A Bayesian approach to time-varying latent strengths in pairwise comparisons

PLoS One. 2021 May 20;16(5):e0251945. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0251945. eCollection 2021.

Abstract

The famous Bradley-Terry model for pairwise comparisons is widely used for ranking objects and is often applied to sports data. In this paper we extend the Bradley-Terry model by allowing time-varying latent strengths of compared objects. The time component is modelled with barycentric rational interpolation and Gaussian processes. We also allow for the inclusion of additional information in the form of outcome probabilities. Our models are evaluated and compared on toy data set and real sports data from ATP tennis matches and NBA games. We demonstrated that using Gaussian processes is advantageous compared to barycentric rational interpolation as they are more flexible to model discontinuities and are less sensitive to initial parameters settings. However, all investigated models proved to be robust to over-fitting and perform well with situations of volatile and of constant latent strengths. When using barycentric rational interpolation it has turned out that applying Bayesian approach gives better results than by using MLE. Performance of the models is further improved by incorporating the outcome probabilities.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Bayes Theorem
  • Humans
  • Models, Statistical*
  • Models, Theoretical*
  • Normal Distribution
  • Sports / physiology
  • Sports / statistics & numerical data*

Grants and funding

Blaž Krese is employed by GEN-I, d.o.o., Ljubljana, Slovenia. The funder provided support in the form of salaries for author BK, but did not have any additional role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. The specific roles of these authors are articulated in the ‘author contributions’ section. Erik Štrumbelj acknowledges the financial support from the Slovenian Research Agency (research core funding No. P5-0410).