NERD Game Scores for June 5, 2017

Devised originally in response to a challenge issued by sabermetric forefather 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.

How are they calculated? Haphazardly, is how. An explanation of the components and formulae which produce these NERD scores is available here. All objections to the numbers here are probably justified, on account of how this entire endeavor is absurd.

Most Highly Rated Game
St. Louis at Cincinnati | 19:10 ET
Martinez (73.0 IP, 82 xFIP-) vs. Wojciechowski (8.0 IP, 151 xFIP-)
The Toronto-Oakland game receives the same score as this St. Louis-Cincinnati contest according to the author’s defective calculus; however, it also feature two left-handed starters. The positioning of the A’s center-field camera tends to distort the movement of a left-hander’s pitches, the ball effectively leaving the pitcher’s hand at the extreme left-hand side of a shot, traveling the entire breadth of the screen, and arriving at the plate on the right-hand side of the shot. The camera in Cincinnati isn’t superior, but the Cards-Reds game offers two right-handers instead — and also the Reds’ offense, which remains the second best in the majors.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: St. Louis Radio.

Another Brief Note
Today’s Free Game
Today’s free game features Toronto at Oakland, starts at 22:05 ET, and can be accessed by means of this hyperlinked text.

Complete Schedule
Here’s the complete and also sortable table for all of today’s games. Pitching probables and game times aggregated from MLB.com and the rest of the internet. Note that calculations both for team and game NERD scores feature adjustment for postseason odds that increases as season progresses. Read more about those adjustments here and here.