Red Sox deserved better yet again

Predicting the baseball postseason is an annual tradition on this otherwise defunct blog, so, as busy as I am, I'll take a few minutes to do the same kind of analysis I've done the last three years, essentially factoring out each team's luck to see how good they really were this season.  (Actually, I'm so busy I'm just adapting last year's post with new data but no new detailed analysis.)  The Nostradamian, Pythagorean and actual win percentages for all teams in 2011:

	nW%	pW%	W%
Rangers	.619564	.605199	.592593
Red Sox	.615862	.577884	.555556
Phillies	.587510	.633263	.629630
Yankees	.573866	.624234	.598765
Tigers	.568963	.546329	.586420
Brewers	.565024	.555720	.592593
Cardinals	.555746	.543971	.555556
Rays	.547264	.564168	.561728
Braves	.530747	.526419	.549383
Dodgers	.523325	.523300	.509317
Giants	.515273	.493624	.530864
Diamondbacks	.512743	.545236	.580247
Angels	.509286	.523918	.530864
Reds	.497204	.509432	.487654
Mets	.489826	.484962	.475309
Marlins	.486833	.447046	.444444
Nationals	.484523	.486281	.496894
White Sox	.482104	.465055	.487654
Blue Jays	.481998	.489050	.500000
Royals	.480274	.480382	.438272
Rockies	.478011	.476364	.450617
Athletics	.475615	476515	.456790
Indians	.469122	.465040	.493827
Padres	.454000	.486323	.438272
Cubs	.451705	.434079	.438272
Mariners	.432221	.412190	.413580
Orioles	.415420	.411949	.425926
Pirates	.407165	.429730	.444444
Astros	.396697	.384120	.345679
Twins	.371774	.382598	.388889

So this year the luckiest teams were the Diamondbacks, Phillies and Pirates; the unluckiest were the Red Sox, Astros, Marlins and Royals.  The Rangers deserved to have the best record in baseball but the Red Sox were actually close behind.  The Red Sox, Braves, Dodgers and Giants didn't make the playoffs even though they were really better than some teams that did.  Every team in the playoffs was lucky to win as many games as they did except for the Rangers and Cardinals, who were slightly unlucky.  The Diamondbacks are the worst team in the playoffs; they deserved to finish behind both the Dodgers and the Giants, but they finished in first place by eight games.  The 2011 Red Sox may be the best team to miss the playoffs in many years.

Based on the above results, it's reasonable to predict:

Yankees over Tigers	Rangers over Yankees	Rangers over Phillies
Rangers over Rays
Brewers over Diamondbacks	Phillies over Brewers
Phillies over Cardinals

But here's what I'm rooting for:

Tigers over Yankees	Rangers over Tigers	Phillies over Rangers
Rangers over Rays
Diamondbacks over Brewers	Phillies over Diamondbacks
Phillies over Cardinals

I got all the statistics I needed for this analysis from these three pages: A B C

Red Sox deserved better

Predicting the baseball postseason is a tradition on this still near-defunct blog, so, as busy as I am, I'll take a few minutes to do the same kind of analysis I've done the last three years, essentially factoring out each team's luck to see how good they really were this season.  (Actually, I'm so busy I'm just adapting last year's post with new data but no new detailed analysis.)  The Nostradamian, Pythagorean and actual win percentages for all teams in 2010:

	nW%	pW%	W%
Yankees	.585972	.596998	.586420
Red Sox	.571691	.543272	.549383
Braves	.571388	.572598	.561728
Reds	.559742	.564878	.561728
Rangers	.558152	.561853	.555556
Rockies	.550320	.532580	.512346
Phillies	.548805	.584957	.598765
Giants	.547321	.580989	.567901
Twins	.546392	.569008	.580247
Cardinals	.538330	.562892	.530864
Rays	.538080	.595649	.592593
Tigers	.532365	.504899	.500000
Blue Jays	.529362	.516654	.524691
White Sox	.519933	.530139	.543210
Athletics	.516039	.526248	.500000
Padres	.513639	.561467	.555556
Dodgers	.508014	.483172	.493827
Marlins	.493185	.501274	.493827
Brewers	.487449	.468235	.475309
Cubs	.477239	.448455	.462963
Mets	.463235	.502798	.487654
Nationals	.454897	.443190	.425926
Angels	.453522	.486109	.493827
Diamondbacks	.452800	.427700	.401235
Royals	.443835	.399307	.413580
Indians	.433936	.430933	.425926
Orioles	.416793	.388744	.407407
Astros	.404867	.419912	.469136
Mariners	.401393	.362730	.376543
Pirates	.358490	.329242	.351852

So this year the luckiest teams were the Astros, Rays and Phillies; the unluckiest were the Diamondbacks, Rockies and Tigers.  The Yankees deserved to have the best record in baseball but the Red Sox were actually close behind.  The Red Sox, Rockies and Cardinals didn't make the playoffs even though they were really better than some teams that did.  Every team in the playoffs was lucky to win as many games as they did except for the Braves and Rangers, who were slightly unlucky.  Surprisingly, the Rays are the worst team in the playoffs; they deserved to finish about six games behind the Red Sox, but they finished seven games ahead of them.

Based on the above results, it's reasonable to predict:

Rangers over Rays	Yankees over Rangers	Yankees over Braves
Yankees over Twins
Reds over Phillies	Braves over Reds
Braves over Giants

But here's what I'm rooting for:

Rangers over Rays	Rangers over Twins	Reds over Rangers
Twins over Yankees
Reds over Phillies	Reds over Giants
Giants over Braves

I got all the statistics I needed for this analysis from these three pages: A B C

Approved!

My favorite voting reform, approval voting, is mentioned in today's xkcd comic as a tooltip (hover your mouse over the comic image to see it).  Very cool.  And, speaking of approval voting, here's a press release that analyzes some interesting anomalies in this month's elections that approval voting would fix.

Another postseason without the Jays

Predicting the baseball postseason is now a tradition on this otherwise near-defunct blog, so, as busy as I am, I'll take a few minutes to do the same kind of analysis I've done the last two years, essentially factoring out each team's luck to see how good they really were this season.  The Nostradamian, Pythagorean and actual win percentages for all teams in 2009:

	nW%	pW%	W%
Yankees	.617779	.588215	.635802
Dodgers	.604922	.609897	.586420
Rockies	.557546	.553467	.567901
Red Sox	.554619	.576957	.586420
Cardinals	.551377	.559907	.561728
Rays	.548008	.528773	.518519
Braves	.543312	.562280	.530864
Phillies	.531833	.566153	.574074
Cubs	.531712	.523212	.515528
Angels	.530636	.567610	.598765
Twins	.520369	.530050	.533742
Rangers	.517763	.526400	.537037
Marlins	.512924	.503570	.537037
Blue Jays	.508989	.515742	.462963
Giants	.503124	.533160	.543210
White Sox	.498027	.494973	.487654
Diamondbacks	.497025	.462281	.432099
Mariners	.496602	.464322	.524691
Tigers	.482815	.498770	.527607
Athletics	.479727	.498796	.462963
Brewers	.468335	.481170	.493827
Mets	.459683	.445051	.432099
Indians	.454076	.448735	.401235
Reds	.451787	.467261	.481481
Padres	.448974	.415383	.462963
Royals	.443433	.407340	.401235
Nationals	.435496	.406054	.364198
Astros	.419356	.418277	.456790
Orioles	.417295	.424023	.395062
Pirates	.408288	.414566	.385093

So this year the luckiest teams were the Angels, Tigers and Phillies; the unluckiest were the Nationals, Diamondbacks and Indians.  The Yankees had the best record in baseball and deserved to.  The Rays, Braves and Cubs didn't make the playoffs even though they were really better than some teams that did.  Every team in the playoffs was lucky to win as many games as they did except for the Dodgers, who were about three games unlucky.  The Twins are the worst team in the playoffs, but they were better this season than the tiebreaker-losing Tigers.

Based on the above results, it's reasonable to predict:

Yankees over Twins	Yankees over Red Sox	Yankees over Dodgers
Red Sox over Angels
Dodgers over Cardinals	Dodgers over Rockies
Rockies over Phillies

Unlike last year, what I'm rooting for is very different from my predictions:

Twins over Yankees	Red Sox over Twins	Red Sox over Phillies
Red Sox over Angels
Cardinals over Dodgers	Phillies over Cardinals
Phillies over Rockies

For what it's worth, I got all the statistics I needed for this analysis from these three pages: A B C

As for my Blue Jays, my last blog post must have cursed them.  They were legit, but, after an ultimately disappointing season, they fired J. P. Ricciardi, their general manager, and hired his assistant, Alex Anthopoulos, on an interim basis.  I'm not sure yet what I think about the move since I liked J. P. but recognized his flaws and I know little about Anthopoulos.  The funny thing about J. P. is that he seemed to be able to build a better team with less money; increasing the team's payroll seemed to decrease the wisdom of the contracts he gave out.  Theo Epstein has done a better job taking advantage of the huge bankroll in Boston.  What really makes no sense to me is that the Jays fired J. P. but kept Cito Gaston as manager.  Cito's a good guy but is certainly not the manager to squeeze every bit of value out of a team's players.  I'll always regret that the Jays decided not to hire Davey Johnson before the 1998 season, and now I wish they'd replace Gaston with someone like Manny Acta.

Anyway, would they still have fired J. P. if the Jays had won the 82 games they deserved to given their performance on the field this year?  It takes a long time for the luck to even out in baseball.

Blue Jays are legit

I just completed my first full year of teaching college, and I haven't been able to make much time for research, much less blogging.  It's been months since I blogged at all and longer since I had anything important to say.  So I'll have to ease back into it . . .

With their just-completed four-game sweep of the White Sox, my Blue Jays currently have the best record in the American League, winning almost two-thirds of their games.  They were widely picked to finish fourth in the AL East, so the natural question is whether they've been lucky to get to such a good start to the season.  The same kind of analysis I did in 2007 will tell us how good the teams have really been so far, largely factoring out the kind of luck that's unlikely to last.  The Nostradamian, Pythagorean and actual win percentages for all teams in 2009, including all games through yesterday's:

	nW%	pW%	W%
Dodgers	.671059	.666821	.675000
Blue Jays	.636715	.632316	.658537
Mets	.600752	.561126	.552632
Brewers	.588384	.595621	.631579
Royals	.580791	.550095	.526316
Rangers	.576806	.570418	.621622
Tigers	.550852	.576040	.555556
Red Sox	.537457	.541316	.578947
Rays	.524886	.554702	.500000
Braves	.524516	.463669	.486486
Angels	.524109	.497534	.513514
Cubs	.521802	.539270	.583333
Yankees	.515264	.471900	.552632
Reds	.507029	.516733	.540541
Cardinals	.502803	.527861	.552632
Pirates	.495702	.524279	.447368
Rockies	.494701	.509838	.405405
Twins	.481084	.458476	.461538
Phillies	.466061	.527294	.555556
Nationals	.462360	.402410	.297297
Indians	.462151	.453064	.358974
Diamondbacks	.450943	.419420	.378378
Padres	.442951	.374305	.421053
Astros	.436358	.450016	.472222
Marlins	.433456	.452729	.473684
Mariners	.412214	.420218	.461538
Orioles	.403796	.427943	.421053
White Sox	.393866	.401755	.405405
Giants	.391831	.456506	.513514
Athletics	.373073	.418811	.371429

So the Blue Jays haven't been nearly as lucky as one might assume—they've been playing legitimately good baseball, and they deserve to have the best record in the American League.  Of course, that doesn't mean that they'll keep winning all season, especially since they haven't played many games against their tough AL East rivals.  But it's an encouraging start.

The luckiest teams so far have been the Giants, Phillies and Cubs, while the Nationals, Indians and Rockies have been the least lucky.  The Giants are lucky to be in second place rather than in the NL West basement, and the Phillies are lucky to be in a virtual tie with the Mets instead of 5 games back.  Nationals and Indians fans should be patient, as those teams deserve to be much closer to .500 than they are.  The surprising Royals deserve to be leading the AL Central and the White Sox should by all rights be in last place.  On the other hand, the lowly Athletics actually deserve to have the worst record in baseball right now, which makes me wonder whether this guy is right about Billy Beane.

I'm on a boat a-and it's goin' fast a-and I got a nautical-themed pashmina afgha-an

The Lonely Island has been on a roll.  On Saturday's SNL, they premiered a new classic, I'm on a Boat.  Last month they gave us We Like Sportz, a sequel to their Just 2 Guyz, and a beautiful new take on the Doogie Howser Theme with Neil Patrick Harris.  (Only the dudes would take the opportunity to make fun of a musician as obscure to the average American as Mike Oldfield.)  And their new album is out tomorrow!

Oh yeah, and here's the funniest music video ever (warning: contains movie violence).

The way you bagged cans got me bothered and hot

Last night the return of Virgania Horsen was only the second best SNL Digital Short—we got more proof that SNL's hiring of The Lonely Island was a genius move, and for the first time Andy was joined by Jorma and Akiva (the other two members of TLI).  The best SNLDS yet?  Most-a-ly.

Elsewhere again

In an infinite number of other parallel universes, the Republicans took back Congress to provide a check on Obama's power.  The Robs in those universes are much less concerned for the future of our economy than this one.

At least the Phillies won the Series in this universe, and isn't that more important anyway?

Elsewhere

In an infinite number of parallel universes, the bailout failed to pass and the Cubs swept the Dodgers.  The Robs in those universes are very happy.