NBA – HANDICAPPING STATS – BY WEEK THROUGH 12/22/2012

The information presented here is inclusive of all games  played through 12/22/2012, as well as historic data through  that provides a snapshot of what is happening by week for the current and prior seasons across many variables.

In the embedded Excel workbook below, you will find the following worksheets:

• BY_GAME_TYPE_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY CONFERENCE/NON-CONFERENCE GAMES BY WEEK
• BY_AWAY_HOME_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY AWAY/HOME BY WEEK
• ML_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF MONEY LINE FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• ATS_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF ATS FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• TOTAL_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF TOTAL OVER WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY

Please note the following regarding the data:

For the spreadsheets BY_GAME_TYPE_STD and BY_AWAY_HOME_STD:

• The data is grouped by a week-ending date and a running season-to-date total
• When a Money Line percent is greater than 75%, the cell is highlighted in green
• When a Line or Total percent is greater than 60%, the cell is highlighted in green
• We have added cells that show the current week differences for both the Season to Date and the Prior Week’s data
• In games that closed as a Pick, for our purposes the Home Team was the Favorite
• All Pushes have been omitted

NBA – HANDICAPPING STATS – BY WEEK THROUGH 12/15/2012

The information presented here is inclusive of all games  played through 12/15/2012, as well as historic data through  that provides a snapshot of what is happening by week for the current and prior seasons across many variables.

In the embedded Excel workbook below, you will find the following worksheets:

• BY_GAME_TYPE_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY CONFERENCE/NON-CONFERENCE GAMES BY WEEK
• BY_AWAY_HOME_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY AWAY/HOME BY WEEK
• ML_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF MONEY LINE FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• ATS_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF ATS FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• TOTAL_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF TOTAL OVER WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY

Please note the following regarding the data:

For the spreadsheets BY_GAME_TYPE_STD and BY_AWAY_HOME_STD:

• The data is grouped by a week-ending date and a running season-to-date total
• When a Money Line percent is greater than 75%, the cell is highlighted in green
• When a Line or Total percent is greater than 60%, the cell is highlighted in green
• We have added cells that show the current week differences for both the Season to Date and the Prior Week’s data
• In games that closed as a Pick, for our purposes the Home Team was the Favorite
• All Pushes have been omitted

NBA – HANDICAPPING STATS – BY WEEK THROUGH 12/09/2012

The information presented here is inclusive of all games  played through 12/09/2012, as well as historic data through  that provides a snapshot of what is happening by week for the current and prior seasons across many variables.

In the embedded Excel workbook below, you will find the following worksheets:

• BY_GAME_TYPE_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY CONFERENCE/NON-CONFERENCE GAMES BY WEEK
• BY_AWAY_HOME_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY AWAY/HOME BY WEEK
• ML_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF MONEY LINE FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• ATS_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF ATS FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• TOTAL_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF TOTAL OVER WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY

Please note the following regarding the data:

For the spreadsheets BY_GAME_TYPE_STD and BY_AWAY_HOME_STD:

• The data is grouped by a week-ending date and a running season-to-date total
• When a Money Line percent is greater than 75%, the cell is highlighted in green
• When a Line or Total percent is greater than 60%, the cell is highlighted in green
• We have added cells that show the current week differences for both the Season to Date and the Prior Week’s data
• In games that closed as a Pick, for our purposes the Home Team was the Favorite
• All Pushes have been omitted

NBA – HANDICAPPING STATS – BY WEEK THROUGH 12/02/2012

The information presented here is inclusive of all games  played through 12/02/2012, as well as historic data through  that provides a snapshot of what is happening by week for the current and prior seasons across many variables.

In the embedded Excel workbook below, you will find the following worksheets:

• BY_GAME_TYPE_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY CONFERENCE/NON-CONFERENCE GAMES BY WEEK
• BY_AWAY_HOME_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY AWAY/HOME BY WEEK
• ML_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF MONEY LINE FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• ATS_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF ATS FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• TOTAL_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF TOTAL OVER WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY

Please note the following regarding the data:

For the spreadsheets BY_GAME_TYPE_STD and BY_AWAY_HOME_STD:

• The data is grouped by a week-ending date and a running season-to-date total
• When a Money Line percent is greater than 75%, the cell is highlighted in green
• When a Line or Total percent is greater than 60%, the cell is highlighted in green
• We have added cells that show the current week differences for both the Season to Date and the Prior Week’s data
• In games that closed as a Pick, for our purposes the Home Team was the Favorite
• All Pushes have been omitted

Getting The Most Out Of Our Website – How To Use The “Current Games – Detail View” Section

We often see questions posted on Twitter asking where to find handicapping information, and it makes us feel that we are not doing a very good job of informing people about all our site has to offer.

As I am sure most of you reading this know there are countless sites that provide this type of  information, but it had been our experience that most of it was fragmented, not very comprehensive, and displayed in ways that doesn’t make sense.

We just thought that someone could do a better job, so why not us.

When designing the site we included all the information that we found ourselves searching out, grouped it by individual game, and then displayed all that information in a way that mirrors how our users, the handicapping public, intuitively think.

In addition to providing the data, we allow you access to it via query tools that we feel are better than anything offered across this very crowded space.

While we think we have done a pretty good job, and hope you do as well, we continue to feel that too much of our site’s functionality and information is being under utilized.

When we look at how our users navigate within our site, it is clear that people land on a main page and either don’t think about or don’t know how much other valuable information is a few clicks away.

With that in mind we thought it might be helpful if we posted a series of articles that drilled down on our site’s features and the data that we offer.

The first topic we chose to write about is the “Current Games – Detail View”.

This is available for all the Leagues that we track and offers a VERY VERY detailed look at all the currently scheduled games from a handicapping perspective.

Some of the highlights include:

• The most thorough Game Snapshot you will find on the web, including anything and everything from Line/Total Movement, Game Time (which came be customized to your time zone),  and a link that provides the weather forecast for any outdoor venue.
• Head-To-Head Cover Rates, Scoring Averages by Road/Home Team (For MLB Pitcher specific data is included), and a 5 year roster of all their games complete with historic ML/ATS/Total results
• Query Tool that shows you Cover Rates at the current Line/Total and allows you to adjust the Line/Total  by half points to see if there has been any value in buying the Line/Total up or down
• Displays how the teams have done historically specific to the current game role – For example Coming off a Home Loss on Short Weeks Rest
• Query Tool that allows you to return ML/ATS/Total histories at the click of a  button for countless scenarios – For example – How have the Bears done as a Dog in Road Division Games On Grass?
• ML/ATS/Total history for both teams that you can both sort and filter
• Match up data presented side by side showing one team’s offense vs the other team’s defense complete with ranking data for each category to help make the comparisons more meaningful

Below you will find a much more in-depth look at “Current Games – Detail View” section of our site.

We hope you find this informative, and if you have questions we would love to hear from you so please feel free to reach out to us on Twitter @GreyMatterStats .

Current Games – Detail View

This view displays a detailed look at the current card of games for each league.

It is broken down into a header and a series of tabs.

Current Games – Detail View – Header

The header display remains visible regardless of what tab you chose and offers a quick reference on the details of a game, such as who is playing, Current Money Line, Line, and Total data, as well as the projected final scores. Throughout the website, the

Favorite team is highlighted in dark green and the Underdog in dark red.

The arrows will page from game to game and for quick access to a specific match-up you can use the drop down menu to go directly to any game.

If one team opened as the favorite, and currently the other team is currently the favorite, the Open Favorite A/H and Current Favorite A/H fields will be highlighted in yellow, alerting you to this change.

In some cases a game may have a valid Line but no Total. In that event, the system defaults to a Total of 299 and highlights the Current Total field in yellow alerting you that no valid total is available.

Current Games – Detail View – Game Snapshot

This tab drills down on the specifics of the selected game. Here you can find information about each team, such as streaks leading into the current game, Current Line and Total data, projected winners and Total result, as well as date, time, venue, and weather information.

Please note, that during registration you can select a preferred time zone, in which to display all game time data.

If Game Type is something other than “Regular Season”, the display will be highlighted in yellow.

If game is being played at a Neutral Site, the display will be highlighted in yellow.

As mentioned above, in some cases a game may have a valid Line but no Total. In that event, the system defaults to a Total of 299 and on this tab highlights the Open Total, Current Total, and Projected Total Result fields in yellow, alerting you that no valid total is available.

NBA – HANDICAPPING STATS – BY WEEK THROUGH 11/17/2012

The information presented here is inclusive of all games  played through 11/17/2012, as well as historic data through  that provides a snapshot of what is happening by week for the current and prior seasons across many variables.

In the embedded Excel workbook below, you will find the following worksheets:

• BY_GAME_TYPE_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY CONFERENCE/NON-CONFERENCE GAMES BY WEEK
• BY_AWAY_HOME_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY AWAY/HOME BY WEEK
• ML_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF MONEY LINE FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• ATS_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF ATS FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• TOTAL_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF TOTAL OVER WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY

Please note the following regarding the data:

For the spreadsheets BY_GAME_TYPE_STD and BY_AWAY_HOME_STD:

• The data is grouped by a week-ending date and a running season-to-date total
• When a Money Line percent is greater than 75%, the cell is highlighted in green
• When a Line or Total percent is greater than 60%, the cell is highlighted in green
• We have added cells that show the current week differences for both the Season to Date and the Prior Week’s data
• In games that closed as a Pick, for our purposes the Home Team was the Favorite
• All Pushes have been omitted

NBA – HANDICAPPING STATS – BY WEEK THROUGH 11/13/2012

The information presented here is inclusive of all games  played through 11/14/2012, as well as historic data through  that provides a snapshot of what is happening by week for the current and prior seasons across many variables.

In the embedded Excel workbook below, you will find the following worksheets:

• BY_GAME_TYPE_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY CONFERENCE/NON-CONFERENCE GAMES BY WEEK
• BY_AWAY_HOME_STD – ML/ATS/TOTAL RESULTS BY AWAY/HOME BY WEEK
• ML_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF MONEY LINE FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• ATS_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF ATS FAVORITE WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY
• TOTAL_BY_WEEK – GRAPH OF TOTAL OVER WIN% BY WEEK FOR CURRENT SEASON AND HISTORY

Please note the following regarding the data:

For the spreadsheets BY_GAME_TYPE_STD and BY_AWAY_HOME_STD:

• The data is grouped by a week-ending date and a running season-to-date total
• When a Money Line percent is greater than 75%, the cell is highlighted in green
• When a Line or Total percent is greater than 60%, the cell is highlighted in green
• We have added cells that show the current week differences for both the Season to Date and the Prior Week’s data
• In games that closed as a Pick, for our purposes the Home Team was the Favorite
• All Pushes have been omitted

A Public Service Announcement On The Evils Of Betting Money Line Favorites

The following is a Public Service Announcement for those that are unaware, and a reminder for those that are aware, of the Evils Of Betting Money Line Favorites.

What we write about below is most applicable to College Basketball and Football, but the lessons should be applied to all your sports handicapping.

*

Those of you familiar with our site know that we project the outcome of every game played and track those projected results as simulated $100 wagers against the Money Line, ATS, and for the Total.

We do this for many reason, but most importantly to provide an easy to understand barometer as to how well our projection methodology is working overall and how it would have performed in any of the “what-if” queries that can be submitted through our site.

So last night we were poking around looking for some trends for the current season of College Football., and we happened to notice that the dollar-ized output for our season to date Projected Money Line results was –$16,265.

And we were like, “Ummmmm, do we have a bug somewhere…it’s only Week 05 that can’t be right, can it?”

So we started to double check everything and uncovered what you will always uncover when you bet Money Line Favorites; Sooner or later you are going to get eaten alive by a huge Live Dog.

Please note that all of the following are based on straight up Money Line wins for the 2012/2013 College Football Season.

Season to date there are been 232 games that we have forecast.

Of the 232 games, we had projected the Favorite to win 195 times and were correct 151 times, or 77.4%, a respectable figure considering that we include every single game played.

But a funny thing happens on the way to the bank with this simulation, and that is we’d have nothing to deposit since we would be $15,323 in the hole, even after winning 77.4%.

Three of the Favorites we had selected straight up were Houston –9000 over Texas State, Arkansas –8000 over UL-Monroe, and Georgia Tech –3000 over Middle Tennessee State.

All three lost outright, and those three games alone contributed $20,000 is losses in our simulation.

Our 151 wins would have gained $15,100 and our 44 losses would have resulted in a staggering loss of $30,423.

Three out of 195, or 1.5% of the games, accounted for 65.7% of our simulated monetized losses.

To further put this in perspective, just to get even from a deficit of -$15,323, betting $X to win $100 you would need to win 154 games in a row.

Once in awhile we come across a thread in a forum or a Twitter question where someone asks, “Hey wouldn’t it make sense to take the Money Line with these big Favorites and not worry about them covering a huge number ATS?”

The answer is, NO NO NO NO NO.

If you don’t want to lay the points in these types of games at something much closer to $110 to win $100, THEN PICK ANOTHER GAME, OR MAKE NO PLAYS AT ALL OR BOX A TRIFECTA AT SOME TRACK.

In our opinion for football/basketball in both college and pro, you should never be playing Money Line Favorites, and never ever ever ever playing huge Money Line Favorites.

Now if you are taking Money Line Dogs, we are all for that and if you have a good please pass it along.

This Public Service Announcement has been brought to you by GreyMatterStats, and we have approved this message.

We now return you to your degenerate gambling habits.

@GreyMatterStats

NBA at the All-Star Break

NBA action gets back underway this evening with a 9-game card, but before the games tip this evening, let’s take a look at some trends and records during the first-half of the season.

– Favs slightly outpaced Dogs, covering 51.6% of the time.
– However, large favorites (12.5pts+) covered 72.4% of the time.
– Unders finally came down a bit, and ended the halfway mark at 54.0%.
– However when the total was 207pts+, the Under hit 81.8% of the time.
– Our projections, which should always be taken with a grain of salt, were best when the spread was between 2.5 and 6.5., netting $3,730 if you bet $110 on each of our line projections in that range.
– Our projections also do well when the P Line Delta (defined as the favorite’s projected score minus the underdog’s projected score minus the closing line; a negative number indicates the underdog with the line, and a positive number indicates the favorite against the line) is either very “negative” or very positive.
– The Clippers and Bulls lead the league in covers at 60% each. The Bobcats and Wizards continue to bring up the rear (34% and 30% respectively).
– For totals, the only thing that jumps out is the Knicks, which went under in 71% of their games in the first-half of the season.
– Miami has not been a dog at all this season.

Daily Favorite/Dog & Over/Under Counts For All Leagues

Each morning we will updating this workbook with the prior days counts by League as follows:

• Money Line Record and Win Percent from the perspective of  the Favorite
• ATS Record and Win Percent from the perspective of  the Favorite
• Total Record and Win Percent from the perspective of  the Over

In the embedded Excel workbook below,  you will find the following worksheets:

1. MLB – DAILY, WEEKLY, AND SEASON TO DATE COUNTS FOR BASEBALL
2. NBA – DAILY, WEEKLY, AND SEASON TO DATE COUNTS FOR PROFESSIONAL BASKETBALL
3. NCAAB – DAILY, WEEKLY, AND SEASON TO DATE COUNTS FOR COLLEGE BASKETBALL
4. NFL – DAILY, WEEKLY, AND SEASON TO DATE COUNTS FOR PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL
5. NCAAF – DAILY, WEEKLY, AND SEASON TO DATE COUNTS FOR COLLEGE FOOTBALL