WHYDFML Index ratings of the AP Top 25 College Football teams

 I love stats.  I don't love sports because of stats but statistics is one of the love languages I use to convey my love of sports.  

Some of my favorite stats are the ones I make up like the STBFI Or the WHYDFML Index that is reference in the title of this post.  The  STBFI stands for Soon To Be Fired Index and WHYDFML stands for What Have You Done For Me Lately,  

The STBFI is straightforward, forward it is a list of the major coaches and managers in a city, (for me it's Chicago )in order of the likelihood that they will be the next person on the list to be fired or otherwise leave their position.  The WHYDFML     (pronounced y dee eff em el) is actually a name for many statistics that measure productivity from most to least recent.

Each Sunday during the college football season, The Associated Press releases a poll of the top 25 teams in College football.  I decided to look out this past Sunday's  rankings thtough the lens of one of the WHYDFML indices.

This particular index takes the results of the last 5 games and scores them this way.  A win in the most recent game counts as 5 wins whereas a loss in the least recent game counts as only 1 loss.  In cases of ties a tie would be treated as 1/2 the points in the win column and 1/2 the points in the loss column  . You then fihure out the win percentage by taking the adjusted win amount and dividing it by the adjusted total game amount.  

For example, if there are 4 teams that are 4-1 in their 5 most recent games (let's call them Teams A through E), and each one of them lost a different game on the time line between most and least recent they would all have different winning percentages in their WHYDFML Index.

Let's say Team A just lost their most recent game after winning the previous four.  Their results would wook like this with the point value for the loss or win in parentheses:

L(5)W(4)W(3)W(2)W (1)

This would make Team 10-5  with a winning percentage of .667 (10/15)

If Team B won 3 games in a row, then lost, and then won again, their results, adjusted record and winning percentage would look like this

W(5)L(4) W(3) W(2) W(1) 11-4 ..733

Team C 

W (5) W(4) L (3) W(2) W (1) 12-3 .800

Team D 

W (5) W (4) W (3) L (2) W (1) 13-2 .867

Team E 

W (5) W(4) W(3) W (2) L (1) 14-1 .933

Now that we have a better understanding of the WHYDFML index, we can compare the AP top 25 using said index.  At this point in the season, most teams have played 2 games.  Some, like Notre Dame, have only played one, and some, like Iowa State, have already played 3.  In order to use a record over the last 5 games, we will need the results of the last 2-4 games of the previous season, including bowl games and playoffs.  I will list each team from the best to worst by its WHYDFML winning percentage, with the best ranking breaking any ties.  

Team              C         L5R         L5C            WHYDFML    AP Rank 

Ohio State    2-0      5-0 1.000 WWWWW  15-0 1.000           1

LSU              2-0      5-0 1.000 WWWWW 15-0 1.000           3

Illinois          2-0      5-0 1.000 WWWWW 15-0 1.000           9

Missouri        2-0      5-0 1.000 WWWWW 15-0 1.000      25

Iowa State     3-0       4-1  .800 WWWWL   14-1 .933        14

Ole Miss        2-0       4-1  .800 WWWWL  14-1 .933        17

South Florida 2-0       4-1  .800 WWWLW 13-2 .867         18

Penn State      2-0       4-1  .800 WWLWW 12-3 .800          2

Oregon            2-0      4-1  .800  WWLWW 12-3 .800          4

Georgia            2-0     4-1  .800 WWLWW   12-3 .800          6

South Carolina 2-0     4-1 .800 WWLWW    12-3 .800        11

Tennessee          2-0    4-1 .800 WWLWW     12-3 .800       15

Utah                    2-0   3-2 .600 WWWLL        12-3 .800      20

Texas Tech         2-0    4-1 .800 WWLWW     12-3 .800       21

Auburn                2-0    4-1 .800 WWLWW     12-3 .800      24

Florida State       2-0     3-2 .600 WWLWL       11-4 .733      10

Indiana                 2-0    3-2 .600 WWLWL       11-4 .733      22

Miami (FL)         2-0     3-2 .600 WWLLW       10-5 .667      5

Oklahoma           2-0      3-2 .600 WWLLW       10-5 .667      13

Michigan            1-1      4-1 .800 LWWWW       10-5 .667      23

Texas A&M        2-0      2-3 .400 WWLLL          9-6  .600      16

Texas                   1-1      3-2 .600 WLLWW         8-7 .533       7

Clemson              1-1      2-3 .400 WLLWL          7-8 .467       12

Alabama              1-1       2-3 .400 WLLWL          7-8 .467      19

Notre Dame         0-1       3-2 .600 LLWWW        6-9 .400       8

Notre Dame by virtue of their loss in the CFP finals, their first week loss to Miami and a second week bye has  the lowest percentage of the AP 25. Illinois, Ohio,State, LSU, and Missouri have all won 5 of their last 5 games but if any of them lose this week they will be down near the bottom to .667 and some won’t stay on the AP 25 with a loss.

I meant to share this on Sunday after I did all the research, but had a very busy week. I will  try to publish an updated list after the new AP poll comes out tomorrow.

U is for U of I Parent

A to Z Challenge 2025

The ABC's of Me

U 

U of I  Parent

Today's post will be all pictures and captions.

The U of I Campus July 2023

One of several campus Visits

Lucy and I at U of I's accepted student day
Realizing we  we both brought the same book to read

Goodbye High School
Hello U of I

Obligatory Move-In Pictures

First U of I game

100th Anniversary of Alumni Field

Illinois Proud

Dad's Weekend

Lucy in EveryMan
during Mom's Weekend

Illinois coach Bret Bielema taunts Shane Beamer and he loses his mind

Footage from Tuesdays Citrus Bowl which Illinois beat South Carolina

Illinois Football 2024 Season Analytics Part II

STATS SUNDAY

This is a continuation of last week's Stats Sunday post which can be found here. It is essentially a look at Illinois' Season Record by adding the w/l record of each opponent before they played Illinois, The result of the Illinois game (win or loss), and their record after the Illinois game.  I am calling the stat Opponent BDA (Before During After)

In essence, each opponent has 3 records: 1) the games they played before they played you,2) their record against you, and 3) the games they played after you. Here is a look at these stats for Illinois with one more game left on their regular season schedule.

This is the end of the regular season BDA

The University of Illinois  2023 Football Schedule

Opponent                                            Before      Against         After

Eastern Illinois Univerity                  0-0               0-1               3-8

Kansas                                               1-0               0-1               4-6

Central Michigan University             1-1               0-1               3-6

Nebraska                                             3-0               0-1               3-5 

Penn State                                           3-0              1-0                7-1

Purdue                                                 1-4              0-1               0-6

Michigan                                              4-2              0-1               3-2

Oregon                                                 7-0              1-0                4-0

Minnesota                                           5-3              1-0                1-2

Michigan State                                   4-5              0-1                1-1

Rutgers                                                6-4              0-1               1-0

Northwestern                                       4-7              0-1                0-0

Totals                                               39-26             3-9                30-37

Winning Pct                                     .600              .250                .448

U of I home opponents are in bold.

Illinois opponents on average have played better before playing than after playing them. Illinois Opponents were 39-26 (.600) prior to playing Illinois.  Teams visiting Champaign this year were a cumulative 16-15 (.516) prior to playing the Illini.  Road opponents fared 23-11 (.676)  in games before hosting U of I. 

After beating NU on Saturday, Illinois' 2024 opponents only won 1/4 of the 12 contests against Bielama's boys.  Visitors to Memorial Stadium went  1-6 (.143) and teams playing in their own friendly confines fared much better with 2 wins and 3 losses and a winning percentage of .400. 

The 10 2024 previous opponents split their games this weekend 5-5 bringing the total record of games after playing the Illini to 30-37 (.448). Teams playing at Memorial this year were a collective 15-31(.326) finishing the season.  Home teams also won 15 games after showing Central Illinois Big 10 team hospitality but they did so with only 6 losses and a winning percentage of .714.

 

Next Sunday: Introducing The WHY DFL Index

Illinois Football 2024 Season Analytics Part I

My daughter Lucy began college at the University of Illinois this year.  As a result, I have become a U of I football fan.  I ended up attending 6 home games this year.  While this is certainly not more college football games than I've ever attended, it is 6 more Illinois games than I've ever attended.  

It had been over 30 years since I'd had an every-game interest in a college football team. I have really enjoyed being a college football fan again.   Everybody does being a fan in their own way.  One of my ways is statistics.  Over the next few weeks, I hope to share some Illinois stats that I've been developing.

One difference between college football and professional football is that you generally only play an opponent one time a year.  It is possible to play a team more than once if your conference has a championship game or if you make it to a bowl game.  But, in the regular season, it's just one per customer.  

With that in mind, I've been developing a way of looking at a team's record for the year through how your opponents performed before and after you played them.

In essence, each opponent has 3 records: 1) the games they played before they played you,2) their record against you, 3) the games they played after you. Here is a look at these stats for Illinois with one more game left on their regular season schedule.

University of Illinois  2023 Football Schedule

Opponet                                            Before      Against         After

Eastern Illinois Univerity                  0-0               0-1               3-8

Kansas                                               1-0               0-1               4-5

Central Michigan University             1-1               0-1               3-5

Nebraska                                            3-0               0-1               3-4 

Penn State                                           3-0              1-0               6-1

Purdue                                                 1-4              0-1               0-5

Michigan                                             4-2              0-1               2-2

Oregon                                                7-0              1-0               3-0

Minnesota                                            5-3             1-0               0-2

Michigan State                                    4-5             0-1                1-0

Rutgers                                                6-4             0-1

Northwestern                                       4-7 

Totals                                               39-26           3-8                  25-32

Winning Pct                                     .600            .273                 .439

Illinois plays Northwestern next Saturday at Wrigley Field.  We already know that Northwesterns record will be 4-7 for the before column.  The only thing we don't know yet in the against column is the result of the Northwestern game as it has not been played yet.  Eastern Illinois finished their season yesterday.  All of their other opponents have one more regular season game remaining.  This means that the 10 teams in the middle of their schedule should add one more win or one more loss to their after column next week.  

Illinois opponents on average have played better before playing than after playing them.  Illinois has only played 2 teams this season with a losing record and will face their third in Northwestern on Saturday. Conversely, six teams have losing records since playing the Illini. Illinois opponents on average are playing 160 percentage points better before their game with the Illini than after the event. Illini opponents are only playing .273 when facing Illinois this year.  The final regular season against number will be between .250 and .333 depending on the Northwestern result.

Next Sunday I'll post an updated version of these numbers.  

Good Lorenzo Charles Reflection.

I was staying up late working on my other blog, tweeting and watching the White Sox lose yet another extra inning game when I saw a tweet from a former pastor of mine regarding this piece at SI.COM. For whatever reason I felt compelled to link it here.

Maybe it's because my last post here was about the NCAA tournament. Maybe because I remember the 1983 NCAA Finals very well because I graduated high school this year. Maybe it's because Lorenzo Charles was 47 and I'll turn 47 in a few months. Not sure exactly why I am sharing it here. But, like my pastor tweeted, it's a great article by a great sports writer. This is also a golden basketball moment . . .





My thoughts, condolences and prayers go out toLorenzo's friends and family.

Hopefully I'll post here again before another former pastor tweets about some sports moment. I was waiting to post until the Sox got rolling again. As Dr. Phil would ask "How is that working?"

NCAA Round 2 Bracket Progress

Day 3. Dave -Winners: West Virginia, Kentucky, Cincinnati, U. Conn, Temple, San Diego State, Richmond, Pitt, Butler, Kansas State,Wisconsin, Gonzaga, BYU, Florida . Losers: Louisville points lost: 4.5, Michigan State points lost 1.

Amy - Winners: West Virginia, Kentucky, Cincinnati, U. Conn, Temple, San Diego State,Pitt, Butler. Kansas State, Wisconsin, Gonzaga, BYU, UCLA, Florida. Losers: Vanderbilt points lost 1, Louisville points lost 7.5.

SEE PREVIOUS POST FOR POINTS EXPLANATION.

Day 4. Dave- Winners: Ohio State, Marquette, Syracuse, North Carolina, Duke, Michigan, Arizona, Texas, Kansas, Illinois, Purdue, Fla. State, Notre Dame. Losers: Villanova points lost 1, Georgia points lost 1.

Amy - Winners: Ohio State, George Mason, Syracuse, Washington, North Carolina, Duke, Michigan, Arizona, Texas, Kansas, Purdue, Notre Dame. Losers: Xavier points lost 1, University of Nevada Las Vegas points lost 1, Georgetown points lost 1, Texas A&M points lost 1.

Results after 2 rounds:

points earned

Dave: 28.5 (1.5, 27)

Amy: 27 (1,26)

Possible Remaining Points:

Dave: 91

Amy: 86.5

NCAA Round 1 Bracket Progress

As I said last time Amy and I have embarked on a bracket with 100 possible points. Instead of writing down everyteam we picked here. I will just check in after the end of the round tell you where we moved and where we lost ground.

Day 1. Dave - Winners: Clemson and UNC Ashville
Amy - Winners: Clemson Losers:Arkansas Little Rock points lost .5

Day 2. Dave - Winners: University of Texas - San Antonio, Losers: Southern Cal points lost 1.5*
Day 2. Amy - Winners: Univerity if Texas - San Antonio. Losers: Southern Cal points lost .5*

Round 1 results
points earned
Dave: 1.5
Amy: 1
Possible remaining points:
Dave 98.5*
Amy 99*

*The amount of points lost can differ even when Amy and I picked the same team. This will differ when one of us picked the team to progress futher than the other. For example Amy had Southern Cal losing in the second round so she only lost the 1/2 point that USC failed to win in the first round. I on the other hand picked U.S.C to win in the second round as well so I lost the point I expecting them to earn in the second round as well as the point they failed to earn in the first.

Even though I currently have more points than Amy does she has a potential for 99 whereas my celing because of the U.S.C loss is 98.5

NCAA Tournament Picks - A Precursor

I love systems. Back in the good old days when the NCAA tournament was 64 teams I had a great dare I say perfect 120 point system for scoring the NCAA tournament picks. There were 6 rounds. 32 games and winners in the first round. 16 in the second. Eight in the third. four in the fourth. Two in the semifinals and one game in the 6th round to determine the eventual champion. If you pick a team to go to the second round and they do you get 1 point if they don't zero. Pick a second round winner and you get two more points. Three for third round winners. 4 for when your team advanced to the final four. Five if they make it to the Championship game. Six more if the won it all.

So if you picked Duke to win it all last year, like I did you would net 21 points on the Blue Devils alone. I love my system because it was incremental and elegant. I loved the way the numbers broke down per round 32 possible points in round 1 32 more in round 2. Which made for 64 possible points in the opening weekend. 24 possible points in round 3 and16 more were available to the successful prognosticator in round 4 for 40 total points in the second weekend of the tournament.
In my system, many people are eliminated by the second weekend as there are only 16 points available onc you whittle the teams to four. It's how you pick the second and third round that often make you victorious among your peers.

When a few years back they expanded the field to 65, I had no real problem with it. The play-in game was scored as a1/2 point if you picked the victor. This would make for an excellent tie-breaker.

This year the field was expanded to 68 teams and instead of a tiebreaker a 7th round was added to the schedule. Using my current system it made for a rather inelegant 122 point tournament. Revamping my system to have 1 point for round 1 winners 2 point for second round winners up to 7 for the champion yielded a cumbersome 171 point total. The point distribution was very lopsided as well with 96 points in rounds 2 and 3 alone. I was going mad trying to decide between the two flawed systems and each time I would explain it to my wife, she would say you need guys!

I finally figured out a great system for scoring a 68 team single elimination tournament. At least one that has 64 teams in the second round. 1/2 point for picking a round 1 winner 1 point for a round 2 winner and 1.5 points more for making it the sweet sixteen. 2 points for picking a team who makes it all the way to the elite 8, 3 points for picking a final four team, 4 points for your team making it all the way to the championship game and 6 points for winning the whole ball of wax.

It's incremental, but not elegant and what I like best about it: The total points of the tournament now equal 100 which turns out to be elegant after all. Well at least I have a functional system until the committee messes with the number of teams again.

Selection Sunday

Sunday's Cool
A Link Up and a Look Ahead

A link up: Crazy Uncle Dave's Sport-O-Rama is my sports blog. I don't update it nearly as often as I'd like to. That may explain why today's link-up about our NCAA Brackets is over 11 months old. It is timely though as the field of 68 was just announced and the tournament starts on Tuesday. Last year Amy and I kind of split our contest. I picked Duke to win it all and they did. Amy picked Butler to win it all and they made it to the championship game. She ended up scoring more overall points than I did. Amy and I will make our picks tomorrow and I will try to post them at Sport-O-Rama prior to Tuesday's tip off.

A Look Ahead: I will try to continue with the Lenten observations I began last week. I also have a few promised posts that might come up this week. Puppy will probably say or do something crazy. So you never know what you will get. One thing I can tell you is that sometime in the next fortnight I will explain what I mean by countdown to 500 which has appeared in the upper left hand corner of this blog for the past few weeks.

Good luck making up for that lost hour and have a great week!

As Another Begins

I posted earlier this week about the end of college basketball season. Major League Baseball was getting into full swing (pun intended) as the NCAA tournament winded down. The tournament , anation obsession, is giving way to basbeball, the national past time.

Hopefully it will be a good season for both sides of Chicago. The Sox have started 1-1 and the Cubs have faltered out of the gate so far at 0-2. That's 2 down and 160 to go. Much too early to draw too many conclusion. I will be posting my musings each week as the season progresses.

One Season comes to an end

Today signified the end of Men's college basketball season. What started as a field if 65 a few weeks ago was down to 2. When the tournament brackets were announced, My wife and I filled out our brackets as we do every year. We were pretty surprised to find out that her pick to win it all and mine were squaring off in the final game.

That's right, my wife picked Butler to win the NCAA tournament. She picked a 5 seed, whereas I went with perennial power house and #1 seed Duke.

What a game it was. If Butler would have made that desperation half court shot, they would have won. The shot was very close. It seems like every other year, I pick Duke to win it all, it just so happens that this year I was right.

The Goalie on the Bench.

Hockey Lessons

Life Lessons from the 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team

Why doesn't life go as planned? The answer to that question often gets back to who is doing the planning. No one ever plans on being born, but once they get here, boy do they want to be in charge of the planning!

People often see the design in their lives in retrospect. Such is the case of Steve Janaszak. By 1979 Steve had already been goalie of two national championship teams at the university of Minnesota. He had just been voted Most Valuable Player of the 1979 squad. His coach, Herb Brooks, had just been selected to helm the U.S. Olympic team. Most pundits figured Herb would choose Jany as his starting goalie for the U.S. No one expected him to be an MVP again, not when going against the vaunted Soviet Union and other hockey powerhouses, but no one expected him to be an asterisk either.

Twelve hockey teams represented their countries in 1980. Twenty players per team, 240 in all. 239 of them played in the Olympics. Only Jany rode the bench the entire event. Coach Brooks had prepared him for this eventuality, that Jim Craig was going to be His only goalie for the Olympics. On the face of it this did not make sense, many of the games were very close, but there were some games that Jany could have easily got some time in.

Janaszak took the entire situation as a pro. Early each morning he took practice shots from his assistant coach, so he would be ready if called upon. Instead of being bitter, aloof and distant from his teammates, he remained positive. Off the ice he bonded with his teammates going to the Olympic Village, hanging out and watching movies together. On one such occasion he encountered an interpreter working in the complex. That interpreter eventually became his wife.

Imagine if it was too much for the NCAA MVP to play the part of back-up. Or if he just went through the motions, and kept to himself at the Olympics hiding in his room, feeling sorry for himself. He might not be the contented husband and father of two daughters that he is now. Janaszak, states in retrospect there is no question what he would rather have the personal glory or the family he has been given. It may have been different if things went as he had planned.

I think there is a little in the Janaszak's story in many how did you meet your spouse stories. I would love to h ear yours. If things went by my plans I would have already been on the mission field by 1990 and not still in college. This means I would have not met my wife in 1990. At least not in the student union of Western Illinois University. Some people call it luck, others a happy accident. I call it the providential hand of God. Just a reminder that life does go as planned. Especially when we're not the ones doing the planning.

Next Time: Free