Quote:
Originally Posted by Mikym
Hey Dave, I can’t tell you if the percentages are accurate or not, since I don’t know how they are calculated. But if you think about it like poker percentages, it might make a bit more sense.
In Texas Holdem heads up, preflop, an unsuited pair of Aces has an 87.2% to win vs unsuited 7 2, which has a 12.40% to win. (There is a small percentage chance for a tie.). So obviously, you want the Aces, right? Post flop, the percentages could get better or worse. So I THINK if you use that logic in your example above, if the horse shows a 60% chance to win, it doesn’t mean the percentage was wrong if the horse loses.
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Good answer but not really the point.
Decades ago I had a conversation with well-know horse guy who said that if you total up all the pcts of the horses you bet and compare to those that won, they should be close.
He further stated that this
proved the pcts were right.
So, I gave him a problem.
"Imagine I bet 4 horses. They had projected win pcts of 40%, 30%, 20% and 10%, respectively. One of the horses won."
I asked, "Ignoring sample size, does this approach prove that the pcts were correct?"
He answered that it did.
I said, these horses were all in the same 4-horse field.
"How could I have been wrong?"
