AL West - Simulation Rankings

by Xeifrank on Feb 12, 2008 3:34 PM CST

I am using my baseball simulator program to rank the teams in each of the six divisions. I have just completed running sims on the AL West (now that the Bedard trade is final). I play 2500 games pitting each team against each of the other three teams in the division. In each matchup 2500 games are played with the #1 pitcher going up against the other teams #1 pitcher, so on for all five starters. This is not a perfect study as there is no consideration to injuries or players more likely to lose playing time due to injuries than others. Nonetheless, the paprameters are equal for all teams. Surprisingly, the Rangers finished in 2nd place in the AL West, behind the Angels. ZIPS dislikes the Mariners offense and they finished last, even with Bedard on the team. I am also running seasonal simulations, playing through the 2008 schedule for each team to get an average win total for each team (that will come later).

Link to study

Results:

Angels
Rangers
A's
Mariners

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Comments

Seattle

Last place? I find that somewhat hard to believe. They aren't great, but they did finish 2nd last year and they made significant upgrades.

baseBALLIN!

by kevzta on Feb 12, 2008 3:49 PM CST reply actions

Bedard only significant upgrade,

the lost a future all star, an outfielder, and a first baseman.

They gained Wilky and Bedard. WooHoo. It would be mighty difficult for them to finish any higher than third place.

Ummm, I got nothing good to put here right now, that sucks!

by NYTXFAN on Feb 12, 2008 4:07 PM CST up reply actions

M's not that good

Go read the USSM blog, the author there also ran sims using ZIPS, but using the DMB simulator instead of mine and got results that had the Mariners as a mid to upper 70s win team. General consensus is that the Mariners were lucky to win as many games as they did last year.
vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 12, 2008 4:16 PM CST up reply actions

Fun.

What simulator are you using?

If I owned a lightsaber, the blade color would be black light, so that I could use it to fight evil and to liven-up parties.

by rooster on Feb 12, 2008 3:59 PM CST reply actions

Simulator

I wrote my own in VB. It has sabermetrical algorithms in it. Taking into consideration such things as park factors, tiring pitchers, lefty/righty splits, leverage index for changing pitchers, when to bunt, steal etc... Hitters rate stats are adjusted based on the pitchers rate stats and park they are playing in. It's probably similar to SBS or DMB sims. I wrote it so I put in some extra features. I can play a schedule/season and repeat it as many times as I want (automated). I can play a matchup of (for example) the Rangers vs Angels playing the same game with the same lineups and pitching matchups many times to get a game win expectancy. I can also start at any point during a game. ie - I can have the game start in the top of the 7th inning score tied 4-4 both starting pitchers just taken out, that way I can get a measurement of which bullpen might be better. I can play the game using the home teams park adjustment or play in a neutral park. I can also manage one of the teams, but I usually only do that for fun. I am using 2008 ZIPS Projections but you can edit the ascii files to put your own or other projection systems in place. I will gladly send anyone a copy of the program (Windows only) if you want to play around with it.

vr, Xeifrank
(xeifrank@yahoo.com)

by Xeifrank on Feb 12, 2008 4:14 PM CST up reply actions

Thanks. I might be interested.

But, I'm not sure what VB means. Virtual Baseball?

If I owned a lightsaber, the blade color would be black light, so that I could use it to fight evil and to liven-up parties.

by rooster on Feb 12, 2008 4:17 PM CST up reply actions

VB

Visual Basic. It's a programming language.
vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 12, 2008 4:19 PM CST up reply actions

question

can you run a realistic schedule?

you know - the actual schedule each team will play for the season?

I don't see how playing only the AL West over and over again is necessarily a simulation of how the teams record will turn out.

it's impressive though - what you're doing

by simplesimon on Feb 12, 2008 4:42 PM CST reply actions

He is

last sentence.

Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.

by WyoRanger on Feb 12, 2008 4:48 PM CST up reply actions

Season

I can do that, it just takes time. The simulation I ran was only to rank the AL West based on head to head matchups. When you rank four teams, you want to have them play each other only. In this simulation study I did not predict 2008 final records, only win percentage in games played against each other. Your suggestion is a good one and I will get around to it shortly. The results will probably be similar. I ran 25 seasons for the Angels already and they averaged 85.52 wins or a win% of .5279 which was very close to the .5272 that the AL West only simulation gave me.
vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 12, 2008 4:52 PM CST up reply actions

85.52 wins

The Angels are considered about as much of a shoo-in for the AL West title as McCain is for the GOP nomination, yet they are only expected to get 85-86 wins... guess we're getting the Rangers into the NL Central one way or another, eh? :D

by Inkara1 on Feb 12, 2008 6:50 PM CST up reply actions

Sweet

Xeifrank, I'd be interested in playing around with a copy of that. I'm new to the sabermetrics world, is it a difficult program to run? Also Visual Basic isn't required to run the program, correct? As long as I have Windows it will run? If you get the time I would appreciate the time to take a look at it.

by ESU1502 on Feb 12, 2008 5:01 PM CST reply actions

Program

Sure, just email me (address is above) and I will send you a zip file with the setup/install file in it. It runs on Windows XP/Vista and has an install wizard you run through. It's easy to run, but since it's not commercial it may have a few quirks. The more computer literate you are the better. :)
vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 12, 2008 5:06 PM CST up reply actions

How close

were the Rangers and Angels?

"LBrooks passes away... after the 'miracle' Rangers of '08 win the AL West." -slc ranger

by dstar442005 on Feb 12, 2008 6:28 PM CST reply actions

Top of diary

has a link to the study, which has a table showing how each team faired against each other and how close the Rangers were to the Angels. They weren't all that close. 2nd and 3rd was very close though.
vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 12, 2008 6:39 PM CST up reply actions

This guy

Is the classic opposite of a troll. He's a Dodger fan popping on to throw out some unique Rangers information.

Thanks!

Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.

by WyoRanger on Feb 12, 2008 6:51 PM CST reply actions

xeifrank, Dodger fan

is a frequent visitor to the Giants blog McCovey Chronicles, and is about as cordial as one could ask for, given the inherent rivalries of the two teams.

And the simulator is apparently accurate, as it has predicted the Giants to be terrible both last year and this.

by biff pocoroba on Feb 13, 2008 3:07 PM CST up reply actions

I think WyoRanger

was being sarcastic but not sure.

Never take life seriously. Nobody gets out alive anyway.

by coolaid on Feb 13, 2008 3:10 PM CST up reply actions

i think 'opposite of a troll'

was meant as a complement by WyoRanger. At least that's how I read it.

by LukeR on Feb 13, 2008 4:02 PM CST up reply actions

Fair enough

what is the "vr" abbreviation?

Variability reduction?

LSB : Trolls :: Rangers : 4th OF'ers

by inactive lsb user on Feb 13, 2008 5:19 PM CST up reply actions

vr

vr = very respectfully.
vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 13, 2008 6:07 PM CST up reply actions

Thanx for the effort......

sounds pretty interesting....With an Angel injury (or two) maybe the Ranger's can give 'em a scare....I'll e-mail for a copy.

by tklawless on Feb 12, 2008 7:15 PM CST reply actions

Interesting

If you run it with a real schedule, and when you do the other divisions, give us a shout.

A working class hero is something to be.

by t ball on Feb 12, 2008 7:55 PM CST reply actions

25 Seasons

I ran 25 seasons for the Rangers, with their 2008 schedule. This is how many seasons I've ran for other teams that I've looked at. Here are the results. Keep in mind there are other ways to fine tune this but it's a good excercise nonetheless.

Wins: 82.84
Losses: 79.16
Win%: .511358
StdDev: 5.89
Best record: 93-69
Worse record: 71-91
Most common record: 83-79 (5 times, 20% of the time)

vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 13, 2008 12:04 AM CST reply actions

Awesome

Thank you.

This is my signature.

by thedirkatron on Feb 13, 2008 1:18 AM CST up reply actions

How does that standard deviation

compare with other teams?

In RL, I would suspect that the Rangers would have more variability due to all of the injury risks, but you said that your sim doesn't really take that into account.

Glenallen Hill Secrets

by a bebop a rebop on Feb 13, 2008 8:20 AM CST up reply actions

StdDev

Your right, since it's not taking injuries into account you won't get the higher standard deviations. Of the 10 teams I've played 25 seasons for, the Rangers have the 3rd lowest standard deviation. My guess is that it's mostly based on luck and sample size. The simulator was originally written to simulate a game between two teams many times in which you don't want to take injuries into account. But in a seasonal sim it's nice to have players get a realistic amount of at bats and innings pitched etc... but even that can be guesswork and I am trying to eliminate guesswork.

vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 13, 2008 9:48 AM CST up reply actions

By the way

Here is the rotation, bullpen and lineup that I am using.

Millwood
Padilla
McCarthy
Gabbard
Loe

CL-Wilson
S1-Francisco
S2-Benoit
RP-Feldman
RP-Littleton
RP-Rheinecker

Kinsler
Young
Hamilton
Bradley
Blalock
Botts
Salt
Broussard
Cruz

I am not a Rangers fan, so if something looks way off please let me know. I got depth charts and lineups from Yahoo/Rototimes and ranked starting pitchers based on Zips rankings of each starter. I don't have time to run alot of seasonal sims with minor tweaks but I did send the program to two of your members to mess around with.

vr, Xei

by Xeifrank on Feb 13, 2008 1:25 AM CST reply actions

Well, you're pretty close -

Jason Jennings is in our rotation now, and the bullpen features Kazuo Fukumori and Eddie Guardado, but other than that, those linups and rotations you found are pretty close.

Although that simulation seems to think Scott Feldman is a lot better pitcher than he really is...

I could use some baseball.

by LSJ on Feb 13, 2008 1:32 AM CST up reply actions