Probability of a Perfect Bracket

I have been meaning to do a proper analysis of this question for years. It was a slow day in the Emerald City so I analyzed all 2,142 March Madness games played since 1985 to answer the question. You can find my analysis of this question as well as some common props bet at my new page on Probability of a Perfect Bracket. For those who just want to jump to the answer, following my basic strategy, the probability is 1 in 42,743,890,552.

The question for the poll is what did you think of the page?

Arent these perfect brackets?

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Rules 20 and 21 are wrong. They should be:

20. The winner of the regional that had the #1 overall team as determined by the NCAA basketball committee when selecting the tournament teams plays the winner of the regional that had the #4 overall team; with the winner advancing.

21. The winners of the two regionals not mentioned in rule 20 play each other, with the winner advancing.

There was a time when the semi-final pairings were on a rotating basis, but this changed a few years ago, presumably because somebody was afraid the top two teams in the country could meet in a semi-final.
EDIT: 2004 was the first year the Final Four was paired based on the relative rankings of the #1 seeds.

I don't understand this paragraph:

Quote:

Warren Buffet has offered $1,000,000 per year, for life, to any employee of his who can fill out a perfect bracket. Warren has about 377,000 employees (source). Assuming each one followed the strategy above, and lived 60 more years, the expected cost to Mr. Buffet would be $529.20.

If everyone follows the strategy above (picking only the higher seeds), Buffett would only have to "sweat" eight possible brackets. So how is it relevant that he has 377,000 employees? Does the $530 expected cost for his promotion factor in that 377,000 employee number in any way? Are you assuming that if multiple employees won with the same bracket (377,000/8), they would each receive the full $60 million annuity?


Edit -- you're also missing the final t in Buffett.

If we take no-vig money lines to be the correct probabilities, it is almost always less than 10 billion to one, with some years under four billion to one. I'll try to find some online articles I've seen that verify me previous attempts at this

As always: if you disagree that the betting odds are the correct probabilities, why aren't you earning millions betting against the games that offer some of the highest maximums of the year?

Quote: TomG

If we take no-vig money lines to be the correct probabilities, it is almost always less than 10 billion to one, with some years under four billion to one. I'll try to find some online articles I've seen that verify me previous attempts at this

As always: if you disagree that the betting odds are the correct probabilities, why aren't you earning millions betting against the games that offer some of the highest maximums of the year?

For clarification: even before the first round, most sportsbooks have odds on winning two, three, four, five, or six games for each team

Quote: darkoz

Arent these perfect brackets?

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[ x ] No.

Quote: ThatDonGuy

Rules 20 and 21 are wrong. They should be:

20. The winner of the regional that had the #1 overall team as determined by the NCAA basketball committee when selecting the tournament teams plays the winner of the regional that had the #4 overall team; with the winner advancing.

21. The winners of the two regionals not mentioned in rule 20 play each other, with the winner advancing.

Good correction, thank you. I copied and pasted your exact words onto the page. Again, thanks. Please add another beer to the number I already owe.

Quote: sodawater

If everyone follows the strategy above (picking only the higher seeds), Buffett would only have to "sweat" eight possible brackets. So how is it relevant that he has 377,000 employees? Does the $530 expected cost for his promotion factor in that 377,000 employee number in any way? Are you assuming that if multiple employees won with the same bracket (377,000/8), they would each receive the full $60 million annuity

First, thanks for the correction on the spelling. Being from the land of the best buffets in the world, I hope that counts as a little bit of an excuse.

What I'm trying to say is that if multiple people picked the same perfect bracket and won, maybe Warren would split the prize. I doubt he ever said what the sharing rule is one this, but if I worked for him, I would want to get all the publicity of the perfect bracket to myself and not share it. My suggestion is what you should do if you don't want to risk sharing a win, for whatever reason you don't want to. I think most people are selfish, including me, and wouldn't want to share in the glory of a perfect bracket.

Quote: darkoz

Arent these perfect brackets?

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Too small.