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We tried to design something that was simple to use and not too cluttered. That being said, we will probably tinker with the design a little bit over the next few weeks.
In the meantime, head on over and sign up today!
Today is opening day in Major League Baseball. One of the holiest days of the year. Well, it is for everybody except the Rays and Orioles who will not play until tomorrow night at The Trop.
So everybody else gets to celebrate and we are left chomping at the bit for another 24 hours. So to bide the time and satisfy our cravings, I dusted off my copy of the 2008 ALCS Game 7 and decided to write a retro diary of the game.
0:00 – FOX starts us off with the pre-requisite aerial shot of The Trop. I always wondered why networks deploy blimps to domes. While The Trop is underrated inside, the aerial shot reminds us that from the outside it looks like the biggest game of the 2008 season is about to take place in a grain silo. Every discussion about a new stadium for the Rays should just start and end with this image.
0:01 — I assume I was pretty nervous at this point when the game happened originally. I have no idea. There is a good chance I had started drinking about 8:00am that day. But even though I know the ending, I am sitting here nervous as hell. BARTENDER!
Immediately I notice the amount of Red in the stands which instantly increases the Sox odds of winning this game because Red Sox Nation is better than other fans. They’re such amazing fans that they can walk on water and had the power of invisibility back in the early 80s. And there is no such thing as a bandwagon Red Sox fan. Every single Red Sox fan is descended from a guy named Sully that came to this land on the Mayflower wearing a hat with ‘B’ embroidered on it, red socks and chanting “Yankees Suck!” the entire trip.
Matt Garza is on the mound for the Rays. It is fun to see 2008-Matt Garza. His sideburns and chin-pubes were so cute back in ’08. They just say, “hey, we just went through puberty.”
0:02 — It is amazing to think how lucky the Rays were to have this game at home. I know The Trop can be very loud at times (I was there for games 1 and 2), but right now we are literally seconds from the first pitch and the place is very quiet. Think that would happen at Fenway?
And immediately after 2 pitches we get the first shot of Garza’s ear plugs which look more like Dioner Navarro stuck a spit ball in his ear when he was taking his afternoon nap.
In 2006 and 2007, we called this “The Mathematical Definition Of ‘No Chance In Hell.” In 2008 it was “The Mathematical Definition Of ‘The Rays Are Getting Warmer,” and last year it was “The Mathematical Definition Of “Rays Are In For A Dogfight.”
In one of our favorite preseason posts, Replacement Level Yankees Weblog, have released their “The 2010 Diamond Mind Projection Blowout.”
In the Projection Blowout, stats from five different projection systems are used to project the 2010 season. The 2010 season is projected using the ”Diamond Mind” simulator and each set of projected stats is used to simulate 100,000 seasons. The projected stats used include CHONE, Marcel, Oliver, PECOTA and CAIRO.
In the overall projections (500,000 seasons), the Rays on average, finish 3rd in the AL east with 91.2 wins. Last year the Rays were projected to finish third with 90.1 wins. The Yankees are first with 96.1 wins and the Red Sox are second at 92.9 wins. In the 500,000 projections, the winner of the AL East on average won 100 games and the Wild Card winner won an average of 94 games.
Below we have summed up the results from each of the projection systems for just the Rays.
A few notes on the projections…
We just got done reading Beyond Batting Average, by Lee Panas of Detroit Tiger Tales. It is an introductory book on Sabermetrics and the new-age baseball statistics that you often see referenced here and on other sites.
Beyond Batting Average is not going to overwhelm you with math. Rather, it does an excellent job of introducing you to the theory behind many of these stats, the strengths and weaknesses of each and when it might be appropriate to use them.
If you already have a firm grasp on Sabermetrics, then this book may be a little elementary. But if you ever wanted a quick lesson on these stats, then we recommend this book. It is a quick read (we read it in two days) and keeps the discussion simple.
If you are interested, a hard copy can be found HERE and an electronic copy can be ordered HERE.
DEVIL DOGS WEBTOPIA…
