What Are the Odds? How Is The Pool Doing?

One of the ways I gauge if the spreadsheet is picking numbers better than if we just did all at-the-store computer picks is looking at the odds. If you click on the Pool Financials link - to the right and check out the fourth tab at the top of the sheet - with a little comparison from the earnings tab - you'll be able to see how we're doing too. The last tab, called "Odds" contains a table. Lottery odds are highlighted in green. You'll also see some potentially more important odds data. For example, what are the odds you will kick the bucket from (fill in the blank.) Wow....look at that - almost a 1 in 3 chance of heart disease cutting your life short - time to start thinking more about diet and exercise, yes?

The odds say we only have a 1 in 69 chance of winning a measly $3 on any draw. So that means for every 69 picks you buy you'll average a $3 win. The odds of winning only $7 jumps to 1 in 290 picks - which fits the odds on our draw last week. So we're doing pretty well - statistically speaking.

Then there was our $100 win (tripled to $300 by the powerball) last October. You can see the odds of winning that much were 1 in 70,000!!!

The odds are enormous that we'll win anything above $100 but then I think that the spreadsheet is demonstrating that it might be giving us a little edge over those odds. So who knows....