Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Texas at Los Angeles AL | 22:05 ET
Perez (43.2 IP, 99 xFIP-) vs. Richards (161.0 IP, 94 xFIP-)
While human efforts to predict baseball have been dismissed by scientists — scientists dressed in real lab coats, surrounded by beakers of roiling and unnamed chemicals — have been dismissed as an exercise in futility, the attempt to project baseball has at least some foundation in actual mathematics. The sort of projections available at FanGraphs suggested in April, May, June, July, and August — suggested in all those months that a future in which the Texas Rangers’ qualified for the 2015 postseason was an improbable one. As of today, however, it’s decidedly less improbable.

Regard, the club’s various odds on the fourth of each month, up to and including the fourth of September:

Rangers’ Postseason Odds on Fourth of Each Month

Date	Division	Wild Card	Playoffs	Div Series
4/4	0.8%	2.3%	3.1%	1.8%
5/4	0.4%	0.5%	0.9%	0.6%
6/4	3.7%	6.1%	9.8%	6.6%
7/4	2.9%	5.8%	8.7%	5.7%
8/4	3.4%	12.5%	15.9%	9.3%
9/4	20.1%	40.9%	60.9%	39.1%

Rocketed northward, is what those postseason odds have done metaphorically. Increased by over 50 percentage points, is what they’ve done literally. One, observing the Rangers, is observing a group of individuals whose actions have become surprisingly relevant — as surprising and relevant as the lyrics of a Jewel song immediately after having been dumped unexpectedly.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Texas Radio.

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Episode 592
Dayn Perry is a contributor to CBS Sports’ Eye on Baseball and the author of three books — one of them not very miserable. He’s also the guest on this edition of FanGraphs Audio.

This edition of the program is sponsored by Draft, the first truly mobile fantasy sports app. Compete directly against idiot host Carson Cistulli by clicking here.

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 1 hr 1 min play time.)

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Chicago AL at Minnesota | 13:10 ET
Samardzija (182.0 IP, 104 xFIP-) vs. Gibson (158.0 IP, 101 xFIP-)
Were one committed to consuming at least one Twins game this season — and had also failed to satisfy the terms of that agreement so far this year — then today represents probably the ideal occasion on which to do so. For one, the club continues to maintain a curious proximity to the last wild-card spot. For two, there’s the opportunity to definitely observe Byron Buxton (who’s playing center and batting ninth) and possibly) Miguel Sano (who strangely absent from the lineup despite having declared a terrible war on major-league pitchers). And finally, Target Field features one of the league’s top center-field cameras.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Minnesota Radio.

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The Fringe Five is a weekly regular-season exercise, introduced a couple years ago by the present author, wherein that same author utilizes regressed stats, scouting reports, and also his own fallible intuition to identify and/or continue monitoring the most compelling fringe prospects in all of baseball.

Central to the exercise, of course, is a definition of the word fringe, a term which possesses different connotations for different sorts of readers. For the purposes of the column this year, a fringe prospect (and therefore one eligible for inclusion in the Five) is any rookie-eligible player at High-A or above both (a) absent from the most current iteration of Kiley McDaniel’s top-200 prospect list and (b) absent from the midseason prospect lists produced by Baseball America, Keith Law, and John Sickels, and also (c) not currently playing in the majors. Players appearing anywhere on McDaniel’s updated prospect list or, otherwise, selected in the first round of the current season’s amateur draft will also be excluded from eligibility.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Seattle at Houston | 20:10 ET
Walker (153.0 IP, 93 xFIP-) vs. Kazmir (154.0 IP, 94 xFIP-)
Baseball, in its current recognizable state, is roughly 150 years old — nor do the various earlier permutations of the sport appear to extend back much further than 1840. The Western sporting tradition, meanwhile, can be traced at least as far back as 776 BCE, i.e. the year of the first Olympic games. Broadly speaking, then, it’s not entirely inaccurate to suggest that baseball has existed for roughly 5% of all sporting history. As a sort of spiritual exercise, contemplate that figure while observing tonight’s game. Also contemplate, if you have time left over or whatever, the wonderful improbability of the Astros’ season.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Houston Television.

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Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
San Francisco at Los Angeles NL | 18:10 ET
Bumgarner (175.2 IP, 75 xFIP-) vs. Greinke (179.1 IP, 82 xFIP-)
This game — or, at least, the result of this game — doesn’t possess the sort of postseason implications that others of today’s do. The Blue Jays and Yankees, for example, remain separated by only 1.5 games in the AL East. The stakes for them, perpetually, are large — either playing in or bypassing the wild-card game. The Giants, meanwhile, currently feature somewhere in the vicinity of an 8% to 17% chance of reaching the divisional series, depending on the methodology one consults. They’re likely not to reach the postseason, it seems. Nor will a victory tonight — even against the division-leading Dodgers — alter that state of affairs greatly. A victory today would, however, create greater implications for tomorrow’s game. It would, in a sense, cultivate the possibility of something marvelous. This sort of possibility holds considerable appeal — if only because the human mind is poorly constructed to understand its improbability.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Basically All of Them.

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Episode 591
Dave Cameron is both (a) the managing editor of FanGraphs and (b) the guest on this particular edition of FanGraphs Audio, during which edition he discusses the dismissal by the Seattle Mariners of general manager Jack Zduriencik, certain comments by Dodgers general manager Andrew Friedman regarding defensive metrics, and the interaction inside a person between team allegiance and the analytical impulse.

This edition of the program is sponsored by Draft, the first truly mobile fantasy sports app. Compete directly against idiot host Carson Cistulli by clicking here.

Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio after the jump. (Approximately 43 min play time.)

Read the rest of this entry »

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Read the rest of this entry »

Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by viscount of the internet Rob Neyer, and expanded at the request of nobody, NERD scores represent an attempt to summarize in one number (and on a scale of 0-10) the likely aesthetic appeal or watchability, for the learned fan, of a player or team or game. Read more about the components of and formulae for NERD scores here.

Most Highly Rated Game
Cleveland at Toronto | 19:07 ET
Salazar (144.1 IP, 82 xFIP-) vs. Price (182.1 IP, 84 xFIP-)
If one accepts the principle that the most compelling sort of baseball games — especially in late August or early September — are those which offer the greatest implications for the postseason, then one is likely to find him- or herself drawn either to the Blue Jays or Yankees for the time being, which clubs are separated by merely 1.5 games in the AL East. If one’s choices are dictated more strongly by another sort of principle, however, then it’s impossible to say which contest, if any, he or she might prefer. This is, of course, the damning reality facing any attempt to rate games based on their aesthetic appeal. “So why even bother attempting it?” one might ask. To which question I reply: “The awful inertia of any human endeavor.”

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Cleveland Radio.

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