AJ Mass - The Science of Fantasy Sports | For Good Reason

D.J. Grothe sits down with ESPN.com's fantasy sports analyst AJ Mass to discuss how fantasy sports relate to science and skepticism. Success in fantasy sports is about predicting the future, and Mass explains how he learned how to gather useful information and avoid the same kinds of misunderstandings of science and human nature that cause people to find patterns where none exist.

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• AJ Mass
• fantasy football
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• fantasy sports
• skepticism
• skeptic
• dj grothe
• jref
• paranormal
• supernatural
• psychic
• sylvia browne

[generationalist]

at about 34:00 the grey elephants in Denmark was my first thought. But I expected it was going to be an elephant because he asked us to pick a country that starts with a D which really limits what country in Europe you can pick. Most would not say Deutschland. So to test it I changed my choice to Emu with a color of brown. He disclosed the statement that there are no grey elephants in Denmark at that made it clear the directed nature of the trick. Pretty cool trick and now I understand the hinge

[slackerdc]

What about brown ocelots in the Dominican republic?

[joeloud1]

34:31 Wrong, there are golden jackals in Djibouti.

[jussts]

@Whisper6911 "i am going to take a wild guess and say football is your game?"

I am not a sports fan at all.

[Whisper6911]

@jussts interesting...

i am going to take a wild guess and say football is your game?

btw: i am not invested in star wars or any other movie.

i am though somewhat fascinated with symbolism, and the dude was massively wrong about his interpretation of this mythological character.

i would make similar observations about jesus or daffy duck if they were misrepresented like that.

[jussts]

@Whisper6911 Interesting. Has anyone done a study about people using studies to feel a smug sense of superiority? Maybe they can cross-reference it with one about people who are way too emotionally invested in Star Wars or make incessant, inane YouTube comments.

[Whisper6911]

@Whisper6911 players like that are 5% athletic prowess, the other 95% happens inside the head.

a player sometimes knows he is going to do well because they get this feeling.

i think that feeling is cause by them subconsciously knowing that right at that moment all the mental variables like focus and confidence and so on are lined up right for a good performance.

so when the guy walks up to the plate you may pick up on his body language

and know that the guy is 'in the zone' atm.

[Whisper6911]

the thing about predicting homeruns...

personally i don't think there is any cooincidence here, nor any selective memory issues.

i have had similar experiences that led to me taking money from a slot machine.

personally i favor the jungian idea of the subconscious tapping into some information

you are not consciously aware of.

in my case recognizing a pattern in a badly tuned machine, in your case perhaps body language expressing confidence on the part of the player.

[Whisper6911]

@Whisper6911 and 3: (and i dont believe u don't see this) darth vader was never overconfident. the main defining character trait is that he is caught in his role of being evil because his anger blinded him to alternative possibilities.

in fact one of the first scenes depicting vader clearly shows him warning others of their

overconfidence.

[Whisper6911]

also you don't know shit about star wars.

1: darth vader WAS the ultimate villain, before lucas cast that nosebleed christianson and turned the ultimate badass into a whining little bitch.

2: darth vader did not lose anything, he turned on his master at the last moment, destroyed his master, and thereby the source of evil and power behind the empire, and thereby fulfilled the prophecy of bringing balance to the force.