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Advanced Analytics Love OSU This Season … Which Worries Me

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Over the weekend, we had our first annual PFB summit in Tulsa. We planned out the preseason posting schedule and tried to figure out a rhythm for how we’re going to run this blog when football really cranks up in September.

We methodically went through every permutation of posts we could write leading up to that first kickoff just over 50 days from now. One of the notes I wrote down was “THINGS THAT WORRY ME.”

We decided against writing the actual post, I believe, but how much advanced analytics like a team that lost part of its soul (Ogbah, Glidden, Jacobs) and has a salty road schedule is definitely a thing that worries me.

Consider ESPN’s Football Power Index (FPI). Here is a definition of that system.

FPI is a predictive rating system designed to measure team strength and project performance going forward. The ultimate goal of FPI is not to rank teams 1 through 128; rather, it is to correctly predict games and season outcomes. If Vegas ever published the power rankings it uses to set its lines, they would likely look quite a lot like FPI.

And how it functions.

Each team’s FPI rating is composed of a predicted offensive, defensive and special teams component. These ratings represent the number of points each unit is expected to contribute to its net scoring margin on a neutral field against an average FBS opponent. In the preseason, these components are made up entirely of data from past seasons, such as returning starters, past performance, recruiting rankings and coaching tenure.

And if it’s any good.

In short, if preseason FPI had been used with no update to predict every game of the 2014 season, the FPI favorite would have won 71 percent of FBS versus FBS games (Vegas closing line was 74 percent accurate).

So yes, it is good. You can read more about how the preseason ratings are put together here, but it essentially has to do with recent past performance, returning starters, recruiting and coaching.

And we already looked at how Oklahoma State’s expected offensive production is supposed to rank in the top 10 nationally. This is just one of the various factors that goes into FPI’s recent performance.

All of that leads to OSU being ranked No. 8 in the preseason FPI. Behind Florida State, LSU, OU, Clemson, Alabama, Tennessee and Ole Miss. Ahead of Michigan, Georgia, USC and UCLA.

I need a drink.

ESPN also gives the Pokes a 2.4 percent chance of running the table and an 18 percent chance of winning the Big 12. It predicts the team will go 9-3. It also predicts OSU will have a lot of blowouts in 2016.

Despite a 10-3 record, Oklahoma State did not blow too many teams out last season. That may change in 2016 with teams such as Southeastern Louisiana, Central Michigan and Kansas on the docket. The Cowboys still have to maneuver a tough road schedule (Baylor, TCU and Oklahoma), but as the eighth-ranked team in FPI, they should have a few dominant wins by season’s end.

And maybe all of this is meaningless, but FPI’s intended goal is to predict who will win individual games which it does with stunning accuracy from such a long distance (see 71 percent number above).

The issues I have are intangible though. Numbers are great. I love them. They should be relied upon more when it comes to news and culture, but they don’t tell the full story of an Ogbah or a Glidden leaving a locker room. They can’t totally explain what a team’s culture will be like. And these things worry me. Playing at Norman, Manhattan, Waco and Ft. Worth worries me. Not knowing who QB2 is worries me.

But for all the consternation, it’s easy to forget how good OSU is and could be as this season rolls on. Mike Gundy has built a machine that has had a puncher’s chance at the Big 12 title in the majority of the last six season and looks like it will again this year. Numbers aside, that’s pretty awesome.

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