FiveThirtyEight: Sports
- How Good Will The Lakers Be With LeBron?
Monday - 07/02/2018 - 02:04 AMLove them or hate them, the Los Angeles Lakers long represented the closest thing the NBA had to a proverbial land of milk and honey. For the better part of three decades, the club often had a surplus of star players, the winning was robust, and championships weren’t all that rare.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share
- The 2018 World Cup: Favorites, Sleepers And Most Pivotal Games
Thursday - 06/14/2018 - 06:30 AMWhen the 2018 World Cup begins play today, it’ll kick off what could be a very good month for the usual suspects of international soccer.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - The Next Phase Of NBA Superteam Technology: Creating One From Scratch
Monday - 06/18/2018 - 03:21 PMWhen healthy, San Antonio Spurs swingman Kawhi Leonard is a card-carrying MVP candidate and one of the game’s premier all-around talents.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - The Most Promising Players In The NBA Draft According To My Computer
Wednesday - 06/20/2018 - 06:08 PMWe usually don’t release our CARMELO NBA projections until after the NBA draft. But this year, in an effort to procrastinate from other modelling-related tasks,28 I finished them a little early.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Which Teams Made The Biggest Gambles On NBA Draft Night?
Friday - 06/22/2018 - 07:45 AMThe NBA draft is a time for optimism, the launching pad for 60 pro careers full of aspirations of championships and star-making moments. In reality, though, only a couple will likely become stars; many more will become key role players, while others will barely sniff the league.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share
- Our NBA Player Projections Are Ready For 2018-19
Tuesday - 06/26/2018 - 01:25 PMJust in time for the NBA’s free agent bonanza (headlined by LeBron James’s The Decision: Part III), FiveThirtyEight has re-launched CARMELO, our NBA player projection system, with forecasts for 2018-19 and beyond.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - The LeBron James Decision-Making Machine
Thursday - 06/28/2018 - 09:52 AMGraphics by Gus Wezerek
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - How The Atlanta Falcons Offense Went From Good To Great
Friday - 01/06/2017 - 04:28 PMThe Atlanta Falcons had the NFL’s most explosive offense this season, racking up yards and points with efficiency and balance. As a result, the Falcons are the NFC’s No. 2 seed in the playoffs, quarterback Matt Ryan is a leading MVP candidate and offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan is reportedly interviewing for four different head-coach openings.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - The Milwaukee Bucks’ Mediocre Record Is Hiding A Dangerous Team
Thursday - 01/05/2017 - 04:01 PMMILWAUKEE — The NBA’s elite teams almost always have a singular, defining trait.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Can Clemson Take Down Undefeated Alabama?
Wednesday - 01/04/2017 - 10:10 AM
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share
- Jordan Spieth Forgot How To Putt
Thursday - 06/14/2018 - 06:01 AMNot too long ago, pundits and golfers alike were awestruck by the meteoric rise of Jordan Spieth.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Messi Walks Better Than Most Players Run
Friday - 06/15/2018 - 12:00 PMIn the 12 years since he became the youngest Argentine to score a World Cup goal, Lionel Messi has won more Ballon d’Or trophies, awarded to the world’s best player, than anyone before him.44 He has scored
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Europe And South America Are Growing In Soccer Power — That Wasn’t Supposed To Happen
Wednesday - 06/20/2018 - 04:50 PMIf there’s been a dominant trend in the first week of the 2018 World Cup, perhaps it has been how well European nations from beyond the continent’s traditional giants have performed.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share
- If The NBA Is Going Small, Why Are This Year’s Prospects Tall?
Thursday - 06/21/2018 - 06:00 AMWhen the NBA drafts its newest class of rookies Thursday, big guys should be the order of the night. According to rankings from ESPN’s Jonathan Givony, six of the top seven prospects in this year’s draft stand 6-foot-10 or taller.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - The Sleepers To Watch In The World Cup Knockout Rounds
Monday - 06/25/2018 - 03:43 PMThe World Cup is not traditionally the tournament for underdogs. The trophy has been lifted by just eight countries — and five of those have won multiple times. But there’s usually enough room for a few Cinderella stories to creep into the knockout phase: Bulgaria (1994), South Korea (2002) and Turkey (2002) were unexpected semifinalists, while Cameroon (1990), Ghana (2010) and Costa Rica (2014) crashed the quarterfinals.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share
- We Timed Every Game. World Cup Stoppage Time Is Wildly Inaccurate.
Wednesday - 06/27/2018 - 01:58 PMThe second half of Iran and Morocco’s tightly contested group match contained nothing too out of the ordinary by World Cup standards. Each side used all three substitutes; there was only one booking; no goals were scored.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share
- Which 2018 Stars Are Doing The Best Impressions Of Pele, Maradona And Zidane?
Friday - 06/29/2018 - 01:52 PMBy analyzing the statistical fingerprints of every performance by every player to appear in a World Cup since 1966,1 FiveThirtyEight’s new interactive tool — 50 Years Of World Cup Doppelgangers — can give a realistic sense of how great or lousy each performance in Russia this month is by comparing them to how othe
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - What’s Behind All These Crazy NBA Stat Lines?
Friday - 01/06/2017 - 01:37 PMAs the calendar approached 2017 Saturday night, Houston’s James Harden decided to provide his own New Year’s Eve fireworks.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - The 10 Games That Shaped The NFL Playoff Picture The Most
Wednesday - 01/04/2017 - 03:53 PMAfter a tedious Week 17, the NFL playoff picture is finally set. Every week since Week 12, we’ve looked at which games could have the biggest impact on postseason chances throughout the league.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Jordy Nelson Is Behind The Packers’ Renaissance
Tuesday - 01/03/2017 - 04:28 PMAaron Rodgers was in the midst of the worst statistical year of his career, had just suffered losses in five of the previous six games and was about to spend Thanksgiving watching the Detroit Lions pull 2.5 games ahead of his Green Bay Packers.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share
- A World Cup Sleeper May Be Lurking In Group H
Wednesday - 06/13/2018 - 03:05 PMFiveThirtyEight is examining each of the eight groups in the 2018 World Cup, which begins Thursday in Russia.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Can This New Crop Of Players Erase England’s Underachieving Past?
Monday - 06/18/2018 - 08:12 AMThere is an uncharacteristic air of hope this year surrounding an uncharacteristic England team. To be an England supporter is to inherit a contradictory combination of utter nihilism and raging anger, expecting nothing and everything at the same time.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Who Is In The Most Trouble: Brazil, Germany Or Argentina?
Wednesday - 06/20/2018 - 04:01 PMThe World Cup has been full of surprises. Of the five teams rated most likely to win the World Cup before the tournament by FiveThirtyEight’s Soccer Power Index, only France won its first match.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share
- Injuries And Underperformance Couldn’t Keep The Dodgers Down
Thursday - 06/21/2018 - 02:24 PMIn retrospect, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ 6-5 loss to the Miami Marlins on May 16 was probably the low point of their 2018 season. It was the Dodgers’ sixth consecutive defeat and their ninth in 10; it dropped their overall record to 16-26, then only the fourth-best in their division; and it brought their playoff odds to a season low of 22 percent.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Russia Is Not This Good — Right?
Friday - 06/22/2018 - 03:14 PMBefore the 2018 World Cup kicked off last week at Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow, much had been written about why Russia was so bad at soccer.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Germany Flamed Out In Spectacular, Historic Fashion
Wednesday - 06/27/2018 - 03:13 PMSay goodbye to another defending World Cup champion: Germany, the team that won it all four years ago, is officially out of the 2018 tournament.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Compare Every World Cup Performance Since 1966
Friday - 06/29/2018 - 10:00 AMFiveThirtyEight
PUBLISHED JUN. 28, 2018 AT 5:43 PM
50 Years Of World Cup Doppelgangers
FiveThirtyEight’s MESSI* analysis compares every player in every World Cup from 1966 to 2018 by generating statistical fingerprints of 5,882 World Cup performances.More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - The Raiders Are Rolling With Historic Inexperience At QB
Thursday - 01/05/2017 - 05:55 PMOn Wednesday afternoon, the Oakland Raiders confirmed that
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - Make College Football Great Again
Thursday - 01/05/2017 - 01:04 PMOhio State somewhat embarrassed the Big Ten in getting shut out by Clemson 31-0 in the College Football Playoff semifinal last week. Still, hindsight is 20/20, and I don’t necessarily begrudge the playoff selection committee for having turned down Penn State, which won the Big Ten championship, in favor of the Buckeyes.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share - The ACC Is Having A Bowl Season For The Ages
Tuesday - 01/03/2017 - 02:49 PMAfter Oklahoma cruised past Auburn in Monday night’s Sugar Bowl, college football’s 2016-17 bowl season is nearing its finale. The only game left? Next Monday’s national championship game between Alabama and Clemson, a rematch of last year’s title tilt.
More | Talk | Read It Later | Share