The numbers behind the Riders and Argos Eastern Final

The Riders and Argos will meet with a trip to the Grey Cup on the line Sunday and 980 CJME has looked at a few numbers associated with the game this weekend.

8 per cent chance

When the Riders began their journey through the east, they were given a 2.11 per cent chance to win the Grey Cup.

After ousting the Redblacks in the Eastern Semi-final, that number had quadrupled to eight per cent.

Keith Willoughby is the dean of the Edwards School of Business at the University of Saskatchewan and is the man behind the model that is predicting the odds for a Grey Cup victory.

“What it really looks at is the margin of victory, it looks at the recent trend of games and really factors in how you’ve done in terms of winning on the road,” Willoughby told the 980 CJME Morning Show.
He said his model has caused him grief at home because him and his family are all Rider fans.

“I think I’m going to be disowned from Christmas celebrations.”

The Argos have a 43.40 per cent chance of winning the cup, Edmonton has a 36.42 per cent chance and Calgary has a 12.19 per cent chance.

30 per cent increase in viewership

While there might be those opposed to having the Saskatchewan Roughriders representing the east in the Grey Cup, it might make sense in a business sense.

“The Saskatchewan Roughriders are the grizzly bear of the CFL ecosystem,” Tom Mayenknecht, host of the Sport Market, told 980 CJME’s Green Zone. “If they’re doing well, if they’re at the top of the food chain, everybody sort of benefits from that.”

Mayenknecht said there is a 30 per cent bump in viewership when the Riders are playing late in the season and that bump gets stronger during the playoffs.

He said this game could be a momentum swing when it comes to the Argos selling tickets next season.

15,500 attendance numbers

The Toronto Argonauts had a tough season selling tickets to CFL games but that’s changing for the East Semi.

TSN’s Dave Naylor told the 980 CJME Morning Show the Argos had already sold enough tickets to surpass their highest crowd of the season, which he believed was around 15,500 people.

Naylor said that Rider fans responded to his tweet indicating it was because the green and white would be in the game and that they were the ones buying all the tickets.

He said he’s been told that wasn’t the case and the Argos had sold that many tickets before the Riders defeated the Redblacks.

“I think the Argonauts just wanted to dispel this notion that nobody in Toronto was buying tickets and the game was going to be played in an empty stadium until Sunday afternoon when Saskatchewan won,” Naylor said.

He said this game gives the Argos a chance to get people out to BMO Field who have never been there and show them the game-day experience.