In Reply to: Disagree. Point spreads are important for judging how well... posted by Born2BBruin on November 03, 2025 at 10:57:41
Vegas is not an objective sports data analysis company, they are NOT trying to accurately predict team performance and share their findings with you in the form of a point spread (LOL to anyone who thinks that) - what they ARE trying to do is evaluate a team's PERCEIVED expected performance (as perceived by the general public) vs what they actually predict a team's expected performance to be, and find that gap between the two - because it is in those margins that Vegas makes their money.
As an example, if their own metrics predict UCLA to win by 15, best case scenario, and they perceive that the public expects a 25 point win, are they going to set the line at 15? of course not! they are going to push it up as close to 25 as they can, maybe "concede" a few points, so that the general idiotic betting public will think "oh +18! what a great deal", then lay a ton of money and LOSE when UCLA only wins by 16 or 17.