Commissioner’s Notes

We’re now through the “regular season” of our game and the playoffs begin next week. This was a wild week across CFB, with some really close games and some really insane games. We’ll take a look at the playoff scenarios, review the luck that led to the playoff bracket we have now, and take a look at Jacob’s no-good, terrible, very bad week.

Choke Job of the Week

This is a team effort. The award goes to Jacob’s entire roster, but specifically embodied by Tulane. While they were slight underdogs, nothing compares to a 50-point loss. That is the biggest loss of the year by far, and one of the biggest losses of all time. We had some really big losses, and Tulane was somehow still 3 touchdowns worse.

Games of the Week Preview

• Tuesday: Ohio @ Miami (OH), in-state MACtion between two pretty good MAC teams; Ohio is tied with Toledo for #1 at 7-2, with two teams close behind at 6-3, and they play each other in week 13, so these teams can’t afford a loss.

• Wednesday: Buffalo @ Ball State, another close MAC matchup; Buffalo is one of the aforementioned 6-3 teams and can’t afford a loss.

• Thursday: Memphis @ South Florida; Memphis is in the AAC 3-way tie at 7-2 for the playoffs.

• Friday: Florida State @ Pittsburgh, while not a great matchup, it’s significantly better than the blowouts.

All the Saturday games are flexed so they’re TBD at time of writing, but the estimated games of the time slot for Saturday:

• Utah @ Arizona, a ranked matchup, and Utah may be primed for a hangover after a big rivalry win, but they’re playing for a first-round playoff bye.

• Florida @ Kentucky; Kentucky ought to be on the outside looking in after getting blown out by the two playoff contenders on their schedule by a combined score of 79-23, so a loss here would officially close the book on them.

• Texas @ LSU; LSU is likewise eliminated but they could really tank Texas’s chances with a win.

• Tennessee @ Texas A&M; Tennessee was just on the outside of the playoffs before blowing out Kentucky, so they can’t afford another loss. TAMU is not an especially great team, but it’s a tough environment and possibly the toughest game remaining on Tennessee’s schedule.

Playoffs

We’re now in the Wild Card Round of the playoffs. For this round, the pod winners get byes so there are only 2 matchups (reminder: playoffs are based on PVP record, first tiebreaker is H2H, and second tiebreaker is margin in H2H games):

• #3 Dylan vs #6 Jacob
• #4 Bruce vs #5 Dan

The winner of Dylan-Jacob will face Bob next week, and the winner of Bruce-Dan will face Zach.

How We Got Here

Here I’ll summarize the entire PVP “regular season” seeding for the playoffs.

Luck

I previously posted a PVP luck analysis, and since then the trend has stayed mostly the same. I am the luckiest, while Bob and Jacob are the unluckiest. You can see the expected records for each player here:

The only swing with luck is my +2 relative to Dylan. With a 1-game lead, that luck would flip the Orange pod lead and give Dylan the bye. Bob’s bad luck ultimately doesn’t matter, as it only pushes him to #2 overall, and he still won his pod, so he still gets the bye. Likewise, Jacob’s bad luck only pushes him ahead of the current 3-player tie at 3-7, so it is a difference in seeding but he’s still playing in week 11.

Closest Games

We did have several very close matchups between players. The top 5 are listed in the table below.

Given the 3-way tie for 4-6, several of those are very impactful. None of the matchups involving Bob, Dylan, or Zach mattered on their own; both of those, if flipped, would not have changed the standings.

Player vs Player Drill Down

Overall, we had 8 sweeps and 7 splits. Dylan only split 1 series, while winning 3 sweeps and losing another. Bruce was the inverse of Dylan, losing 3 sweeps and splitting a series, but sweeping one. The Crocketts all split the season, with each player going 1-1 against each of the others.

Records are from the perspective of the row against the column

Week 10: What Happened?

Jacob ended week 10 with negative points. He had the most unlucky week of the year, probably ever, and possibly one of the unluckiest weeks possible.

He had 0 passes, so 16 games. Of those, SMU (+17 ATS), Tennessee (+21), and Baylor (+1) covered. Those 39 points were dwarfed by -47 ATS from Tulane alone. Three separate games were at least -21 against the spread.

Overall, his teams were -143.5 ATS, the worst of the week by 90 points, and the worst of the season. The only larger ATS difference in absolute terms was Zach’s +146.8 from week 1, which was of course boosted by several FCS blowouts.