ESPN Stats & Info: Michigan State given only 5.9 percent chance to win Big Ten

by **Giant Moose** Tue Jul 15, 2014 9:54 am

ESPN Stats & Info gives Michigan State 5.9 percent odds to win the Big Ten in 2014. The Spartans projected overall record is 7.79 wins and 4.32 losses with its conference record coming in at 4.72 wins, 3.28 wins.

"If sportsbooks started using these odds, something tells me there would be quite an avalanche of bets on Michigan State," writes ESPN's Josh Moyer.

ESPN Stats & Info, which plans to update these numbers throughout the season, gives Michigan a 12.7 percent chance to win the Big Ten, and Ohio State a 40.9 percent chance.

ESPN Stats & Info: Michigan State given only 5.9 percent chance to win Big Ten LmQ1Me7

ESPN Stats & Info: Michigan State given only 5.9 percent chance to win Big Ten LmQ1Me7

by **SeeRockCity** Tue Jul 15, 2014 9:58 am

we're gonna win so much

by Herbie Green Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:05 am

WTF? What kind of program could come up with that?

by MSUgöat Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:06 am

**** michigan

by **Blanch32** Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:15 am

If this was stats over time historical bs then sure but definitely no grounded in reality

by **InTenSity** Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:19 am

It probably has more to do with how MSU plays the game. It isn't a flashy offense, and we don't score a lot on teams, not saying that we can't, just that we don't. Defensive stats maybe don't show as much, but I also know that in the past, it was more of a bend, don't break D.

Then again I'm just talking out of my ass. Maybe they add in recruiting rankings and average star or recruit #.

by **DWags** Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:20 am

Scrap the program!

by **Robert J Sakimano** Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:44 am

I have Nike clothing and I'm not afraid to wear it.

by **Giant Moose** Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:46 am

Robert J Sakimano wrote:I have Nike clothing and I'm not afraid to wear it.

I thought you burned it all (on your couch, of course) when Nike ended its relationship with Lance Armstrong?

by Stoops21 Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:48 am

Lol wut?

Pin it in the locker room

by MasonGuy Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:49 am

I guess there is only one thing left to do...

by **Robert J Sakimano** Tue Jul 15, 2014 10:50 am

Giant Moose wrote:
I thought you burned it all (on your couch, of course) when Nike ended its relationship with Lance Armstrong?

you underestimate my commitment and love for Michigan State University and it's athletics program..

GO GREEN!

by **Dr. Strangelove** Tue Jul 15, 2014 11:07 am

Fire Comley

by Cosmo_Kramer Tue Jul 15, 2014 11:27 am

Well if ESPN Stats and Info said it, let's scrap the season...

by **Mentalstate** Tue Jul 15, 2014 12:09 pm

Good thing I didn't purchase season tickets! Thanks, ESPN Stats!

by **Floyd Robertson** Tue Jul 15, 2014 12:14 pm

Mentalstate wrote:Good thing I didn't purchase season tickets! Thanks, ESPN Stats!

You should have been leery of buying season tickets anyway, because we've finished with fewer than 10 wins once in the last four seasons.

by **InTenSity** Tue Jul 15, 2014 12:16 pm

Floyd wrote:You should have been leery of buying season tickets anyway, because we've finished with fewer than 10 wins once in the last four seasons.

And you have a super long commute, which would probably get expensive after a while.

by **Jake from State Farm** Tue Jul 15, 2014 12:17 pm

Did Kirk Herbstreit and Desmond Howard put that program together?

by **Other Teams Pursuing That** Tue Jul 15, 2014 12:18 pm

I wish Vegas agreed

by **Mentalstate** Tue Jul 15, 2014 1:18 pm

Floyd Robertson wrote:

You should have been leery of buying season tickets anyway, because we've finished with fewer than 10 wins once in the last four seasons.

Two steps ahead of you, I had written the ticket office and demanded they guarantee me 10+ wins before I purchase. I'm awaiting their response, should be soon, I sent it in 5 months ago.

by **The_Dude** Tue Jul 15, 2014 1:31 pm

by CrazySparty Tue Jul 15, 2014 1:47 pm

The kids are playing their tails off, and the recruiting grades are screwing it up!

by Izzo Court Tue Jul 15, 2014 1:57 pm

So ESPN thinks MSU will only go 8-4 and win 5 conference games. After looking at the schedule I would say that ESPN predicted the worst possible scenario for MSU.

Jacksonville State (W) 1-0
at Oregon TV (L) 1-1
Eastern Michigan (W) 2-1
Wyoming (W) 3-1
Nebraska (L) 3-2 - 0-1
at Purdue (W) 4-2 - 1-1
at Indiana (W) 5-2 - 2-1
Michigan (L) 5-3 - 2-2
Ohio State (L) 5-4 - 2-3
at Maryland (W) 6-4 - 3-3
Rutgers (W) 7-4 - 4-3
at Penn State (W) 8-4 - 5-3

by WCS Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:02 pm

InTenSity wrote:It probably has more to do with how MSU plays the game. It isn't a flashy offense, and we don't score a lot on teams, not saying that we can't, just that we don't. Defensive stats maybe don't show as much, but I also know that in the past, it was more of a bend, don't break D.

Then again I'm just talking out of my ass. Maybe they add in recruiting rankings and average star or recruit #.

Out of our 13 victories, we recorded blowout wins in 12 of them. The most dominating regular season performance in the history of the B1G.

by CrazySparty Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:07 pm

WCS wrote:

Out of our 13 victories, we recorded blowout wins in 12 of them. The most dominating regular season performance in the history of the B1G.

Meh, we may have won 12 games by double digits, but we didn't blow out WMU, USF, Purdue or Minnesota.

by **Giant Moose** Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:10 pm

CrazySparty wrote:

Meh, we may have won 12 games by double digits, but we didn't blow out WMU, USF, Purdue or Minnesota.

Winning by 14+ is a blowout in my book, so I think USF and Purdue were. Plus Purdue didn't even score. We completely destroyed them defensively.

by **InTenSity** Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:20 pm

Izzo Court wrote:So ESPN thinks MSU will only go 8-4 and win 5 conference games. After looking at the schedule I would say that ESPN predicted the worst possible scenario for MSU.

Jacksonville State (W) 1-0
at Oregon TV (L) 1-1
Eastern Michigan (W) 2-1
Wyoming (W) 3-1
Nebraska (L) 3-2 - 0-1
at Purdue (W) 4-2 - 1-1
at Indiana (W) 5-2 - 2-1
Michigan (L) 5-3 - 2-2
Ohio State (L) 5-4 - 2-3
at Maryland (W) 6-4 - 3-3
Rutgers (W) 7-4 - 4-3
at Penn State (W) 8-4 - 5-3

They have UMD as a tossup.

by **Giant Moose** Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:23 pm

InTenSity wrote:
They have UMD as a tossup.

That's such a joke. UMD never wins games late in the year. Once mid-October comes, they always suck horribly. I give us 95% chance to win that game.

by CrazySparty Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:25 pm

Giant Moose wrote:
Winning by 14+ is a blowout in my book, so I think USF and Purdue were. Plus Purdue didn't even score. We completely destroyed them defensively.

We also needed a trick play to score our first offensive TD of the game to get to double digits ourselves. You can't cite how great our defense was while ignoring how horrible our offense was. I'm not classifying a game that was 7-0 headed to the 4th quarter, and only ended 14-0, as a blowout.

Similar story for USF. It was a one-possession game headed to the 4th quarter. We won by 15. That's not a blowout.

by **Giant Moose** Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:28 pm

CrazySparty wrote:

We also needed a trick play to score our first offensive TD of the game to get to double digits ourselves. You can't cite how great our defense was while ignoring how horrible our offense was. I'm not classifying a game that was 7-0 headed to the 4th quarter, and only ended 14-0, as a blowout.

I am. Despite our offensive struggles, that game was never in doubt.

I don't remember the USF game too well, and I'd have to look up the stats, but 14+ is still a good bookmark I think.

by **InTenSity** Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:30 pm

CrazySparty wrote:

We also needed a trick play to score our first offensive TD of the game to get to double digits ourselves. You can't cite how great our defense was while ignoring how horrible our offense was. I'm not classifying a game that was 7-0 headed to the 4th quarter, and only ended 14-0, as a blowout.

Similar story for USF. It was a one-possession game headed to the 4th quarter. We won by 15. That's not a blowout.

USF was never in doubt. We could have run the ball whenever we wanted, but the coaches wanted the QB's to throw the ball. USF was a glorified scrimmage in which the coaches used that time to see what was working and what they needed to work on. At any time in that game we could have started running the ball and there was nothing that USF could do to stop us. When the game wasn't in question there is no need to run the score up, especially if you need to work on things.

Purdue was a horrible game. I remember nothing from that game, other than being disappointed we only won by 14 or whatever it was. Minny is a well coached team and they played us well. I forget what exactly they did, but they played very clean and one of their best games, and we still beat them.

All that being said, we beat O$U when it mattered the most and then went on to WIN THE ROSE BOWL. The offense did a complete 180 and I never remember seeing another MSU team improve from beginning to end of the year, like I did last years team.

by Rodeo Burger Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:35 pm

We all know that the offense sucked last September. But keep in mind that we were rotating guys at QB, RB, WR, TE and to some degree on the OL. Exactly zero skill players were clear cut starters.

Not to mention that it rained for 5 of our 7 home games, which exacerbated the inexperience of the offense.

by CrazySparty Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:39 pm

InTenSity wrote:
USF was never in doubt. We could have run the ball whenever we wanted, but the coaches wanted the QB's to throw the ball. USF was a glorified scrimmage in which the coaches used that time to see what was working and what they needed to work on. At any time in that game we could have started running the ball and there was nothing that USF could do to stop us. When the game wasn't in question there is no need to run the score up, especially if you need to work on things.

Purdue was a horrible game. I remember nothing from that game, other than being disappointed we only won by 14 or whatever it was. Minny is a well coached team and they played us well. I forget what exactly they did, but they played very clean and one of their best games, and we still beat them.

All that being said, we beat O$U when it mattered the most and then went on to WIN THE ROSE BOWL. The offense did a complete 180 and I never remember seeing another MSU team improve from beginning to end of the year, like I did last years team.

Minnesota converted an absurd number of 3rd and longs, but I chalked it up to hangover from clinching the division/looking ahead to OSU.

And that's what I'm talking about with Purdue. The majority of MSU fans left that game thinking "Wow, that was disappointing". That's not the type of mentality you have after blowing someone out. I had that same feeling after USF, but I guess more fans felt otherwise.

by **InTenSity** Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:46 pm

CrazySparty wrote:

Minnesota converted an absurd number of 3rd and longs, but I chalked it up to hangover from clinching the division/looking ahead to OSU.

And that's what I'm talking about with Purdue. The majority of MSU fans left that game thinking "Wow, that was disappointing". That's not the type of mentality you have after blowing someone out. I had that same feeling after USF, but I guess more fans felt otherwise.

I thought that the offense didn't look that great against USF, but like I said, I thought the coaches were either trying to instill some confidence in the receivers or find out which QB they were going to go with. I didn't even feel as if they treated it like a real game, until they had to score to win. Purdue was frustrating, but it was also a win and sort of an outlier. In 3 weeks MSU scored 98 points. Having just that information, you would probably be satisfied with the wins. They only allowed 31 points.

by CrazySparty Tue Jul 15, 2014 2:58 pm

InTenSity wrote:
I thought that the offense didn't look that great against USF, but like I said, I thought the coaches were either trying to instill some confidence in the receivers or find out which QB they were going to go with. I didn't even feel as if they treated it like a real game, until they had to score to win. Purdue was frustrating, but it was also a win and sort of an outlier. In 3 weeks MSU scored 98 points. Having just that information, you would probably be satisfied with the wins. They only allowed 31 points.

I don't disagree with that, but there's a gap between "satisfied" and "blowout".

55-17 over YSU was a blowout.
42-3 over Illinois was a blowout.
29-6 over UM was a blowout.
30-6 over NW was a blowout.

14-0 over an awful Purdue team, or 21-6 over an equally awful USF team? Nah.

by **Other Teams Pursuing That** Tue Jul 15, 2014 3:05 pm

CrazySparty wrote:

I don't disagree with that, but there's a gap between "satisfied" and "blowout".

55-17 over YSU was a blowout.
42-3 over Illinois was a blowout.
29-6 over UM was a blowout.
30-6 over NW was a blowout.

14-0 over an awful Purdue team, or 21-6 over an equally awful USF team? Nah.

Agreed..... Suspect

by CrazySparty Tue Jul 15, 2014 3:05 pm

Other Teams Pursuing That wrote:

Agreed.....

That's twice in less than a week. Cut that shit out.

by **InTenSity** Tue Jul 15, 2014 3:19 pm

One other thing I've noticed about Coach D, and I hope it doesn't happen against Oregon. He places an emphasis on winning the B1G, to the degree that he uses the non conference games as a chance to work on plays, keep things simple and keep the playbook very basic. MSU isn't going to be flashy, and he would prefer to work on what he believes are the teams strengths rather than run up a score.

I believe that last year, the goal was winning the B1G and making tRose Bowl. I think that MSU wanted to win against ND, but coach still thought it was important to get kinks worked out. If he would have known beforehand that MSU was going to be undefeated in conference play, I think the ND game would have been played differently.

This year I'm expecting the Oregon game to be competitive and good. Coach knows that in order to make it to the Playoffs, winning that game will do a lot in order to get there. We also know that the one team that has had Oregon's number the last couple of years, is the same team we beat in tRose Bowl.

Is it Fall yet?!?

by CrazySparty Tue Jul 15, 2014 3:23 pm

InTenSity wrote:One other thing I've noticed about Coach D, and I hope it doesn't happen against Oregon. He places an emphasis on winning the B1G, to the degree that he uses the non conference games as a chance to work on plays, keep things simple and keep the playbook very basic. MSU isn't going to be flashy, and he would prefer to work on what he believes are the teams strengths rather than run up a score.

I believe that last year, the goal was winning the B1G and making tRose Bowl. I think that MSU wanted to win against ND, but coach still thought it was important to get kinks worked out. If he would have known beforehand that MSU was going to be undefeated in conference play, I think the ND game would have been played differently.

This year I'm expecting the Oregon game to be competitive and good. Coach knows that in order to make it to the Playoffs, winning that game will do a lot in order to get there. We also know that the one team that has had Oregon's number the last couple of years, is the same team we beat in tRose Bowl.

Is it Fall yet?!?

Because last year, the goal was to win the B1G, then it was to win the Rose Bowl.

Been there, done that, on to the next one(Playoff).

by MSULordyoda Tue Jul 15, 2014 4:10 pm

Herbie Green wrote:WTF? What kind of program could come up with that?

I'd love to see what data are inputted into it. It must be heavily weighted towards offense.

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