It’s that time of year again when the Super Bowl becomes all the rage, millions, if not billions of dollars are spent on food, entertainment, and betting on the outcome of the big game.
Another tradition is EA Sports’ prediction of the winner of the Super Bowl based on statistics, trends, and players’ records throughout the season. The company’s simulation used Madden NFL 13 and puts the Baltimore Ravens ahead of the San Francisco 49ers and even goes so far as to predict a 27 to 24 point victory.
EA’s prediction record isn’t quite perfect, though they do tend to get the winners right most of the time. They’ve never been right with exact scoring, however. Last year, the simulation predicted the New York Giants to win, which they did, but with a score of 21 to 17 over the Patriots, not 27 and 24 as predicted.
We’re not in the business of giving betting advice, but EA’s prediction engine has only ever got two outcomes incorrect out of the last nine years of running the simulation, and even then, the scores weren’t off by a huge margin.
We’d love to see San Francisco take home the title this year, but we have a hard time going against a prediction engine that not only seems to get a lot right, but also seems to get better as the years roll on. Regardless of who EA predicted, enjoy the Super Bowl if you’re planning to watch, and make sure if you’re drinking, you’re not driving.