Statistics and Sport Tutorial
It’s midway through our home and away part to the AFL (Australian Football League) season here in Australia. Of course we’d like to rave about the brilliance of the all-conquering 2023 Collingwood magpies, but now is not the time … it’s only “midway”!
However, statistically, we watchers of the AFL Ladder (whether live, on weekends, or not) might see a bit of “spookiness” in the middle of the ladder, where top 8 finals aspirations still run deep, where …
- Gold Coast Suns … in …
- round 12 of 24 home and aways … have …
- won 6 …
- lost 6 … involving …
- points for 991 …
- points against 991 … resulting in …
- percentage 100.0%
… and they are at the bottom of the …
- won 6 …
- lost 6 …
… ladder list (because all 6/6 others have a percentage above 100.0%) here at this halfway point. Does aspiration beat statistics, and mathematics? We tried Google searches in case there is an “aspiration bias”, but could not frame a proper working question, so any mathematicians or statisticians out there with ideas, feel free to leave a comment?!
But we decided to leave “spookiness” thoughts behind, and tried a more “scientific approach” by looking at past Round 12 snapshots, and it somewhat eased my “spookiness” thoughts. Some 6/6 teams over recent years have had percentages below 100.0%. Actually, my relief was palpable, as we do believe in logic and mathematics and non-warped statistics. Still, and all, if someone does have a second hand ouija board you know that the comments section is only a short downward distance away?!
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