Sports – Winning Baseball? What!?!?

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With the All Star break approaching, I thought I’d take a quick look at the improvement our lovable Royals have made.

To do this, I’m going to take a look at the Pythagorean Record of the team, which is based on runs scored and runs allowed. (For a further explanation of the formula, please click here and here.)

For those so interested, I’m using the ^1.83 model.

Currently, the team’s pythag winning percentage is 37%, which puts them on pace for just over 100 losses this season.

However, on a month by month basis, the boys in blue have made incredible strides towards becoming a respectable team.

Month  Pyth %
April   28%
May     29%
June    46%
July    59%

July’s results are of a negligible sample size, but the improvement for the month of June is certainly encouraging. That’s a 75-87 team over the course of the season, which is far from fantastic, but much closer to the league-average expectations many of us had heading into the season.

The chart below shows the winning percentage as a ten game rolling average.

Man, did April and May suck.

A 4-0 loss to the White Sox on April 19th had the Royals looking at a 14% winning percentage over the previous ten games. That’s a 23-win season. That’s beyond bad.

Luckily, the schedule requires teams to actually play the rest of their games. By May 2nd, the team seemed to have turned things around, posting a ten game pythag percentage of 43% despite losing to Detroit 4-1.

This being the Royals, though, they promptly lost 14 of their next 18 games and hit another low point on May 23, playing like a 30-132 team (18%) and losing to Detroit 8-5.

Thankfully, all has not been lost. From that point forward, we have seen a steady climb to mediocrity with a high point of a 65% pythag record over a ten game stretch from June 16th through the 27th (capped off by a 9-8 victory at Cincinnati).

Heading into the All-Star break, the Royals have managed to impersonate an above average major league baseball team. Over the last 30 games, the numbers say the Royals should be winning 53% of the time. That’s an 86-76 ball club only needing a few more pieces to contend.

That’s a team that’s fun to root for.

Enjoy Pittsburgh, Mark Redman.

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3 thoughts on “Sports – Winning Baseball? What!?!?”

  1. I find your blogs fascinating. Have you ever considered the world of statistics as a career option? Forgive me if this is already your profession, as it is quite likely that it is. You are quite brilliant. Thank you for providing such interesting commentary and mathematical information on my favorite baseball team.
    Truly,
    A Fan

  2. I find your blogs fascinating. Have you ever considered the world of statistics as a career option? Forgive me if this is already your profession, as it is quite likely that it is. You are quite brilliant. Thank you for providing such interesting commentary and mathematical information on my favorite baseball team.
    Truly,
    A Fa

  3. Okay, so I won’t be as flowery as the guy who posted before me, but I enjoy reading your stuff, dude. I’m a Royals Fan. Thanks for making a place I can come to for good, solid info on them. I see you also write stuff. How come nothing’s changed for a while? I like your style. Write something.
    –Anonymous from Mississippi

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