Baseball has always been a sport with a rich history of using statistics to understand and analyze who are the best players and teams. For a long time, the popular baseball stats were fairly rudimentary. After the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) was established in 1971, the development of more sophisticated stats became known as “sabermetrics.”
One of the early analytics formulas was Bill James’ Pythagorean expectation, which was an attempt to predict the number of games a team should win given the number of runs scored and runs allowed. His original formula for a team’s winning percentage was
where RS and RA stand for runs scored and allowed, respectively. The reason James called it Pythagorean expectation was because the denominator was reminiscent of the Pythagorean formula relating the lengths of the three sides of a right triangle, a² + b² = c².
It was quickly realized that the exponent “2” in the formula was not optimal, and that Pythagorean expectation for winning percentage could be generalized to
The exponent α =1.83 works better when applied to many decades of data. Even better, for a given year, the exponent can be adjusted depending on the overall run environment, which means the average number of runs scored per game across all of major league baseball. But for our purposes here, we will use α = 1.83 .
In practice, a team may win more or less than their Pythagorean expectation in any given year, but when averaged across all teams, the Pythagorean expectation is very accurate. It has been shown that the Pythagorean expectation for one year is a better predictor of the following year’s results than simply wins. For example, if a team has fewer wins in a season than their Pythagorean expectation, it means they were “unlucky” and will have a tendency to perform better in the next season.
You can apply calculus to the Pythagorean expectation formula to determine how many more runs a typical team would have to score in a season to produce one more win:
where RSavg is the average runs scored per game. For example, when a team scores 4.5 runs per game (about the average in the last few years), the Pythagorean expectation says that it would take approximately 10 additional runs in a season to create one more victory, which is the source of the popular sabermetrics yardstick that “10 runs equals 1 win.” While it may seem that 10 additional runs should produce more than just 1 win, remember that in some games the team is already ahead, and in others the team is more than 1 run behind, and so adding a run in those games does not affect the number of wins. When those 10 runs are randomly spread across the whole season, the net effect is to add just 1 win on average.
Finally, another sabermetric concept is wins above replacement (WAR), sometimes also called Wins Above Replacement Player (WARP). WAR for a given player is an estimate of how many extra wins that player was directly responsible for beyond what is expected for a so-called replacement player, which is a minimally qualified player that is just below major league level. A replacement-level player can also be thought of as the player who is brought up from the minors when a major league player is injured.
WAR is calculated by first determining how many runs a player is directly responsible for, and then applying the 10 runs = 1 win relationship to calculate the WAR for that player. The runs attributable to a player are not just what they score or drive in, which can depend on factors other than the skill of the player, but rather how many runs they would contribute to a typical team when applying their batting stats to generic baseball situations. There are also methods for calculating the runs added or subtracted for base-running, fielding, and pitching. As a rule of thumb, an average everyday player in major league baseball has a WAR of 2.0 for a full season, an all-star 5.0, and a league MVP around 10. Roughly speaking, a team of replacement players is expected to win just 50 games in a 162-game season, so the combined WAR for a team with an 81-81 record should be about 31.
The basic currency for Pythagorean expectation and WAR is runs. This means that these analyses are determined basically by a single parameter, and two teams that score the same average number of runs should split their games against each other evenly in the long run. But is that necessarily the case? I will investigate this question in Part 2.
Math & baseball?
*nods off*
Excellent. I can’t wait for your analysis of Cricket and the Duckworth rule.
Ahem, Duckworth-Lewis-Stern Method.
Yes, but only “Duckworth” is funny.
I was told there would be no math.
↑
Huh, I was told the opposite.
This
I always thought WAR stats were voodoo.
It seems they are voodoo with math to hide the voodooness.
I don’t like baseball, and usually don’t pay attention to it unless it happens to be on a TV at a bar. Then I’m reminded why I don’t pay attention to it.
Anyways…
I heard about these statistics and “voodoo” was my first thought.
A simple game turned into a statistical nightmare.
Is that a picture of Comiskey? Is there another Sox fan here besides Swiss and I? If so, the Sox’ pythag record is rather terrible this year, although beating up on Detroit this week made it a bit less grotesque. Their manager seems out of his element, but given the division is pretty lousy and the fact that so many guys have been hurt or terrible, maybe two games under .500 ain’t so bad.
Go Twins!
*glares balefully*
Swissy, you like polkas don’t you?
Better version
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Fb-efJIhNnE
That. Was. AWESOME.
1991: local DC TV station pre-empts a World Series game in order to show a regular-season Redskins game. I never forgave DC for that (it may have even been game 7)
I’d sooner root for the Cubbies./Cardinals fan
I have a Sox tattoo, so yes, I am a sadist….I mean , fan.
I imagine that saves you a lot of money on hosiery expenses.
UCS, how did you hack NA’s account?
Because I never change my password.
There are many lurkers who will enjoy this. I enjoyed it too. Thanks!
Non-lurkers too.
I have considered returning to my daily baseball birthday posts, with lots of WAR included.
Hmmm…today is…
Wally Joyner, 35.8 career WAR
Kerry Wood, 27.6 (Fuck Dusty Baker)
Ron LeFlore 18.0
Ken Johnson 17.9
LeFlore had 455 stolen bases in 1099 games.
I neither lurk nor pay attention to baseball, but I still enjoyed it. Interesting!
Just got my husband’s Father’s Day gift.
Neil Peart? **Updates Wish List**
Cool. I read “Ghost Rider” about a year ago for the first time.
As a long term fan of Peart and Rush, I do have to admit that he comes across as kind of a dick at times.
Same impression.
OTH, poor Alex Lifeson. “Yeah, Rush, that cool band with Geddy Lee, Neil Peart and what’s the guitarist’s name again?”
The thing that turned me off when reading that book was his frequent sneering at what he clearly perceived as the unwashed masses around him when traveling anonymously. I mean, yeah, I get it that you disdain popular culture (and so do I), but the nasty disrespect for people was reall off-putting.
Bingo! Same.
It really knocked my high opinion of him down more than a few notches.
Pissed me off when he said he was a libertarian, but Rand Paul was racist.
IIRC, Paul was in Haiti at the time giving free eye surgeries, just to hide his racism, I assume.
Yes, that and his slagging of anyone who opposed Obamacare as evil really pissed me off too. How far he fell from his early days!
Maybe it was the brain tumor talking in later years.
I read a book about the Replacements and they definitely came across as dicks.
I read a book by Peter Hook about his time in New Order. Dick.
I read a book by Keith Richards. (funny) Dick.
Maybe they are all just dicks?
Tried to read Chrissie Hynde’s autobio and as I recall, found it an illiterate mess, so I didn’t get far, much less finish. (If you’re lurking, Chrissie, sorry. Love the voice, but don’t quit your… night job.)
It is odd that we expect them to be interesting people.
I read both John and Andy Taylor’s Duran Duran memoirs. I didn’t really learn anything new. They did confirm that Simon is the THE DREAMIEST
Perry Farrell was/is a complete dick. He demanded 62.5% of JA’s profits.
Take a really talented musician in his or her 20s (who is probably already fairly strange) and have that person go from dirt poor to fabulously wealthy with no stops in-between. They have nothing in common with their mostly middle-class audience.
I remember, back about 1980-something, seeing some schlub interviewing David Lee Roth about just this. Dave was going on about his and the other Van Halen member’s blue-collar youths and how much money they were making with the band.
The interviewer said, “You know, Dave, they say you can’t buy happiness.”
Dave grinned and said, “Maybe not, but I can buy a yacht big enough to sail right up next to it.”
GHOST RIDER was the one my husband put on his wish list, but it was only in paperback. I was working and distracted, found Peart had a few other books, too (yay, don’t have to depend on Stephen King anymore!), so found a book in hardback so I bought it while I was thinking about it. I THEN found out there IS a hardback of GHOST RIDER, but I will save that for Christmas.
Personal tragedy broke him, and 9/11 convinced him that a church going baptist is no different than a suicide vest jihadi. The difference between 1996 Peart and the cultural bigotry that came after is significant.
I looked at a BMW Z8 at the KC,MO BMW dealership in the early 2000’s. List price was $100,000…
Also Big Bend N.P. has absurdly low speed limits. The park ranger lady was a total dick.
We went there in 2021 and had a blast. I waded across the Rio Grande (reverse wetback!) and bought some awesome tamales from a dude, as the border was “closed”.
Reverse wetback you say? Can you imagine the conniptions that would be raised if that had been done for some American product (especially now)?
And it couldn’t be repaired at a regular dealership.
But damn, it was pretty.
::Sees a novelization of Clockwork Angels:: Sweet!
::Cowritten with Kevin J. Anderson:: Wait that name sounds familiar….
::Checks KJA’s previous works…:: Saga of Seven Suns holy shit that series sucked sweaty elephant balls
::Sadly closes tab::
I’d be interested in knowing how accurately predictive this is compared to Mike Royko’s famous Ex-Cubs Factor. (Scroll down to 10/5/93 column): https://press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/730735.html
The ex-Cub factor started failing eventually, leading to actual Cubs winning.
So glad I lived to see them take it all. ::raises a glass to little Stevie Goodman::
I thought I knew you GT…
Now the Indians will never win a World Series (or even another game) in my lifetime.
I regret nothing! https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rzy2wZSg5ZM
Never to be played again.
Paging Voros McCracken. Voros to the white courtesy phone.
[unless whiz is Voros, then nevermind]
LOL, no, I’, not Voros..
Thanks, Whiz. Very interesting article. Looking forward to the next installment.
Nice. I always wondered how things like WAR and expected wins were calculated, thank you for this.
One aspect of baseball, hitting, is best explained more simply. See ball, hit ball
Thanks. Of course I left off a lot of the gory details.
Gotta do something to kill time, I guess!
Interesting article, whiz! I had heard about WAR and “sabermetrics” but had no idea what it meant.
Same here.
As a kid the Mpls Sunday paper published the stats for the major leagues and the Mpls Millers AAA club. A couple friends and I could recite/argue those for week until we got our next fix. The Millers were a Giants farm club, the St Paul Saints were a Dodger club and we would watch those players going up and sometimes coming down. Great to be a kid, circa the ’50s (the 1950s).
Growing up in Bloomington, I got to go to a lot of Twins games. Rod Carew was my hero and I followed the team for many years.
Not sure when my love of baseball disappeared, but it was probably due to that fucking Metrodome. By the time they built the new stadium I just didn’t care anymore.
I hadn’t heard of any of it, but the article was cool.
Although athletic, I’m missing the Sports! gene.
OT – The roofers are to the point where they’re going to start putting down the new shingles after lunch. We’re past the point of new surprises on the project.
*at least surprises that will cost me money.
A few roof boards will need replacing @ $10 per sq ft
“While we were stripping the underlayment, we noticed some of your Atlas struts were warped and rotting. Gonna need replacing, but lucky for you I just had an overage on another job and I can give you a great deal on them…”
Nah, it’s the lintels between the lally columns.
Baseball stats are the most interesting of all sport stats. In my youth, I had most all time lists memorized, not so much now, but I do love reading about things like this. Thanks!
If you really like baseball stats, go to baseball-reference.com (if you don’t know about it already). They were the source of a lot of the data I use. They also have sites for other sports as well.
Sportsball! I think my enjoyment of sports is incredibly shallow comparatively. The only sport where I really get into strategy and numbers is cycling, and even then it’s not too deep.
I’m a fair-weather fan. I admit it. Royals all the way in 2014 and 2015. My husband taught me how to watch baseball and enjoy the game (where I had always pretended to to my gpa and dad so they would be happy). But then… post-championship slump in 2016, and then… “It’s a building year” ever since. Dafuq.
/looks at the Browns 1-31 seasons
When I was a little kid, I’d watch the Phillies.
Except for the year they had their World Series run (84? 83? can’t remember), it was predictable: They’d lose.
So I moved on.
The only professional (or amateur, for that matter) I’ve ever watched with any interest was rodeo, mostly because I’ve had a couple of cousins who were into it, one in bull riding, the other in roping.
I don’t know anything about stats associated with rodeo. But I did find this interesting, even if the math was a bit over my head.
Where’s Mr.Famous?
A brief introduction to baseball’s Pythagorean expectation and its uses
*eyes glaze over*
Baseball has always been a sport with a rich history of using statistics to understand and analyze who are the best players and teams.
The numbers have to be interesting because the gameplay is such that I would rather watch paint dry.
It’s a good napping on the couch on Sunday afternoon sport kind of like golf.
Not a good look, Nancy.
Not a good look at all.
She’s been semisenile for going on a decade now so no surprise.
If it doesn’t go to an image from this clip I am disappoint.
Yep, that’s perfect.
Maybe the best mathematician ever in baseball.
Classic, it is stories like these that make baseball interesting. So of course MLB is toying with the idea of using bots to call balls and strikes.
Yep, and why sabremetrics, even if completely correct, aren’t that interesting.
Angel Hernandez should try that method.
Hoes mad: Inside the Mises Caucus Takeover of the Libertarian Party
Looking forward to seeing Dave Smith accepting the nomination. Who’ll be his running mate I wonder?
All this drama has been interesting. The “Post Libertarians” (or whatever the fuck they call themselves) have been almost as weird as the establishment.
Dave Smith went through a couple articles about that on his show.
He seemed genuinely surprised at Reason’s write up.
He said, “That’s what stupid progressives do when they disagree”.
Hate to break it to you Dave, but that’s what they’ve become.
You mean there is more to libertarianism than selling out to the left, being obnoxious and stripping naked on stage?
I like baseball on the radio. Partly nostalgia for listening to twins games with my grandpa
Yeah, the Twins had fantastic broadcast teams. Herb Carneal had a voice that made you think everything would be fine.
Baseball and hockey on the radio is fantastic especially if you have a great announcer and color commentator that can really put you at the park/rink. Football is terrible IMO. I also have nostalgia with listening with my stepdad.
Well, if the feds can revoke the approved Keystone XL…
The groups have sued the Department of the Interior, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Director Tracy Stone-Manning. The suit seeks to halt the approval of more than 3,500 permits in the Permian Basin in New Mexico and the Powder River Basin in Wyoming, claiming the approved permits violate environmental laws.
I won’t shed a tear if the Center for Biological Diversity is firebombed with all of their employees locked inside.
Well, up here at the Casa de Animal, we’re striving for a green future. We have a solar/wind powered clothes dryer.
So you save up all your laundry during the year then wash it during the six weeks it’s above freezing?
Have you been watching us?
Anyone able to shed any light on all these dead cattle?
It looks a little hinky.
What the hell?
Any idea when or where that was actually taken?
Kansas?
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/nation-world/national/article262574297.html
Yesterday, apparently.
Article.
And from the link embedded there…
Is our news cycle so voracious that it must make news out of things that weren’t previously considered newsworthy?
Hence my request for insight from someone who knows about ranching.
Pretty sure heat and humidity aren’t new to Kansas.
My first week working in Wichita, everyday was 100+ degrees
It seems the weather was indeed unusual and the reaction of the cattle isn’t.
http://www.oklahomafarmreport.com/wire/beefbuzz/2022/06/00980_BeefBuzz06162022ScarlettHagins_092212.php
That… seems like quite an authoritative source.
Just from reading replies and picking through the rational ones, it seems to be a problem on feedlots, where large numbers of animals are crammed together without shade. Makes sense that the heat would affect them more.
Is there nothing that Climate Change cannot affect!
It’s always the Black angus that’s hardest hit.
That restaurant was okay back in the 80s/90s.
This is quite hilarious.
License, to be artistic!
Who’s at the gallows?
Why bother with the gallows; there’s lampposts right there?
Gallows are more stylish. Lamposts suggest a lack of planning and, quite frankly, laziness.
Plus, the typical lamppost isn’t rated to support more than about 0.3 Nadlers in weight.
Which building is that?
The Fed
That was my guess, but :
https://www.google.com/search?q=federal+reserve+building&sxsrf=ALiCzsZ2bgMjHSUaUJLc-R3AK25Ea1TsTw:1655404700947&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj88qKJz7L4AhWwH0QIHaXiCYgQ_AUoAXoECAMQAw&biw=1920&bih=969&dpr=1
Whatever, he’s not wrong.
Seems legit.
President Joe Biden and his staff are considering declaring a public health emergency if Roe v. Wade is overturned by the Supreme Court, according to a new report.
Biden would use the declaration of a public health emergency to shield doctors from legal liability for treating patients in a state where they are not licensed, according to a report in the New York Times.
Other ideas include allowing doctors practicing in states that ban abortions to perform them on federal sites, such as military bases.
The baby killing must proceed, Comrades!
More governing by executive order. That always works out so well when the other team is in charge.
Maybe we should be looking at prenatal covid shots!
Has anyone thrown that one around?
Seriously though, they’re gonna fuck around with state licensing schemes? Wow. What are the liability insurance ramifications there?
Sean, why are you questioning them in a PUBLIC HEALTH EMERGENY?
Do you want babies to die…I mean…Look fat, it’s an emergency!
Do you want babies to die…I mean…Look fat, it’s an emergency!
Ouch.
I’m sure the Nazgul will look kindly on such a blatant effort to make an end run around the other branches and the Constitution.
I mean, it is seriously getting past the point that Congress and the Supremes should be stepping in before this crap is “ordered” to say “cut this shit out already”.
I know, I know… and we all can dream ourselves ponies while we’re at it.
OT, but since DB posted not long ago — thanks for making me have to watch PumaMan again Tuesday night! 😉 Still have a love for Jack Frost and Touch of Satan before it, but it is one solid episode all the same.
He’s totally not a tyrant and we need a national divorce. Sweet Jesus, the can of worms that’d open up.
Awesome! I look forward to part two!
Long, but it entertained me even though I’m not a father.
–Modern Drunkard Magazine Father’s Day Message
Perfect. Thanks, Neph – I’m gonna share this with the fam.
Nail…head…hit
GLORIOUS.
I like it.
Though I think this is still tops.
Excellent
My brother-in-law has Father’s Day right this year–he’s off on a hiking trip out West with some friends while the kids and wife are back home. Well, not back home, they’re visiting us this weekend.
Putin’s supply chain disruption has no limit!
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/uk-facing-naked-butler-shortage-27214042
CC hit hardest.
She can’t really be that naive, can she?
That’s a rhetorical question, right?
How is she supposed to be involved? It sounds like they’re really fishing now.
She supposedly
engaged in her first amendment rights to petition her government as a private citizenlobbied lawmakers to not certify the election using her status as a wife of the racist SCJSaid racist SCJ completely bending to her will when the inevitable court challenge comes – in half a decade or so.
Appropriate
I’m not sure it matters anymore.
*sensible chuckle*
Awesome sauce.
Midwest Republican Congress-critters, whores for ethanol.
Before reading, I am going to assume, Iowa, Illinois and Indiana…
…
OK, I was half right.
Well, that should take of any food shortages.
Nice job, team!
What has changed when we were taught that the breadbasket of America could feed the world….now we are begging Ukraine and China for wheat.
We are not begging for it for us…there is a lot of the ME, Africa and Indo-Pak area that count on Russia and Ukraine to supply grain. Price goes up worldwide, we get some pain…other places may get hungry.
True.
Negligible effect on fuel prices, decrease fuel efficiency and increase food prices. Sounds like a plan!
Fuel, less expensive (but not really); food, more expensive.
Wonderfuckingful…
Sabermetrics sucks dick. If the stat wasn’t on the back of a Topps card circa 1965, it’s not a real category.
(Nice work all the same whiz!)
What can I say, the more advanced stats have a better correlation to runs than those old baseball card stats.
BTW, I still have my baseball cards from the 1960’s, mostly 1966 to 1968, with some earlier, back to 1962. My best cards are a 1967 Mickey Mantle and a 1962 Stan Musial; they are in excellent condition. Unfortunately, most of my 1966 cards got too much use at the time and their condition is not as good.
Next hurdle cleared in emancipating XY without emancipating him. Virtual school #FTW!
Remember when I joked about raising the minimum age to buy a firearm to 26? They’re working on it.
Adulthood will be achieved when you are put into the ground.
You can vote at 12, but you can’t have a gun until
182126ever.I’m hoping the dems go way too far in the actual write ups and lose support from the squishy rinos.
That’ll only happen when the RINOs hate the Dems more than they hate their own constituents. In other words, never.
Federal background checks are still the law.
Well now… Mr. Mojeaux and I are free to attempt to attend SP’s celebration of life. Don’t get too excited. Still working out the deets.
The J6 House Cunte Committee just implied that it is improper to invoke one’s 5th amendment right. I do believe that would get a good dress down from a judge in a courtroom.
That uh…should be immediate grounds to shut it all down.
Apparently Drumpfler is going to “seize the presidency in 2024 if he or his anointed doesn’t win”.
These are not serious people.
J6 is HUAC without a legitimate threat.
I really wish someone would do “news coverage” on YouTube of the Jan 6 committee, but use the proceedings and film of the HUAC instead. Basically bill it as current news.
Looks like the bundle of charisma known as Brian Stelter will be shitcanned shortly:
https://acecomments.mu.nu/?post=399625
Without him around how’s CNN gonna attract the ladies?
No! The CNN resident eunuch is way too fun in his absurdities. Likewise for Jim “Look at me!” Acosta.
I don’t quite get how he got the job in the first place. He has the looks for radio, the charisma of a wet dishrag, is the opposite of a deep thinker, and has a high squeaky voice. He just exudes sleaze.
“Dear diary, …”
So now he’s preparing for his second career as an actual potato?
Great job, Whiz!!
I never understood or appreciated baseball until I read Michael Lewis’ “Moneyball”. Way more interesting and detailed than theBrad Pitt movie. Heck, I thought the idea of a “no hitter” was an epic fail.
Prior to reading that book, I hadn’t appreciated the strategy, the psychology, the importance of knowing the opponent’s strength and weaknesses.
Now I loooove baseball.