BP: PECOTA Predictions?

by RangerMoto on Oct 3, 2007 10:58 AM CDT

I've seen this linked around the intertubes and was wondering if anyone has a subscription so we could have some insight into how accurately PECOTA predicted the 2007 standings.

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=6035

Just a simple "yes, it predicted really freaking well" or "nah, they were about 50/50" would be fine.

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An excerpt, without the commentary

An excerpt:

That leaves things to settle out as follows:

AL East PECOTA (3/27/07) Nate
-----------------------------------------
New York Yankees 93-69 95-67
Boston Red Sox 92-70 92-70
Toronto Blue Jays 80-82 82-80
Tampa Bay Devil Rays 78-84 75-87
Baltimore Orioles 75-87 74-88

AL Central PECOTA (3/27/07) Nate
-----------------------------------------
Minnesota Twins 91-71 88-74
Cleveland Indians 90-72 89-73
Detroit Tigers 85-77 88-74
Chicago White Sox 73-89 77-85
Kansas City Royals 66-96 66-96

AL West PECOTA (3/27/07) Nate
-----------------------------------------
Los Angeles Angels 86-76 88-74
Oakland Athletics 80-82 82-80
Texas Rangers 80-82 77-85
Seattle Mariners 73-89 73-89

NL East PECOTA (3/27/07) Nate
-----------------------------------------
Philadelphia Phillies 87-75 86-76
New York Mets 86-76 88-74
Atlanta Braves 82-80 83-79
Florida Marlins 79-83 77-85
Washington Nationals 66-96 59-103

NL Central PECOTA (3/27/07) Nate
-----------------------------------------
Chicago Cubs 85-77 87-75
Milwaukee Brewers 85-77 83-79
St. Louis Cardinals 81-81 81-81
Houston Astros 80-82 81-81
Pittsburgh Pirates 76-86 74-88
Cincinnati Reds 71-91 72-90

NL West PECOTA (3/27/07) Nate
-----------------------------------------
Arizona Diamondbacks 88-74 88-74
San Diego Padres 86-76 86-76
Los Angeles Dodgers 80-82 82-80
Colorado Rockies 79-83 76-86
San Francisco Giants 79-83 81-81

by DJCahill on Oct 3, 2007 10:58 AM CDT reply actions

Looks like...

...they were pretty low on Win totals in both leagues.

Still, fairly impressive. Looks like the only glaringly misplaced teams are the Twins, Rockies and Mariners. Way, way, way off on Giants, D-Rays, A's & Rangers records though.

Thanks, Cahill.

What's the deal with all the artists?

by RangerMoto on Oct 3, 2007 11:25 AM CDT up reply actions

Mariners

and when you consider Pyth. they weren't that far off on the Mariners, either.

Baseball Fever - catch it!

by t ball on Oct 3, 2007 11:57 AM CDT up reply actions

Wins and PECOTA

PECOTA will always tend to have predicted wins bunched around the middle, because in general, teams that win a lot of games are playing above their "true talent" level. They usually get a couple of fluky career years or so.

I'm gonna check this theory, with a randomly chosen >95-win team...

Randomly chosen year: 1997.

Randomly chosen team: Baltimore.

Interestingly enough, I could only find two flukish years, both in the pitching staff: SP Scott Kamieniecki and RP Randy Myers.

However, they had a bunch of players (Mussina, Key, Erickson, Alomar, Anderson, Surhoff, Hoiles, Hammonds, Benitez, Orosco, Rhodes) all performing at peak levels at the same time. Not exactly fluky career years, but all of those guys were performing at established peak levels, and nobody really underperformed. They got lucky in the sense that nobody really had an off year, basically.

So anyway, PECOTA will tend to smush the win distributions together because it's not going to predict perfect storms of performance like that.

by a bebop a rebop on Oct 3, 2007 9:44 PM CDT up reply actions

N.L.

They did pretty good in the N.L.

Predicted Phillies, Cubs and D-Backs as the division winners, with the Padres being in a one game playoff for the wild card (against the Mets, rather than the Rockies).

Predicted Angels, Twins and Yanks in the A.L., with the BoSox as wild card.

by Adam J. Morris on Oct 3, 2007 11:00 AM CDT reply actions