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.

Real good

It's October again, time for my predictions for the playoffs.  I'll present the same kind of analysis I did last year, essentially factoring out each team's luck to see how good they really were.  The Nostradamian, Pythagorean and actual win percentages for all teams in 2008:

	nW%	pW%	W%
Red Sox	.610946	.589104	.586420
Cubs	.603984	.609085	.602484
Rays	.560113	.564963	.598765
Blue Jays	.556137	.571527	.530864
Dodgers	.552834	.535256	.518519
White Sox	.550722	.548613	.546012
Mets	.542775	.550644	.549383
Yankees	.539291	.537372	.549383
Diamondbacks	.537358	.508982	.506173
Phillies	.531918	.573249	.567901
Cardinals	.530346	.532819	.530864
Brewers	.526723	.538733	.555556
Angels	.516943	.542486	.617284
Marlins	.513352	.501786	.521739
Indians	.510257	.525693	.500000
Braves	.506736	.485062	.444444
Twins	.500555	.548722	.539877
Rangers	.496077	.467703	.487654
Tigers	.490483	.480377	.456790
Rockies	.471172	.456340	.456790
Athletics	.465682	.469891	.465839
Astros	.461321	.480512	.534161
Royals	.459870	.444219	.462963
Padres	.457011	.417586	.388889
Orioles	.455094	.451888	.422360
Giants	.439190	.422608	.444444
Reds	.425489	.441781	.456790
Mariners	.404741	.414163	.376543
Nationals	.401473	.386557	.366460
Pirates	.384832	.416346	.413580

So this year the luckiest teams were the Angels, Astros, Twins and Rays; the unluckiest were the Padres and Braves.  The Red Sox deserved to have the best record in baseball, and the Angels didn't deserve anything close to it—in fact, they are the worst team in the playoffs.  My Blue Jays were the fourth-best team in baseball but only finished fourth in their division (though really they were better than the Yankees).  Four of the five best AL teams are in the AL East.

Anyway, based on these results, it's reasonable to predict:

Red Sox over Angels	Red Sox over Rays	Red Sox over Cubs
Rays over White Sox
Cubs over Dodgers	Cubs over Phillies
Phillies over Brewers

But what I'm rooting for is just slightly different:

Red Sox over Angels	Red Sox over Rays	Cubs over Red Sox
Rays over White Sox
Cubs over Dodgers	Cubs over Phillies
Phillies over Brewers

May the best teams win, then, at least until the Series.  Go Cubbies!

Something

This blog has been dead for a long while now as I've begun a new full-time teaching position.  I keep thinking I'll find time to post something substantial, but for now I'll go with something trivial and meaningless.

Question:  How many times has Alabama beaten Auburn in football at home in Tuscaloosa?

Answer:  Zero.  Auburn is 6-0 in Tuscaloosa.  Alabama will get another chance to win their first true-home-game victory in the Iron Bowl ever this November.

Pausch to remember

Randy Pausch died this morning.  His book The Last Lecture is based on a lecture he gave at Carnegie Mellon after he found that he had terminal cancer.  It's full of not empty sayings and false hopes but real stories and lessons learned from a full life.  It is the only inspirational book I've read that deserves to be called inspirational.

A look ahead

Last week I analyzed how the major-league standings would look if all teams were equally lucky in the way that runs fell among games and hits and outs fell among innings.  Well, unfortunately, not all teams are equally lucky, and only the real results matter.  But the real won-loss records so far don't predict the future; in fact, a team's Nostradamian record is a far better predictor of future wins and losses than past wins and losses.  So (using the All-Star break as the cutoff point) let's use each team's Nostradamian record to predict its winning percentage for the rest of the season and see how the final standings would look:

AL East	extrapolated		real (at ASB)
Red Sox	97.4–64.6	.600940	57–40	.587629
Rays	93.1–68.9	.574946	55–39	.585106
Yankees	85.5–76.5	.527664	50–45	.526316
Blue Jays	83.0–79.0	.512472	47–48	.494737
Orioles	78.6–83.4	.484937	45–48	.483871

AL Central	extrapolated		real (at ASB)
White Sox	94.2–67.8	.581437	54–40	.574468
Twins	85.0–77.0	.524404	53–42	.557895
Tigers	82.2–79.8	.507135	47–47	.500000
Indians	72.6–89.4	.448405	41–53	.436170
Royals	72.0–90.0	.444402	43–53	.447917

AL West	extrapolated		real (at ASB)
Angels	89.6–72.4	.552936	57–38	.600000
Athletics	88.8–73.2	.548438	51–44	.536842
Rangers	83.1–78.9	.513119	50–46	.520833
Mariners	65.6–96.4	.404811	37–58	.389474

NL East	extrapolated		real (at ASB)
Mets	87.8–74.2	.542000	51–44	.536842
Phillies	87.7–74.3	.541186	52–44	.541667
Marlins	82.7–79.3	.510535	50–45	.526316
Braves	82.7–79.3	.510198	45–50	.473684
Nationals	61.0–101.0	.376426	36–60	.375000

NL Central	extrapolated		real (at ASB)
Cubs	97.1–64.9	.599642	57–38	.600000
Cardinals	88.3–73.7	.544952	53–43	.552083
Brewers	85.8–76.2	.529915	52–43	.547368
Reds	75.2–86.8	.464356	46–50	.479167
Astros	72.4–89.6	.447143	44–51	.463158
Pirates	70.4–91.6	.434335	44–50	.468085

NL West	extrapolated		real (at ASB)
Diamondbacks	83.0–79.0	.512538	47–48	.494737
Dodgers	79.7–82.3	.491871	46–49	.484211
Giants	69.7–92.3	.430035	40–55	.421053
Rockies	68.5–93.5	.422900	39–57	.406250
Padres	68.0–94.0	.419531	37–58	.389474

For example, the Blue Jays have won 47 games so far and have 67 post-All-Star-break games.  I multiplied 67 by their Nostradamian record, .537618, to get 36.0, the number of those games they can expect to win, giving them an extrapolated final record of about 83–79.  Of course, this approach doesn't account for roster changes (such as injuries and the Sabathia, Harden and Blanton trades) or differences in schedule, but it beats assuming that winning percentages won't change.

So the Red Sox, White Sox, Cubs and Diamondbacks are likely to extend their division leads, while the Angels are likely to lose most of theirs and the NL East should remain very tight.  The Braves have been so unlucky so far that they're projected to finish fourth even though they have the best Nostradamian record in their division.

coolstandings.com, using different assumptions than I do, calculates not likely final standings but the rough probability that each team will make the playoffs.