'Match' Madness: Picking Upsets a Losing Strategy

[steven johnson]

Here is a study that suggests that one system of betting is a losing strategy. Good luck

Soon Americans nationwide will begin poring over NCAA men's basketball tournament brackets in their annual attempt at glory -- and maybe even a little cash -- in winning the ubiquitous, albeit illegal, office pool.

Some will go by the numbers, picking the team in each matchup with the best ranking or seed. Others use intuition, sports knowledge, favorite colors, mascot preferences -- it's not called March Madness for nothing -- or other somewhat unscientific methods for picking winners and more importantly, picking the upsets.

New research from Indiana University and the University of Wyoming has found that strategists, regardless of their sports expertise, would be better off sticking with the numbers -- but what's the fun in that? Bettors often think picking the upsets will give them an edge, and that they know how to pick them.

Other studies have shown that making NCAA bracket predictions based on rankings from other experts, such as sportswriter polls or gambling bookies, are no more successful than choosing the lower seeds. Hirt and McCrea sought to examine whether bettors used probability matching to pick upsets, if this approach was more successful than picking winning teams based on seeding, and whether people use probability matching because they viewed basketball as a skilled, non-random activity that could be predicted -- essentially, thinking they just know better.



'Match' Madness: Picking Upsets a Losing Strategy

[JonLP24]

1. So true

Several years ago I correctly picked Connecticut and Georgia Tech to make it to the final but hurt myself along the way with 'upset' picks. However I incorrectly picked the winner in the final where I picked GT but UConn won. I guess that was an upset pick but GT beat UConn earlier in the year but it was without Okafor.

[caraher]

2. The problem is that picking the seeds won't make you a winner, either

In other words, on average, yes, picking the seeds gives more correctly-predicted wins. But the tournament is played just once, not "on average." How often would picking only top seeds *ACTUALLY* win a typical tourney pool? Almost never, I think, except for very small ones where nobody is likely to pick the right upset combination.