White Sox defied the statistics geeks
By the numbers, Chicago never should have even been in playoffs
 David J. Phillip / AP The White Sox's Scott Podsednik, who hit a triple in the third inning of Game 4 of the World Series on Wednesday, was viewed as a fraud by sabermetricians, writes columnist Bob Cook. |
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By the calculations of those who use terms such as OPS and VORP in casual conversation, the White Sox should have finished at least six games behind the Cleveland Indians in the American League Central, and at least three games behind the Boston Red Sox or the New York Yankees in the wild card. "The ChiSox are quite simply the luckiest team in baseball," Bob Collins wrote Oct. 24 in "Bleacher Bums," his Minnesota Public Radio baseball blog.
Though Collins notes he is an Indians fan, and he serves an audience in the home of the Twins, his feelings are shared by those who aren't fans of a Sox divisional rival.
The first measure by which the White Sox are declared lucky is based on the Pythagorean formula. It has nothing to do with triangles, or anything else you slept through in your high school geometry class. The formula calculates expected victories by this equation: the number of runs scored squared, divided by the number of runs scored squared plus the number of runs allowed squared. (A more accurate formula has those numbers being taken to the 1.83 power, but my cheap calculator won't let me make that calculation.)
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Most teams' expected record falls within about three games of their actual won-loss record. The White Sox, depending on various formulas employed by Baseball Prospectus, should have been seven to 11 games worse than their 99-63 record, far and away the biggest discrepancy in the majors.
Instead of being the best in the American League, the Sox, with 741 runs scored and 645 allowed, should have finished an also-ran, somewhere between 87-75 and 91-71. (The Indians, meanwhile, should have finished somewhere between 96-66 and 100-62, rather than 93-69, according to Baseball Prospectus.)
Worse yet, the White Sox offended sabermetricians with their style of play. By their calculations, bunting and stealing, two strategies employed often by the White Sox, are counterproductive, sacrificing outs for hits over the long term. Sure, the White Sox hit 200 home runs, but they also got thrown out stealing a league-high 67 times (while stealing 137 bases).
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