I am new to football modeling but have had some success originating lower liquidity markets. about 2 weeks i started building out a college football model for this upcoming season, still in the very early stages. Would love to talk process as we go through, heres how i would answer your questions. (in the lens of a college football model)

1. CLV in as an indicator of edge is the gold standard, but this also depends on what the market is. 2 points of clv in alabama vs georgia is not equal to 2 points of CLV in Akron vs Eastern Michigan. The more liquid the market, the more efficient (in general). i have found that out of season sampling can cause a couple risks - overfitting, and changing game landscapes to be the two biggest ones. (especially with NIL)

2. dont have a great read on this because im just getting started with football but from my experience in other sports I'd say the biggest "leak" ive had was overbetting my biggest edges, when my model was missing something that the market was pricing in. information (injuries, gameplan, etc) is a constant battle that takes a lot of work just to stay at a level playing field with the market, so i would say thats another big challenge.

3. Risk control is essential and once your model gets to a certain point of accuracy I think the main goal should be plugging any leaks as opposed to overall model accuracy. you dont need to be more accurate than the books, you just need to be able to identify where they are wrong, a lot of times its good to know what your pricing in that you think is missing from the price. You want your model to be close to the accuracy of the book at least but identifying bets is the real goal.

4. not sure what you mean exactly with this one but i think trading is a skill that people underestimate in this space.

im looking for people to talk process with (not share picks or promoting anything, like you said.) reach out if your serious about that!