The Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers will face off Sunday in Super Bowl LIV in Miami. Our model has the 49ers as 3.5-point underdogs, with a 37 percent chance of pulling off a win. The model is even less enthusiastic about San Francisco quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo, who has a quarterback Elo rating of […]
Two months after initial reporting in The Athletic that the Houston Astros used illegally placed cameras to steal signs during their 2017 season, the scandal is back in the headlines. The resulting MLB investigation led to the firing of three managers and one general manager, plus the loss of draft picks and a $5 million […]
The divisional round of the NFL playoffs did not disappoint. While there was only one upset in the four games, it was the biggest upset in the Super Bowl era (according to Elo). The No. 6 seed Tennessee Titans took down the No. 1 Baltimore Ravens 28-12 on Saturday night. Neil, Geoff and Sara break […]
The NFL’s wild-card weekend lived up to its name, with three of the four games ending in upsets, according to the odds given by the FiveThirtyEight model. The Hot Takedown crew breaks down each of these surprising wins and discusses how these teams can keep their upset streaks in the divisional round. On Monday, LSU […]
Over the past few weeks, Hot Takedown has covered several cheating scandals, from the Astros’ sign stealing to state-sanctioned Russian doping. Now that the Patriots — a team that’s no stranger to scandal — is facing fresh allegations, we thought it was time to apply more evaluation and rigor to how we think about cheating […]