Rufus Peabody, professional sports bettor and creator of Massey Peabody football analytics, joins the show to talk football analytics and predictions. He tells us how his numbers balance preseason expectation with incoming data from the current season. Then he breaks down Oklahoma State and USC, two college football teams that numbers find overrated, as well as the surprising Los Angeles Rams of the NFL. I discuss my new college football totals in a segment after the interview.
Brian Fremeau, creator of the FEI college football rankings and writer for ESPN Insider and Football Outsiders, tells us how he started doing college football rankings way back in 2003. He uses points per possession adjusted for starting field position to evaluate teams on offense and defense. He's also a Notre Dame fan and previews the game at Michigan State. After the interview, I discuss balancing data from a small sample size of games with preseason expectations early in the season.
I welcome Drew Martin of Sports Book Review to talk about handicapping small school college football. He takes us on his journey from all county QB in high school to JP Morgan to the sports world. We discuss how he handicaps games, and how the show Man vs Machine that he does with me came about. After the interview, I discuss small sample size and how it relates to football predictions.
Bill Connelly, college football analytics expert and SB Nation writer, joins me for a wide ranging college football discussion. He describes how he writes a preview for every FBS team each off season 7 years running. Then we give predictions and analysis for Oklahoma at Ohio State, Stanford at USC, Auburn at Clemson and Georgia at Notre Dame.