Pro Football Reference Blog

Two weeks ago I whipped up a quick system to forecast the wildcard games. The forecasts I got matched up very closely with the Vegas lines. Last week I applied the same system to the divisional games and got what I thought at the time were less believable results. And they did in fact turn out to be less believable. The system differed significantly from the line on three of the four games and was wrong on all three.

Undeterred, I'll post the championship game projections here. Go back to the first link to remind yourself what these tables mean.

 TM  YR   R  OPP    W L6   SOS    PD H B   SIM Res

==================================================

chi                 3  0 -0.021   81 1 0

ind 2006  w  kan    3  0  0.021   51 1 0   928  W 23- 8

ind 2005  d  pit    3  0 -0.025   61 1 1   876  L 18-21

hou 1991  w  nyj    3  0  0.071  114 1 0   875  W 17-10

atl 2004  d  stl    3  0 -0.046   76 1 1   870  W 47-17

stl 2001  c  phi    3  1  0.000   95 1 0   865  W 29-24

nyg 1993  w  min    2  0 -0.050   96 1 0   856  W 17-10

ind 2003  w  den    2  0  0.000   31 1 0   829  W 41-10

nwe 2006  w  nyj    2  0  0.037  127 1 0   795  W 37-16

min 1992  w  was    2  1 -0.025   80 1 0   795  L  7-24

chi 1990  w  nor    3 -2 -0.021   69 1 0   787  W 16- 6

gnb 2002  w  atl    3  1 -0.035  -18 1 0   786  L  7-27

sea 2005  d  was    3  0 -0.104  115 1 1   782  W 20-10

dal 1994  d  gnb    3  1 -0.033   71 1 1   777  W 35- 9

sea 2004  w  stl    1  0 -0.042   71 1 0   769  L 20-27

phi 2001  w  tam    2  1 -0.046   91 1 0   765  W 31- 9

WEIGHTED AVERAGE:  73.9 pct chance of victory

PROJECTED SCORE:  24.4-15.1

 TM  YR   R  OPP    W L6   SOS    PD H B   SIM Res

==================================================

ind                 0 -2  0.004  -81 1 0

phi 1995  w  det    0 -2 -0.042 -120 1 0   915  W 58-37

oak 2000  c  bal    0 -2 -0.004   12 1 0   898  L  3-16

chi 1991  w  dal    0 -2 -0.037   -2 1 0   879  L 13-17

mia 1992  d  sdg    0 -2  0.008  -35 1 1   849  W 31- 0

sea 2003  w  gnb    0 -2 -0.025  -58 0 0   848  L 27-33

sfo 1997  c  gnb    0 -1  0.008  -30 1 0   844  L 10-23

cin 1990  w  hou    0 -1 -0.046  -90 1 0   841  W 41-14

tam 1997  w  det    1 -2  0.023  -37 1 0   837  W 20-10

sfo 2002  w  nyg    0 -1  0.023  -25 1 0   825  W 39-38

sea 2006  w  dal    0  0 -0.004  -81 1 0   791  W 21-20

mia 1998  w  buf    0 -1  0.062  -11 1 0   771  W 24-17

cin 2005  w  pit    0  0 -0.017  -60 1 0   758  L 17-31

car 2003  c  phi   -1 -2 -0.037  -66 0 0   743  W 14- 3

min 2000  c  nyg   -1 -2  0.042  -56 0 0   737  L  0-41

tam 2002  c  phi    0 -1  0.015  -24 0 0   732  W 27-10

WEIGHTED AVERAGE:  59.5 pct chance of victory

PROJECTED SCORE:  23.3-20.7

The algorithm views the Bears-Saints matchup as a pretty boring one: one team is significantly superior to the other. Most of the time, the superior team wins. Not much to see here. Of course, nobody seems to think the Bears are actually superior to anyone, but the reasons for that --- primarily freakishly inconsistent QB play --- are hard to quantify and build into an algorithm like this one.

The AFC game is an interesting case because the Colts only appear to have one advantage: home field. All the other indicators point to the Patriots being the better team. Given the almost nonexistent home field advantage we've seen in the playoffs when two teams with equal records meet, I was a little surprised to see the algorithm pick the Colts.