01/19/10 10:19 AM
Beware conventional wisdom
In the past
weekend, six of ESPN’s eight professional
NFL analysts picked the
Dallas Cowboys to defeat the Minnesota
Vikings.
The Vikings
smashed the Cowboys so badly that the visitors from
Dallas whined afterwards about a superfluous
touchdown at the end of the game.

All eight of
ESPN’s professional NFL analysts picked the San Diego
Chargers to defeat the New York Jets. The Jets
handled the Chargers and will play the Indianapolis
Colts in Indy on Sunday.
To their
credit, all eight predicted the Colts victory over
Baltimore.
Even with the
unanimity for the Colts, three of ESPN’s NFL experts,
Mike Golic, Seth Wickersham and Merril Hoge, picked
three of the weekend’s four games incorrectly.
They
made those picks even though the network's
"Accuscore" computer simulation system predicted
three of the four games
correctly.
Why did this
happen and what should it mean for
you?
Conventional
wisdom about what will happen next week often is
based on what happened last week. Conventional wisdom
comes from opinions that spread virally, from talk
shows to columnists to bars and back to talk shows
with the original rationales disappearing in the
trail.
For those who
need to steer conventional wisdom, it’s important to
push the thoughts of opinion leaders with fresh
information and appealing arguments. For those who
need to predict outcomes, it’s important to resist
the instant theorists and rely on those with
perspective and experience.
Tags: Colts, conventional wisdom,
predictions