Scorecasting: The Hidden Influences Behind How Sports Are Played and Games Are Won

[Pokerjoe]

I haven't read this yet. Probably won't, because I don't think it will have info specifically useful for sportsbetting (I'll skim through it in a store sometime to be sure).

But it's sparked some good discussion here:

http://sonicscentral.com/apbrmetrics/viewtopic.php?t=2735

and in the comments after the good article here:

http://sabermetricresearch.blogspot.com/2011/01/scorecasting-is-home-field-advantage.html

Love the data about the effect on HFA of the NFL reviewing turnovers.

[Justin7]

I read this, and wrote a review of it here:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A1KJS7QLDAC2GB/ref=cm_pdp_rev_title_1?ie=UTF8&sort_by=MostRecentReview#RBZF8D7GKHI9Z

[Jasonal_98]

Sounds interesting. Going to download the first chapter on Kindle and see what I think.

[Peregrine Stoop]

Good book, but mainly confirms what I already knew.

Disagree on the referees do a good job stuff... that was weak sauce analysis that neglects having a benchmark for what good is.

[Justin7]

Good book, but mainly confirms what I already knew.

Disagree on the referees do a good job stuff... that was weak sauce analysis that neglects having a benchmark for what good is.

I could have written a book on all the things with which I disagreed. But there was some interesting analysis in there.

[Pokerjoe]

Good points there, Justin.

BTW, to those who don't have the habit, Amazon book reviews are a great resource. Take them all with a grain of salt, obv, but generally, very useful.

[TheDon72]

some very interesting topics to say the least though

[Stallion]

Interesting Articles. Was Tim Donaghy the referee in any of the NBA games?? LOL

[Wrecktangle]

I always find HFA analysis by others to be interesting. Rather than considering that HFA for whichever sport is a large covariant matrix of factors that basically says: the home team makes fewer errors on average than the away team, many "analysts" blame the bulk of HFA on one factor, the one that they happen to have data for. In this case, NFL officials: possibly crooked but certainly biased.

BTW for football, certainly the pro variant, not enough data exists to solve for values in the matrix, but certainly blaming the bulk of HFA on officials without considering how other factors covary is far off-base.