Dave Mason from BetOnline.ag joins me to talk about college football and the NFL. He tells us how his sports book sets market each week and the advantages of putting out lines before others. He talks about how NFL results have impacted his company this season and the importance of Bitcoin. After the interview, I tell a story that answers the question: what is sports analytics good for?

When host Ed Feng was doing his research on how to win your college football bowl pool, he realized the ideas also apply to NFL pick 'em pools. In this episode, he shows how to win your NFL pool this week by picking the winners in games and assigning confidence points. This is done through his analytics. Then he goes through his procedure for finding contrarian games for people in larger pools.

Ed Feng explains his quantitative research on college football bowl pools. Based on 4 years of data, he explains why there is value in entering bowl pools. He then explains which types of bowl pools to enter. You should avoid pools in which randomness decreases your win probability. Then you should consider using contrarian strategies, or fading the choices of the public. However, this only works in certain pools. Ed closes with a few market based NFL predictions for teams with quarterback injuries.