ESPN's Lazy, Lazy Soccer Journalism
- Fred
- 5 days ago
- 2 min read
The English Premier League begins this weekend, and predicting the outcome of the Premier League is one of our favorite articles to write here at Beacon of Speech.
In 2023-2024, we actually did a really nice job of predicting the future.
In 2024-2025, not so much.
Part of the fun of predictions is evaluating signings and gauging upward and downward trends, but in the Premier League, the formula is fairly straightforward, whoever spends the most money, usually wins.
Now last year, Manchester United spent the second most in wages and was in discussion for regulation toward the end of the year. That was an anomaly and the teams' rivals all laughed at them. Nottingham Forrest, on the other hand, didn't spend much money on wages, but was in the discussion for Champions League soccer right up until the end of the season.
With that being said, there's surprises every year.
Before I give you my predictions, let me give you ESPN's predictions.
Liverpool
Arsenal
Manchester City
Chelsea....
Wait a minute, that's the same as last year. What about their bottom 3 for relegation?
Leeds United
Sunderland
Burnley
So the 3 worst teams will be the ones just promoted? Now don't get me wrong, Bill Connelly and Ryan O'Hanlon's article was chock full of advanced analytics, but if I was ESPN, I'd fire the both of them. Of course analytics is going to spit out next year's results based off of last year. Connelly and O'Hanlon played video game soccer instead of watching real soccer.
The article bothered me so much, I had to go to England itself, THE BBC.
The BBC asked 33 pundits, AI, and their Supercomputer, who the top 4 were going to be and all 35 entities answers some variation of Liverpool, Arsenal, Manchester City, Chelsea.
Wow. I mean, why even play the games? 11 commentators did the exact same as ESPN, 6 more simply flip-flopped Arsenal and City.
Listen. This is my lead-pipe lock for next year. 1 through 4 will not be Liverpool, Arsenal, Manchester City, Chelsea AND a team from outside the top 4 from last year will make it up. I mean, I think that's a fairly safe bet.
With that being said, games are starting today and I need to get my predictions in under the wire.
Manchester City
Liverpool
Chelsea
Aston Villa
Arsenal
Newcastle
Crystal Palace
Brighton
Manchester United
Fulham
Tottenham
Bournemouth
Wolverhampton
Leeds United
Brentford
West Ham
Sunderland
Nottingham Forrest
Everton
Burnley
Any last comments? Evangelos Marinakis will melt down and Nottingham's fairy tale season will be a distant memory. Look for 5 managers at Nottingham this year. Manchester United will be average, but at this point they are just shoveling money into a hole.
Spot # 17 is purely hope. Sunderland is one of my favorite soccer teams, I never thought they'd be out of the Premier League for nearly a decade. Here's hoping the Black Cats have a successful return.
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