And the best team in the league is………

Friday June 17, 2016

 

With the season almost a third completed, we thought we’d have a little bit of forecasting fun using sabermetrics.

 

Sabermetrics, coined by Bill James, is the empirical analysis of baseball using statistics in an attempt to answer questions objectively instead of subjectively.   Sabermetricians frequently question the value of traditional measures of baseball.

 

For example, to determine who is the “best” team in the league, a sabermetrician would most likely assume that baseball teams should win games in proportion to their “quality” and that their “quality” is measured by the ratio of their runs scored to their runs allowed.  The three most popular formulas used for this are Pythagorean by Bill James, Pythagenport by Clay Davenport, and Pythagenpat by David Symth.    

 

While the season is admittedly in its infancy, we thought we’d use the average of all three formulas to determine the “best” (e.g., highest quality) team in the league…….based solely on the data accumulated so far.   Thru last night’s results, the top three teams, so far, are:

 

Putty Hill Panthers            (expected to win 73.4 percent of their games played)

KOA Sports Green Wave  (73.1 percent expectation to win)

Baltimore Chop                 (70.5 percent expectation to win)

 

We decided to take it a step further and apply the above percentages to the remaining games in the season for all three teams.   Assuming that all three teams play at their exact current “quality” for the entire remainder of the season, the results show:

 

Baltimore Chop  :                24 wins

KOA Sports Green Wave:  24 wins

Putty Hill Panthers:             22 wins

 

Thus, it could be that the “best” team in the league (Putty Hill) makes the playoffs but misses out on a first round post-season tournament bye.

 

Results, however, are not achieved on paper using sabermetrics, but between the white lines on the field.   Stay tuned to see how the season plays out.