Can analytics help you win your NCAA tournament pool? Don't bet on it
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Back in the days before the internet became an all-consuming repository of humanity’s foibles, I decided to attempt a new method for filling out my NCAA Tournament bracket. I called my brother and had him put my infant nephew on the phone. I told my brotheCan analytics help you win your NCAA tournament pool? Don't bet on it
Back in the days before the internet became an all-consuming repository of humanity’s foibles, I decided to attempt a new method for filling out my NCAA Tournament bracket. I called my brother and had him put my infant nephew on the phone. I told my brother to hold up a newspaper and ask my nephew to point out, or coo at or drool on, whichever team he thought might win a game. Full disclosure: I did not win my pool that year. In fact, my nephew is now in college, and I still haven’t won an NCAA Tournament pool since I was a kid myself and chose Indiana to win it all in 1987 — mostly because I admired its candy-striped warmup pants and Bobby Knight’s Tasmanian devil combustibility. I’ve picked the tournament badly during years when I’ve watched college basketball games five nights a week; I’ve picked the tournament badly during years when I hardly watched college basketball all season. And this is what makes the tournament such an utterly fantastic event: No matter what you think you know, you don’t really k Read more