Tesla and Totals

Last week, I cautioned against blindly backing the the Overs in NFL Divisional Playoff games and in the end they split 2-2. 

As for the apparent value for Overs, I'd be wary. We're dealing with a small sample again, and while Overs has a 37-31 record overall, most of that advantage is in games where the line is 12 or higher, and none of this weekend's four games are close to that.

When the total is 48 or higher, the Overs is now 17-9 with the one qualifier (Kansas City Chiefs v Houston Texans) easily covering by 31 points. The win was secured by half-time, and the Chiefs made the 51 points on their own.  

Road Teams in this round getting 7 points or more tend to have an edge, but that didn't work out this weekend with just one winner form the three bets. With a 24 point lead at the end of the first quarter, the Houston Texans were looking good but the Chiefs came back strongly. 

The totals are currently set at 45 for the Chiefs v Tennessee Titans and 52 for the San Francisco 49ers v Green Bay Packers. 

So onto the Championship Round next week and there's half the data we have for the previous two weekends, i.e. not a lot. Road Teams are 16-18 while Overs do have a 20-13-1 advantage

Some of you may have seen the trend that since Andy Reid has been the head coach of the Chiefs, Unders is 37-19-4 in home games. While this is true, in playoff games this record is an insignificant 3-2.  

Neanderthal's blog has an interesting post on the subject of backing the Under in the NBA, something this blog looked at less than a week ago. His numbers are worth comparing with what I have found, and for those of you interested in the College version of the game, there's a little secret given away.

Some of you may recall my recommendation of Tesla shares from back in 2018, when they were trading in the low 300s, and while I doubt that anyone would have followed me on it, nor should you without doing your own research, the stock is certainly flying high right now:

Less than a month ago, Tesla were in the low 400s. 

As the short-sellers get driven out by forced covering and interest costs, the price could go even higher. A one day gain of close to 10% helped the spreadsheet last night, but didn't do much to support the "efficient market" hypothesis.

With parallels to betting markets, Warren Buffett's succinct observations on this topic (EMH) are appropriate:

Observing correctly that the market was frequently efficient, they [academics, many investment professionals and corporate managers] went on to conclude incorrectly that it was always efficient. The difference between these propositions is night and day.