Bet(ch)a my Team Wins the Playoffs. (1st November 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Johnson, Roger W.
• Is Part Of: College mathematics journal. Volume 48:Number 5(2017)
• Page Start: 347
• Page End: 353
• Publication Date: 2017-11-01
• Subjects: Mathematics -- Study and teaching -- Periodicals; Mathematics -- Periodicals; Mathematics; Mathematics -- Study and teaching; Periodicals; 510.071
• DOI: 10.4169/college.math.j.48.5.347
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0746-8342

Abstract

Summary: We consider an arbitrary (odd) length playoff series between our team and an opponent where game outcomes are independent and our team has a fixed chance of winning any particular game. While the chance our team wins the playoff series is simple enough to write as a sum involving binomial coefficients, we see that expressing this probability in terms of an incomplete beta function allows us to easily show several elementary and intuitive properties about the playoff series.