Last week ESPN’s Keith Law said there’s literally nothing the Baltimore Orioles can do to convince him they are a good team. This rubbed some people the wrong way in Baltimore.
I’ve seen a lot of angry tweets.
KLaw pointed to the Orioles run differential (currently -22 as I type this) as a reason that they aren’t a good team. I wrote back in August about how the O’s run differential is heavily weighed down by some major losses to the Rangers and Angels. I tweeted this find and an up and coming sports journalist named Peter Gammons (perhaps you’ve heard of him) retweeted the statistic.
If you follow BSR on Twitter, I give nightly updates of the Orioles run differential against all teams but the Angels and Rangers. If you want to do the math yourself, just add 63 to their current run differential.
As of Wednesday morning, the Birds run differential against teams not from Anaheim or Arlington is +41. Against their current opponent, the Tampa Bay Rays, the Orioles have have a +14 run differential (outscoring them 20-6) over their last five meetings.
If you’re still not buying this lame stat and thinking that the Orioles are lucky or flukey through five and a half months of the season, they haven’t lost back-to-back games since August 16-17 against the Red Sox and Tigers.
Peter Gammons has forgotten more about baseball than Keith Law ever knew in the first place.
Mr. Harvard made some stupid assessments and now he doesn’t have the balls to say he was wrong.
I know some guys like that myself.
Stat Boy wants to know why the BSR needs to skew numbers to bolster their argument…i’m here to tell you that giving numbers but exempting the numbers you don’t like so that your argument looks better certainly will get the wine and cheese crowd to call you out…Even an east side guy cannot allow, I say cannot allow this distortion of unequivocal facts…Surely, ‘Golf Guy’ would like to drop strokes off a great round of golf to allow ‘Golf Guy’ lasting trash talk at the 19th Hole but ‘Golf Guy’ would lose credibility…Don’t skew numbers to suit your argument…I’m just sayin’…
I really like this analogy. As I’m sure you know Stat Boy, baseball teams are ultimately only judged on wins and losses at the end of the year. The team that scores the most runs isn’t the team that wins the division. It’s the team that has the most W’s.
Using “Golf Guy” as a comparison… it would be like saying “Golf Guy” can’t win this round because he only drives the ball 100 yards, even though he’s tied for the lead through the first 16 holes. No one cares what it takes to get you there. As long as you do.
And furthermore the stats about how you got there don’t define how good of a team (or golfer) you are. Wins and losses (or distance off the tee box) are the only things teams (or golfers) are judged on. Are the Red Sox (64-79) a better team than the Orioles (80-62) because they’ve scored 2 more runs than them this season? Ask their front office if they feel better knowing they outscored the team tied for the lead in the division.
The golf analogy is wrong if you are using stroke play. The valid comparison is match play where you win or lose each hole and the cumulative strokes (while admittedly usually an indicator of who is doing better) doesn’t determine the outcome. I can certainly win my match 3-and-2 despite having blown up and taken triple bogeys on several of the holes.
DBH,
“Stat Boy” as he is now calling himself, will never admit his own mistakes.
He loves to focus on his predictions that he hits on (very few) but will never admit defeat on the ones he’s been dead wrong on.
O’s wins? He started off in Spring Training saying 100 losses or 62 wins.
He “fine tuned” it in July when he said 70-75 wins, proclaiming “bookmark it, archive it”.
Now that he is 18 games off his original prediction, 10 and counting on his second prediction, 5 and counting on his 3rd prediction, his only retort is “next year is going to be bad”. LMAO
He’s a hater, like a jilted lover, and he can’t give it up. And he’s a stalker using bogus names, etc.
LMAO
Sort of like, how many licks it takes to get to the center of a lollipop!
I had a sandbox friend in college who practiced with lollipops,,,,,,,,,,she was excellent in the sandbox , practice makes perfect,,,,,,,,,,,
Stat Boy is trying to hide behind a new name…let me tell you why…
He predicted “100 losses” in March or 62 wins.
Then he predicted “70-75” wins around July, a “colossal collapse” were his words… “bookmark it, archive it”
Now we have the gloom and doom forecast for “next year” as his other 3-4 predictions have gone down the shitter.
Throw 5-6 predictions out there and focus on the 1 or 2 you got right, is tht how you do it “Stat Boy”?
By the way, nice retort Zach on the golf analogy. Just because a golfer can’t drive very well doesn’t mean his short game and putting don’t make up for it.
Stat Guy, who hasn’t watched many games all year, still hanging on to fantasy baseball statistics to bolster his faltering arguments.
LMAO
Now he’s trying to say “next year they