delahg

Knowing full well that these games will be played on the field, and not on
paper, I did this strength of schedule assessment anyway.
I gave each team 1 point for a game against the opponent with the best AL
record (NYY), 2 points for a game against the opponent with the second-best
record (Oak.), etc., and 14 points for each game against the opponent with the
worst AL record (Det.).
I got the following results:

New York 237
Seattle 208 *
Oakland 204 *
Boston 201

Assuming that each point is worth 1/10 of a game (quite arbitrary, but
inconsequential):

~Additional Games Behind ~Final Games Behind

New York -
-
Oakland 3
5
Seattle 3
7
Boston 4
9


So if form prevails, the season might as well end today.
As the saying goes, Seattle has its destiny (wild card aspirations) in its
own hands. (And the WEST Championship is still possible.)
________
*These numbers are somewhat deceptive. Oakland and Seattle have essentially the
same schedules.

John

hsberman

That would go along with a chart in USA TODAY last week. It showed that
something like 86 of the 94 post-season teams since 1969 were in the lead for
division or WS on Sept 1.

Henry

hsberman

Whoops. Freud, where are you when I need you? That should have been WC, not
WS.

Henry

mike

Funny thing about numbers. You can make them say whaever you want.
Why did you pick 1, 2, 14? Why not 1,2,3,4? Didn't like the results?

Let me say one thing about "last place" teams. These are not
guaranteed wins for Seattle. NY, Boston and the As seem to do better
against last place teams. Just my gut feel; I have not actually
checked this, as last place teams change throughout the season.

norrisdt

Mike <ipscone555@msdsite.com> writes:


Probably because 3,4,5,etc. went to the third-, fourth-, and fifth-best
teams. Duh.

Doug

delahg

The old saying, "Figures don't lie, but liars can figure" is not applicable
here.
I did use 3 and 4; and 5 too *; and all the applicable numbers from 5 to 14
(the number of teams in the AL.)
I simply wanted to quantify the degree of difficulty of the schedule.
Instead of saying "Seattle is playing Okland at the end of the season, while
Boston is playing Tampa Bay," we can refer to some numbers that better tell
what this schedule means.
I see it as an innocent exercise, not as an attempt to manipulate numbers..

I think we're all aware of that. (No one said or implied that they were
guaranteed wins.)
________
*Not 6 though. That's Kansas City, and none of the contenders are playing them.
(And another 3, Philadelphia.)

John

delahg

My gut feeling too, but knowing that things sometimes aren't as they seem
(as MS Burton often reminds us), I thought I'd better check it out (using the
current standings.)
I got these results:

Against last-place teams

Oakland 20-8 -
New York 20-10 1
Boston 23-9 2
Seattle 23-14 4.5 *

Is it ever true!
[Let's hope this pattern doesn't continue. (3 more against Tampa Bay, 7 more
against Texas.)]
________
*Talk about an unbalanced schedule! (We had 6 against San Diego, while Oakland
had 6 against San Francisco; and we played the Mets while they were playing
Florida.)

John

pete livengood

FWIW, for a few weeks now, BP has had a "Postseason Odds Report" that
includes a strength of schedule rating, updated daily. You can find
it here:

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/current/ps_odds.htm

As of today, SOS:

New York .478
Boston .492
Seattle .514
Oakland .516

If you want to read more about how they came up with this, read Nate
Silver's explanation of this report here:

http://premium.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=2205

It's premium content, but if you are still interested at this point,
you should already be a subscriber.

Pete