What fun would draft week be without looking at some data? In that spirit we decided to look how draft position affects the willingness of a team to play a given player. In other words, does the sunk cost of the draft pick encourage a team to give a player more playing time than the player’s skill might otherwise call for? We looked at data for running backs and quarterbacks. Also, for quarterbacks we looked at when the playing time was occurring: was it during mop up time in a blowout or was it when the outcome was still in question.

Running Backs
Are running backs drafted higher more likely to “get a shot” than players drafted lower?

The running backs selected in the first half of the first round definitely get a better chance at playing time. There is an oscillation when comparing the first half of a round to the second half of a round. This is probably a result of the fact that teams picking in the second half of the draft probably need to give a rookie running back playing time.

The distributions of rushes demonstrate this even better. Running backs selected in the first half … Read the rest

We have our Winners! It has been a fantastic few months since we launched the Farsite Forecast with our inaugural Oscar Forecast.  Below is a summary of the pundits and data science predictions.  Farsite Forecast was five for six, including correctly projecting Christoph Waltz for Best Supporting Actor.  Our one miss was the Best Director award, where we had Spielberg instead of winner Ang Lee.  We will evaluate the model and provide some additional color commentary on that projection later in the day. Thanks for following us over the last few months. But, don’t stop! We’ll continue to post on a variety of fun topics, including the movies, music, and perhaps even some issues related to pop culture and politics… 

TGIF – no, not thank goodness it is Friday; Thank Goodness It is FINAL. Today is our final forecast for Sunday’s Academy Awards.  And, don’t worry. We are going to keep blogging after the Oscars.  Our topics will expand to cover some other unique and cool topics. In fact, if you have a topic, that you’d like us to cover, email michael@farsitegroup.com or conor@farsitegroup.com.

First things first – here are our final predictions.

We’ll give you some additional commentary throughout the day. And, keep an eye on our Twitter (@farsiteforecast) and Facebook (www.facebook.com/farsiteforecast) for some fun news and nuggets throughout the weekend.

As they say in the gambler, you gotta know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em.  Oscar betting is a little easier with the help of data science.  For those of you looking to place real money on the Oscars – here are what the prop betting markets are saying going into Oscar Sunday.

And, our lawyers told us to make sure and say that we in no way shape or form encourage gambling of any sort…gotta know when to listen to the suits too!