Post 6: Avoid divisional games, road favorites, or bad weather. Are these effective strategies?

This is the last (and maybe most controversial) post in my initial six-part backtesting series. I am planning more research posts, but I wanted to get this series out before the season began.

Quick recap of my previous posts:

• Chalk survives longest but rarely wins (Post 1),
• Leaning slightly away from the crowd beats Chalk (Post 2)
• Adding future value doesn't help (Post 3)
• Going more aggressive on fading the field is worse on both survival and winning (Post 4)
• Running multiple entries with different, safe picks multiplies your survival odds. Add in buybacks and survival odds go up even more (Post 5).

Per usual, I need to give my standard disclosure that I built SurvivorPulse for people who play multiple survivor pools and entries.

In this post, I looked at the past 10 seasons to determine whether common strategies of avoiding divisional games, road favorites, or bad weather games really make a difference.

First, I looked at divisional games. Over 2,634 games across 10 seasons, home teams have won 54.13% of divisional games versus 54.62% for non-divisional games. RESULT: No impact.

Next up, should you avoid road favorites? Over 10 seasons home favorites won 67.08% while away favorites won 65.59%. RESULT: Minimal impact.

Finally, what about bad weather games? I tested six seasons of real weather data and found that neutral and dome conditions run a 31.67% upset rate, adverse and extreme weather game upset rates sit at a combined 34% and 28%, respectively. RESULT: Minimal impact.

So my final take on this is that none of these strategies have a truly meaningful impact, and should only play a small role in your decision making.

See my full methodology including sourcing on everything across all six posts.

Also, check out the current Week 1 Rankings.

Well, that's this series, but I will be back soon with more research. Hope these were helpful.

Stay alive and survive!