Why Sports Rankings Make No Sense

Fans and coaches always think head-to-head wins should decide rankings, but the math says otherwise. Mark Broadie, Carson Family Professor of Business at Columbia Business School, explains why sports rankings can never perfectly reflect every result, even when teams beat each other multiple times.

ABOUT THE EPISODE What makes a sports ranking system fair? And can rankings ever truly reflect who the “best” team or player is? Mark Broadie, Carson Family Professor of Business at Columbia Business School and creator of the groundbreaking “strokes gained” metric, joins Wharton Moneyball to discuss golf analytics, college rankings, predictive models, and the impossible math behind sports rankings. The conversation explores NCAA golf rankings, World Golf Rankings, sports betting models, tournament design, and how analytics shape modern sports.

ABOUT THE PODCAST Sports is a game of numbers. Wharton experts Eric Bradlow, Shane Jensen, Cade Massey, and Adi Wyner team up to tackle the world of sports, from current events to longstanding issues such as: What sports streaks are the most impressive? How do you rank the best players? Can athletes be compared across sports? Moneyball Highlights explains how decision-makers in the game can avoid the common mistakes and embrace the data. Episodes are recorded at the Wharton School.

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