As Ranger Fans, we are constantly beaten over our heads with the fact that TBPIA is a decisive advantage for our offense and a hindrance to our pitching staff. Even with Park Factor Data, at first glance Texas has a few major concerns.

Well, contrary to the initial glance, TBPIA is actually fairly consistent with the rest of MLB parks in baseball. There are very few areas that are a concern, such as triples and sacrifices, but as a whole we fall into the "norms" of the rest of baseball.

Now before I get chased out of town as a lunatic spouting gibberish, let me explain how I derived these numbers and more importantly what I learned about the AL West.

Let’s start with getting the Data. I used the 3 year park factor data from 2006-2008. This is available here in Excel 2007 format.  I then used some very basic statistical approaches. First derive the mean or average of all the categories. I then derived the standard deviation of each category in the spread sheet as well.

I then subtracted the Park Factor of whatever team I was sampling from the MLB average. Let’s call this that particular team’s distance from the mean   At this point it is a simple "IF" function with Excel. If the absolute value of a team’s distance from the mean is greater than or equal to the standard deviation, it fell into the "Fail" category, if not it was "Good".

At one Standard Deviation, this if we assume with our 30 samples that the data is a normal curve, encompasses roughly 68% of all the ballparks In the MLB or 20 ballparks. Texas fell within 1 standard deviation in all but 3 of the 26 categories in the test data. Out of those 3, triples, at bats, and sacrifices, only at bats and triples would have a large effect on the offensive output.  Needless to say, runs, RBI's and home runs fell within the "norms" of baseball.

Now it is time for the fun part. Let’s compare that to the rest of the AL West. The Angels home park "Fails" the at bats, hits and walks categories, which is a nice plus to the pitching staff.  The Mariners home park "Fails" the games criteria, walks, strike outs, stolen bases, caught stealing, and hit by pitch categories. And then there is Oakland.

McAfee Coliseum is a major advantage, regardless how you break up the numbers. It "Fails" in the at bats, runs, total bases, extra base hits, RBI’s, strike outs, caught stealing, stolen base percentage, batting average, on base percentage, slugging percentage, OPS, ground outs and air outs.  In any case of how you slice it, that is a huge factor in offensive performance.  

Is the BPIA the major problem with the pitching, No. Is the BPIA the reason for the Ranger's offensive success, No.  Is our park comparative to most parks in the league, Yes. 

All these snide remarks we Rangers fans get beat down with now have a better answer than "No, our pitching really is that bad" or "No, our offense is really pretty damn good". Next time just say that the BPIA falls within one standard deviation of all the major offensive categories, and is easily within the ranges that would be classified as the "norms" of the MLB. If they look at you funny, tell them to go look it up.

If you want the  excel file with the formulas or the charts that would be associated with this, email me at laxtonto@hotmail.com and leave a note in the thread to check my email.