Orb Analytics Week 17 Recap: Perfection
For the first time since starting this project, the Orb model had a perfect performance in Week 17! It went 4-0 on spread picks and 10-0 on moneyline predictions. So none of the annoying ❌’s in the results this week, just our favorite ✅’s all the way down. The Orb has had perfect weeks on moneyline picks before, but never against the spread. Part of our modeling strategy this year has been to reduce the volume of picks we give out each week, so 4-0 isn’t quite as impressive as if we had gone perfect during an 8 or 9-spread sample size like we used to release occasionally last season. But regardless, hitting our first perfect week ATS is a great milestone for the models!
As you will see below, the story of Week 17 and really the season as a whole has been favorites absolutely dominating. Between weeks 2-17, they are covering 55.8% of games against the spread. So while taking the favorite, or in our case giving them out as a model pick, always feels like a chalk move, it has been a lucrative one this year. Week 17 was a prime example of this as 12/16 favorites covered, which cannot be good for the sportsbooks. By this point in the season, (other than the New York Giants) the bad teams in the league have packed it in and are prioritizing their draft position over winning games.
Here is how each of the Orb’s picks performed in Week 17:
Spreads:
Ravens -5.5 (Christmas Day - Premium) ✅
Bengals -3 (Saturday - Premium) ✅
Cardinals +6.5 (Saturday - Premium) ✅
Bills -8.5 ✅
All spreads: 4-0, 100%, +3.636 units
Moneyline:
Chiefs (Christmas Day - Premium) ✅
Ravens (Christmas Day - Premium) ✅
Chargers (Saturday - Premium) ✅
Bengals (Saturday - Premium) ✅
Rams (Saturday - Premium) ✅
Bills ✅
Buccaneers ✅
Dolphins ✅
Commanders ✅
Lions (MNF - Premium) ✅
All moneyline: 10-0, 100%, +4.239 units
Overall a +7.875 unit performance in Week 17.
Week 17 Model Performance:
Favorites covered 12/16 games (75.0%) and won 14/16 outright (87.5%).
Weekly spreads:
Weekly Moneyline:
Season-To-Date Model Performance:
Not including week 1, favorites have covered 134/240 games (55.8%) and won 173/240 (72.1%) outright this season.
Season spreads:
Season moneyline:
Official Orb Picks Season Results:
Season spread picks: 45-36, 55.6%, +5.0 units
Season moneyline picks: 106-42, 71.6%, +6.9 units
Confusion Matrix:
The Orb saved the best for last! After starting our official season 1-4 ATS and -6.7 units overall in Week 2, it is only fitting that Week 17 is our best of the year. These two outliers almost cancel each other out, if we were to remove them the models would still be sitting at +10.6 units for the season. So this year’s success thankfully hasn’t been built on the back of ‘just one good week’ since even with our biggest losing streak yet, its main drawback this year was ‘just one bad week’ to start things off.
My plan going into the year was to have our official season replicate last year’s meaning from Weeks 2-17. Week 1 was ruled out because we have no data on the teams we see to start the year and Week 18 because there is so much uncertainty around which teams are trying to win, which are trying to lose, and therefore what players we will see on the field. Once I run the models for Week 18, I will see if any of the consensus picks happen to be on the few matchups in which both teams are trying to win for playoff berths or seeding. But looking ahead at the lines for Sunday, Vegas is not expecting many of these games to be ‘Orb eligible’. For example, the Broncos are currently favored by 10.5 points over the Chiefs who will be resting Mahomes. I will see what the models predict will happen, but I would say there is a very high chance that all the ‘picks’ on Friday come with a heavy disclaimer that they are not official and are just for the exercise, rather than going on our record even if they hit. Plus just like every fan reading this, we at Orb Analytics are ready for the playoffs to start!
- Team Orb Analytics
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