Stock Watch 2016

Submitted by The Mathlete on

My annual retreat from retirement to leverage 15 years of play by play and recruiting data to predict the coming season. All predictions are based off of data. Looking at returning rosters, recruiting rankings and prior year’s performance to feed thousands of simulations to answer your most pressing needs on how things will go this coming season (but never for gambling purposes).

Can’t claim to be an expert about 2016 without exposing the folly of 2015:

Best 2015 picks:

One last time for this pic [single tear emoji]

Pitt - easily cleared their 6 win bar.

Virginia Tech - came two games short of their 8 win over/under and Frank Beamer is playing Headbanz with the grandkids now.

Illinois - no Beckman, no problem. Successfully called Illinois’ over two straight years

Wisconsin - stalled out a win short of hitting the target

West Virginia - Underachieved by a game

Arkansas – ended up winning 6 of last 7 including crazy win against Ole Miss, but the early hole was too much to dig out of.

Worst 2015 picks:

Image result for oregon state football

The Pac-12-Called Utah as a fraud and Oregon State as a sleeper. One was in NC contention at one point and the other won two games on the season.

Auburn – Predicted over 8.5 and landed at 6 wins. The Malzahn magic wasn’t there in 2015.

2016 Buy Picks

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A lot of low expectations for new USC head coach [surely not Clay Helton]

Maryland, over 4.5 wins – I actually have their mid point at about 6.5 wins. The offense can’t be much worse and Durkin may have struggled with a game plan against Ohio State but was very strong for most of the season. I have a feeling Terps would take quality games against the middle pack of teams on their schedule right now.

USC, over 7.5 wins – I get that their coaching hire was a head scratcher, but this team could be a monster. A massively talented offense with a deep o-line makes over 7.5 wins an easy call for me. Rare for me to see a team project to 9 wins and get them at 7.5.

North Carolina, over 8.5 wins -  Nowhere near the easy call that USC was, but still a team that my numbers really like the potential of.

Mississippi St, over 6.5 wins – No one in the SEC took a bigger relative loss than the Bulldogs and Dak Prescott, but a pretty easy non-conference slate and enough other pieces remaining make this MSU a buy.

Texas A&M, over 6.5 wins – Yes the QB situation is a mess, but I think the defense alone can them to 7 wins.

2016 Sell Picks

Boston College, under 7 wins – you don’t lose this

 Image result for don brown's mustache

and win 4-5 more games than the prior year.

Utah, under 7.5 wins – Gonna keep predicting this one until it hits!

Cal, under 5 wins – Gave up 31 points to a team projected in the triple digits to open the season. Won 7 games last year with first round QB who is now gone along with the top 6 WRs.

Michigan State, under 8.5 wins – I really don’t take this one every year, just most years. Betting against #disrespekt has had a low payout the last several years but picking MSU this year is purely a pick for Dantonio this year because there isn’t much other data to make them attractive.

Washington State, under 7.5 wins – As much as I would love to be right about the above I’d gladly take being wrong on this one.

Wake Forest, under 5.5 wins –Jim Grobe ain’t walking through that door…

Florida, under 8 wins – Think the defense will be worse, the offense will still be bad and the lucky escapes can’t last forever.

Pitt, under 7.5 wins – Last year I took the over but think this team will reverse course. Two tough non-conference games and a team that doesn’t look to be great on either side of the ball doesn’t seem like an 8 win team to my numbers.

Iowa, under 8.5 wins – Bring it Hawkeye fans!

Playoff Predictions

My heuristic prediction is that the National Champion will be a team that has Top Ten roster talent. Roster talent is the recruiting rankings of players on your roster with upperclassmen significantly weighted in value. I have measured this for 12 years and every year the National Champion is on the list and usually has at least one side of the ball in the top 4. Last year, both finalists were in the top 10 and eventual champion Alabama was 3rd overall and in the top 4 on the defensive side of the ball. This year’s top 10 are:

1. LSU (#1 D)

2. Ohio St (#2 O, #3 D)

3. Michigan (#3 O)

4. USC (#1 O)

5. Florida St (#4 O)

6. Notre Dame

7. Texas A&M (#4 D)

8. Alabama

9. Auburn

10. Oklahoma

Those teams have a whole range of expectations heading into the season and there are teams outside this list (Clemson) that absolutely have a great shot, but this list is a great place to start.

A side note, somehow South Carolina has 2nd most roster talent on defense this year. It’s going to be the most Muschamp of all seasons in South Carolina.

Michigan

OK, let’s go. This team is going to be good. It feels like there are a lot of fail safes to protect this team. The linebackers are a huge gap, but there may only be 2-3 games that they are relevant. The two biggest games are on the road, but both teams are facing more question marks than usual this year. Quarterback is still unproven, but Harbaugh. This is a remarkably high floor team.

A lot of the floor is dictated by the schedule Michigan faces. I have Michigan projected as the 8th best team but 44% of my simulations had 10+ wins and Michigan trailed only Florida St and Clemson by making the playoffs in 27% of simulations. I am projecting a weak middle class in the Big Ten this year. Only Nebraska is projected near the level of Michigan and Ohio State and they are off of the schedule in 2016. On the non-conference side, all three opponents are projected in the bottom third of the FBS. The floor, high it is.

This team may or may not be a National Title contender when it’s all said and done, but the opportunity is surely in front of them and the odds of competing aren’t going to get much higher in “Year 3” or some other defined horizon point.

Comments

Michigoss

September 1st, 2016 at 4:31 PM ^

This preseason is set up to make it sound like under 10 wins in the regular season would be a big disappointment, and I believe it. I suppose it could happen where we throw a trap game and end with 9 wins, but it is nice to be "back" to the point of a 10 win expectation after years of disappointment. 

ehatch

September 1st, 2016 at 4:52 PM ^

I think the over/under on USC is because of their schedule.  Alabama, Notre Dame, @ Stanford, @ Washington are all going to be very difficult games.  They would basically need to sweep the rest of their schedule to hit the over.

 

Surprised your model likes the Texas A&M defense -- I thought their defense was their weak point a year ago (if I am remembering last year and S&P+ numbers correctly -- and it is entirely possible I'm not). [Looks like their run defense was bad last year].  They also have a tough schedule.

 

I am glad that both you and S&P hate MSU.  Please let this happen.  Maybe they can have the opposite luck as last year and miss a bowl game altogether. Though that seems farfetched. 

NittanyFan

September 1st, 2016 at 10:18 PM ^

What am I missing?  

(1) This team was 3-9 last year, with 2 of the wins over FCS teams.

(2) They never scored more than 17 points --- not even once! --- against any of their 10 FBS opponents.  They lost a home game to Wake Forest last year by the score of 3-0 (!!!).

(3) Scot Loeffler is their new OC.  This guy was a budding star back in the day at Michigan. I don't think he is any longer.  He wasn't really improving things at VT over the last 3 years.  VT of course had their own offensively challenged game against Wake when Loeffler was in charge (0-0 after regulation).

(4) Admittedly, their OOC is pretty weak.  Wagner, Buffalo, Connecticut, AT Massachusetts.  I guess 4-0 is theoretically possible.

(5) Even with the OOC, they're still going to be underdogs in at least their 3 of their 4 "home" games (vs Syracuse, vs Clemson, vs Louisville, and Georgia Tech in Ireland).  They're also going to be underdogs in at least 3 of their 4 road games (FSU, NC State, VT and Wake).

Under seems like the obvious play here.  Even if BC does go 7-5, you're getting your money back.  8-4 really would be amazing.