Certified Legendary Thread Squiggle 2017

[BallaratBulldog]

WB the only tip the squiggle has got right, but margin alot off (so far)

Strange round.

 

[GreyCrow]

WB the only tip the squiggle has got right, but margin alot off (so far)

Strange round.

Me and Squiggle are in tune then

 

[radiojake]

Adelaide is the only tip I have wrong so far


yes I missed putting in tips last round so I went for an all mighty 'stuff it' and picked who I wanted to win/ would make up ground

may have worked

 

[spinynorman]

Found an interesting sliding door reality where Sydney manage to sneak in as 7th, beat St Kilda in the Elimination Final, knock off Geelong in the semi, squeeze past GWS in a prelim and then get thrashed by Adelaide in the Grand Final.

It's like the Bulldogs tale from last year except with Sydney returning to their standard Grand Final form at the end there. Fascinating.

 

[Hobbes]

WB the only tip the squiggle has got right, but margin alot off (so far)

Strange round.

Yes, it's the week where tips go to die.

Similarly, my algorithm is 1/6, although I did get the Bulldogs margin pretty much spot on.

 

[kreglze]

Waiting for a nice big squiggle spike!

 

[Del165198]

Adelaide should head dangerously left after that game.

 

[WhiskeyTangoFoxtrot]

Crows made a mistake and took a hard left instead of going straight on or hanging a right.

 

[BEaston]

I'm not sure that's what he meant
I think he meant
Beat every team bar one which they couldn't

Essendon still won rd 6 so split the series

i doubt any team in the afl era did this other than Collingwood 2011
We'd probably have to go looking to the pre west coast days and look through 2 loss teams.

If that's what he meant then Dogs last year beat every team except Geelong.

 

[rippersnipper]

If that's what he meant then Dogs last year beat every team except Geelong.

Nah, more like beat everyone all the time but one team which always had the edge over them. In 2011 collingwood were insanely good (182% in round 21 ffs!) but geelong beat them by 3 points, then destroyed them by 96 in round 22 and then again by 39 in the grand final. Those were the only 3 games the pies lost all season. Geelong were insanely good at the right time. After belting the pies they beat the hawks by 5 or so goals in the qualifying final, west coast by 50 odd in the prelim and then collingwood by 39 in the grand final. Quite remarkable.

 

[catstorm]

Nah, more like beat everyone all the time but one team which always had the edge over them. In 2011 collingwood were insanely good (182% in round 21 ffs!) but geelong beat them by 3 points, then destroyed them by 96 in round 22 and then again by 39 in the grand final. Those were the only 3 games the pies lost all season. Geelong were insanely good at the right time. After belting the pies they beat the hawks by 5 or so goals in the qualifying final, west coast by 50 odd in the prelim and then collingwood by 39 in the grand final. Quite remarkable.

while being told the entire time by David King they were complete shit house, even after they made it to the Grand Final

 

[Power Raid]

I'll hold off watching squiggle for a while.

 

[Rotayjay]

it'll be interesting if Adelaide stays sub 60 defence for the whole year and wins a flag - how many teams have sat in that area for long periods of time?

Our defence is rubbish by premiership standards. Needs to tighten up considerably

 

[Final Siren]

Yes, it's the week where tips go to die.

Similarly, my algorithm is 1/6, although I did get the Bulldogs margin pretty much spot on.

Last week I played with the idea of adding a cap to the declared probability of Round 7 tips just because they've always been harder than normal:

But of course I decided, "No, it's just random noise, there's no reason why Rounds 1, 4, and 7 should be harder to tip."

LO AND BEHOLD

5, 5, and 3 from those three weeks.

I mean, it probably is just random noise. I think.

 

[Final Siren]

Round 7, 2016​

I don't know why I do this. Seriously. Six games to open the round and they're all upsets except one that just falls short, and which one is that? RICHMOND. This is like going home to visit your family for the holidays and you decide to go on a long walk by yourself and then come back to find that everyone has burned to death except that one cousin you hate. And then you have to graph it.

So, I dunno, a bunch of bullshit happened and some teams won and some lost. See for yourself:

I missed the first quarter of the Richmond game, by the way. I only caught the last three, where the Bulldogs slowly but relentlessly mowed us down. That was great.

Speaking of unbelievable bullshit, North Melbourne, the 15th most likely team to make the Final Eight according to the bookies, outscored flag favourite Adelaide 64 to 0 in the first quarter. After the scientists at CERN get done analysing the god particle thing I would like them to take a look at that, because I need a rational explanation.

In light of that game, St Kilda beating GWS doesn't even seem that weird. I mean, of course they did. Why not? Why not win by a THOUSAND points and make it really interesting. But the Saints did it in style, and shifted into that pack of teams that look like genuine finals challengers.

Collingwood again failed to decide if they're a bad team or an okay one and stick to it for more than one week in a row. That was a fine win for Carlton, though, making it a great fortnight for the Blues after dispatching Sydney last week.

The Swans were no surprise this week, which was a surprise. Also sticking to the script were Melbourne and Hawthorn, who were expected to be evenly matched. Although of course Squiggle tipped Melbourne by 3pts when it should have known that that's Hawthorn's favourite margin to win by.

Gold Coast are suggesting a pattern, too, with a distinctive upward trend this year as they've improved their attack. Of course, there are no patterns, because football is really random noise designed to break your heart. But that's what it looks like.

Carlton have shifted out of the bottom 2, with Squiggle marking down Essendon pretty harshly for the final quarter against Fremantle.

It's all pretty even, though, which as I've mentioned before, isn't really that shocking, as it's at least halfway explained by the fact that Gold Coast and GWS no longer have under-16s teams. There were plenty of seasons like this pre-2011. It's also still the first part of the year, when everyone's optimistic and trying hard, as opposed to later, when they've sacked the coach and are playing kids with an eye on the next five year plan and losing every week.

Speaking of Richmond, they remain an excellent chance of losing an Elimination Final, or possibly falling short in the final rounds and finishing 9th. So that's really promising. You know, it's not even the fact that we lost to the Bulldogs, because we were closer than I expected, it's just the way it went down. Like a horror movie where the serial killer is shambling along the corridor behind the girl and she's trying all the door handles and you're just like RUN YOU GORMLESS MORON and it seems like forever before the killer reaches her and raises his arm and says, "Deliberate out of bounds."

Flagpole! North gets a rise out of smacking Adelaide, as does Gold Coast for punishing the Cats.

More squiggle bullshit here

And here

 

[Clems Knee]

You are like a Blues singer. You write better when you are in pain.

 

[Daksian]

Love your stuff mate. Gotta ask who's the serial killer: the Doggies or the umpires?

 

[WhiskeyTangoFoxtrot]

This is like going home to visit your family for the holidays and you decide to go on a long walk by yourself and then come back to find that everyone has burned to death except that one cousin you hate. And then you have to graph it.

Do you write like this in your books? If so, I think I need to go out and buy them, because that was hilarious to read!

 

[BEaston]

haha, great write up this week.

 

[Le Grille]

So at the moment, if the 2017 premier won with their current position on the map, it would be a pretty massive outlier?

 

[Pugz89]

Squiggle only predicting a 3pt Melbourne win, time for a Squiggle boost!

You should have taken what was on offer, rather than the reality alternative Those that continue to doubt Squiggle does so at their own peril.

 

[asanque]

I open the thread for the stats and stay for the recaps

 

[Rotayjay]

So at the moment, if the 2017 premier won with their current position on the map, it would be a pretty massive outlier?

We're in a pretty weird position. There have been question marks over the Crows' defence for at least five years now, even as our attack has grown into the best in the league. But giving up 67 points in a first quarter without a score? That's monstrously bad, and also monstrously tough and good football by North.

This problem of suddenly letting through lots of goals from the opposition is now going to be hanging over Adelaide's heads until they prove otherwise in finals. Happened in the opening quarters of the 2015 and 2016 semis as well.

Adelaide probably can't win the flag unless they squiggle to the right (and stay there this time!)

 

[catstorm]

Brisbane looks so lonely out there all by themselves

 

[lusheslewis]

So at the moment, if the 2017 premier won with their current position on the map, it would be a pretty massive outlier?

There is "inflation" in the scores as the year goes on i.e. the average rating of all teams does not stay the same throughout the year, it moves up.* Also the eventual premier always gets a boost at the end (unless they are already really high) as it requires you to win multiple games against other highly rated teams. Look at the Bulldogs last year, they came from nowhere but ended up in the "premiership zone".

*I believe this is because when a team is kept to a very low score, the opposing team receives a much higher boost to their defence rating than that team loses in its attack rating i.e. the rating system is not "zero sum". These large increases in defence ratings then result in higher attack ratings for other teams in future games so both scores eventually get inflated across the league. Perhaps ideally it would be "zero sum" for each game but if the system works then it doesn't really matter.