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It is time once again to update Some Blog Site readers on the results of my Some Fun Site project to create a more accurate football prediction method.

The 2014 NFL season is over, and here are the most accurate methods for predicting regular-season game results (wins-losses):

• MPWLS: 69%
• MPWHFA: 66%
• ITPLS: 66%

MPWHFA is listed first because it was one game better than ITPLS.

This year saw the addition of MPWHFA to the prediction methods. “MPWHFA” stands for More Points Wins with Home Field Advantage and contends that the team that will win is the team that scores more points than its opponents, adding a few points to the home team. It did great, capturing the long-term title among prediction methods. (For the ideas behind the methods, please visit the Some Fun Site page.)

And if you think you have a formula that can predict the winner of an NFL game better than 63.8% of the time, let me know and I’ll add it to the list.

There are those who disagree with the current setup of playoffs for the NFL. If you’re not familiar with the playoff format: the NFL is divided into 2 conferences, and each conference has 4 divisions of 4 teams each. The winner of each division gets into the playoffs, and there are 2 extra spots (wildcard) in each conference for teams with the next best win-loss records.

It sounds like a fairly straightforward arrangement. Division schedules are setup so that there is a clear winner within each division. And if a team is good but happens to be in a division with a slightly better team, it can still get into the playoffs via the wild card spot.

The problem that some people have with this arrangement is this: what if one whole division is good and another whole division is bad?

For example, let’s say the best team in the NFC West has a losing record, at 7-9. But they win the division, so they get into the playoffs. Meanwhile, teams with better records than 7-9, in other divisions, miss the playoffs.

Maybe the NFC West teams had tougher schedules. I think that, either way, those teams will be eliminated along the way.

The alternative promoted by those opposing divisional seeding is to scrap the meaning of divisions and base playoff entrance and seeding solely on overall record.

Going to seeding based only on record doesn’t account for tougher or easier schedules. Plus I don’t like change, so I’m going to say keep the playoff format like it is.

What is the purpose of the playoffs and championship game?

To determine the best team that year?

Ostensibly, yes. In reality, no. It determines who is playing the best at the end of the year. Otherwise, why not just play the season and crown as champion the team with the best record? If there’s a tie, have a playoff.

Why don’t they do that? Because people like having tournaments. And because they like having underdogs who could have a chance.

Those who do want to change it do so because they add to the purpose of the playoffs. They want to find the best team, and they want close, exciting playoff games.

But what if the 4 best teams are in the same division? Would people want to watch them play again after having watched them play each other twice in the regular season already? No. People want to see matchups of different divisions.

Bottom line: If a team didn’t win its division, then it is not the best team in the league. So the current format does fit the purpose of the playoffs.

And Mr. Commissioner, if you’re reading, the one thing you should absolutely not do is expand the playoffs. Right now, it’s about a third of the teams make the playoffs. That’s a good ratio. If you widen the playoffs to include more teams, you’ll approach the mark of half the teams making the playoffs. That’s ridiculous – playoffs should be significant. Handing them out to anyone who is average or better makes them less relevant.

Plus it would mess up all those “they haven’t made the playoffs since …” stats.

Based on the popularity existence of last year’s article predicting bowl games in haiku form, I present to you this year’s all-haiku bowl game predictions. Still America’s only all-haiku college football bowl game predictions.

These are listed in order of date (earliest first). Some picks are whom I think will win, and some picks are whom I want to win. I’ll leave it to you, the reader, to decide which is which.
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No photos of the weekend, because I didn’t want to carry a camera with me.

Here are some of my thoughts and observations from my participation in the 2014 Air Force Marathon.

I prefer to say I participated in the marathon, rather than ran in the marathon, because my pace doesn’t qualify as a run. Jog maybe, run no.

• First off, packet pickup is held offsite and the day before the race, in order to simplify logistics on race day. It does do that, but it is complicated by having the 5k race during and at the packet pickup. Marathon, half marathon, and 10k are Saturday at the air force base. The 5k is Friday evening, at the venue where the packet pickup is, and at the main time when all the marathoners are trying to pickup their stuff. If you are going to participate in the AF marathon, be sure to get your packet before 5pm Friday.
• The expo was large and you couldn’t short-circuit it. It’s in an arena, and you can’t just go to the pickup table and get your stuff. You must walk around the entire arena – the entrance and tables are setup such that you must walk past each and every vendor before you get your stuff. I suppose that lets them charge more for the vendor spaces, since the visitors are guaranteed.
• Shuttle buses. Given how bad the parking and traffic were Friday night, I was worried that having every arrive at the expo center for shuttle buses Saturday morning would cause equal congestion. But it didn’t. Must have been the 5k. I had no problem getting on the bus, although it did seem to drop us off about a quarter mile from the start line.
• The starting area was marked well, with flags for various expected finish times to space people out and keep things organized.

  A few minutes before the start, they had the big wigs, both from the Air Force and from the sponsors, get up on stage and make the necessary announcements and acknowledgements. They had a microphone, but it was not very effective. Since none of the runners could hear them, no one paid any attention. But then the national anthem started, sung rather well by a female member of the AF. Her voice at least carried well enough to be heard and, being on an active base, everyone respected the song. The flag was shown on the screen, when the screen was not showing the singer. There are some sporting events where people don’t care about the national anthem. This was not one of those.

• The start was interesting, as I was expecting a starting pistol or a horn. What we got instead was more like a cannon blast – a deep, booming starting shot. But at least there was no question about it. Also, I heard they used to do a flyover before the start but, due to budget constraints, there was no flyover this year.
• As far as courses go, it is one of the less-scenic courses. Unless you like pavement and chain-link fences. Because that’s what most of this race seemed to be. And I expected that, based on what I had read.
• The day was nice and sunny, surprisingly warm for the second half of September. But the wind more than made up for that. The wind was fierce. And since the base had a lot of open areas and long straight stretches, we got just about all of the wind.
• Main interesting thing during the race: barefoot guy. Did I mention it was pavement the whole way? And this guy (wearing a white and dark blue jersey with a verse from Isaiah on it) was running barefoot the whole way. I stuck with him and his brother for the first several miles, then they dropped back.
• Since there were not many spectators (an active military base is not open to the public), there were not many signs. But in one of the few spectator areas outside the base, I remember only one sign as being amusing: Seems like a lot of work for a banana.
• The pace team captains were a varied lot. The one I tried to stick near – the 3:55 finish time – was quieter. But the 4:00 finish time lady was not. Her voice carried across most of the base.

  Here is a conversation that played out behind me somewhere around mile 1:
  4:00 lady: WHERE Y’ALL FROM?
  Some female runner: Alabama!
  4:00 lady: WOOHOO! ROLL TIDE!
  Some female runner: WAR EAGLE!
  4:00 lady: ROLL TIDE!
  (at this point, I was thinking things could get ugly. But people swallowed their words and were quiet for a bit, after which this happened:)
  Some male runner: Michigan. Go blue!
  Some other male runner: No, Air Force Go Blue!
  at which point several other runners erupted in cheers.

• The finish is the longest mile ever. I thought it would never end. The wind didn’t help. I normally have a decent finishing kick. People were cheering at the 1/2 mile-to-go mark, so I tried to pick it up for the last 1/2 mile. But I was spent. I managed a decent kick only for the last 200 yards.
• This is one of the only races I know that hands out pizza slices as part of the post-race food at the finish line. But that was also the slowest part. I had my bagel and banana and water, so I didn’t feel like waiting behind 20 people for pizza. My leg muscles would not have let me stand in line anyway. So I skipped the pizza.
• I am going to have to stick to half marathons or under. My body can’t handle the full marathons. You know those encouraging, inspiring slogans such as You can achieve anything your mind can believe ?

  They’re wrong.

  My mind believed I could run that marathon in under 4 hours. My leg muscles did not agree. Guess who won the argument?

• Through most of the race, there were signs that said Alert Level: Low. Or maybe it was Threat Level. Either way, runners were not suspicious.

  But at the finish line, the signs said Alert Level: Moderate. Apparently spectators are a problem. But at least now my kids have had the experience of being wanded at a checkpoint.

In the last week, we had the announcement of the 2014 NFL schedule. Now that we know who will play whom and when, we can start predicting wins and losses.

I keep my predictions over at Some Fun Site. View results of previous football seasons.

2013 Summary

Last year, I predicted that

• Arizona Cardinals = 3-13
• Dallas Cowboys = 7-9
• Oakland Raiders = 4-12
• San Francisco 49ers = 14-2

How they actually did was

• Arizona Cardinals = 10-6
• Dallas Cowboys = 8-8
• Oakland Raiders = 4-12
• San Francisco 49ers = 12-4

Pretty good, except for the Cardinals.

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I don’t follow basketball much, but I hear a little bit about it as I listen to the news, traffic, weather, and sports during my commute. Every year, some people have complaints about the NBA lottery pick system. Why their draft can’t be like everyone else’s, I’m not sure.

But people were proposing changes to the lottery draft format. Most proposals are intended to curb the motivation for teams to lose on purpose in order to get a better draft. One proposal that I remember was to give more ping-pong balls to the non-playoff teams with the better records. That would decrease the incentive to lose, but that would be counter to the purpose of the draft – to help bad teams.

That whole sports-talk radio bit got me thinking as to other ways the NBA could run its draft. Here are my proposals, if they are intent on ignoring the simplest process of just basing it on record:

• Plinko
  It would make as much sense as the current system, but be more entertaining. Make it a giant Plinko board, with the names of all the available draft picks at the bottom. They would have to have all the number combinations as separate ping-pong balls, instead of just 14 balls like they have currently. But then the commissioner just dumps all the balls at once and then it’s a race to the bottom!
• Silent Auction
  Not as entertaining as Plinko, but perhaps some more drama possible. Instead of a certain number of ping-pong ball combinations, each team would get a certain number of Draft Bucks they could spend. Worse teams would get more Draft Bucks. I think this would work better if it applied to the whole draft, not just the first part. Then teams could overspend for one player if they wanted, at the expense of their second round. On second thought, this might be too much like a salary cap, and fans might want something different.
• White Elephant-Style
  That’s right – stealing. The draft would occur with the best team going first and the worst team last. A team could draft anyone off the board, or steal a player who was drafted by an earlier team. The NBA would set limits on how many steals are allowed and such. Possibly confusing, but definitely more exciting.

Any other ideas for how to improve (or at least change) the NBA draft?