FiveThirtyEight’s top stories this week

A [FiveThirtyEight]( email [Popular This Week] Sunday, October 31, 2021 [1. Joe Burrow, Ja’Marr Chase And The Bengals Are Ahead Of Schedule]( [Cincinnati Bengals v Baltimore Ravens]( Zac Taylor was a young, lightly qualified Sean McVay acolyte entering this season on the hottest of hot seats. Quarterback Joe Burrow was an exciting prospect with a lot of question marks and an ugly knee scar. Ja’Marr Chase was the first wideout off the 2021 draft board — taken, it seemed, in the unlikely hope that he and Burrow could dominate in the pros just like they did together at LSU. But given that Chase’s selection precluded the Cincinnati Bengals from drafting a blindside protector for Burrow in the first round, the odds the two of them producing the same results in orange and black stripes as they did in purple and gold ones seemed low. [Read more]( [2. This World Series Comes Down To Which Astros Team Shows Up]( [World Series – Atlanta Braves v Houston Astros – Game Two]( Going into the World Series, our forecast model offered up a rare prediction: a perfectly 50-50 championship tossup between the Houston Astros and Atlanta Braves. Atlanta disrupted that balance with a 6-2 win in Game 1, overcoming the loss of starting pitcher Charlie Morton (whose leg was fractured on a comebacker in the second inning) to take the series lead — and a 66 percent probability of winning the title. But after Houston struck back with a commanding 7-2 win Wednesday night, the teams are right back where they started: exactly 50-50 to win the World Series. And as unpredictable as this matchup looked going into its opening game, the outcome might be even less certain now. [Read more]( [3. We’re Tracking Trump’s And Harris’s Popularity Ahead Of The 2024 Presidential Election. (Yes, It’s Early.)]( [A photo illustration of Kamala Harris and Donald Trump against a gridded background]( Welcome to Pollapalooza, our weekly polling roundup. [Read more]( [4. How You View Climate Change Might Depend On Where You Live]( [A stylized illustration of a profile view open head with a planet globe above it]( ILLUSTRATION BY EMILY SCHERER / GETTY IMAGES [Read more]( [5. Brad Raffensperger Says GOP Lawmakers Lack ‘Moral Courage’ On The Big Lie]( [Georgia Electoral College Voters Cast Ballots Amid Protests]( In early January 2021, then-President Donald Trump tried to persuade Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to overturn the state’s election results. Raffensperger rejected Trump’s requests as well as his unsubstantiated claims of election fraud. Now, Raffensperger is facing a primary in 2022 from Rep. Jody Hice, whom Trump has endorsed for Georgia secretary of state. [Read more]( [6. Opposing Defenses Show Us Just How Scary Derrick Henry Is]( [Buffalo Bills v Tennessee Titans]( Derrick Henry is on quite a tear. Through Week 7, the Tennessee Titans running back leads the league for the third time in as many years in rushing yardage. His 43 regular-season rushing touchdowns since 2019 are best in the league. And this past week against the Kansas City Chiefs, he even threw a touchdown pass, the second of his career. [Read more]( [7. College Football Fans Can’t Stop Rushing The Field. But Which Games Are Worth It?]( [Oklahoma State v Iowa State]( Texas A&M student Karson Bell had never stormed a field before Oct. 9. Then he rushed two within eight hours. [Read more]( [8. Kyle Lowry Made His Toronto Teammates Better. Can He Do The Same In Miami?]( [Boston Celtics v Miami Heat]( In recent years, the Miami Heat have been a quality team but not considered a member of the NBA’s heavyweight contender class. Jimmy Butler has a knack of turning his individual weaknesses into team strengths, but the Heat have had a few too many team weaknesses to join the class of title favorites, despite a surprise Finals appearance in a pandemic-shortened 2020 season. [Read more]( [9. Ohio State Turned Its Defense Around And Looks Like A Contender Again]( [Maryland v Ohio State]( The first two weeks of the college football season raised an unusual but not unreasonable question: Was Ohio State going to be less than its usual dominant self in 2021? [Read more]( [10. Democrats Worry A Lot About Policies That Win Elections. That’s Short-Sighted.]( [U.S. President Joe Biden speaks at the NJ Transit Meadowlands Maintenance Complex]( Democratic leaders, activists and strategists spend a lot of time discussing — and arguing about — policy under the assumption that the policies the party prioritizes affect whether they will win the next election. It’s been a big part of President Biden’s governing strategy so far, and one need look no further than Democrats blaming talk of defunding the police for losses in the House in 2020 or, conversely, citing health care in the 2018 midterm elections as the reason they did so well to understand the role they think policy plays in their electoral success. [Read more]( --------------------------------------------------------------- Weekly Listen [Play]( [It’s A Toss-Up Between The Braves And Astros]( Lastly, The Riddler By [Zach Wissner-Gross]( [riddler_4x3_default]( Halloween is just around the corner, which means it’s time for some pumpkin math! I have a spherical pumpkin. I carefully calculate its volume in cubic inches, as well as its surface area in square inches. Next, I got up to have a piece of Halloween candy (which, naturally, was a [Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup](. But when I came back to my calculations, I saw that my units — the square inches and the cubic inches — had mysteriously disappeared from my calculations. But it didn’t matter, because both numerical values were the same! What is the radius of my spherical pumpkin? Extra credit: Let’s dispense with 3D thinking. Instead, suppose I have an [n-hyperspherical]( pumpkin. Once again, I calculate its volume (with units inn) and surface area (with units inn−1). Miraculously, the numerical values are once again the same! What is the radius of my n-hyperspherical pumpkin? [Solve it!]( [FiveThirtyEight] [View in browser]( [ABC News]( [Unsubscribe]( Our mailing address: FiveThirtyEight, 47 West 66th Street, New York, NY 10023.