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Since the start of the 1995-96 NFL season there have been 49 teams that ran the inter-conference table at 4-0 SU. The theory is, a team that went 4-0 in these games may have had an easy path, and with a more difficult schedule in front of them in these 4 games the following season, it may be quite difficult to reach the same win total.
THE VERIFICATION:
The 49 teams that ran the table over the period, met this fate:
38 of them lost more games
9 of them won more games
2 of them won the same amount of games
34 of the 49 lost 2 more games or more 69.4%
The 38 teams that lost more games, did so to an average net wins over the previous season of -3.95!
So the fact is 78% of these teams lost an average of just about 4 more games the following season!
Supporting evidence then should mean, that if a 4-0 team loses a significantly greater amount of games the next season under this hypothesis, then shouldn’t an 0-4 team win a lot more?
It certainly would make this hypothesis a lot truer, and acceptable if that were the case.
PAYDAY:
We now look at the 0-4 SU teams, and reverse what was said of the 4-0 SU teams, and here are the facts:
Since the start of the 1995-96 season, there have been 53 teams that went 0-4 SU in their previous inter-league schedule.
38 of the 53 won more games the next season
12 of the 53 teams lost more games
3 of the 53 won the same amount of games
34 of the 53 teams won 2 or more games the following season (64.1%)
The 34 teams that won more games, did so to an average additional wins of a whooping 4.1!
COMBINING THE 4-0’s and the 0-4’s:
When we put this all together into one, since they are indeed the same thing we get:
Since the start of the 1995-96 season, there have been 103 teams that won all, or went winless in their 4 inter-conference games the previous season.
THESE TEAMS COMBINED TO:
positive theory results in 76 of 102 case studies (74.5%)
negative results in 21 of 102 case studies
neutral results in 5 case studies
The average wins or losses above or below the previous season in the 76 positive outcomes was 4!
Think about that for a second. Out of all case studies, with a positive outcome(75%) the results from the previous year were positive by 25% of the schedule, 4 games up or down!
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Some very interesting data to be sure. The teams that fit the 4-0/0-4 profile are;
4-0 PLAY UNDER
Dallas 9.5 (+105)
Seattle 10.5 (+100)
0-4 PLAY OVER
Chicago 5.5 (+130)
Cleveland 4.5 (+110)
San Francisco 4.5 (-115)
We will put 1 unit on each of these. Our first NFL wagers of the season.
