Who all is taking Warren Buffett's billion dollar march geighness bracket challenge?

[Riccardo]

THE GREAT Riccardo has never filled out a bracket - mebbe this is the year to try

[Irish George]

you'd be nuts not to

Of course I will. Gonna fill a few out anyway...what's one more? I know the odds are astronomical, but why not give it a go?

[PackWest]

I think the best way to win the Buffet cash is to collaborate

Only 1 entry per household, but if a group got together via the internet I think you could increase your chances immensely

I'm not good enough at math, but at some point whether its a 1000 or 10,000 guys working together I think you could enhance your chances to beat the system

Alone you have no chance as history has shown.

1 billion divided by 1000 players still leaves a $1 million each
1 billion divided by 10,000 players still leaves $ 100k each
1 billion divided by 100,000 players still nets you $10k per dude which wouldn't be bad

.

[IronEagle]

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/01/warren-buffett-and-quicken-loans-will-pay-you-1-billion-for-the-perfect-march-madness-bracket/283228/

[TerpEagle]

I think the best way to win the Buffet cash is to collaborate

Only 1 entry per household, but if a group got together via the internet I think you could increase your chances immensely

I'm not good enough at math, but at some point whether its a 1000 or 10,000 guys working together I think you could enhance your chances to beat the system

Alone you have no chance as history has shown.

1 billion divided by 1000 players still leaves a $1 million each
1 billion divided by 10,000 players still leaves $ 100k each
1 billion divided by 100,000 players still nets you $10k per dude which wouldn't be bad

.

You have to look at it like the lottery and the reasonable number of permutations that could win versus how many you enter and your chance in probability of winning.

For lotteries like Mega Millions and Powerball, it's statistically not worth it to pool multiple entries between a group of people that have to split the winnings. The advantage gained by having multiple entries is minimal, let along the fact that you're not playing for a much smaller sum.

The best method is to play one ticket/entry that you solely own possession of.

But, emotion takes over, and no one wants to the be that office mate who gets to watch everyone else retire due to sticking to statistical principles.

Now with an NCAA bracket, there are 147,500,000,000,000,000,000 (1.475e20) possible solutions. That means, assuming all brackets have an equal chance to to get it 100% correct, entering 100,000 separate brackets means you have approx. 1 chance in 1.475e15 instead of 1.475e20.

The NCAA bracket gets a little different because you can knock out a large chuck of possibilities that will never happen. But that advantage of the statistics is mitigated due to the fact that nearly everyone else will be knocking out those possibilities as well.

In the end, I'd bet (without further analysis) that the risk/reward analysis still falls with you picking your own bracket to win it all. Not including any tax ramifications.

[PackWest]

Math ain't my strong suit !

I figured that a "smart" group of fans could pick the top 10,000 most likely scenarios instead of treating them all the same as in a lottery

Sure the 16 seed could beat the number 1, but I'd bet against it in this scenario

I thought that when you narrow it down with some basketball insight the numbers would look better - but apparently not

And in a lotto, you have to pay to play; while this one is free so that's what fooled me into thinking you could beat the system.

People with a billion to give away didn't get there by being foolish, clearly they ran the numbers before they made the offer.

[Riccardo]

I wonder if there is a prize for getting every one of the first round games wrong?

I prolly have a better shot at that

[noguano]

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/...racket/283228/

Bread and circuses.

[TerpEagle]

Math ain't my strong suit !

I figured that a "smart" group of fans could pick the top 10,000 most likely scenarios instead of treating them all the same as in a lottery

Sure the 16 seed could beat the number 1, but I'd bet against it in this scenario

I thought that when you narrow it down with some basketball insight the numbers would look better - but apparently not

And in a lotto, you have to pay to play; while this one is free so that's what fooled me into thinking you could beat the system.

People with a billion to give away didn't get there by being foolish, clearly they ran the numbers before they made the offer.

If you ran a statistical analysis of which seeds advanced to which rounds and then took the top 100,000 most common scenarios you'd likely improve your odds but by how much.

Just to give perspective, current Powerball odds are 1 in 175,223,510 or 1.75e8. So without shading based on likelihood of certain seeds advancing or not, your odds to win the power ball by yourself are about 8 and a half million times better than putting 100K entries into the tournament pool.

[noguano]

If you ran a statistical analysis of which seeds advanced to which rounds and then took the top 100,000 most common scenarios you'd likely improve your odds but by how much.

Just to give perspective, current Powerball odds are 1 in 175,223,510 or 1.75e8. So without shading based on likelihood of certain seeds advancing or not, your odds to win the power ball by yourself are about 8 and a half million times better than putting 100K entries into the tournament pool.

When the Powerball reaches 175M I play.

that is all