff Index for the NHL.

Power Rankings provide a calculation of relative team strength based on performance to date.

The strongest team is given a strength of 0.0, and all remaining team strengths are relative to this standard.

The difference between two teams' scores indicates the expected average goal differential in a series of neutral-ice games played between the two teams.

The Playoff Index for each team gives the probability (expressed as a percentage) that the team will make the playoffs.

These probabilities are calculated by simulating the remainder of the season while taking into account team strength, home-ice advantage, and historical trends.

Team	Power Ranking	Playoff Index
Detroit	0.00	100.00
Ottawa	-0.89	99.99
Vancouver	-1.29	96.25
New Jersey	-1.35	95.42
Pittsburgh	-1.35	92.86
Montreal	-1.37	92.70
Columbus	-1.52	41.60
New York Rangers	-1.54	68.70
Philadelphia	-1.57	81.66
St. Louis	-1.59	69.41
San Jose	-1.59	94.09
Dallas	-1.65	86.79
Calgary	-1.76	83.26
Colorado	-1.76	65.60
Chicago	-1.76	23.28
Buffalo	-1.81	39.68
Minnesota	-1.86	62.52
Nashville	-1.88	25.28
Carolina	-1.89	68.46
New York Islanders	-1.92	38.98
Boston	-1.94	57.16
Toronto	-2.16	9.81
Florida	-2.21	25.03
Anaheim	-2.23	31.25
Edmonton	-2.32	6.32
Washington	-2.39	11.54
Atlanta	-2.44	17.53
Phoenix	-2.52	14.35
Tampa Bay	-2.76	0.47
Los Angeles	-2.82	0.00

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com

What If—Could the Eagles and Texans Have Had a Chance?

Mark Myers — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 07:53:15 -0500

As NFL seasons go, 2007 is pretty quiet going into the final week. At this point, with eight teams locked into their seeds and 10 teams assured a playoff spot, there isn't much to do in the way of simulations over at ChanceBot.com.

That said, with nearly a full season of games in the books, the bot has a pretty good measure of the relative team strengths so this is the perfect time to set the bot loose on some 'what-if' scenarios.

Let's take a closer look at the Houston Texans and the Philadelphia Eagles. Both of these teams go into Week 17 with the possibility of earning the odd distinction of coming in last in their division without having a losing record (both can finish 8-8 with a win this weekend).

According to Zachary Levine of the Houston Chronicle, there have only been two teams since the NFL went to a 16 game schedule 30 years ago that finished alone in last place at 8-8. If the Redskins win their game on Sunday, that number could double.

Not surprisingly, with 8-8 only being good enough for last place, both of these divisions have beaten up on outside competition this year; and both have seen tough competition within the division.

It's worth noting that, aside from the second-place teams in these divisions having already locked up a wild-card spot, the third place teams control their own destiny going into the final week. So the Eagles and Texans have had more than their share of games against playoff-caliber teams this year.

But here are some questions to think about:

How would Houston and Philadelphia have fared if they played in a different (and weaker) division by switching places with another last place team? Would two games against the Chiefs raise their chances of making the postseason? What about swapping places (and schedules) with Atlanta or St. Louis? Did the toughness of their divisions really hurt their chances?

To answer these questions, I fired up the bot.

The first step in the process is to establish a baseline. To do this I simply had the simulator rerun the entire 2007 season 500,000 times. Over the course of the simulation, the Texans made the playoffs 26.3 percent of the time with an average of 7.95 wins and the Eagles made the playoffs 25.68 percent of the time with an average of 7.88 wins.

The next step was to run the swaps one by one. Each team swapped both divisions and schedules with Oakland, Atlanta, and St. Louis and after each swap the season was rerun 500,000 times. This gave some surprising results.

First, swapping Houston for other last place teams led to only a slight increase of their playoff chances—and in two of the three swaps, their average wins actually went down. On the other hand, swapping Philadelphia led to significant increases in both their playoff chances and average wins.

Here's how the different swaps worked out.

When Houston was swapped into the AFC West for Oakland, the Texans average number of wins went down to 7.77, but on the strength of improved chances at a division title, their playoff chances rose modestly to 29.8 percent. When placed in the NFC South by being swapped for Atlanta, the results were a bit worse—an average of 7.55 wins and a 28.3 percent chance of making the playoffs.

The only scenario that saw the Texans rise in both average number of wins and playoff chances was a swap with St. Louis of the NFC West. When placed there, the Texans averaged 8.27 wins and made the playoffs 35.5 percent of the time.

The Eagles fared much better than the Texans when swapped into a weaker division. All three swaps led to an increase in their average number of wins and a dramatic increase in their playoff chances.

Swapping spots with Oakland pushed the Eagles' average win value to 9.10 and their playoff chances to 55.1 percent. Trading places with Atlanta yielded similar results—8.77 wins per season and a playoff appearance 51.7 percent of the time.

Finally, swapping places with St. Louis turned the Eagles into a real contender. Their average of 9.64 wins per season put them in the playoffs a full 60.5 percent of the time with more than half of their playoff appearances coming as a result of division championships.

Of course, it's impossible to predict what would have happened if the 2007 season was replayed once under any of these alternative alignments. The old rule about any given Sunday would still apply and despite improved chances, both the Eagles and the Texans might still find themselves out of playoffs.

But running these 'what ifs' allows us to fully appreciate how difficult it is to get a wild card spot in the NFL. Not only have the number of wild card spots gone down since realignment, but teams near the middle of the pack are more likely to have their chances sunk or buoyed merely by the quality of the division they are in.

So hats off to the Giants and Jaguars (and possibly the Redskins and Titans) for making the post season in spite of a difficult road.

Mark Myers is the founder and primary developer at ChanceBot.com, a sports simulation and analysis website. He can be reached at chancebot@gmail.com