After being swept by the Orioles and almost losing home-field-advantage for their wild-card playoff game against the Astros, the Yankees limped into the 2015 MLB playoffs. The 2015 Yankees are not a championship team. This became evident by watching their games against Toronto and other very good teams. In fact, I think the Yankees have …
My last blog focused on the stories of some of the players who belonged to The Cup of Coffee Club (The CCC). To have a cup of coffee means to have a very short stint of1 game in the majors. For those of you who have not read the last blog, it is still listed, …
The expression that good pitching will defeat good hitting has always been true in baseball. Instead of chasing top free agent pitchers Max Scherzer, Jon Lester, and James Shields, the Yankees decided to stand pat with their 2015 starting pitchers. The only guy they brought in was Nathan Eovaldi via trade. Gone from the 2014 …
A defensive shift is employed when a power-hitter, known to swing for the fences, comes to the plate. A lefty hitting power-hitter will pull the ball to the right side and a righty power-hitter will pull the ball to the left side. A defensive shift occurs when defensive players leave their normal positions to overload …
By Alex Everett The funny thing about baseball is that what we expect to happen doesn’t always happen. As I posted in my last article the Mets were the only team with a positive run differential (+11) and a losing record (79-83). Using Dr. Stan’s formula to predict winning percentage (Winning Percentage = .000683*(runs scored …
As said in the previous blog posting by Dr. Stan “The Stats Man”, the Mets were the only team in 2014 with a winning season and a losing record. A winning season means the subtraction of their runs allowed from their runs scored for the 2014 season was positive. This difference is called their run …
In a previous blog I talked about two important sabermetric formulas. Bill James’s Formula is Win% = (Runs Scored)2 / [(Runs Scored)2 + (Runs Allowed)2] and Stan “The Stats Man” Formula is Win% = 0.000683*[(Runs Scored) – (Runs Allowed)] +.50. James’s formula is called the Pythagorean Formula for Baseball and Stan’s Formula is called the Linear Formula …
Bill James, the Father of Sabermetrics, introduced his ”Pythagorean Theorem of Baseball”. His theorem provides a formula to predict a team’s winning percentage (W%) using the runs scored (RS) and runs allowed (RA) by the team for a season. Sabermetrics uses mathematics (especially Statistics) to make objective baseball decisions. The Pythagorean Theorem of Baseball states: …
The data for instant replay presented below was obtained from the MLB. This data includes the first 381 instant replay reviews that occurred in the first 759 games played this season which represents about one-third of a season. Below are the 381 initial calls that were challenged, classified by type. Unlike the NFL …
In my next posting I will review the new instant replay rules that will be in effect for the 2014 baseball season. However, the most missed call made by umpires is not reviewable. So what is the most missed call in baseball? Of course, it is the ball and strike call by the home-plate umpire. …