Is AL Central really the best?

by SLOtown on Sep 3, 2006 5:37 PM PDT Comment 24 comments

You've heard it all year long, and I heard it again in the Angels/Tigers pregame: "The red-hot Twins, the World Champion White Sox, and the Tigers: First place in baseball's toughest division." This got me thinking, so I did a little research. Let's look at the average win totals by division.

AL East: 68.0 wins per team
AL Central: 71.4 wins per team
AL West: 71.0 wins per team

For fun, here's the NL:

NL East: 69.0 wpt
NL Central: 63.2 wpt
NL West:67.6 wpt

So there you go. The AL Central is the toughest, but not by as much as you'd think. If the Angels win tonight, which they may with Escobar on the hill (7-0 lifetime vs. Detroit), our WPT would be at 71.25. That's less that 1 division-wide win. Why hasn't the west been hyped? Besides East-coast bias, I think it's because the west doesn't have 100 game winners every year, we rarely have the best team in baseball. I believe the last time that happened it was the Mariners. What we do have is four decent teams that have a legitimate chance of winning every night no matter who they play. The East and Cetral have punching bags at the bottom of their division, all we have are the very capable (except against us) Mariners.

Here's a fun fact: using this measurement, the NL East is stronger than the AL East. What a difference Ortiz and Ramirez make.

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AL Central also has that WPT while enduring the

winning percentages of the Royals (Worst in Baseball). You note that in your post analysis seemingly as 'look who the top guys in that division have to face,' and that is valid, but those same top dogs in those divisions are more than making up (in the winning per team of the division) for those punching bags. Therefore, they must really be strong (numbers backing up perception). So- for me- your numbers were a little decieving when I first read them, but it was nice of you to point out that we do not have nearly the number of 'gimme' games withing the division.

by StewFan on Sep 3, 2006 6:20 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

"Enduring?"

The other AL Central teams aren't enduring the Royals, they're thriving on their presence. It makes no sense to eliminate the Royals from the calculation while leaving DET, MIN, and CHW with all the wins they piled up from playing the Royals so often.

The AL West has had the best record of any AL division every season from 2000-2006. In that span, the big, bad AL East Champ has only finished ahead of the AL West champ twice.

by Danny on Sep 4, 2006 9:17 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

yes, the Win Per Team Stat For The AL Central IS

Enduring the Roylas. The Royals have not only been bad in relation to their own division. My point is that the OVERALL Win Per Team Stat is suffering from having to factor in the Royals crappy record and is still pretty good for the Division.

Also within a division (games played between division opponents the Win Per Team Stat, I believe, would (again to use the term) endure both a win and a loss, no matter how good or bad or what divisionthe teams are in.

I do not understand what you are trying to tell me.

by StewFan on Sep 4, 2006 10:23 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

My point

is that a lot of the wins from the top teams in the AL Central have come against the Royals. It would be more "misleading" to leave the Royals out of the analysis than to leave them in.

by Danny on Sep 4, 2006 10:39 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

But you seem to be missing that:

for each win an AL Central team gets against the Royals that counts as a loss for the Royals. For the Purposes of the Stat Win Per Team, the DIVISION RECORD recieves both a loss and a win. If anything, the Royals being a bad team helps other division's Win Per Team because when the Mariners Beat the Royals, the AL West recieves a Win and the AL Central recieves a loss (for the purposes of Wins Per Team).

I think, though I was missing a key part of the diary post in that all of this discussion is coming about because of an offhand comment made by some BSPN commentator.

by StewFan on Sep 4, 2006 10:50 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Every division

has a net .500 record against itself. All of the variation comes from games played against non-divisional opponents.

Ultimately, though, this is irrelevent to the argument.

Is the AL Central really the best?

Well, that depends on how you define the best.

Does it have the most quality at the top? Without doing a complicated analysis, I would say the answer is probably yes.

Does it have the most quality at the bottom?
No, not even close. That would be the AL West.

Does it have the most overall quality?
It's extremeley close, essentially a tie between the AL Central and West.

So, which way of looking at it is best? Well, that depends on the context of your discussion.

Are you trying to put a team's record in context? Well then you shouldn't be focusing on division stregth, you should be focusing on strength of schedule or, if you really want to talk about the division, take the average record of teams not including the team in question.

If you're wondering which team on the outside, looking in was most robbed or which team on the inside looking out was given a gift, then you probably want to look the top few teams, ignoring the bottom feeders.

Another project of Devo's

by devo on Sep 5, 2006 9:54 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

yeah, I get that and agree.

I was only trying to point out (in my original post) that the Win Per Team stat IS dragged down for the AL Central because they have one of (if not THE) worst teams in baseball dragging that Division Win Total (and thusly the Wins Per Team) down. Danny seemed to take umbridge (is that the right word?) with my pointing this out and I seem to have had a hard time getting him to see what I was saying (and, in fairness I think I may very well have been missing what he was saying as well).

Thanks for the thoughtful response (it appears as though you were (to some degree) trying to calm the thread down). At least it did allow me to take a step back and be less frustrated.

by StewFan on Sep 5, 2006 7:57 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

I think its close

...but the Central also has 5 teams including the Royals (sorry royals fans but the fact is they only have 51 wins). That brings the average wins down... without the Royals the average goes up to 75.6 wins

Living in the mitten is second best to being Canadian...

Lets go GVSU!

by Alisa on Sep 3, 2006 6:22 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

haha

same time...same point i guess

Living in the mitten is second best to being Canadian...

Lets go GVSU!

by Alisa on Sep 3, 2006 6:23 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

No

"I hate the Angels"

by Vegas A's Fan on Sep 3, 2006 7:09 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

The Indians and Royals

Are both much better than their record, according to their run differentials. The Indians are actually a good team and could easily win the central next year, while the Royals, while obviously not good, have a bunch of young guys who can hit and may have an above average offense in two years.

by Nick86 on Sep 3, 2006 7:32 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

In the AL Central,

the A's would be about tied for 4th (and about tied for 2nd). But the Mariners and Rangers can give the Indians and Royals a run for their money any day, so...

'pends how you look at it, I supposey.

I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal

by Nico on Sep 3, 2006 7:52 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

I think this looks at it the wrong way...

Shouldn't you subtract intra-division games(games within each division) from the records?

Bill James on Duane Kuiper: "It's absolutely incredible that a player this bad could be given 3000 at bats in the major leagues." -- Baseball Abstract, 1982

by blueconversechucks on Sep 3, 2006 8:17 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

as well as against the NL

because each division plays different teams AND (with very few exceptions) the NL is weak.

by StewFan on Sep 3, 2006 8:44 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

But you can't throw out the NL games

or the Red Sox are just a .500 team!

I like Cindi. A. She never pretends to know more than she does. B. She has unbridled enthusiasm for her "Hotties," and isn't afraid to show it. -IM4Oakgal

by Nico on Sep 3, 2006 9:15 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

andn the Mariners would have

an even worse record this season

by OaklandSi on Sep 4, 2006 8:21 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

If you throw out intra-division games

You'd be losing a win and a loss. I figured games within the division would not be a factor, since every division plays .500 against itself. Maybe I'll check it out tomorrow, but it's late here in Idaho and I must get to rest. Go A's.

Doesn't Magic Johnson sound like a porno name?

by SLOtown on Sep 3, 2006 11:08 PM PDT reply actions 0 recs

throwing out intra-division and inter-league games

the AL east is 142-162 (42.68%) combined against the AL central and west
the AL central is 139-142 (50.35%) combined against the AL east and west
the AL west is 164-141 (53.77%) combined against the AL east and central

the overall numbers show the AL west is by far the superior division - doesn't even really seem to be much of a competition.

further breakdown:
AL east - vs central 72-68 (51.43%); vs west 70-94 (46.71%)
AL central - vs east 68-72 (48.57%); vs west 71-70 (50.35%)
AL west - vs east 94-70 (57.32%); vs central 70-71 (49.65%)

"Apparently there's a rule that you have to be old enough to drive yourself to the induction ceremony. So obviously that's not gonna work."

by F171615 on Sep 4, 2006 4:07 AM PDT reply actions 0 recs

corrections:

the AL east combined win% is 46.71% - the 42.68% is for against the west
the AL central combined win% is 49.47% - the 50.35% is for against the west

maybe it's a little late for me to be doing all this number stuff.

"Apparently there's a rule that you have to be old enough to drive yourself to the induction ceremony. So obviously that's not gonna work."

by F171615 on Sep 4, 2006 4:12 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Thank you

for doing that for me. Thats much better than I thought. Maybe the diffrence is in the number of teams per division.

Doesn't Magic Johnson sound like a porno name?

by SLOtown on Sep 4, 2006 8:54 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

So ...

the West is better than the East ...
the East is better than the Central...
and the Central is better than the West ...

Illuminating.

Another project of Devo's

by devo on Sep 5, 2006 9:57 AM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

of course it was the ckicken that hatched the egg

that came from the egg from the chicken that came first

"Apparently there's a rule that you have to be old enough to drive yourself to the induction ceremony. So obviously that's not gonna work."

by F171615 on Sep 5, 2006 4:40 PM PDT up reply actions 0 recs

Best way to do it is

simply remove the sub .500 teams. If everyone's complaining about who gets to beat up on the Royals and D-Rays, how about only looking at the teams that are decent.

Look at each division's record against +.500 teams and let's see which division performs the best against quality teams.

by fadedash on Sep 4, 2006 10:19 AM PDT reply actions 0 recs