GIGA BITES 2 – Director’s Cut

Below is a significantly extended version of Giga Bites, which appeared in the Saturday Age on 12th February, 2011.

 

by Andrew Gigacz

 

DRAWING A LONG (SUPER) BOW(L)

Super Bowl XLV was played this week and the Green Bay Packers’ winning score of 31 should have come as no surprise, especially given the fact that their opponents were the Pittsburgh Steelers.

In all of the Packers’ previous appearances in the Super Bowl, the winning score has been 31, 33 or 35. When combined with the fact that the Pittsburgh Steelers were involved in the only other Super Bowls to register any of those three scores, a winning score of 31, 33 or 35 last Monday was really never in doubt!

Super Bowls involving scores of 31, 33 or 35:

1967: Packers 35 defeated Kansas City Chiefs 10

1968: Packers 33 def Oakland Raiders 14

1979: Steelers 35 def Dallas Cowboys 31

1980: Steelers 31 def Los Angeles Rams 19

1997: Packers 31 def New England Patriots 21

1998: Denver Broncos 31 def Packers 24

2011: Packers 31 def Pittsburgh Steelers 25

A TALL STORY

 Collingwood kicks off its premiership defence tonight when it joins Richmond and Carlton in the round-robin phase of the NAB Cup. The Magpie hierarchy would be well aware that securing back-to-back flags will be a tall order but it seems that, from a list-management perspective, this doesn’t necessarily require a huge number of tall players. The Pies have only five players on their 2011 primary playing list whose height exceeds 195 cm. Only Fremantle, with four, has less.

At the other end of the scale Adelaide has ten players over 195 cm on its playing list, while Port Adelaide has eight on the primary list and four on the rookie list. Gold Coast, with an expanded list, also has ten on their list, as well as rookie Joel Tippett.

 

 

THE NUMBERS DON’T LIE

 

What seems to have been an eternally long summer of international cricket has come to a close. As much as the Australian team itself, the performance of the administration, coaches and selectors has been the subject of much debate, with many pundits believing that Cricket Australia have given themselves credit where debit is due.

Regardless of the various opinions, a look at the results of Australia’s international summer reveals one indisputable fact. In matches where the Australian team contained fewer than two Victorian players, Australia’s winning percentage was 20%. In matches that involved two or more Victorians, the team’s winning percentage rose to a very impressive 78%.

When Cricket Australia next sits down to do some number-crunching, that pair of figures is one that really should not be ignored.

 

POSTCODE OF THE WEEK

As reported in this column last Saturday, a recent race at Doomben threw up a serendipitous combination of numbers. The same course last Saturday provided a permutation of numbers that revealed more irony than anything else. The “First 4” numbers in Race 5 were 6-3-9-8. Those lucky enough to have that combination received a handsome dividend of $3,864.70. It may come as somewhat of a surprise then, to discover that 6398 is the postcode of a town in the far south of Western Australia named… “Broke”.

SPORTING ANAGRAM OF THE WEEK

The surfacing this week of a You Tube video featuring Adam Cooney and Jarrad Grant wreaking havoc outside a nightclub in the streets of Hong Kong has brought a black mark against their names and caused new Bulldog CEO, Simon Garlick, a few early headaches. So it seems only fitting that “COONEY AND GRANT SKYLARKING” anagrammatically produces the (somewhat Shakespearian) phrase “YON DARK GENTS ANNOY GARLICK”.

 

About Andrew Gigacz

Well, here we are. The Bulldogs have won a flag. What do I do now?

Comments

  1. Gigs – love the credit and debit remark. That’s accountant’s humour! Very funny lot, accountants.

  2. John Butler says

    Does this mean Bill Lawry was right all along?

  3. Gigs, I’ve read your statistics in awe and amazement before but the Superbowl stat just blows my mind.

  4. Phil Dimitriadis says

    Sensational stuff Gigs,

    are you sure you don’t moonlight as exotic Eastern European Numerologist Madam Gigacz? You’d make a fortune!

    Love the anagram. They say Garlick is used to ward off evil spirits, but it doesn’t seem to work with misbehaving footballers.

  5. Re; players’ names ending with ‘x’ (Age, Feb 26) I remember a good Richmond centreman, John Nix, in the fifties. Came from Sale, I think.

  6. #5. You’re right, Ian. 95 games, originally from Trafalgar. I’d like to say I was “just testing you” but the truth is that one slipped through my net!

    Thanks.

    Gigs

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