March 20, 2024 • 36 mins
On today’s episode, Jason is joined by professional sports bettor and Clevanalytics founder Clevta for a lengthy NCAA Tournament preview. During the conversation, TA discusses why picking the eventual national champion isn’t as difficult as people might think (10:09), why it isn’t a smart bet to pick UConn to repeat as champs (14:15), why Purdue appears to be criminally underrated heading into March Madness (20:49), why it's almost impossible to trust John Calipari’s Kentucky team (31:23), the narrative that the Big East as a whole is being disrespected (38:44) and much more!
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
The volume.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
This is Straight Fire with Jason McIntire.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
What is up straight firefam, It's me Jason McIntyre. Straight
Fire for Wednesday, March twentieth.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
The NCAA Tournament began with a bit.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Of a thud last night. I don't know, Wagner, Howard
was okay. Howard had three chances from deep win the final,
like five seconds, and they couldn't make any of them.
And then there was the Virginia game, and anybody who watched,
you know, three minutes of Virginia basketball this season knew
they were total garbage and did not belong in the tournament,
and they proceeded to put up one of the worst
performances I can remember in recent years. They're just not
(00:49):
a good basketball team, and they got smoked. So your
boys started out too, and Oho hit the parlay, Wagner
getting three and Colorado State money line, then Colorado State
Straight Up from Monday's podcast, listen.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
The heater continues.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
I don't know if it will definitely continue on to
tonight because tonight's games I don't feel as confident in
they're actually probably gonna be decent games. To break down
the entire tournament, we got my guy Ta coming on
the pod. You guys know him form football season. He's
really good. He no, I don't want to say he's
a slave to the numbers, but the numbers are his jam,
(01:26):
and that's really all he cares about. You know, you
could you could say narratives and you know what's his name,
Rick Barnes can't win the big game. You could do
all that stuff if you want, but he's all about
the numbers, about it, bout it. So we will break
down Cinderella's double digit seeds, favorites, bracket stuff, and and
when I decide what I'm firing on tonight, I'll post
(01:49):
them on the GRAM early lean, I guess I would
go Colorado, but I don't feel super confident in that,
you know, fade the Mountain West Conference obviously. Yeah, so
I believe I would go Colorado in the nightcap in
the first game. If you remember, I had Montana to
complete a three or fourteen parlay championship week and Montana
State got him. Montana State is not terrible, and I
(02:11):
would probably go moneyline parlay with Montana State and Colorado.
Not a ton of confidence, but if anything else jumps out,
I'll drop it on ig. But for now, let's get
to our guest, the Great Ta from clev Analytics.
Speaker 4 (02:27):
You know a guy, Jason likes to think he knows
everything when it comes to sports. I know what sports
fans want, but for everything he doesn't. He knows a
guy who does. Let's just say I know a guy
who knows a guy who knows another guy.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
All right, let's welcome into straight fire.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
You know him from football season, TA totally dominant when
it comes to the numbers. He has cashed in the
Super Contest in Vegas, and now we're bringing him on
for college hoops. Listen, college basketball is in a weird place, Ta,
Like people used to love it, you know, fifteen twenty
even maybe like ten years ago with the jalil okafor
Duke freshman team, and now it's just kind of it's
(03:06):
just not what it was. So regular season college hoops
nobody really pays attention to. However, there is a ton
of data out there that can help you win your
bracket pool, win your Calcutta all that. So TA puts
some stuff on the Internet that's just blowing people's minds.
So I thought I'll bring them on TA. What's the
feedback been like on your stuff that you posted on
Cleve Analytics.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
What's going on, Jason, Yeah, I mean, I you know,
we're just talking before this. You know, I'm a NFL
guy for the most part. I used to love college
basketball growing up in the eighties and nineties and you know,
the old Big East and ACC and just all these
NBA players running around, and you know, now it's it's
totally different. So I just haven't had the time to
follow college basketball deep like a lot of people, you know,
(03:49):
so when you go to fill out these brackets, it's
hard to just you know, you don't know the players
and the teams really well. So for me, it's just
I've used you know, historical data in the tournament, using
a lot of the advanced metrics, using you know, mainly
Ken Pond data, which is great. It's out there for
everyone to grab. So I use that as a backdrop
(04:09):
for me to help fill out my bracket, and I
think it can be helpful for you know, I'm assuming
ninety plus percent of your audience is not you know,
they're not college basketball experts, and so you know, just
at least having the background on the types of teams
that profile to be national champions, you know historically, the
(04:31):
higher set of teams that historically have been prone for upsets,
the you know double digit seated teams that have a
shot to upset the big boys and kind of their profiles.
Like having that in your back pocket. You know, it's
not perfect, and the goal is not to make a
perfect bracket. It's just to beat you know, everybody else
in your in your pool. And so having that data
(04:52):
really is helpful, at least for me, and I think
for others, you know, creating you know, a bracket that
at least has a fighting chance of winning some money.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yeah, it's it's it's a tough one because you know,
COVID kind of messed up college basketball and now you've
got like twenty five year old guys littered throughout the sport,
which is fine, I'm happy for them, but it's made
it tough to pay attention. And the freshmen just don't
have the value they once did because again you're eighteen
or nineteen going up against a twenty four year old,
like good luck, so ta When you look at the
(05:22):
historical numbers, how much have they changed in the last
three years, Because like I figured, like last year was
a massive outlier with like San Diego State making the
title game and who was FAU made a massive run,
Like just very strange things happened last year. What can
we learn from that and apply it to this year.
Speaker 4 (05:40):
Well, you know, it's funny you say that it really
hasn't changed all that much. It's actually been a little
bit more predictable, I think when it comes to the
title winners. And we could talk about specifically, but you know,
the title winners have not been that you know, for
a tournament, for an event that is so quote unquote unpredictable,
you know, you can narrow down the potential champions pretty
(06:00):
pretty well. And using like I said, using the ken
Pom rankings. Even though Yukon was a four seed, they
were one of I think they were the sixth highest
or sorry, they were the fourth highest ken Pom team
and they were a four seed. That just tells you
how badly the NCAA committee does at putting together this bracket.
(06:20):
So if you look at the last I think it's
eight years, every single winner of the of the title
has been a top six ken Pom team entering the tournament. Okay,
So and if you go back, I mean you got
the Shabaz napier A Yukon team in twenty fourteen they
were twenty fifth. You have the Carmelo team in three
(06:42):
with Syracuse they were twenty second, and then you have
the Kemba Walker team with Yukon in twenty eleven they
were fifteenth. Every other team has been top six since
two thousand and one entering the tournament. So from that perspective,
like you could really narrow down the types of teams
that can win just based on that, and then there's
other things, like I said, my website goes into detail
(07:02):
like that, some of the defensive metrics and some of
the offensive metrics, like very very few teams that you know,
come in ranked above like sixty ninth in defense historically
have even had a shot of winning the title. So
you could really narrow down the types of teams. And
so last year Yukon was the fourth going into the
(07:22):
tournament and they won. That wasn't really that much of
a shock. It was just because they were a four seed.
It seemed like came out of no worse. San Diego
State wasn't your typical profile of a of a contender,
and they were a little bit higher. See I think
there were a five seed, but you know they too were,
you know, top twenty five in the Kempom ratings coming in,
(07:43):
so you know, you have plenty of teams that yeah,
I think there are twentieth, so they have plenty of
teams that fit that category. In Santy Ygo State was
one of them. I mean, like I said, well, we
can dive a little bit deeper. But Miami was a
little bit of an outlier because they were a team
that was really really good on off but just horrible
defensively when you look at their advanced metrics, and for
(08:03):
them to make the final four was a little bit
of an outlier. But in general, you know, they kind
of ran into a buzzsaw in Yukon and they couldn't
get over the hump. And that's typically what you see
with these teams that are not great on defense. They
just can't together five or six straight games and wins
to win a title. So it really wasn't that far
off of the norms last year, although no number one
seed made it, which is the first time that hasn't
(08:27):
happened in a while, but at least the winner wasn't
too fluky.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
Yeah, the Miami run basically feeds everybody's well, you need
good guard play, which is like the most basic thing ever,
Like that's what everybody says all now on TV, you
need good guard play, which is fine, they have great
guard play. But if you look at this year's top
you said top seven, or the last eight years the
top seven and chemp top six.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
Somebody won top six six, But I would narrowed Honestly,
I wouldn't narrow down my focus to that degree. But
it just so happens that top six has been kind
of standard here for the last handful of years.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
I think one of the other things was, I think
you had to be top twenty offense and defense or
something along those lines, like nineteen of the last twenty
one winners were top twenty offense and defense heading into
the tournament. And again that's just a baseline. Connecticut is
certainly fits that bill, but sodaes Houston, Purdue twenty first
(09:23):
in defense. Auburn's the one I want to talk about,
because again, not a lot of people SEC didn't have.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
A great year.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Everybody knows more about Kentucky than they do Auburn. But
Auburn's tenth in offense, fourth in defense, I don't know.
You're big on the numbers. I don't know what Bruce
Pearl does for you, But I don't know. Are we
sleeping on Auburn because you posted something today where Auburn
had the best value based on the odds that were
out there. They're considered a long shot by many and
well a long stop according to ESPN, But meanwhile you
(09:52):
have them as really really good value.
Speaker 4 (09:53):
Yeah, it's funny. So we were just talking about Yukon
last year. They were a four seed and they were
grostly underseated. They were, like I said, fourth by ken
Pom going into the tournament. So you know that was
a team that ended up winning and they kind of,
you know, made ken bomb look good and made the
committee look pretty pretty poor because you know, they were
way too good to be a four seed. And Auburn
(10:15):
is almost the exact replica of Yukon last year. They
also are a four seed, but they're number four in
ken Pom's overall rankings. They really when you look at
the underlying metrics or playing like a number one seed. Now,
you know, again I haven't followed it close enough in
terms of kind of resume and all that stuff. I
know others have, but you know, they don't have a
ton of you know, top ten level wins. I don't
(10:37):
think they have any actually, but they have you know,
blown out the teams that they're supposed to. So there
there's eighteen teams that ranked seventieth or higher in ken
Pom and Yale one of their their first opponent, I
think is like eighty fourth and they're eighteen and oh
in those games, and they've blown pretty much everybody out
by at least fifteen points or at least fourteen points.
(10:58):
They blew out Alabama. You know, they've done They've kind
of done enough to make their numbers look good because
margin of victory does matter in this stuff. And so
you know, they profile very similarly to Connecticut last year.
And you know, as we talk about, you know, how
do you win in your brackets? If you're in a
large pool that has a ton of entrances, one thing
(11:20):
you want to do is differentiate yourself. You know, picking
all number one seeds and picking Yukon to win it
all is not gonna not gonna differentiate things when when
you have a large pool. You know, maybe in a
smaller pool it's okay, but a large pool. And one
way to potentially do that that I'm looking at in
my bracket is picking Auburn over Yukon in the Sweet
sixteen in that region, getting them to the final four.
(11:42):
You don't necessarily have to have them win it all,
but just getting them to you know, in that region
is going to be different than a lot of others
because you know, like twenty five, twenty six percent of
you know, right now, I think ESPN's public brackets are
picking Yukon to win it all. I bet you a
lot more pick up the final four. So you know,
it just almost seems too easy, and we've seen it
(12:04):
so many times, like it's very hard to repeat. It's
been since what the seven Florida Gators, and it's happened.
So as good as Yukon is, you know, if you
want to win your pool and you've got a lot
of entrance, a lot of contestants in that pool, picking
potentially Auburn over Yukon could be that kind of differentiator.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
Yeah. I think I saw seventeen years since Florida not
repeating but getting out of getting steen. Yeah, which is crazy.
Did you say twenty five percent of the pools have
Yukon winning it.
Speaker 4 (12:32):
Oh yeah, it's like twenty five, twenty six percent. And
so what I did was I posted today and it's
on you know, on my website on that March Madness page.
You know, I go through one way if you're just
not following, you're not really paying attention to to all
this and you don't want to spend a ton of time,
you know, doing a deep dive on all the teams.
One easy way is, and you could use this as
(12:53):
a guide is you know, if you're at a pool
and you want to you want a DIFFERENTI You want
to you know, stick out a little bit because you
don't want to have this same teams everybody else has.
You're never gonna win. Comparing the actual betting odds to
win the championship versus the ESPN quote unquote public bracket,
which they do a great job. It's great. It's great
information to have, like it's a good proxy for what
(13:15):
you know, everyone's pool is going to look like. And
right now, twenty five percent of ESPN's public betters or
public picktors and brackets are taking Yukon to win it all.
When you look at the actual betting odds and kind
of the implied win the win probability, it's only seventeen
and a half percent. I mean that's a huge gap.
So you know, Albert is probably the best value on
(13:37):
the board when you look at that about you know,
the little less than three percent of public pictors are
taking Auburn to win it all when they're implied betting
odds say they're closer to five percent. Again, it's a
biggest it's one of the larger gaps that among the
top teams. So you know Tennessee is another one for example.
So if you if you want to if you're not
(14:00):
playing in one of those small you know, with a
couple of buddies or a small pool, and you got
a larger pool of you know, fifty one hundred, one
hundred plus people, you know, Auburn is a good way
to kind of differentiate yourself from a team like Yukon.
You just can't if you're in a big pool, you
really can't pick Yukono win at all. It's just there's
no way because everybody else is going to be picking them.
Like I said, so when a quarter of public pools
(14:21):
are taking Yukon, that's a good proxy for what your
orders is. Probably going to look like, yeah, I like that.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
I almost wonder, you know, sweet sixteen, it looks like
Yukon will be playing in Boston, which is basically like
a home game against Auburn.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
Now does that factor in at all?
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Like, man, they really stack the deck for Yukon now
that I know the bracket is hard, and you know
they have some very good day of conference champs all
over the place. But I don't know, does that factor
in for you at all? Like Auburn would be beating
Yukon in Massachusetts.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
Nah, I don't take that much stake in it. And
you know, to be honest, these days, you know, it
isn't like a true home court where where you know
one team is trying is really traveling a lot versus
the other, and you're getting the home whistle like it's
really about the referee bias at the end of the
day when you're in a home court. But I don't
take too much when it's a different home court. It's
(15:13):
you know, maybe it's it's mileage in that far away
Like I personally don't think it's that big of an advantage,
but you know, I can understand, you know, some people
think that way and honestly, like if you're in a
Sweet sixteen setting, people love to see upsets and love
to see the underdog win, and especially a big contender
like Yukon. So if you're one of these other teams
(15:33):
in that region, like let's say Illinois is playing Iowa State,
I don't know, it's kind of picking two teams there.
They want to see Yukon lose. So those fans that
are sitting in there because you get like the full
you know, the fans of the teams might be in
for both games, like they're rooting for the underdogs. So
it's not, as you know, one sided in that regard.
So I personally don't take that much stock and do
(15:54):
it when when I look at look at these games,
I just kind of picked the pick the teams as
as kind of the quality and like I said, historical profiles.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
Okay, Arizona and Purdue lost early last year. Do you
think that they're almost undervalued in a sense because everybody's saying, oh,
those guys are choke artists, they're frauds. They lost in
the first round last year as heavy favorites. What do
you say to that.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
Yeah, you know, Purdue is very undervalue because you know,
just like everyone's saying, like, oh, I'm not gonna pick Purdue,
like they keep they've blown a year after year. You know,
they're not the greatest defensive team in the world. They're
better than they were last year, but they're not They're
not elite. You know, they've got the big man Edie
and so they're but you look at the resume. I mean,
(16:40):
they have beaten some really really good teams. It's actually
pretty impressive. So like they have proven that that they
can win against the best. I mean they beat Tennessee
by four, they beat Marquette by three, they beat Arizona
by eight, you know, like they have something. They beat
Illinois twice, they beat Alabama, Like, they have some really
really good wins on their resume. So you have a
(17:03):
team that, like if you didn't know who that you know,
if you didn't know that was Purdue and you just
looked at the resume and you looked at some of
the underlying metrics, you would say, oh, this team is
a legit like championship contender. But because it says Purdue
and it's Matt Painter, they're being discounted. So yeah, I mean,
I like I don't love to do it because you know,
it's like, shame on, how many times in a row
(17:24):
can you see them lose? But from a pure kind
of value perspective, you just kind of hold your nose.
They're a team that probably is a is a decent
bet to get to the Final four, and honestly, their
region is probably the easiest in my opinion, like Tennessee
is tough, but at the top of that bracket. Now,
we just saw Kevin McCullers has been announced out for
for for Kansas, So that's their best player. So he's
(17:47):
he's out. That's gonna hurt them. Gonzaga's you know, they're fine,
but they're not some elite team like they were in
the past couple of years. You know, the Purdue would
play potentially TDU or Utah States round two, like they
can win that game. I mean, perdue be could Zaga
earlier this year I think by ten, so they can.
It's not that difficult of a path. And it really
does kind of remind me of Virginia a handful of
(18:11):
years ago, Right, Virginia lost every year after the year
they lost the first round to UNBC, and then the
next year they won the title, right, So it's not
exactly the same, but it's got a similar feel. And
that was I remember I wrote about that at the time.
It was very similar. There were number one seed. Nobody
wanted to pick them because of all their historical failures,
and so they were under actually an under valued one seed,
(18:32):
which you rarely ever see, and very few people were
picking them in the gets to the final four letterlone
the title, and so if you put them in your bracket,
it's kind of an easy you know, it's a number
one seed. They should be you know, they should have
a good chance to get there, and nobody was picking
them and they ended up winning. So it's got a
similar feel. I don't know if it's going to happen,
but you know, I think if you're looking to again
(18:53):
stick out a little bit, feel free to put them
in your final four. I don't think it's really that
that bigger the league.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
I like that my and again this is Minutia, but
like TCUs, one of those scrappy teams where their guards
all they'll turn you over. It looks like they're twenty
second in turnover percentage, like Jimmy or Nelson's kid is
on the team, and he's a menace. He's like twenty three,
twenty four years old. And I just I can see
the Purdue guards wil thing. But I'm with you, I
will have perdue in most of Well.
Speaker 4 (19:19):
You know what the problem is, Jason is they've got
Tennessee in that region. Who's got Rick bart It's like
the same thing with Rick Barnes, like to put them
both in the same region, and neither of those coaches
can ever get their teams that's out of like the
second round, and it's like, man, you've got all these
you know, kind of a you know this the Spider
Man meme looking at each other like it's it's it's
(19:42):
they set up very well. It's almost like they intentionally
set it up for Purdue after these last couple of years.
I mean, just the way this kind of you know,
with Kansas and the injuries, and I don't know, I
actually don't think that the route, like I said, if
they were in, if they were if you swipped swapped
spots with Yukon, they would have no shot to get
to the final four, in my opinion, not no shot,
(20:02):
but like it would just be really difficult. But I
just think that with the region that they're in. Now
it's a lot easier to get there.
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Speaker 3 (20:26):
A couple double digit dogs you should take a look at.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
I think a couple dogs will be barking opening.
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Speaker 1 (21:33):
You mentioned that produced resumes amazing. You had this great
stat that I didn't even notice, but Duke did not
face a top five team all season, and they went
zero to three against top ten kN PALM teams.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
They have one win over a top fifteen team.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
You know this ta Duke forever has been one of
the talking points, one of the darlings.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Everybody knows Duke.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
I feel like they've got no juice whatsoever right now.
They had that bad loss to NC State. They come
in the season with two straight loss in the tournament
with two straight losses.
Speaker 3 (22:03):
I don't know where are you on Duke.
Speaker 4 (22:05):
Yeah, you know they're they're a fringe team. They kind
of have a lot of the you know ingredients, like
said historically to get there you know from air their
eighth and Ken Pom their top seven, and offense, you know,
defensively not as good. They're twenty six and adjusted defense.
But you know we've seen offenses has mattered a little
bit more recently than defense the last handful of years.
(22:26):
You know, they got a really good player in Philapowski,
you know, but quinc er John Shire hasn't really proven
that he can, you know, lead a team very far.
I'm not sure if he's really a good coach you've got,
you know, I'm not sure. Like I said, they haven't
beaten the elites. They have zero wins against anybody in
(22:47):
the top ten. When you look at Ken Pomp, the
Baylor is their best win at fourteenth. They've lost to
Arizona by five. I mean they lost a lot of
close games, to be fair, so Arizona by five. They
lost to North Carolina by nine, lost a game too
Carolina by five. You know, all their losses are very close.
I don't think they have any loss more than single digits.
(23:08):
So you know, from that perspective, like margin of victor,
they easily could have been you know, instead of twenty
four and eight, that could have been like twenty eight
and four, like they they were this close and could
have been a number one seed and things might be different. So,
you know, I don't think it's impossible for them to
get there. I just think that they really haven't proven
that they can consistently win these these close games against
(23:31):
you know, the top, top elite level teams. But maybe
you know, some of the luck at the late game
will will help, you know, will turn around and they
can get there. It's not not impossible. They do face
Houston if they get there in the sweet sixteen, and
you know, Houston's just a really tough team. So yeah,
like it's not impossible for them to get there. But
I'm not personally picking them myself, all right.
Speaker 1 (23:54):
I'll say one of the most eye opening things I
saw from you that I'm in a Calcutta group and
I send it to our group by said, listen, uh,
Kentucky profiles very badly, and then I sent them your
stuff on Kentucky's.
Speaker 3 (24:06):
Defense being horrific.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
The narrative though, TA is, oh, Kentucky's got to Duan
Wagner's kid and the kid Shepherd and Dillingham.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
I mean, they got three pros. They're gonna be good.
They could score outscore anybody.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
They could run and jump, and then you dig into
the numbers and you're like, holy cow, these guys can't stop.
Speaker 3 (24:22):
They might not be able to stop my rec league team.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
Yeah, so that's a good This is exactly like if
you if you don't know anything about these teams, just
who's playing whatnot, and you just look at the you know,
look at the history, and you just go buy probabilities
and the odds and kind of what has been kind
of what leads to one of these higher seeds, like
a Kentucky what has led to those losses early in
(24:44):
a tournament? And it's purely this profile of team. It's
an elite offense, so top twenty five in offense, but
or defensively. So the number that I've used in you know,
my research is one hundred and thirty fifth in the
country or worse from a points per possession allowed. Okay,
so that's before any sort of you know, adjustment for schedule, etc.
(25:06):
Just purely how many points did you allow per possession? Right?
And there since two thousand and four, there have been
thirty eight teams that have been a top seven seed.
So you're a good seed. So you're expected to go
farther your top twenty five in offense, like I said,
and then you know, one hundred and thirty fifth or
worse on defense. Among those thirty eight teams, only one
made the Final four, and that was Miami last year.
(25:28):
I told you that was a little bit of a fluke.
And honestly, if you remember that round one game against Drake,
they were trailing with I think three minutes left. They
should have lost that game. Then I mean back in
winning and then you know they had a nice run
into the Final four. But that is very you know,
that is an outlier based on history. Other than that,
four other teams out of thirty eight made the Elite eight,
(25:50):
and twelve out of thirty eight teams were upset by
a double digit team in a double digit seed in
round one, which is pretty incredible. Three of the last
fifteen teams that kind of fit this profile since twenty
seventeen have made it past round two. Okay, like these
are this is like historically the exact type of team
(26:13):
that you want to fade. And it's not just Kentucky
this year. It's Illinois, it's Baylor, it's Alabama, it's Florida,
It's interesting. There's three SEC teams and all were just
awesome on offense but couldn't stop a nosebleed. And it
makes sense, right, Like, you know, if you're gonna string
together multiple wins, you're gonna have to win close games
and you're gonna have to get stops, and if you're
just not capable, maybe you can do it on a
(26:35):
singular game or even like two games, but to do
it multiple games in a row is just very difficult
with defenses you know that poor. And so you know,
Kentucky is a team that I'm gonna be fading, not
necessarily round one, although I do like Oakland against Spread
getting fourteen, I think that I would not put them
or them Florida or Alabama really or Illinois passed round two,
(26:58):
like to me, that's like the the cutoff. And maybe
they said maybe one of them squeaks by to an
elite eight or something, But in general, I think fading
those teams we've seen, I mean, twelve to thirty eight,
you're talking about almost a third of higher set of
teams being losing in the first round to a double
digit seed, Like these are real upsets, and so a
team like Kentucky just a always never believe the hype
(27:21):
before a tournament when everybody is saying like this is
the hot team and this is the team we're gonna back,
and it's kind of a public fade, if you will,
Like that's always something to be nervous about. You look
at some of the ESPN numbers, Like I said, we
look at kind of general with the public is taking
to win the title versus actual odds, and Kentucky's got
(27:41):
the third kind of you know, worst value when it
comes to that North Carolina and in Connecticut or the
other two. You could see just like the general publics
believe in the hype and they're just ignoring the fact
that their defense is just really poor. I mean they are.
I mean this defense is two hundred and eleventh in
the country on a points for possession basis. So I'm
(28:02):
gonna be fading them and let everybody else pick Kentucky
to get to the kind of the you know, the
everyone's darling to get to the final four, and I'll
be fading them early.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
Do you remember their team from twenty twenty two, the
team that lost to Saint Peter's I'm just looking up now.
Fifth in offense, thirty sixth in defense, and they had
Oscar Sheibwey, who was like the player of the year.
Ty Ty Washington was going to the NBA. I think
he's on the Rockets. Maybe they had the kid from David.
They had like a squad and everybody's like, oh yeah,
I gotta love Conar And they get smashed by Saint
(28:32):
Peter's in overtime and it was like whoa.
Speaker 4 (28:34):
Yeah. Like I said, that team was actually profile a
little bit better than this one, a little better.
Speaker 3 (28:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (28:40):
I mean I remember watching it again. Like I said,
I I'm more of an NFL guy, But I remember
watching Gonzaga go into rapp Arena maybe a month ago
and they just laid it on them. They could not
stop Gonzaga, who's a really good offense, because it just defensively,
they have no shot. I mean, they've got an elite offense.
It's gonna be fun like them in Alabama and Florida,
Like they're gonna be scoring a lot of points. It's
(29:00):
gonna be entertaining. But just to expect a team like
that to be so hot on offense to you know,
be able to make up for that deficiency on defense,
is really hard, and historically it just hasn't proven out
that way.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
Have you did you get any futures on anybody ahead
of the tournament or did you are you just gonna
go game by game?
Speaker 4 (29:20):
Yeah? You know, so it's probably six or seven weeks ago.
I was looking because I knew I always look at
these Ken Palm numbers and some of the historical data points,
and I knew I wanted to find somebody that maybe
was just outside of like the top three or four
that could have value. So the only future I haven't
I don't look. I don't love it now because honestly,
I think they're a little vulnerable is North Carolina. I
(29:40):
have them at sixteen to one. If you look at
the like said, if you look at the kind of
who's who everyone's picking in the brackets and kind of
what their actual odds are, like, the Carolina is up
there with one of the most overvalued teams. You know,
they're a good team. They've got bay Cod, They've got
you know, Davis like they're they're a good team, and
(30:01):
there's a chance that they can get to the final
four and all that. But you know they are probably
the most vulnerable. I mean they're ninth and Ken Palm
and there they're a number one seed, so they don't
necessarily deserve and profile to be a number one seed.
I still think it's live, but it's not my favorite
right now, so I don't personally like taking futures at
this point. I just don't see the value because, like.
Speaker 3 (30:21):
You said, you can just roll over, Yeah, rollover, right, you.
Speaker 4 (30:25):
Know the money lines and probably do you know do better.
So I haven't. I haven't gone to that route with
it with any of these teams, but yeah, Caroline is
the one that I haven't. It's probably the one I
don't like.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
All Right, we can wrap up I saw. I don't
know if it was Ken Palm or bart Torvik. What
are the sites? Had the Big East as the second
best conference in America this year. Now they only get
three into the tournament, and it almost feels like there's
no pop behind Creighton and Marquette. Now colect the point
guard for Marquette, who's awesome, All American, he's hurt, apparently
he's gonna play. He just sat out the BIGGAST tournament.
(30:58):
Is there is there a chance either of those two
makes a San Diego State type run? Both top twenty
five in defense, top twenty five in offense, and they've
got some experience. I just don't know if the Big
East almost feels undervalued because they had a couple teams snubbed.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
Yeah, so say though, you know, I don't mind either
of those teams. I will say so if you're looking
at kind of the higher seat of teams that are
vulnerable to these kind of double digit seeds, and you know,
typically profiles from an upset perspective, teams that don't turn
(31:34):
you over when you're one of the better seeds or
are not able to grab defensive rebounds. They allow this,
you know, the small guys to stick around, and that
makes you vulnerable for an upset. So Creighton, I mean,
they're three hundred and sixty second in the country and
defensive turnover percentage, so they don't get any steals, they
(31:56):
don't turn you over. And again, if you're playing a
you know, a lower see a team that you know
wants to hang around, they'll let you hang around because
they're just not going to create extra possessions. That's the
whole name of the game is can you create extra
possessions if you're an underdog and can you prevent that
if you're one of the big boys. Ay, Creyton's not
very good at you know, defensive rebounding. They're just kind
of average, and they're really poor at creating turnovers. So
(32:19):
you know, if they face a team that gets hot,
it's hard for them to steal extra possessions, which is
what you need to come back in games. So they've
got everything that profiles as a contender and everything else
actually fits. It's just those things, you know, make me
a little bit nervous. Not to say they can't do it,
but you know they're going to have to really do
it with their offense more than anything, and they can.
(32:41):
They're very capable. Marquette a little bit better. They're six
and turnover percentage and we know, you know with the
Shaka smart you know, you know, the pressure defense that
they can create turnovers. They're not very good on the
boards on either end. I mean they're two hundred and
forty eighth and offensive rebounding two twenty second and defensive rebounding.
So if they face a team that could you know,
(33:02):
brash the boards and get those extra possessions, they could
be in trouble. And again you mentioned the injury that
matters as well. But both teams have a shot. Not
to say that they don't. I'm not necessarily that high
on them per se, but I think they both have
a shot. I mean, they clearly have, you know, the
firepower to do it. They just have to they have
to do it with their offense, to be honest.
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Yeah, it's weird.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
A Shaka Smart had so much juice with that VCU team,
and I don't know, man, I just feel like every
March he's kind of been a letdown with better teams,
with better with NBA players, I mean Texas, I don't know.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
I don't know what to say, man, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (33:37):
You talk about it's tunny that that VCU team was
it twenty eleven. When you look at like the last
twenty five years or whatever of data, there's only one
team that is like the most complete out. You can
make a case like this, Okay, I could see how
this team, you know, got to the final four. It
BCU sticks out like a sore thumb in every category.
(33:58):
There is nothing that they did well in the you know,
from an underlying metrics season during the season to actually
like get you to the point where like, Okay, I
could see VC you get there like there was nothing.
When you look at the numbers looking back, you're like,
how in the world they get there? And then you
see what the final four was that year, it was
like was a butler and like it was all like
I think zerially six and higher. It was. It was
(34:19):
a really really weird year. But he did get a team,
you know, that didn't deserve to be there. To be honest,
I think they just had really hot shooting and they
got you know, got a streaky and you know, they
got on a run and that can happen. But yeah, yeah,
Other than that, though, he really hasn't done much in
the tournament, which is a little disappointing.
Speaker 3 (34:38):
Yeah, all right, Ta.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
You could definitely visit his website, Cleveanalytics dot com.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
Great stuff.
Speaker 1 (34:45):
He's an oracle when it comes to the numbers. Are
you going to be doing any other sports? Obviously NFL
your site's mandatory, but college hoops?
Speaker 3 (34:52):
Now, are you going to do golf? For tennis? What
are you expanding the profile?
Speaker 4 (34:55):
Well, so, you know, just I did this last year
with college basketball, just you know, just for the turn.
I like to do it just because I have the numbers.
I have the data and I could, I could, you know,
put those together. I love golf. I love betting golf.
I don't know if you if you ever a bet golf.
I'm a golfer myself. So in the off season when
when you know, off football season, it's a great sweat
to have a guy or two you know in it
(35:16):
at the end of a tournament. So you know, I dabble.
I don't really post that much. I'll have something probably
on the Masters, but otherwise it's just kind of like,
you know, toss a couple of guys with with some
some outrights and maybe top tens. But yeah, it's really
just to me, NFL is the bread and butter. I'm
gonna have my NFL preview coming up typically end of
(35:37):
June early July, so that takes I mean that takes
like a good six to eight weeks to put together
as so much data and really digest the off season,
and so I'll be starting that probably you know, kind
of late April, really May, so that takes up a
lot of my time. Otherwise, like I said, just get
outdoors a little bit, to spend some time with the
family and you know, maybe bed a little bit of golf,
but that's that's about it. No baseball, no NB yeah
(36:00):
really you know, just for fun, but no kind of
nothing on the site unfortunately.
Speaker 1 (36:05):
All right, t A great stuff, continued success man, talk
to you soon.
Speaker 4 (36:08):
Thanks Jason,
The volume.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
This is Straight Fire with Jason McIntire.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
What is up straight firefam, It's me Jason McIntyre. Straight
Fire for Wednesday, March twentieth.
Speaker 3 (00:25):
The NCAA Tournament began with a bit.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Of a thud last night. I don't know, Wagner, Howard
was okay. Howard had three chances from deep win the final,
like five seconds, and they couldn't make any of them.
And then there was the Virginia game, and anybody who watched,
you know, three minutes of Virginia basketball this season knew
they were total garbage and did not belong in the tournament,
and they proceeded to put up one of the worst
performances I can remember in recent years. They're just not
(00:49):
a good basketball team, and they got smoked. So your
boys started out too, and Oho hit the parlay, Wagner
getting three and Colorado State money line, then Colorado State
Straight Up from Monday's podcast, listen.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
The heater continues.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
I don't know if it will definitely continue on to
tonight because tonight's games I don't feel as confident in
they're actually probably gonna be decent games. To break down
the entire tournament, we got my guy Ta coming on
the pod. You guys know him form football season. He's
really good. He no, I don't want to say he's
a slave to the numbers, but the numbers are his jam,
(01:26):
and that's really all he cares about. You know, you
could you could say narratives and you know what's his name,
Rick Barnes can't win the big game. You could do
all that stuff if you want, but he's all about
the numbers, about it, bout it. So we will break
down Cinderella's double digit seeds, favorites, bracket stuff, and and
when I decide what I'm firing on tonight, I'll post
(01:49):
them on the GRAM early lean, I guess I would
go Colorado, but I don't feel super confident in that,
you know, fade the Mountain West Conference obviously. Yeah, so
I believe I would go Colorado in the nightcap in
the first game. If you remember, I had Montana to
complete a three or fourteen parlay championship week and Montana
State got him. Montana State is not terrible, and I
(02:11):
would probably go moneyline parlay with Montana State and Colorado.
Not a ton of confidence, but if anything else jumps out,
I'll drop it on ig. But for now, let's get
to our guest, the Great Ta from clev Analytics.
Speaker 4 (02:27):
You know a guy, Jason likes to think he knows
everything when it comes to sports. I know what sports
fans want, but for everything he doesn't. He knows a
guy who does. Let's just say I know a guy
who knows a guy who knows another guy.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
All right, let's welcome into straight fire.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
You know him from football season, TA totally dominant when
it comes to the numbers. He has cashed in the
Super Contest in Vegas, and now we're bringing him on
for college hoops. Listen, college basketball is in a weird place, Ta,
Like people used to love it, you know, fifteen twenty
even maybe like ten years ago with the jalil okafor
Duke freshman team, and now it's just kind of it's
(03:06):
just not what it was. So regular season college hoops
nobody really pays attention to. However, there is a ton
of data out there that can help you win your
bracket pool, win your Calcutta all that. So TA puts
some stuff on the Internet that's just blowing people's minds.
So I thought I'll bring them on TA. What's the
feedback been like on your stuff that you posted on
Cleve Analytics.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
What's going on, Jason, Yeah, I mean, I you know,
we're just talking before this. You know, I'm a NFL
guy for the most part. I used to love college
basketball growing up in the eighties and nineties and you know,
the old Big East and ACC and just all these
NBA players running around, and you know, now it's it's
totally different. So I just haven't had the time to
follow college basketball deep like a lot of people, you know,
(03:49):
so when you go to fill out these brackets, it's
hard to just you know, you don't know the players
and the teams really well. So for me, it's just
I've used you know, historical data in the tournament, using
a lot of the advanced metrics, using you know, mainly
Ken Pond data, which is great. It's out there for
everyone to grab. So I use that as a backdrop
(04:09):
for me to help fill out my bracket, and I
think it can be helpful for you know, I'm assuming
ninety plus percent of your audience is not you know,
they're not college basketball experts, and so you know, just
at least having the background on the types of teams
that profile to be national champions, you know historically, the
(04:31):
higher set of teams that historically have been prone for upsets,
the you know double digit seated teams that have a
shot to upset the big boys and kind of their profiles.
Like having that in your back pocket. You know, it's
not perfect, and the goal is not to make a
perfect bracket. It's just to beat you know, everybody else
in your in your pool. And so having that data
(04:52):
really is helpful, at least for me, and I think
for others, you know, creating you know, a bracket that
at least has a fighting chance of winning some money.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
Yeah, it's it's it's a tough one because you know,
COVID kind of messed up college basketball and now you've
got like twenty five year old guys littered throughout the sport,
which is fine, I'm happy for them, but it's made
it tough to pay attention. And the freshmen just don't
have the value they once did because again you're eighteen
or nineteen going up against a twenty four year old,
like good luck, so ta When you look at the
(05:22):
historical numbers, how much have they changed in the last
three years, Because like I figured, like last year was
a massive outlier with like San Diego State making the
title game and who was FAU made a massive run,
Like just very strange things happened last year. What can
we learn from that and apply it to this year.
Speaker 4 (05:40):
Well, you know, it's funny you say that it really
hasn't changed all that much. It's actually been a little
bit more predictable, I think when it comes to the
title winners. And we could talk about specifically, but you know,
the title winners have not been that you know, for
a tournament, for an event that is so quote unquote unpredictable,
you know, you can narrow down the potential champions pretty
(06:00):
pretty well. And using like I said, using the ken
Pom rankings. Even though Yukon was a four seed, they
were one of I think they were the sixth highest
or sorry, they were the fourth highest ken Pom team
and they were a four seed. That just tells you
how badly the NCAA committee does at putting together this bracket.
(06:20):
So if you look at the last I think it's
eight years, every single winner of the of the title
has been a top six ken Pom team entering the tournament. Okay,
So and if you go back, I mean you got
the Shabaz napier A Yukon team in twenty fourteen they
were twenty fifth. You have the Carmelo team in three
(06:42):
with Syracuse they were twenty second, and then you have
the Kemba Walker team with Yukon in twenty eleven they
were fifteenth. Every other team has been top six since
two thousand and one entering the tournament. So from that perspective,
like you could really narrow down the types of teams
that can win just based on that, and then there's
other things, like I said, my website goes into detail
(07:02):
like that, some of the defensive metrics and some of
the offensive metrics, like very very few teams that you know,
come in ranked above like sixty ninth in defense historically
have even had a shot of winning the title. So
you could really narrow down the types of teams. And
so last year Yukon was the fourth going into the
(07:22):
tournament and they won. That wasn't really that much of
a shock. It was just because they were a four seed.
It seemed like came out of no worse. San Diego
State wasn't your typical profile of a of a contender,
and they were a little bit higher. See I think
there were a five seed, but you know they too were,
you know, top twenty five in the Kempom ratings coming in,
(07:43):
so you know, you have plenty of teams that yeah,
I think there are twentieth, so they have plenty of
teams that fit that category. In Santy Ygo State was
one of them. I mean, like I said, well, we
can dive a little bit deeper. But Miami was a
little bit of an outlier because they were a team
that was really really good on off but just horrible
defensively when you look at their advanced metrics, and for
(08:03):
them to make the final four was a little bit
of an outlier. But in general, you know, they kind
of ran into a buzzsaw in Yukon and they couldn't
get over the hump. And that's typically what you see
with these teams that are not great on defense. They
just can't together five or six straight games and wins
to win a title. So it really wasn't that far
off of the norms last year, although no number one
seed made it, which is the first time that hasn't
(08:27):
happened in a while, but at least the winner wasn't
too fluky.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
Yeah, the Miami run basically feeds everybody's well, you need
good guard play, which is like the most basic thing ever,
Like that's what everybody says all now on TV, you
need good guard play, which is fine, they have great
guard play. But if you look at this year's top
you said top seven, or the last eight years the
top seven and chemp top six.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
Somebody won top six six, But I would narrowed Honestly,
I wouldn't narrow down my focus to that degree. But
it just so happens that top six has been kind
of standard here for the last handful of years.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
I think one of the other things was, I think
you had to be top twenty offense and defense or
something along those lines, like nineteen of the last twenty
one winners were top twenty offense and defense heading into
the tournament. And again that's just a baseline. Connecticut is
certainly fits that bill, but sodaes Houston, Purdue twenty first
(09:23):
in defense. Auburn's the one I want to talk about,
because again, not a lot of people SEC didn't have.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
A great year.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Everybody knows more about Kentucky than they do Auburn. But
Auburn's tenth in offense, fourth in defense, I don't know.
You're big on the numbers. I don't know what Bruce
Pearl does for you, But I don't know. Are we
sleeping on Auburn because you posted something today where Auburn
had the best value based on the odds that were
out there. They're considered a long shot by many and
well a long stop according to ESPN, But meanwhile you
(09:52):
have them as really really good value.
Speaker 4 (09:53):
Yeah, it's funny. So we were just talking about Yukon
last year. They were a four seed and they were
grostly underseated. They were, like I said, fourth by ken
Pom going into the tournament. So you know that was
a team that ended up winning and they kind of,
you know, made ken bomb look good and made the
committee look pretty pretty poor because you know, they were
way too good to be a four seed. And Auburn
(10:15):
is almost the exact replica of Yukon last year. They
also are a four seed, but they're number four in
ken Pom's overall rankings. They really when you look at
the underlying metrics or playing like a number one seed. Now,
you know, again I haven't followed it close enough in
terms of kind of resume and all that stuff. I
know others have, but you know, they don't have a
ton of you know, top ten level wins. I don't
(10:37):
think they have any actually, but they have you know,
blown out the teams that they're supposed to. So there
there's eighteen teams that ranked seventieth or higher in ken
Pom and Yale one of their their first opponent, I
think is like eighty fourth and they're eighteen and oh
in those games, and they've blown pretty much everybody out
by at least fifteen points or at least fourteen points.
(10:58):
They blew out Alabama. You know, they've done They've kind
of done enough to make their numbers look good because
margin of victory does matter in this stuff. And so
you know, they profile very similarly to Connecticut last year.
And you know, as we talk about, you know, how
do you win in your brackets? If you're in a
large pool that has a ton of entrances, one thing
(11:20):
you want to do is differentiate yourself. You know, picking
all number one seeds and picking Yukon to win it
all is not gonna not gonna differentiate things when when
you have a large pool. You know, maybe in a
smaller pool it's okay, but a large pool. And one
way to potentially do that that I'm looking at in
my bracket is picking Auburn over Yukon in the Sweet
sixteen in that region, getting them to the final four.
(11:42):
You don't necessarily have to have them win it all,
but just getting them to you know, in that region
is going to be different than a lot of others
because you know, like twenty five, twenty six percent of
you know, right now, I think ESPN's public brackets are
picking Yukon to win it all. I bet you a
lot more pick up the final four. So you know,
it just almost seems too easy, and we've seen it
(12:04):
so many times, like it's very hard to repeat. It's
been since what the seven Florida Gators, and it's happened.
So as good as Yukon is, you know, if you
want to win your pool and you've got a lot
of entrance, a lot of contestants in that pool, picking
potentially Auburn over Yukon could be that kind of differentiator.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
Yeah. I think I saw seventeen years since Florida not
repeating but getting out of getting steen. Yeah, which is crazy.
Did you say twenty five percent of the pools have
Yukon winning it.
Speaker 4 (12:32):
Oh yeah, it's like twenty five, twenty six percent. And
so what I did was I posted today and it's
on you know, on my website on that March Madness page.
You know, I go through one way if you're just
not following, you're not really paying attention to to all
this and you don't want to spend a ton of time,
you know, doing a deep dive on all the teams.
One easy way is, and you could use this as
(12:53):
a guide is you know, if you're at a pool
and you want to you want a DIFFERENTI You want
to you know, stick out a little bit because you
don't want to have this same teams everybody else has.
You're never gonna win. Comparing the actual betting odds to
win the championship versus the ESPN quote unquote public bracket,
which they do a great job. It's great. It's great
information to have, like it's a good proxy for what
(13:15):
you know, everyone's pool is going to look like. And
right now, twenty five percent of ESPN's public betters or
public picktors and brackets are taking Yukon to win it all.
When you look at the actual betting odds and kind
of the implied win the win probability, it's only seventeen
and a half percent. I mean that's a huge gap.
So you know, Albert is probably the best value on
(13:37):
the board when you look at that about you know,
the little less than three percent of public pictors are
taking Auburn to win it all when they're implied betting
odds say they're closer to five percent. Again, it's a
biggest it's one of the larger gaps that among the
top teams. So you know Tennessee is another one for example.
So if you if you want to if you're not
(14:00):
playing in one of those small you know, with a
couple of buddies or a small pool, and you got
a larger pool of you know, fifty one hundred, one
hundred plus people, you know, Auburn is a good way
to kind of differentiate yourself from a team like Yukon.
You just can't if you're in a big pool, you
really can't pick Yukono win at all. It's just there's
no way because everybody else is going to be picking them.
Like I said, so when a quarter of public pools
(14:21):
are taking Yukon, that's a good proxy for what your
orders is. Probably going to look like, yeah, I like that.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
I almost wonder, you know, sweet sixteen, it looks like
Yukon will be playing in Boston, which is basically like
a home game against Auburn.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
Now does that factor in at all?
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Like, man, they really stack the deck for Yukon now
that I know the bracket is hard, and you know
they have some very good day of conference champs all
over the place. But I don't know, does that factor
in for you at all? Like Auburn would be beating
Yukon in Massachusetts.
Speaker 4 (14:52):
Nah, I don't take that much stake in it. And
you know, to be honest, these days, you know, it
isn't like a true home court where where you know
one team is trying is really traveling a lot versus
the other, and you're getting the home whistle like it's
really about the referee bias at the end of the
day when you're in a home court. But I don't
take too much when it's a different home court. It's
(15:13):
you know, maybe it's it's mileage in that far away
Like I personally don't think it's that big of an advantage,
but you know, I can understand, you know, some people
think that way and honestly, like if you're in a
Sweet sixteen setting, people love to see upsets and love
to see the underdog win, and especially a big contender
like Yukon. So if you're one of these other teams
(15:33):
in that region, like let's say Illinois is playing Iowa State,
I don't know, it's kind of picking two teams there.
They want to see Yukon lose. So those fans that
are sitting in there because you get like the full
you know, the fans of the teams might be in
for both games, like they're rooting for the underdogs. So
it's not, as you know, one sided in that regard.
So I personally don't take that much stock and do
(15:54):
it when when I look at look at these games,
I just kind of picked the pick the teams as
as kind of the quality and like I said, historical profiles.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
Okay, Arizona and Purdue lost early last year. Do you
think that they're almost undervalued in a sense because everybody's saying, oh,
those guys are choke artists, they're frauds. They lost in
the first round last year as heavy favorites. What do
you say to that.
Speaker 4 (16:19):
Yeah, you know, Purdue is very undervalue because you know,
just like everyone's saying, like, oh, I'm not gonna pick Purdue,
like they keep they've blown a year after year. You know,
they're not the greatest defensive team in the world. They're
better than they were last year, but they're not They're
not elite. You know, they've got the big man Edie
and so they're but you look at the resume. I mean,
(16:40):
they have beaten some really really good teams. It's actually
pretty impressive. So like they have proven that that they
can win against the best. I mean they beat Tennessee
by four, they beat Marquette by three, they beat Arizona
by eight, you know, like they have something. They beat
Illinois twice, they beat Alabama, Like, they have some really
really good wins on their resume. So you have a
(17:03):
team that, like if you didn't know who that you know,
if you didn't know that was Purdue and you just
looked at the resume and you looked at some of
the underlying metrics, you would say, oh, this team is
a legit like championship contender. But because it says Purdue
and it's Matt Painter, they're being discounted. So yeah, I mean,
I like I don't love to do it because you know,
it's like, shame on, how many times in a row
(17:24):
can you see them lose? But from a pure kind
of value perspective, you just kind of hold your nose.
They're a team that probably is a is a decent
bet to get to the Final four, and honestly, their
region is probably the easiest in my opinion, like Tennessee
is tough, but at the top of that bracket. Now,
we just saw Kevin McCullers has been announced out for
for for Kansas, So that's their best player. So he's
(17:47):
he's out. That's gonna hurt them. Gonzaga's you know, they're fine,
but they're not some elite team like they were in
the past couple of years. You know, the Purdue would
play potentially TDU or Utah States round two, like they
can win that game. I mean, perdue be could Zaga
earlier this year I think by ten, so they can.
It's not that difficult of a path. And it really
does kind of remind me of Virginia a handful of
(18:11):
years ago, Right, Virginia lost every year after the year
they lost the first round to UNBC, and then the
next year they won the title, right, So it's not
exactly the same, but it's got a similar feel. And
that was I remember I wrote about that at the time.
It was very similar. There were number one seed. Nobody
wanted to pick them because of all their historical failures,
and so they were under actually an under valued one seed,
(18:32):
which you rarely ever see, and very few people were
picking them in the gets to the final four letterlone
the title, and so if you put them in your bracket,
it's kind of an easy you know, it's a number
one seed. They should be you know, they should have
a good chance to get there, and nobody was picking
them and they ended up winning. So it's got a
similar feel. I don't know if it's going to happen,
but you know, I think if you're looking to again
(18:53):
stick out a little bit, feel free to put them
in your final four. I don't think it's really that
that bigger the league.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
I like that my and again this is Minutia, but
like TCUs, one of those scrappy teams where their guards
all they'll turn you over. It looks like they're twenty
second in turnover percentage, like Jimmy or Nelson's kid is
on the team, and he's a menace. He's like twenty three,
twenty four years old. And I just I can see
the Purdue guards wil thing. But I'm with you, I
will have perdue in most of Well.
Speaker 4 (19:19):
You know what the problem is, Jason is they've got
Tennessee in that region. Who's got Rick bart It's like
the same thing with Rick Barnes, like to put them
both in the same region, and neither of those coaches
can ever get their teams that's out of like the
second round, and it's like, man, you've got all these
you know, kind of a you know this the Spider
Man meme looking at each other like it's it's it's
(19:42):
they set up very well. It's almost like they intentionally
set it up for Purdue after these last couple of years.
I mean, just the way this kind of you know,
with Kansas and the injuries, and I don't know, I
actually don't think that the route, like I said, if
they were in, if they were if you swipped swapped
spots with Yukon, they would have no shot to get
to the final four, in my opinion, not no shot,
(20:02):
but like it would just be really difficult. But I
just think that with the region that they're in. Now
it's a lot easier to get there.
Speaker 1 (20:09):
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Speaker 3 (20:26):
A couple double digit dogs you should take a look at.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
I think a couple dogs will be barking opening.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
Weekend to the tournament.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
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Speaker 1 (21:33):
You mentioned that produced resumes amazing. You had this great
stat that I didn't even notice, but Duke did not
face a top five team all season, and they went
zero to three against top ten kN PALM teams.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
They have one win over a top fifteen team.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
You know this ta Duke forever has been one of
the talking points, one of the darlings.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
Everybody knows Duke.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
I feel like they've got no juice whatsoever right now.
They had that bad loss to NC State. They come
in the season with two straight loss in the tournament
with two straight losses.
Speaker 3 (22:03):
I don't know where are you on Duke.
Speaker 4 (22:05):
Yeah, you know they're they're a fringe team. They kind
of have a lot of the you know ingredients, like
said historically to get there you know from air their
eighth and Ken Pom their top seven, and offense, you know,
defensively not as good. They're twenty six and adjusted defense.
But you know we've seen offenses has mattered a little
bit more recently than defense the last handful of years.
(22:26):
You know, they got a really good player in Philapowski,
you know, but quinc er John Shire hasn't really proven
that he can, you know, lead a team very far.
I'm not sure if he's really a good coach you've got,
you know, I'm not sure. Like I said, they haven't
beaten the elites. They have zero wins against anybody in
(22:47):
the top ten. When you look at Ken Pomp, the
Baylor is their best win at fourteenth. They've lost to
Arizona by five. I mean they lost a lot of
close games, to be fair, so Arizona by five. They
lost to North Carolina by nine, lost a game too
Carolina by five. You know, all their losses are very close.
I don't think they have any loss more than single digits.
(23:08):
So you know, from that perspective, like margin of victor,
they easily could have been you know, instead of twenty
four and eight, that could have been like twenty eight
and four, like they they were this close and could
have been a number one seed and things might be different. So,
you know, I don't think it's impossible for them to
get there. I just think that they really haven't proven
that they can consistently win these these close games against
(23:31):
you know, the top, top elite level teams. But maybe
you know, some of the luck at the late game
will will help, you know, will turn around and they
can get there. It's not not impossible. They do face
Houston if they get there in the sweet sixteen, and
you know, Houston's just a really tough team. So yeah,
like it's not impossible for them to get there. But
I'm not personally picking them myself, all right.
Speaker 1 (23:54):
I'll say one of the most eye opening things I
saw from you that I'm in a Calcutta group and
I send it to our group by said, listen, uh,
Kentucky profiles very badly, and then I sent them your
stuff on Kentucky's.
Speaker 3 (24:06):
Defense being horrific.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
The narrative though, TA is, oh, Kentucky's got to Duan
Wagner's kid and the kid Shepherd and Dillingham.
Speaker 3 (24:14):
I mean, they got three pros. They're gonna be good.
They could score outscore anybody.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
They could run and jump, and then you dig into
the numbers and you're like, holy cow, these guys can't stop.
Speaker 3 (24:22):
They might not be able to stop my rec league team.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
Yeah, so that's a good This is exactly like if
you if you don't know anything about these teams, just
who's playing whatnot, and you just look at the you know,
look at the history, and you just go buy probabilities
and the odds and kind of what has been kind
of what leads to one of these higher seeds, like
a Kentucky what has led to those losses early in
(24:44):
a tournament? And it's purely this profile of team. It's
an elite offense, so top twenty five in offense, but
or defensively. So the number that I've used in you know,
my research is one hundred and thirty fifth in the
country or worse from a points per possession allowed. Okay,
so that's before any sort of you know, adjustment for schedule, etc.
(25:06):
Just purely how many points did you allow per possession? Right?
And there since two thousand and four, there have been
thirty eight teams that have been a top seven seed.
So you're a good seed. So you're expected to go
farther your top twenty five in offense, like I said,
and then you know, one hundred and thirty fifth or
worse on defense. Among those thirty eight teams, only one
made the Final four, and that was Miami last year.
(25:28):
I told you that was a little bit of a fluke.
And honestly, if you remember that round one game against Drake,
they were trailing with I think three minutes left. They
should have lost that game. Then I mean back in
winning and then you know they had a nice run
into the Final four. But that is very you know,
that is an outlier based on history. Other than that,
four other teams out of thirty eight made the Elite eight,
(25:50):
and twelve out of thirty eight teams were upset by
a double digit team in a double digit seed in
round one, which is pretty incredible. Three of the last
fifteen teams that kind of fit this profile since twenty
seventeen have made it past round two. Okay, like these
are this is like historically the exact type of team
(26:13):
that you want to fade. And it's not just Kentucky
this year. It's Illinois, it's Baylor, it's Alabama, it's Florida,
It's interesting. There's three SEC teams and all were just
awesome on offense but couldn't stop a nosebleed. And it
makes sense, right, Like, you know, if you're gonna string
together multiple wins, you're gonna have to win close games
and you're gonna have to get stops, and if you're
just not capable, maybe you can do it on a
(26:35):
singular game or even like two games, but to do
it multiple games in a row is just very difficult
with defenses you know that poor. And so you know,
Kentucky is a team that I'm gonna be fading, not
necessarily round one, although I do like Oakland against Spread
getting fourteen, I think that I would not put them
or them Florida or Alabama really or Illinois passed round two,
(26:58):
like to me, that's like the the cutoff. And maybe
they said maybe one of them squeaks by to an
elite eight or something, But in general, I think fading
those teams we've seen, I mean, twelve to thirty eight,
you're talking about almost a third of higher set of
teams being losing in the first round to a double
digit seed, Like these are real upsets, and so a
team like Kentucky just a always never believe the hype
(27:21):
before a tournament when everybody is saying like this is
the hot team and this is the team we're gonna back,
and it's kind of a public fade, if you will,
Like that's always something to be nervous about. You look
at some of the ESPN numbers, Like I said, we
look at kind of general with the public is taking
to win the title versus actual odds, and Kentucky's got
(27:41):
the third kind of you know, worst value when it
comes to that North Carolina and in Connecticut or the
other two. You could see just like the general publics
believe in the hype and they're just ignoring the fact
that their defense is just really poor. I mean they are.
I mean this defense is two hundred and eleventh in
the country on a points for possession basis. So I'm
(28:02):
gonna be fading them and let everybody else pick Kentucky
to get to the kind of the you know, the
everyone's darling to get to the final four, and I'll
be fading them early.
Speaker 1 (28:12):
Do you remember their team from twenty twenty two, the
team that lost to Saint Peter's I'm just looking up now.
Fifth in offense, thirty sixth in defense, and they had
Oscar Sheibwey, who was like the player of the year.
Ty Ty Washington was going to the NBA. I think
he's on the Rockets. Maybe they had the kid from David.
They had like a squad and everybody's like, oh yeah,
I gotta love Conar And they get smashed by Saint
(28:32):
Peter's in overtime and it was like whoa.
Speaker 4 (28:34):
Yeah. Like I said, that team was actually profile a
little bit better than this one, a little better.
Speaker 3 (28:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (28:40):
I mean I remember watching it again. Like I said,
I I'm more of an NFL guy, But I remember
watching Gonzaga go into rapp Arena maybe a month ago
and they just laid it on them. They could not
stop Gonzaga, who's a really good offense, because it just defensively,
they have no shot. I mean, they've got an elite offense.
It's gonna be fun like them in Alabama and Florida,
Like they're gonna be scoring a lot of points. It's
(29:00):
gonna be entertaining. But just to expect a team like
that to be so hot on offense to you know,
be able to make up for that deficiency on defense,
is really hard, and historically it just hasn't proven out
that way.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
Have you did you get any futures on anybody ahead
of the tournament or did you are you just gonna
go game by game?
Speaker 4 (29:20):
Yeah? You know, so it's probably six or seven weeks ago.
I was looking because I knew I always look at
these Ken Palm numbers and some of the historical data points,
and I knew I wanted to find somebody that maybe
was just outside of like the top three or four
that could have value. So the only future I haven't
I don't look. I don't love it now because honestly,
I think they're a little vulnerable is North Carolina. I
(29:40):
have them at sixteen to one. If you look at
the like said, if you look at the kind of
who's who everyone's picking in the brackets and kind of
what their actual odds are, like, the Carolina is up
there with one of the most overvalued teams. You know,
they're a good team. They've got bay Cod, They've got
you know, Davis like they're they're a good team, and
(30:01):
there's a chance that they can get to the final
four and all that. But you know they are probably
the most vulnerable. I mean they're ninth and Ken Palm
and there they're a number one seed, so they don't
necessarily deserve and profile to be a number one seed.
I still think it's live, but it's not my favorite
right now, so I don't personally like taking futures at
this point. I just don't see the value because, like.
Speaker 3 (30:21):
You said, you can just roll over, Yeah, rollover, right, you.
Speaker 4 (30:25):
Know the money lines and probably do you know do better.
So I haven't. I haven't gone to that route with
it with any of these teams, but yeah, Caroline is
the one that I haven't. It's probably the one I
don't like.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
All Right, we can wrap up I saw. I don't
know if it was Ken Palm or bart Torvik. What
are the sites? Had the Big East as the second
best conference in America this year. Now they only get
three into the tournament, and it almost feels like there's
no pop behind Creighton and Marquette. Now colect the point
guard for Marquette, who's awesome, All American, he's hurt, apparently
he's gonna play. He just sat out the BIGGAST tournament.
(30:58):
Is there is there a chance either of those two
makes a San Diego State type run? Both top twenty
five in defense, top twenty five in offense, and they've
got some experience. I just don't know if the Big
East almost feels undervalued because they had a couple teams snubbed.
Speaker 4 (31:14):
Yeah, so say though, you know, I don't mind either
of those teams. I will say so if you're looking
at kind of the higher seat of teams that are
vulnerable to these kind of double digit seeds, and you know,
typically profiles from an upset perspective, teams that don't turn
(31:34):
you over when you're one of the better seeds or
are not able to grab defensive rebounds. They allow this,
you know, the small guys to stick around, and that
makes you vulnerable for an upset. So Creighton, I mean,
they're three hundred and sixty second in the country and
defensive turnover percentage, so they don't get any steals, they
(31:56):
don't turn you over. And again, if you're playing a
you know, a lower see a team that you know
wants to hang around, they'll let you hang around because
they're just not going to create extra possessions. That's the
whole name of the game is can you create extra
possessions if you're an underdog and can you prevent that
if you're one of the big boys. Ay, Creyton's not
very good at you know, defensive rebounding. They're just kind
of average, and they're really poor at creating turnovers. So
(32:19):
you know, if they face a team that gets hot,
it's hard for them to steal extra possessions, which is
what you need to come back in games. So they've
got everything that profiles as a contender and everything else
actually fits. It's just those things, you know, make me
a little bit nervous. Not to say they can't do it,
but you know they're going to have to really do
it with their offense more than anything, and they can.
(32:41):
They're very capable. Marquette a little bit better. They're six
and turnover percentage and we know, you know with the
Shaka smart you know, you know, the pressure defense that
they can create turnovers. They're not very good on the
boards on either end. I mean they're two hundred and
forty eighth and offensive rebounding two twenty second and defensive rebounding.
So if they face a team that could you know,
(33:02):
brash the boards and get those extra possessions, they could
be in trouble. And again you mentioned the injury that
matters as well. But both teams have a shot. Not
to say that they don't. I'm not necessarily that high
on them per se, but I think they both have
a shot. I mean, they clearly have, you know, the
firepower to do it. They just have to they have
to do it with their offense, to be honest.
Speaker 3 (33:22):
Yeah, it's weird.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
A Shaka Smart had so much juice with that VCU team,
and I don't know, man, I just feel like every
March he's kind of been a letdown with better teams,
with better with NBA players, I mean Texas, I don't know.
Speaker 3 (33:35):
I don't know what to say, man, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (33:37):
You talk about it's tunny that that VCU team was
it twenty eleven. When you look at like the last
twenty five years or whatever of data, there's only one
team that is like the most complete out. You can
make a case like this, Okay, I could see how
this team, you know, got to the final four. It
BCU sticks out like a sore thumb in every category.
(33:58):
There is nothing that they did well in the you know,
from an underlying metrics season during the season to actually
like get you to the point where like, Okay, I
could see VC you get there like there was nothing.
When you look at the numbers looking back, you're like,
how in the world they get there? And then you
see what the final four was that year, it was
like was a butler and like it was all like
I think zerially six and higher. It was. It was
(34:19):
a really really weird year. But he did get a team,
you know, that didn't deserve to be there. To be honest,
I think they just had really hot shooting and they
got you know, got a streaky and you know, they
got on a run and that can happen. But yeah, yeah,
Other than that, though, he really hasn't done much in
the tournament, which is a little disappointing.
Speaker 3 (34:38):
Yeah, all right, Ta.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
You could definitely visit his website, Cleveanalytics dot com.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
Great stuff.
Speaker 1 (34:45):
He's an oracle when it comes to the numbers. Are
you going to be doing any other sports? Obviously NFL
your site's mandatory, but college hoops?
Speaker 3 (34:52):
Now, are you going to do golf? For tennis? What
are you expanding the profile?
Speaker 4 (34:55):
Well, so, you know, just I did this last year
with college basketball, just you know, just for the turn.
I like to do it just because I have the numbers.
I have the data and I could, I could, you know,
put those together. I love golf. I love betting golf.
I don't know if you if you ever a bet golf.
I'm a golfer myself. So in the off season when
when you know, off football season, it's a great sweat
to have a guy or two you know in it
(35:16):
at the end of a tournament. So you know, I dabble.
I don't really post that much. I'll have something probably
on the Masters, but otherwise it's just kind of like,
you know, toss a couple of guys with with some
some outrights and maybe top tens. But yeah, it's really
just to me, NFL is the bread and butter. I'm
gonna have my NFL preview coming up typically end of
(35:37):
June early July, so that takes I mean that takes
like a good six to eight weeks to put together
as so much data and really digest the off season,
and so I'll be starting that probably you know, kind
of late April, really May, so that takes up a
lot of my time. Otherwise, like I said, just get
outdoors a little bit, to spend some time with the
family and you know, maybe bed a little bit of golf,
but that's that's about it. No baseball, no NB yeah
(36:00):
really you know, just for fun, but no kind of
nothing on the site unfortunately.
Speaker 1 (36:05):
All right, t A great stuff, continued success man, talk
to you soon.
Speaker 4 (36:08):
Thanks Jason,
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