As any gambler will tell you, predicting games in the NFL can be a risky business. Bing Predicts, Microsoft’s machine intelligence prognosticator, found this out the hard way in Week 4. Bing only managed an 8-7 mark, down significantly from its 11-5 record in Week 3.
Apparently, Bing Predicts called for some updates that simply didn’t happen:
Upsets did not go Bing’s way in Week 4, as Pittsburgh and Dallas lost overtime games Thursday and Sunday night, respectively. Across the Atlantic, Miami also failed to deliver against New York in the first of three pro games played in London this season. Week 4 saw Bing Predicts go 8-7, bringing us to 38-25 for the season. Green Bay, Denver, Carolina and Atlanta remain undefeated, and our prediction models confirm we’re sticking with our pre-season call for them to make the playoffs.
Check out the winners and losers in Week 5, according to Bing Predicts (with a better user interface, to boot):
There you have it. Bing Predicts is a machine, we can’t forget, and machines don’t have hearts. So, they can miss those intangibles that turn a sure loss into a surprising win. We’ll see if cold logic can do any better this week.
