PredictionMachine.com is a website that uses computer analysis to determine the outcome of a single game, or a full season of a team or the entire league. They ran the entire 2012 NFL schedule, including the playoffs and Super Bowl, to come up with a champion. Then they did it again. And again.
In fact, they ran the 2012 NFL season 50,000 times and the team that won the Super Bowl the most were the Philadelphia Eagles, winning it all over 18% of the time. Delving even deeper, their most common opponent in the Big Game were the New England Patriots, whom they defeated 54% of the tie by an average score of 28-26.
The Baltimore Ravens have a 5.9% chance to win the Super Bowl, although they had them making the post-season as a Wild Card (#5 seed) but losing to the San Diego Chargers 21-20. Going through the Ravens schedule, the Prediction Machine give them a record of 13-3, but still not enough to win the AFC North over the Pittsburgh Steelers.
(Click on the 'Jump' to read the full story, including the game-by-game 2012 Ravens season)
PredictionMachine.com strives to be the most accurate and trusted source for predicting sports outcomes. The state-of-the-art, Prediction Machine, was built by Paul Bessire (Twitter: @predictmachine), a statistician and veteran sports writer, who offers his in-depth analysis and unique takes through his blog posts and game predictions. If you’d like to set up an interview either via phone or through email questions with Paul Bessire to talk about his NFL predictions or any specific team please let me know.
In sports, matchups dictate outcomes. Instead of data mining to attempt to find historical trends that may lend some insight into future games - a common, yet misleading approach for many other predictive models - PredictionMachine.com's accuracy stems from the Predictalator (a fancy name for the Machine), which plays an upcoming game 50,000 times before it's actually played.
The Predictalator has already played the 2011 NFL season 50,000 times before it's actually played. The Philadelphia Eagles turn their "Dream Team" into Super Bowl champions, winning it all league-high 18.0% of the time. In the most likely Super Bowl, Philadelphia defeats the New England Patriots 54.3% of the time and by an average score of 28-26. New England, the AFC's top-seed, wins the Super Bowl 14.2% of the time. The Green Bay Packers (9.2%), Houston Texans (9.2%) and Pittsburgh Steelers (7.2%) follow the Eagles and Patriots in Super Bowl likelihood
Based on the analysis, here is the projected NFL 2012 Playoff bracket. It should be noted however, that this exact bracket only occurred 416 of the 50,000 seasons played by the Predictalator:
AFC
Wild Card Round
#6 Buffalo 16 @ #3 Pittsburgh 23
#5 Baltimore 20 @ #4 San Diego 21
Divisional Round
#3 Pittsburgh 17 @ #2 Houston 20
#4 San Diego 24 @ #1 New England 34
AFC Championship
#2 Houston 23 @ #1 New England 29
NFC
Wild Card Round
#6 New York Giants 19 @ #3 San Francisco 20
#5 Detroit 23 @ #4 Atlanta 26
Divisional Round
#4 Atlanta 17 @ #1 Philadelphia 26
#3 San Francisco 19 @ #2 Green Bay 27
NFC Championship
#2 Green Bay 24 @ #1 Philadelphia 28
Super Bowl
Philadelphia 28 over New England 26
Here are the Ravens game-by-game projections
|
Week |
Opponent |
Ravens Score |
Opponent Score |
Win % |
|
1 |
20.1 |
14.2 |
66.8 |
|
|
2 |
@ Eagles |
15.3 |
21.5 |
32.6 |
|
3 |
Patriots |
26.7 |
23.4 |
58 |
|
4 |
21.7 |
12.8 |
75.4 |
|
|
5 |
@ Chiefs |
19.5 |
17.2 |
56 |
|
6 |
22.5 |
17.1 |
65 |
|
|
7 |
@ Texans |
15.8 |
17.8 |
44.4 |
|
8 |
Bye |
|
|
|
|
9 |
@ Browns |
19.9 |
14.9 |
64.1 |
|
10 |
25.2 |
16.2 |
73.7 |
|
|
11 |
@ Steelers |
14.8 |
19.3 |
37.7 |
|
12 |
@ Chargers |
21.9 |
20.8 |
52.7 |
|
13 |
Steelers |
17.4 |
15.8 |
54.1 |
|
14 |
@ Redskins |
19.7 |
17.4 |
56.5 |
|
15 |
24 |
16.1 |
71.4 |
|
|
16 |
Giants |
22.1 |
18.3 |
60.3 |
|
17 |
@ Bengals |
16.8 |
16.6 |
50.6 |
|
|
Pts/Game |
Pts/Game |
Total Wins |
|
|
|
20.2 |
17.5 |
9.2 |
|
The results are always fun to look at. Please see the links below. Also, see a chart below my signature for every team’s chance to win their division, make the wild card, win their conference, or win the Super Bowl.