Get in the Game

Tim Chartier is the Joseph R. Morton Professor of Mathematics and Computer Science at Davidson College. He has fielded analytics questions from ESPN, the New York Times, the US Olympic and Paralympic Committee, and teams in the NBA, NFL, and NASCAR. Among his numerous books, he is the author of Math Bytes: Google Bombs, Chocolate-Covered Pi, and Other Cool Bits in Computing.

• 1 Unforgettably Unbelievable2 Shoot 3’s Like Steph Curry3 Dicey Hitting Streak4 Racking Up the Wins5 Unbreakable Tennis6 Improbable NFL Playoff7 FIFA Octopus Oracle8 Super-sized Super Bowl TD9 Scoring Confidence10 Tiger’s Consistency11 Moneyball Analytics12 Race Usain Bolt13 Get in the GameAcknowledgmentsFurther ReadingPersonal Training—Answers

"The key aspect that separates this book from other statistics and probability books that I have read, as well as sport data analytics books, is that Chartier has worked very hard to ensure that any mention of statistics and probability in this book is done through the use of coin tosses or rolls of a die. He wants the reader to understand the underlying concepts of the book are no more complicated than understanding a 50/50 coin toss or the distribution of possible rolls of a six-sided die. He manages to extrapolate these two concepts to far more complex concepts such as the binomial and normal distributions, Pythagorean expectation and computer simulations in sports forecasting using a very clear path for readers with little experience in formal statistics and probability studies. . . . This is certainly the most accessible book on sport data analytics that I’ve read. If you know someone who likes different sports but isn’t too confident with their mathematical abilities then this is a good bet (pun intended)."