{"id":2070,"date":"2016-05-02T21:10:19","date_gmt":"2016-05-03T01:10:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/?p=2070"},"modified":"2019-06-26T16:50:59","modified_gmt":"2019-06-26T20:50:59","slug":"5000-to-won-making-sense-of-what-leicester-city-just-did","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sullyonsports.com\/?p=2070","title":{"rendered":"5,000 to Won: Making Sense of What Leicester City Just Did"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Photo Credit: English Press Association<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We’ve seen some pretty awesome underdogs in the history of sports, but we’ve never witnessed one quite like this.<\/p>\n

Today, these underdogs completed the conquest of their sport and attained what might be the most unlikely title in the history of sports. Yes, the history of sports.<\/p>\n

Going into the English Premier League season,\u00a0nothing<\/del> very little was expected of Leicester City FC. \u00a0That lack of expectation has followed the Foxes since last March; the team was ranked last in the English Premier League with seven games to play last season. \u00a0Things were so bad that they were seven points behind the 19th and second to last place squad, facing the very real prospect of relegation to the Football League Championship. \u00a0(The bottom three teams in the Premier League are relegated and the top three teams in the Football League Championship are promoted to the Premier League each season.)<\/p>\n

However, the team pulled off a miracle, securing 22 points in its final nine games and finishing in 14th place to ensure another season of Premier League football. \u00a0As it turns out, the comeback finish would be a harbinger of things to come.<\/p>\n

The team was, and you may want to be sitting down for this,\u00a05000-1\u00a0underdogs<\/em> to win the league this season. \u00a0We’ll come back to that figure later.<\/p>\n

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Leicester City was 5000-1 odds to win the Premier League title. That’s the same odds as Elvis being found alive. https:\/\/t.co\/VeJBRHzXHW<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) May 2, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Anyway, the team wasn’t expected to go very far this year. \u00a0The odds of their relegation were assuredly greater than those of them actually winning the league. \u00a0Despite these slim chances, Leicester got off to a strong start, accumulating 40 points in its first 17 games to top the league table on Christmas. \u00a0A winless three-game stretch from December 26 to January 2 dropped them to second, but a three-game winning streak kickstarted by a 1-0 January 13 win over Tottenham Hotspur put the team back on top. \u00a0And that’s where they would stay. Tottenham blew a two-goal lead with seven minutes to play and ceded a 2-2 draw to Chelsea today, clinching the title for LCFC.<\/p>\n

Impressively, the team would lead the table for a total of 147 nights over the course of the season. \u00a0This means that it led for 52% of the year; this certainly wasn’t a wire-to-wire championship, but leading the league for over half the season isn’t bad either.<\/p>\n

With all of that being said, the team was a 5000-1 longshot to win the league. \u00a0How is it possible that they actually pulled this off? \u00a0That we may never know, but it is important to add context to this championship.<\/p>\n

For example, the Weber State Wildcats made this year’s NCAA Tournament as a 15-seed. \u00a0They would ultimately fall, 71-53, to Xavier in the first round. \u00a0As a team in a mid-major conference (Big Sky) that has never had a national champion, you would figure that their odds of winning one next year are pretty long. \u00a0They are; according to\u00a0vegasinsider.com<\/a>, the team is a 2000-1 longshot to be featured at the end of next season’s edition of One Shining Moment<\/a>. \u00a0The Wildcats still aren’t nearly as big underdogs as Leicester was this year.<\/p>\n

The closer you look, though, the worse it gets. \u00a0The Cleveland Browns look like they might be one of the worst teams in the history of the NFL this coming season. \u00a0They’re a glorified expansion squad, and that is a serious, majority opinion. \u00a0The Browns are so bad that they turned to a baseball executive<\/a>, albeit an analytics guru, to run its front office. \u00a0Not to pile on, but the team will probably be an underdog in every single one of its games. \u00a0Translated: Las Vegas thinks the Browns will go 0-16.<\/p>\n

But do you know what their odds are to win the Super Bowl? \u00a0200-1<\/a>. I’m not sure how that is possible, but that’s the Browns’ chances of winning it all in 2016. \u00a0If it’s any consolation, Cleveland’s odds to win the AFC are 100-1. \u00a0Let’s do one more of these, shall we?<\/p>\n

The Atlanta Braves have been baseball’s worst team so far this season, winning 5 of 23 games in the month of April. \u00a0They’ve hit a grand total of five home runs to this point in the season; three of them have come from star first baseman Freddie Freeman. \u00a0Atlanta is quite obviously going nowhere this year, and as I write this, the Braves are losing 4-0 to the Mets.<\/p>\n

The best part of all of this? \u00a0They only face\u00a0500-1<\/a>\u00a0odds to win the World Series this season.<\/p>\n

The point of this exercise was to demonstrate how disrespected the Foxes were by oddsmakers and pundits going into the season. Relegation was the most likely outcome for the team and anything more would have been considered a pleasant surprise. \u00a0But a championship? \u00a0That is a complete and utter shock, to say the least.<\/p>\n

There have been many memorable, inspiring, and shocking underdog championships in the history of sports. \u00a0Some that immediately come to mind are the 1983 North Carolina State Wolfpack, the 1985 Villanova Wildcats, the 2008 and 2012 New York Giants, the 1969 New York Jets, the 1969 New York Mets, and the 1980 U.S. Hockey Miracle on Ice.<\/p>\n

This is the difference with Leicester, though: they did it for a full season. \u00a0There were no playoffs for the Foxes to win and there would be no getting hot at the right time. \u00a0The team would have to be the best team in the Premier League for an entire season, all while having to manage injuries and cold stretches. \u00a0All of the aforementioned squads weren’t the best in the regular season and simply played their best at the most opportune time.<\/p>\n

It’s hard to win consistently in sports, but to be the best team in the sport for the majority of the season at such long odds is far more difficult. \u00a0Leicester City did that\u00a0and defied every prediction and prognostication in the process. \u00a0They also took much of the world by storm, captivating those who may not have been otherwise interseted in the Premier League season.<\/p>\n

Not bad for a team that should have been relegated.<\/p>\n