You never quite know how a talk goes when you’re giving it.
I traveled to Costa Rica in 2017 to give an analytics talk at the first International Football Betting Conference hosted by Sports Book Review (SBR).
Fortunately, I got a lot of compliments on the talk afterwards. SBR probably didn’t pay all those people to say such nice things.
Later, I had another realization. During my talk, no one was on their phone. Another good sign.
In the talk, I discuss these three insights from football analytics:
- How to choose computer rankings wisely
- The reason why accurate preseason college football rankings are possible
- The surprising truth about passing and rushing in the NFL
The first 30 minutes of video should be a great introduction to football analytics for the beginner.
FYI, I do drop an F-bomb during the video, so it’s not G rated.