Best Ball Strategy: Using Game & Team Totals - 2021 Actual Comparative Analysis
gm, Austrailia.
There has been quite a bit of buzz surrounding the importance of correlating game stacks into your drafted teams for the playoff weeks in Underdog tournaments (playoff weeks = week 15, week 16, week 17).
As I am a believer in heavily correlating drafted teams when the opportunity presents itself during drafts, I wanted to have a better understanding of how much we should plan ahead for this correlation, and if I should include SuperBook Sports projected game totals within my strategy when targeting games to correlate in weeks 15 - 17.
Last year I wrote a speculative theory piece on intra-divisional stacking and I used SuperBook Sports 2021 projected game totals within the analysis to build a case for what games and divisions to target when stacking. I would be amiss to say that during writing that piece, I wasn’t suspect to the accuracy of SuperBook Sports projected team and game totals. Could a book really project out 6 months away at a team and game total micro level with accuracy? - was the thought.
This post is a recap comparative analysis of the 2021 SuperBook Sports projected implied game and team totals compared to the actual result.
Bullet data nug analysis throughout cuz data. Concluding thoughts at the end.
Game Total Comparison
Week 15
SuperBook Sports Game Total vs. Actual
KC vs. LAC and NO vs. TB were projected for the most points, KC vs. LAC actually scored the most (62), NO vs. TB actually scored the least (9)
1 of the top 4 projected games or 25% actually finished top 4 (KC vs. LAC)
4 of the top 8 projected games or 50% actually finished top 8
Game Total Delta
6 of 16 or 37.5% of games actually finished within a 7 point delta of the projected total
The average delta was -8.5 points projected vs actual
7 of 16 games or 43.75% of games actually scored less than -10 points than projected
2 of 16 games scores or 12.5% of games actually scored more than 10 points than projected
12 of 16 games or 75% hit the under
4 of 16 games or 25% hit the over
Week 16
SuperBook Sports Game Total vs. Actual
TB vs. CAR was projected for the most points (51) and actually scored the T-11th most (38)
WAS vs. DAL and LAC vs. HOU actually scored the most (70), WAS vs. DAL was projected for the T-5th most (48) and LAC vs. HOU was projected for T-9th most (47)
0 of the top 4 projected games or 0% actually finished top 4
1 of the top 8 projected games or 25% actually finished top 8 (PIT vs. KC actually finished T-8)
Game Total Delta
7 of 16 or 43.75% of games actually finished within a 7 point delta of the projected total
The average delta was -1 points projected vs actual
6 of 16 games or 43.75% of games actually scored less than -10 points than projected
3 of 16 games scores or 18.75% of games actually scored more than 10 points than projected
8 of 16 games or 50% hit the under
8 of 16 games or 50% hit the over
Week 17
SuperBook Sports Game Total vs. Actual
ARI vs. DAL was projected for the most points (52) and actually scored the T-5th most (47)
DET vs. SEA actually scored the most (80) when projected for T-9th most (45)
1 of the top 4 projected games or 25% actually finished top 4 (KC vs. CIN)
3 of the top 8 projected games or 37.5% actually finished top 8 (KC vs. CIN actually finished 2nd, TB vs. NYJ actually finished 4th, ARI vs. DAL actually finished T-5th, ATL vs. BUF actually finished 8th )
Game Total Delta
8 of 16 or 50% of games actually finished within a 7 point delta of the projected total
The average delta was -.625 points projected vs actual
4 of 16 games or 25%% of games actually scored less than -10 points than projected
3 of 16 games scores or 18.75% of games actually scored more than 10 points than projected
10 of 16 games or 62.5% hit the under
6 of 16 games or 37.5% hit the over
Team Total Comparison
Week 15
6 of 10 or 60% of teams with the highest projected team total actually finished top 10
BUF, KC, SF actually finished top 5 as projected
TB, CLE, ARI missed their projected total by double digit Rk
Week 16
6 of 10 or 60% of teams with the highest projected team total actually finished top 10
KC, DAL actually finished top 5 as projected
ATL, BAL, ARI missed their projected total by double digit Rk
Week 17
4 of 10 or 40% of teams with the highest projected team total actually finished top 10
KC, DAL actually finished top 5 as projected
ATL, BAL, ARI missed their projected total by double digit Rk
Player To Team Total Comparison
Below are the top 10 finishing players by position by week comparing the teams SuperBook Sports team total compared to the actual team total. Data nugz are not represented below comparing top 10 finishers vs actual rank; generally as expected, top 10 finishers each week produce from actual top scoring teams.
Week 15
7 of 10 or 70% of the highest scoring QBs produced from games projected 15th highest scoring or lower. Tyler Huntley was the #1 scoring QB of the week, rostered on ~ zero UD teams (so insignificant not looking up actual rostered actual #)
6 of 10 or 60% of the highest scoring RBs produced from games projected 11th highest scoring or higher. Duke Johnson was the #1 scoring RB of the week, rostered on ~ zero UD teams (so insignificant not looking up actual rostered actual #)
5 of 10 or 50% of WRs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. The other 5 produced from games projected 25th highest scoring or lower
4 of 10 or 40% of TEs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. The other 6 produced from games projected 14th highest scoring or lower
Top 10 player finishing stacks that hit with SB team Rk:
BAL- 8: Huntley (35.9) - Andrews(30.6)
KC - 2: Mahomes (30.6) - Hill (26.8) - Kelce (36.1)
PHI - 15: Hurts (28.6) - Goedert (17) - Sanders (15.6)
LAC - 17: Herbert (24) - Ekeler (16.2)
GB - 6: Aaron Rodgers (23.8) - MVS (18.3)
BUF - 2: Allen (21.8) - Davis (23) - Singletary (16.1)
DET - 28: Goff (20.6) - St. Brown (19.5)
CHI - 10: Fields (16.9) - Kmet (10.1)
Week 16
6 of 10 or 60% of the highest scoring QBs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. SuperBook Sports had projected CIN with the 2nd lowest team total in week 16; Joe Burrow was QB1
5 of 10 or 50% of the highest scoring RBs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. Justin Jackson was the #1 scoring RB of the week, minimally drafted on UD teams (so insignificant not looking up actual rostered actual #)
4 of 10 or 40% of WRs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. The other 6 produced from games projected 14th highest scoring or lower
6 of 10 or 60% of TEs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. 3 TEs produced from games projected 25th highest scoring or lower
Top 10 player finishing stacks that hit with SB team Rk:
CIN - 31: Burrow (38.1) - Higgins (37.4) - Mixon (28.5)
DAL - 5: Prescott (31.3) - Cooper (18) - Schultz (18.2) - Zeke (16.7)
BUF - 10: Allen (31) - Diggs (18)
KC - 1: Mahomes (22.3) - Pringle (22.5)
ARI - 7: Murray (21.9) - Ertz (9.4) - Edmonds (22.7)
BAL - 4: Johnson (20.2) - Andrews (22.5)
GB - 8: Rodgers (20) - Adams (28.4)
LAC - 6: Herbert (18.9) - Jackson (30.2)
Week 17
7 of 10 or 70% of the highest scoring QBs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. SuperBook Sports had projected CIN with the 21st highest team total in week 16; Joe Burrow was QB1
5 of 10 or 50% of the highest scoring RBs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. Rashaad Penny was the #1 scoring RB of the week, drafted as the RB2 on the team in 2021
2 of 10 or 20% of WRs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. The other 8 produced from games projected 11th highest scoring or lower
5 of 10 or 50% of TEs produced from games projected 10th highest scoring or higher. The other 5 TEs produced from games projected 14th highest scoring or lower
Top 10 player finishing stacks that hit with SB team Rk:
CIN - 21: Burrow (34.8) - Chase (50.1)
SEA - 6: Wilson (27.8) - Metcalf (27.9) - Penny (31.5)
TB - 4: Brady (27.4) - Grayson (17.1) - Gronk (15)
BUF - 2: Allen (23.9) - Singletary (23)
DAL - 6: Prescott - Prescott (23) - Schultz (8.4)
NE - 11: Jones (22.3) - Wilkerson (18.2) - Meyers (17.3) - Stevenson (22.7)
KC - 3: Mahomes (20.9) - Kelce (10.9) - Williams (24.2)
GB - 14: Rodgers (20.3) - Adams (25.1) - Dillon (21.3)
SF - 1: Lance (20.1) - Mitchell (20)
Sum Thoughts
That’s a lot of data - a lot of nugz - and to be honest, I don’t think it paints a picture that we as drafters should be putting all of our chips into a SuperBook Sports game or team implied total projecting out 6 months in advance. It is okay to say we don’t know what we don’t know when there is so much unpredictability between injuries, player breakouts, weather, etc. that will impact each player, team and game throughout the entire season.
Of the top four game totals across all three weeks, 2 of 12 or 16.7% of the games actually finished top 4. Both of those games of which were KC games; KC was expected to be one of the highest scoring teams in the NFL for the season (2021 1st best odds to be the highest scoring team on DraftKings).
Like KC, SuperBook Sports for the entirety of the season was also very high on DAL, TB and BUF. All of KC, BUF, DAL and TB were projected top four highest projected implied totals for the 2021 season. Many of which, were the few teams that actually finished as expected compared to projected implied game and team totals for all weeks 15, 16 and 17.
Amon-Ra St. Brown was the only WR to finish as a top 10 WR weeks 15, 16 and 17. DET was ranked as the 28th, 28th, and 31st highest team total team in weeks 15, 16 and 17. They actually finished 6th, 25th and 8th.
Each of the top scoring RBs for week 15 (MIA - Duke Johnson Jr.), week 16 (LAC - Justin Jackson) and week 17 (SEA - Rashaad Penny) were all drafted (if they were drafted) as RB2s in the 2021 draft. MIA was projected as the 9th highest team total and finished 2nd, LAC was projected as the 6th highest team total and finished 9th, SEA was projected as the 6th highest team total and finished 1st.
Week 16 and 17 exposure to CIN was the stack to have. Joe Burrow finished as QB1 both weeks 16 and 17 and supported the #1 wide receiver finisher each week (Tee Higgins - Wk 16 / Ja’Marr Chase - Wk 17). CIN was projected the 31st highest scoring team total week 16 and 21st highest scoring detail week 17. CIN was however projected as the 7th highest game total week 16 (vs. BAL and 2nd highest game total week 17 (vs. KC).
Very surprising (to me): each week there were multiple top scoring QB and RBs from the same team. I still think drafting QB-RB stacks from the same team at too high of a price cannabalizes the overall return of your team and reduces the weekly ceiling outcome needed to cleanly advance through each round of the playoffs. Of the 13 week 15-17 QB-RB stacks that both finished top 10, 6 of 13 or 46% were RB2s on the team based off 2021 ADP. Below are the QB-RB combinations that advanced scoring top 10 positionally each week with the SuperBook Sports projected team total rank:
Wk 15 - 3 Occurrences: PHI (15) - Hurts-Sanders, LAC (17) - Herbert-Ekeler, BUF (2) - Allen-Singletary
Wk 16 - 4 Occurrences: CIN (31) - Burrow-Mixon, DAL (5) - Prescott-Zeke, ARI (7) - Murray-Edmonds, LAC (6) - Herbert-Jackson
Wk 17 - 6 Occurrences: SEA (6) - Wilson-Penny, BUF (2) - Allen-Singletary, NE (11) - Jones-Stevenson, KC (3) - Mahomes-Williams, GB (14) - Rodgers-Dillon, SF (1) Lance-Mitchell
When looking at projected game and team totals from SuperBook Sports for the playoff weeks, I will be aware of them, but in no way will I treat them as absolute to base my draft strategy upon them. I very much believe that a better utilization of the books is to use team futures for the entirety of the season (i.e. best odds to win Super Bowl, best odds to be highest scoring, etc.) and by using those futures as a reference, gain further conviction on targeted situations within your best ball portfolio as a whole.
As far as targeting correlation in weeks 15-17 goes, like always, every draft is completely different. Plant your early positional anchors and correlate to those positional anchors as opportunities present themselves throughout the draft. There are multiple ways to bake cake, but when baking, I’d steer clear of treating projected implied game and team totals (six months from now) as a critical must-have ingredient. That could turn into a depressing cake when i.e. the top 2021 implied week 15 Tampa Bay Buccaneers game total was actually the lowest scoring.
Be humble when looking at implied totals projected six months out - Don’t treat them as absolute.
Bake cake
Eat cake
Luv U Australia. g2g
