Food for thought:

Not sure if anyone else here is familiar with the Pythagorean Method for baseball. Basically, it's a measure of how many games a team SHOULD win in a season, based on their run production, pitching and defense. The reason it popped into my head today is because I happened to pick up a copy of Rob Neyer and Eddie Epstein's "Baseball Dynasties" on the sale rack at Barnes and Noble yesterday. They use it to compare great teams. I thought it might be useful for comparing teams who have over/underachieved thus far this season. Most teams were pretty close to where they should be...here are the exceptions. All actual records are through Saturday's afternoon games.

Overachievers:
San Fransisco (actually 20-9, "should" be 16-13)
Atlanta (actually 19-10, "should" be 15-14)
Boston (actually 20-10, "should" be 17-13)
Kansas City (actually 18-9, "should" be 16-11)
Cincinatti (actually 13-17, "should" be 11-19)

Underachievers:
Los Angeles (actually 14-16, should be 17-13)
Philadelphia (actually 17-13, should be 19-11)
St. Louis (actually 16-12, should be 18-10)
Cubs: (actually 17-13, should be 19-11)
Arizona (actually 12-18, should be 14-16)
Anaheim (actually 13-16, should be 15-14)
Cleveland (actually 8-21, should be 10-19)
Detroit (actually 3-25, should be 5-23)

What do you guys think? Do you put any weight in these numbers?

 

Not really to be honest... because there are ALWAYS teams you expect to do better and don't and teams you expect to fail that play good... paper isn't what counts its what's put on the field... furthermore those papers are kinda biased... let me give you an example... Pitcher Bob Jones is an AVERAGE pitcher... he's finished 12-10 in his BEST season as a pro... EVERY publication expects him to finish around a .500 winning percentage at best... well this year he has a GREAT year... he goes 18-6, goes to the All-Star game, and his team makes the playoffs... because of this the following year he is expected to match those All-Star numbers and it just doesn't ALWAYS happen... players on occassion will have a breakout year and then fade back into mediocrity... but those same publications that predict records base their predictions on the previous years performance... that's why you can't really put TOO much stock into them.

 

I guess that's not quite what I meant. Let me see if I can rephrase it.

I'm expecting San Fransisco, Atlanta, Kansas City, Boston and Cincinatti to falter, at least in part because the numbers I listed above show me that they're getting lucky and getting good breaks now and I'd expect what goes around to come back around for them.

By the same token, I'm expecting some of the teams listed with the underachievers to get better, because the numbers LA, St. Louis, Philadelphia and Anaheim are putting up definitely make them look like a better team than their records indicate.

I try not to evaluate players based on one season (although I did draft Rodrigo Lopez in my fantasy draft.) But in this case, I do put some stock into it, because I'm not making evaluations based on one player, I'm making them based on the performance of 25 or more players. So I think these stats do hold some water, at least as much water as can be held by stats accumulated in April. But that's just my opinion. I wanted to throw it out there to see if there's any more stat junkies out there like me.

 

Does your equation factor in injuries and/or the numbers of the replacements for the injured? Lets say a pitcher goes down for a month or the season. Or you lose a key hitter or defensive player or your closer. The one great thing about sports is that you cant just "do the math" and pick the winner(s). Somebody woulda figured out a way to cash in on it a long time ago. Not that this is what you're sayin though. I guess its kinda fun to test theories, you must really love the game. Baseball...a thinking mans game.

 

It sounds about right to me...I generally go with the law of averages. It's logical to expect a teams win/loss record to reflect their production on the field. Of course you have to take into account who they're playing, and when. If the overacheivers are playing the underacheivers at the beginning of the season, then the W/L record will be off from the beginning, but eventually they're going to have to play other overacheivers...so it should even out in the end.

Or something like that.

 

K, two replies in one:

Tank, the pythagorean method formula is rather simple, all things considered. Here's the basic formula:

(runs scored to the 1.83 power)/[(runs scored to the 1.83 power) + (runs allowed to the 1.83 power)]

That equation gives you a win percentage which you can easily convert into a number of wins.

So no, it doesn't take injuries into account at all. I agree they can make a difference, but there's no way to predict them, so the best prediction one can hope to make is just to compare the future to the present.

RSGal, the reason I saw fit to try it now is because the teams you face in April, are for the most part division opponents, thanks to the unbalanced schedule. So your schedule through May 2 is generally a pretty good reflection of what your schedule will be like for the rest of the season.

 

How do you expect San Fransisco, Atlanta, Kansas City, Boston and Cincinatti to faulter?? Pretty muc... excluding Cincy those are solid teams that are regularly in the post season... I'd consider it mistake to think they would possibly play any worse than they currently are... Atlanta whil I know I am bias was considered to do worse due to the losses of Millwood and Glavine... but what apparently these stats keepers are missing is they plugged in quality replcements and have a good enough coaching staff to train them... Robert Fick is also playing well and that wasn't expected by many number punchers, but was predicted by most league coaches... basically that goes to show that baseball isn't based on numbers and figures and it makes no sense to follow that because generally the numbers make no room for decline or increase in a player's performance... and in a perfect world where no one grows old and no young players reach their prime this could be an effective method, but its not a "perfect" world

 

KC? A solid team regularly in the post season? What have you been smoking?

Boston will choke, they always do. And you think that San Fran is going to play .700+ ball all season long? They're good, but they ain't the Yankees...

 

no you aren't getting my point... the teams are solid... I don't expect them to shatter W/L records, but they aren't the worse teams in the league by any means

 

You asked KL how could possibly expect those teams to falter...I was just helping to explain for him.