Pacific Northwest-Coast Bias

Andrew Luck may be this year’s Heisman Trophy winner. This would be quite the feat for a West Coast athlete from a school other than USC.

In the last 40 years, there have only been 4 Heisman Trophy winners from players in the Pacific Time Zone (All from USC, Reggie Bush included in the totals). Mountain Time Zone fairs even worse with only 2 winners. Heisman voters don’t stay up late on Saturday night.

Interestingly, the last player from the West Coast that won the Heisman Trophy and didn’t come from USC was QB Jim Plunkett in 1970, from none other than Stanford.

But the real Heisman bias is not in region, but in position. If you’re not a QB or RB, you’re probably not winning. Only 3 non-QB/RBs have won the trophy in the past 40 years.

As I watched the Game of the Century last week and saw LSU beat Alabama, I asked myself, why was Alabama favored by 4.5 when conventional wisdom states that home field advantage is worth only 3 points, and Alabama was facing the #1 team in the country? They should not be favored by more than 3!

Could bookies be over-weighting the value of Alabama’s homefield advantage? Turns out they did, as LSU won the game by 3.

I double-checked Jeff Saragin‘s estimate of home field advantage, and it turns out it was lower than the expected 3 points, at 2.6. I wondered, is the value of home field advantage declining?

Yes, the value of home field advantage is on the decline.

Leveraging Jeff Saragin’s online models going back through the 1998 season, I charted the value of home field advantage in each season, and did a simple linear regression to determine the trend. Indeed, there’s a downward slope, and the R-squared is .47, not too shabby.

Why is this happening? Looking at the chart, it appears 2005 was the year things changed, with every year but 1 since then having home field advantage below 3 points.

Instant Replay was introduced in 2005!

Consistent with Sports Illustrated’s examination of what drives the value of home field advantage (officiating) (don’t have the link, here’s a similar piece published by Wired), the introduction of instant replay in 2005 drastically reduced the value of home field advantage. Here’s a chart with the averages pre and post-2005.

Up until 2005, home field advantage was worth almost 4 points. Once the impact of bad calls were reduced, which are more likely to be in the home team’s favor, home field advantage dropped precipitously to 2.6.

I don’t know if everyone’s expectations have been re-set on home field advantage, but don’t put as much stock in the home team. And, it Instant Replay technology improves, or the rules committee expands the uses or frequency of Instant Replay, expect the value of home field advantage to decline even further.

College Football season is upon us. It’s about time!

I wondered, who has the toughest schedule going into the season, and what conference has lined up the toughest opponents?

A tough out-of-conference schedule can mean boom or bust for college football teams. With only a 12 -game season, it’s tough to make up for an early loss, even against a top team. Indeed, the risk-reward balance is out-of-whack when the system rewards preservation of a perfect record over any 1-loss team despite their schedule.

Methodology: I looked at each of the 6 BCS automatic-qualifying (AQ) conferences and looked at their non-conference games. I calculated the % of games played against the top 6 conferences, plus Notre Dame and Boise State.

Conference Strength of Schedule

The ACC has lined up a pretty tough schedule. 44% of non-conference games are against other BCS AQ schools. In fact, 8 of the 12 teams play >=2 games against AQ teams, and only Virginia Tech lined up a schedule of cupcakes (0 AQs). My hypothesis is that this does not bode well for the ACC when it comes to top 25 rankings, and that we’ll see the conference under-represented come the end of the year.

The Pac 12, Big East, and Big 12 are in the middle – 40% – 33% of non-conference games against AQ schools. The Pac 12 and Big 12 only have 3 non-conference games, so it’s a tall ask to schedule more than 1 AQ game.

The Big 10 and SEC are at the bottom. Both have 4 non-conference games, and average only 1 AQ opponent each. Only Ohio State, Iowa, Georgia, LSU, and Vanderbilt scheduled 2 AQ games.

Team Strength of Schedule

A couple teams have laid out a difficult path for themselves to run the table this season. Six teams have scheduled more than half of their non-conference games against AQ teams:

USC has lined up a killer schedule. Good luck Lane Kiffin. While they’re not facing the toughest of the AQ schools (Minnesota, Syracuse, and Notre Dame), any time you go up against another BCS AQ team, you’re in for a challenge. They have nothing to lose though, being ineligible for a bowl game due to sanctions. Similarly, Miami may have picked the right year to load up their non-conference schedule, as it faces looming NCAA sanctions as well.

My hypothesis is that none of these teams will be contending for a BCS bowl when all things are said and done. Two of them will be ineligible anyway.

Who are the teams that lined up cupcakes?

Arizona, Mississippi State, Ole Miss, Texas Tech, Virginia Tech. and Washington State are the only schools that scheduled an entirely non-AQ non-conference schedule. What a joke.

I remember starting pitchers getting 2-3 innings each in the All Star game. Not anymore. AL starter Jered Weaver got 1 inning in last night’s All Star game.

Not that it’s bad that more players get into the game now, but the starting pitcher, the best pitcher from each league, deserves more than a single inning in the game.

With rumors this week that at least one person is investigating sites to build an NBA arena in Bellevue (Bellevue SuperSonics, anyone?), I wondered what sites are under consideration.

How much space is needed?

First, I looked up the details of the most recently constructed NBA complex, Amway Center in Orlando, Florida. While the name is perhaps the worst name for an arena in the country (on par with Value City Arena for the Ohio State Buckeyes basketball team), the complex is state of the art. The compound sits on 9 acres and has garage parking.

It’s hard for me visualize how big 9 acres is, so I took to Bing Maps. Here’s a screen shot of the Amway Center site (1 inch = 1k feet).

I then isolated the arena with some additional land for parking, which I would use to size potential sites in Bellevue:

Option 1: Bellevue Downtown Park

Ok, this probably isn’t a real option, but if you truly wanted a downtown basketball arena in Bellevue, this site is perfect.

As you can see, the arena would fit perfectly in Bellevue Downtown Park. The site itself is 20 acres, which makes sense for the arena: ~9 acres for the arena and 11 acres for additional parking. Plus, with the Bellevue Square garage a block to the north, parking would be plentiful for 8pm games.

Now, the opposition to this site would be strong and powerful. Bellevue Downtown Park is a mini “Central Park” for Bellevue. It features a 1/2 mile running and walking trail, beautiful water features, and plenty of grass to play and relax on. With the influx of apartment and condo buildings in Bellevue, it has become one of the few open spaces in all of Bellevue. It would be a crying shame to bulldoze the site in favor of an NBA arena, but I’m just calling out the option.

Option 2: Car Dealership Row

Along 116th between Main and 8th, there’s a long stretch of defunct car dealerships. The real estate is prime yet undeveloped. There appears to be a massive opportunity to put something useful in this space, as well as cover up the cracking asphalt that now features weeds as high as corn stalks.

As you can see, the arena would not fit perfectly here. It overlaps the abandoned rail line (which could one day feature the East Link connection), and even butts up against the existing Best Buy and Home Depot.

But with a little creativity, the site could fit if the parking garages were placed to the north, south, and across the street from an arena built on the east side of 116th. The site definitely appears to be a possibility.

From a transportation perspective, the site is near perfect. It has easy highway access via 4th and 8th, would be near the future East Link train connection, and wouldn’t clog up downtown.

However, there would be plenty of opposition to this site as well. The Wilburton neighborhood would have plenty to say about this potential site. Basically, “NIMBY.” They have (so far) successfully fought off the NE 4th Street extension, which has been funded since 2009, but there are no signs of progress.

Option 3: Safeway Complex off 124th

Safeway has a huge distribution center and bottling facility on both sides of 124th. I heard on 710  ESPN that this was one of the sites the Chicago businessman who’s interested in bringing an NBA/NHL team to the area visited in Bellevue. Not sure exactly where he was looking, but there does look like ample room for a stadium.

It looks like not 1 but 3 arenas could fit on the site. Which means plenty of parking and the possibility of additional entertainment/eating/shopping along with the arena.

The close freeway access is another benefit, with 405 and 520 just a few blocks away. And, with light rail proposed in there area (proposal along 12th), it could be a sweet spot.

Another benefit is the fact that it’s largely an industrial area – very few houses are in the vicinity. There doesn’t appear to be a huge NIMBY problem with the Safeway site.

We may have a winner.

In the comments of the MLB close wins post, Justin Morgan proposed doing similar analysis for NCAA football. How do close wins in college football impact final standings? Do the national champions just get lucky and eek out close wins? Do certain coaches/programs have better luck over time in close wins?

To answer this, I picked out programs to analyze over the past 10 years. I chose all the national champions since 2002, and threw in Boise State, Oklahoma, Michigan, Notre Dame, and Washington (because that’s the team I’m stuck with) just for fun. The data set included all games by these 13 teams over the past 10 years.

I considered a “close game” as any game decided by 3 or fewer points. Not scientific, but generally games settled by 3 or fewer points are toss-ups which hinged on field goal or less. Do “successful” programs get more wins than their fair share via close games?

Win % vs. Close Game Win %

First of all, these teams (excluding Washington) are very successful. Five have win %s above 80% in the last 10 years.

But how does their “Close Game” win % compare? It’s much lower.

These teams do benefit from a better-than-average win % in close games, but at 56%, it’s only slight advantage. Based on 248 games in the last 10 years for these teams settled by 3 or fewer points, it’s a advantage of 1 game per team over 10 years. A 0.1 win-per-year advantage. Barely detectable.

Further, there’s no correlation between win % and “close game” win %.

With an R-squared of 0.004, it’s pure noise. Overall, there’s no advantage for these teams from close games, but for some individual teams, they did benefit from a better-than-fair share of close game wins…

Team-by-Team Basis

In the graphs above, Texas and Auburn have an extreme win % in close games (89% and 79%). How much of an advantage has this been?

Auburn and Texas have both benefited from 7 extra wins over the past 10 years had their win % been 50% in close games. In this day and age of 14-game seasons for top teams, it means that their win % has improved by ~5% based on these games. Not extreme, like I’ve observed in MLB, but it matters.

National Championship Seasons

What about teams in their National Championship seasons? Did they benefit from lucky seasons? Surprisingly, other than Auburn, the answer is no.

No team other than Auburn has more than 2 close wins in their entire National Championship campaigns. I was most shocked about Ohio State, who some felt have had underwhelming seasons over the past decade despite their stellar record. But in their championship season, they did not win 1 game by fewer than 3 points (although they had 2 overtime wins). Even in their 2006 and 2007 seasons when they lost in the championship, they had 1 win in both seasons combined by fewer than 3 points.

What lead matters?

So what lead matters? For these 13 teams, their wins over the past 10 years have been fairly evenly distributed for 1-point and 2-point games. But in 3-point games, a difference emerges.

So there you have it. 1-point and 2-point wins are bogus. They’re evenly distributed even for the best teams in football, including all the recent national champions. But a 3-point lead is special. It is deserved. Whether it’s talent, kicking, or coaching, good programs separate themselves from the pack in these types of wins.

In 2011, I’ll be watching teams that win games by 1 or 2 points. These teams got lucky, and may not have what it takes down the stretch.

Last year I lamented the Seattle Mariners and their tough luck losses in 1-run games. Last week’s 3 losses in a row to the Nationals in 1-run fashion reminded me to check in on who’s benefiting from a small sample size of close victories.

You would expect teams to play about .500 ball in 1-run games. But looked to see which teams are being helped and hurt by tight victories, and what would happen if luck wasn’t necessarily in the team’s favor.

Tampa, San Francisco, and Arizona are getting lucky in 1-run games. On the other end of the spectrum, Oakland and Cincinnati don’t have much luck, with the lowest win percentage in 1-run games.

Interestingly, when I did this analysis last year, Oakland and Cincinnati led the league in 1-run wins, which demonstrates how random this stat is.

To correct for this randomness, I adjusted each team’s win total to reflect a .500 record in 1-run games. The goal was to eliminate the randomness from the records and see which teams really deserve to be leading their division.

Take 5 wins from San Francisco and 4 from Arizona. They don’t deserve them. Oakland and Cincinnati improve, with 4 and 3 wins added to their totals.

With all these adjustments, I determined the new MLB divisional leaders. Surprisingly, 4 of the 6 divisions have a change at the top.

Key Takeaways:

• That’s why the season is 162 games. This reaffirms just how much chance exists in baseball
• Just because upstarts Arizona and Cleveland are leading their division, don’t assume they are there to stay. They’ve been the beneficiary (and others the victim) of lady luck.
• Philadelphia and Texas look like the real deal.
• My poor Mariners – those 3 1-run losses last week were payback – they now have a .500 record in 1-run games.

Note: Data through 9pm PDT Saturday. Source: Baseball-Reference

First, the overwhelming feeling I have when reading Greatland is jealously. How I would love to write about pop culture and sports for 1,000 words or more per day and 1) get paid and 2) have people love it and beg me for more.

But the second feeling I have is how sports have become less awesome. The two stories that really struck a nerve with me over the past two weeks have been:

• Chuck Klosterman’s epic piece on sports in the DVR age
• An eerie-ly similar story by Michael Weinreb lamenting the end of the phrase “What’s the Score?”

What does this mean for the age of watching sports?

1. Watching sports doesn’t work in the post-TiVo world. Truly the only way to watch sports is live, on a flat screen LCD, with friends and beer, and in HD
2. If you didn’t see the game live, it’s like it never occurred

After watching my first game in widescreen HD, it’s basically ruined all other experiences. The most vivid game I can remember in HD was the 2007 Virginia Tech game versus LSU in 2007. I was at Ross Catrow’s parent’s house, and they had a ginormous HD screen. This was new technology to me. The game looked like nothing I’d ever seen before. I remember laughing to myself, only fools attended the game in person. We helped ourselves to grocery store beers and homemade salsa, while watching the game in higher-def than the fans at Tiger Stadium. I could see the linebacker and cornerback coverage all on the same screen as the typical line coverage. I was in heaven.

Why would anyone attend a game in person, or watch a game in standard-def, after that experience? I could see the blades of grass blow in the wind.

The sad thing is, attending sports in person used to be the pinnacle of life’s experiences. My friend Sam Miller saw the New York Yankees win the World Series in 2000. I was probably the most jealous person in the world. He told tales of the huge rivalry of the subway series, cursing out Met’s fans, and the jubilant atmosphere of Yankee Stadium, where he was the savior of the day by hitting an inflatable cow and keeping it aloft in the air.

Now, I would laugh in his face. He paid $500 to attend the game? Come on. I was in Boston last week for the NHL Stanley Cup Finals. My brother and I hit a bar right outside the TD Gardens and experienced the game in real style, watching the game (in HD) with 500 Boston Bruins fans screaming their heads off. With $3 beers. Life is good.

This is not a good development. Going to the actual game should be better than watching the game in a crappy bar across the street. But the truth is it’s not. Watching the game in HD with friends (or acquaintances) with cheap beer and food has suddenly become better than watching the game in person. Watching it at home with all of the above is even better. The in-person experience now sucks compared to the alternatives, and that’s bad for sports.

Secondly, there’s increasingly less point in trying to watch the game on tape-delay.

One of my favorite Seinfeld’s was when Jerry was trying to watch the tape delay of a baseball game, and when told the score before he could watch the game, his experience is ruined. There was no point in watching the game.

Now it’s harder than ever to try to watch a tape-delayed game. Between Facebook and Twitter status updates of every aspect of the game, added with apps, TV shows, and tickers constantly recounting game stats, it’s a magnificent accomplishment to time-shift a game.

I’ve only successfully accomplished the feat several times. Often, I think I’ve successfully navigated all obstacles, only to be disappointed. The OSU-USC game two years ago was a tragic example. I had the game recorded on TiVo. All friends were notified to cease communications. I had removed myself from technology to ensure I did not see the score.

But during an Ethiopian dinner (without TVs) with another couple, I mistakenly looked across the street to see a TV at a different restaurant showing an empty Ohio Stadium. I knew Ohio State was defeated. I did not bother watching the game.

And that’s the tragedy. I could not enjoy the tape-delayed game because I knew the outcome. This didn’t used to be a problem – I would consistently time-shift TV, especially sports, to the cadence that suited me. But with technology advanced to the stage it is today, it’s a losing battle. I give up.

What does this mean for future sports fans? The sad thing is, a game that was not watched live basically did not occur. It’s live or nothing. I find myself discounting games that I did not watch live and favor the plays/games that I watched first hand. People will be able to recall the SportsCenter highlights, but anything that did not make the reel will be ignored. Which is a tragedy.

Secondly, watching sports in-person will be discounted. Sure, Super Bowl tickets will still cost $2,000. But most sports fans will kick back and just watch television. For me, I’m going to do my best to watch games in person the way they were meant to be, whether that means watching high school football and basketball live, or scalping a rare seat to a championship game.

Finally, I will always respect other sports fans wishes. If they say they’re TiVo-ing the game, I’m going to give them their space. I’m not even going to say “You’re going to love the game.” Not cool. I promise to give others the space to enjoy the game in the method that they choose. I hope you do too.

Mariners win % with Milton Bradley: 41%

Mariners win % since Milton Bradley was released (May 16th): 64%

The East Coast bias in sports is pervasive. But on the first Monday in April, West Coasters get a little bit of revenge when the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship tips off at 9:23 pm Eastern Time.

The fact that it tips off so late is ridiculous. Yes, it’s nice that I get a chance to get home from work, cook up some wings, and enjoy the game. But if they started the game at 5 pm Pacific, I could make do. CBS is looking to maximize their dollars by stretching East Coasters to the limit while making it convenient for West Coasters.

I remember being 8 years old and desperately wanting to watch the Michigan – Seton Hall Championship game (interestingly, played in Seattle), but was not allowed because it started too late. The only way I got to experience the game was vicariously through my Grandpa the next morning when he recounted the smooth foul shots of Glen Rice to clinch the game.

Tonight, children up and down the East Coast will face the same fate as I did – bedtime before the Championship game even starts. But not the West Coast kids. They’ll be able to watch the entire game, and even fit in some video games before bed.

As for me, I’ll get to watch the game and not feel groggy the next morning, which doesn’t make up for 1989, but I’ll take it.