August 10, 2007

There Are No Monsters Under The Bed

On the morning of July 20, the Red Sox led the Yankees by 6.5 games.
           W   L   GB   RS   RA
Boston 56 39 -- 471 381
New York 49 45 6.5 505 422
Since then, New York has gone 14-6 while Boston has gone ... 13-6.
           W   L   GB   RS   RA
Boston 69 45 -- 589 460
New York 63 51 6.0 678 531
So in almost 3 weeks, New York has made up only one-half of one game.
           W   L   GB   RS   RA
Boston 13 6 -- 118 81
New York 14 6 +.5 173 109
At this pace, it will take the MFY about 36 weeks -- 9 months! -- to catch the Red Sox. That's roughly mid-May 2008.

And this is what is allegedly causing every Red Sox fan all over the globe to lay awake at night, in a cold sweat, chewing his or her fingernails while thinking of the nearest bridge to jump off of because the Big, Bad Yankees are coming to devour us?

9 comments:

Barbara Dembek said...

This is poor reasoning. By your logic, we can take a span of, say, a week where the Yankees gained three games on the Sox, and say "At this rate, they'll tie in two weeks!"

laura k said...

It's excellent reasoning, in the context of baseball and the current atmosphere of panic (or gloating, depending on your perspective).

The season is winding down. The Yankees are not catching us. The panic is unnecessary.

Thanks for making the comment a post. :)

tim said...

This is poor reasoning. By your logic, we can take a span of, say, a week where the Yankees gained three games on the Sox, and say "At this rate, they'll tie in two weeks!"

Obviously you have little business experience, as you think that micro-trends are the same as macro-trends.

By your logic, we can take a one day span, say, Tuesday, when the Yankees won and Red Sox lost, then say "At this rate, they'll tie in six days!"

A 19 game span is a better indicator of a long-term trend as opposed to a 7 day short-term trend. And clearly, long term trends are better indicators of a teams performance than short-term trends. When judging a season, you go by their long-term, 162 game record, right? Not their short-term, 7 game record.

allan said...

And the day-to-day GA for the Sox had no wild swings:

up 7.5
up 7.0
up 7.0
up 7.0
up 7.0
up 6.0
up 7.0
up 8.0
up 9.0
up 8.0
up 7.0
up 7.0
up 8.0
up 7.0
up 7.0
up 7.0
up 6.0
up 5.0
up 6.0

So the MFY spun their wheels for 3 weeks -- but the mediots are trying to get us to believe that they are practically stampeding past us.

Benjamin said...

I'm less concerned that the MFYs will come from behind to win the division than that they'll win the wildcard and cause us conniptions in the actual playoffs.

Joe Grav said...

Well, the more and more posts we see trying to convince us that there's nothing to worry about probably reflect the fact that there IS something to worry about.

allan said...

Posts from me or from the mediots?

allan said...

Since the Sox have not clinched, there is the chance they will lose the division.

That's doesn't mean what has been written in the papers is based on any kind of factual information.

laura k said...

Joe Grav, I think the posts telling us we have nothing to worry about are just meant to counter the panic that is out there. If people weren't panicking, I don't think we'd need the convincing. If that makes any sense.

****

Great gif!