Saddoboxing Presents: Prediction Contest Nine (AUG14 - DEC20)

[Nameless]

I just want to thank everyone for making their picks every week. I know it's hard enough to remember, let alone be at the mercy of the technology gods.

It was my first participation and I quite enjoyed it, thanks Gorilla.

[superheavyrhun]

Congratulations Comegalletas, hard luck fatsandman, another good season.... I'm aiming for top 5 in the new year!

[Comegalletas]

Thanks for the congratulations. This was my first season here, and it was a great ride. My hat off to FatSandman, who came really close to win.

To present myself, I live in Monterrey, Mexico. I enjoy a lot watching boxing, but many of you know far more than me. In the other hand, I have a deep statistical background, having adapted the Elo rating system used in chess to other sports.

This year I started playing in a similar contest to this one, "Gurus del Boxeo". In the last two seasons I have won handily, so I came here to test me against a thougher opposition. I was pretty confident that I would end winning, but after seeing the high level here, I guess my chances to repeat the championship are no higher than 40%.

About the contest format, I really like the joker pick. It makes each week more variable, but in the long run the better players come ahead.

On the other hand, I find the "post your picks" system clumsy. It is a grind for the admin (Kudos, BG!), and it is prone to mistakes. During this season twice I got more points than the correct number, and had to contact BG to fix it. In Gurus we have an automated system, it is much better. I guess Saddoboxing should write its own script. If the problem is money, I would be happy to donate my prize to start the work.

I have collected all my picks and FatSandman's in a spreadsheet, to be sure that the totals are right. And indeed, the final difference is 2 points. You can see it at:

https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?...yb2N3c0E&hl=es

(I do not have the last week picks by FatSandman, but he confirmed his total as 43).

I played well, but in the first months I was too "UD" happy. It costed me a few points, and I had to adjust the model. FatSandman a few times picked specific KO rounds, which I see as a losing proposition. He lost 9 points that way; had he picked simply "KO", he would be the winner now.

Thanks again for this great tournament. I have a few rules suggestions for the next season, I will post them in a later post. For now, it is time to celebrate

See you next season

Comegalletas.

[CFH]

Thanks for the congratulations. This was my first season here, and it was a great ride. My hat off to FatSandman, who came really close to win.

To present myself, I live in Monterrey, Mexico. I enjoy a lot watching boxing, but many of you know far more than me. In the other hand, I have a deep statistical background, having adapted the Elo rating system used in chess to other sports.

This year I started playing in a similar contest to this one, "Gurus del Boxeo". In the last two seasons I have won handily, so I came here to test me against a thougher opposition. I was pretty confident that I would end winning, but after seeing the high level here, I guess my chances to repeat the championship are no higher than 40%.

About the contest format, I really like the joker pick. It makes each week more variable, but in the long run the better players come ahead.

On the other hand, I find the "post your picks" system clumsy. It is a grind for the admin (Kudos, BG!), and it is prone to mistakes. During this season twice I got more points than the correct number, and had to contact BG to fix it. In Gurus we have an automated system, it is much better. I guess Saddoboxing should write its own script. If the problem is money, I would be happy to donate my prize to start the work.

I have collected all my picks and FatSandman's in a spreadsheet, to be sure that the totals are right. And indeed, the final difference is 2 points. You can see it at:

https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?...yb2N3c0E&hl=es

(I do not have the last week picks by FatSandman, but he confirmed his total as 43).

I played well, but in the first months I was too "UD" happy. It costed me a few points, and I had to adjust the model. FatSandman a few times picked specific KO rounds, which I see as a losing proposition. He lost 9 points that way; had he picked simply "KO", he would be the winner now.

Thanks again for this great tournament. I have a few rules suggestions for the next season, I will post them in a later post. For now, it is time to celebrate

See you next season

Comegalletas.

Congrats on the win.

[YIDDLE]

whoever one well done and i am happy first time and just under 500 pts and i missed a week and many thanks for taking the time to sort it all out

[Comegalletas]

After my first season in Saddoboxing Prediction Contest, I have a few suggestions:

A.- Things that just need to be documented in the rules:

1.- Technical Decisions. A TD is also considered a UD (or MD, SD)? I guess it should, but it is not currently stipulated one way or the other by the rules.

2.- No Contest. Which is the time limit to allow for a NC? The fight night decision stands, or there is a time window to change it? Most after-fight NC are for doping tests, but there are others that could took several weeks, as Bradley - Campbell. Any reasonable rule is OK (night result stands, two days, one week, the duration of the season); but it has to be clearly stipulated. Also, what happens with the joker in NC fights? 3 points sounds fair.

3.- The "Points" result. Sometimes there are only one judge in UK fights, so the decision cannot be graded UD, SD, MD. In such cases, I guess the correct procedure is to convert any UD, MD and SD prediction into Pts, earning 6 points.

4.- Final tie. What happens if two players finish the season with the same points? I guess an extra week should be used to break the tie between them. Again, it would be good to have it documented.

5.- Drawn fights. Currently the rule states: "Should your fighter of choice go down in flames no points you will be awarded.". It ought to say "Should your fighter of choice draws or go down in flames no points you will be awarded.".

All these points are fairly easy to implement, as they does not change the contest as it is currently run.

B.- More significant changes:

1.- Point weighting. Currently the points assigned to differen choices are skewed to the conservative side. The vanilla "Pts" and "KO/TKO" are most often the best value at 6 points each. The only risky proposition that is fair value is UD at 8 points. SD, MD, TD, DQ and Draw are losing propositions. The same goes for KO; picking a round is usually a bad bet. Maybe they should get more points, but it has to be carefully designed. The other thing that sounds bad is "If you just type the name of the winning fighter you will score 1 point"; it should be at least 3 points.

2.- Script: I think that a script would make easier and less error prone the administration of the contest. Saddo looked at it, and said he prefers the forum method, as it is more presonal. That is OK, I hope we have a BoxingGorilla for many seasons

Regards,

Comegalletas

[Fatsandman]

SD, MD, TD, DQ and Draw are losing propositions.

If it wasn't for the two Split Decisions I picked in the final week of league 7 I wouldn't have won. SD isn't always a losing proposition ;-)