How the Antic Rating works

An Antic Rating (glossary: Antic Rating) is a score from 0 to 10 for one player in one game. It is built from the player's plays in that game, so it describes that game, not the whole season.

It looks at what the player did in that game: their box score, and how much their plays helped or hurt the team's chance of winning.

Half of a starter's games land between about 1 and 5 in most sports, and a great game lands around 6 to 9. A bad game can dip a little below 0. A player with no box-score line and no play that moved the win chance (glossary: Win probability) is not rated.

A 10 is already a standout game. Anything at or below 10 is shown as it is. When you see a rating above 10, the player had a ball-out game, and those are rare: about half of one percent of player games in each sport rate above 10.

However big the game, a rating stays under 12, and within a sport a higher rating always ranks higher.

The game rating (glossary: Game rating) scores the whole game on the same 0 to 10 scale, and it asks one question: how exciting was it? It is built from the win chance, which is each team's chance of winning after every play.

It looks at how far the win chance swung over the game, with late swings counting most, how often the lead changed and how close it stayed at the end.

The middle game in each sport rates 5.0, and roughly one game in a hundred rates 9.5 or more. A game that was never close usually rates low, because the win chance barely moved. While a game is live, the rating updates after every play. It shows what has happened so far, not how the game will end.

Every sport uses the same 0 to 10 scale, but each one has its own yardstick, set against real games from that league.

Hockey and soccer do not have a play-by-play win chance in the data we use, so their ratings come from the box score alone. The soccer box score has goals, assists, shots, saves and cards, but no passes or tackles. So a defender can rate low even when the defending was strong.

A rating is not a pick. It scores a game that has been played or is being played, so it does not tell you who to back. It is not a tip or advice on any bet.

A rating is not a prediction. A high rating describes what has already happened. It does not say how the player will do next, and the win chance during a live game is only a read on the game as it stands.

A sportsbook price includes its margin, often called the vig (glossary: Vig). Antic estimates each side's fair chance with that margin taken out, from several of the most efficient books and exchanges. The fair chance is an estimate. It is not a guarantee, and it is not a recommendation.

An edge compares a price with that fair chance. Expected value (glossary: Expected value) (EV) is the fair chance times the decimal payout, minus one. A positive EV means the price pays more than the estimated chance justifies. A negative EV is the normal result for most prices.

What goes into a fair price, how fresh it is and what it can't tell you are on how Antic's numbers work. The exact recipe stays private.