NERD Game Scores for Sunday, September 27, 2015

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 Houston | 14:10 ET
Perez (65.2 IP, 104 xFIP-) vs. Keuchel (219.0 IP, 68 xFIP-)
Houston’s win Saturday (box) — on the strength largely of a combined four home runs from their middle infield alone — allowed the club to reclaim a game in the standings from Texas in the AL West and, more importantly, to retain a half-game lead over Los Angeles for the second wild-card spot. With seven dates left on their schedule, however, basically nothing has been resolved wherein the Astros’ postseason future is concerned. According to the methodology used at the site, they possess a 60% probability of qualifying for the playoffs in some form and 32% probability of advancing to the divisional series. The suspense, not unlike a cave-aged gruyère or cave-aged some other sort of comestible, is delicious.

Readers’ Preferred Broadcast: Texas Radio.

Another Brief Note
Today’s Free Game
Today’s free game features Cleveland at Kansas City, starts at 14:10 ET, and can be accessed by means of this hyperlinked text.

Complete Schedule
Here’s the complete and very sortable table for all of today’s games. Pitching probables and game times aggregated from MLB.com and also the rest of the internet. Note that the calculations both for team and game NERD scores have changed recently to better integrate playoff odds into same. Read more about those adjustments here and here.

Away		SP	Tm.	Gm.	Tm.	SP		Home	Time
Erik Johnson	CHA	3	4	5	5	8	NYA	Luis Severino	13:05
Matt Andriese	TB	4	4	5	5	5	TOR	Mark Buehrle	13:07
Ervin Santana	MIN	5	5	4	4	2	DET	Randy Wolf	13:08
Shelby Miller	ATL	7	4	5	5	3	MIA	Tom Koehler	13:10
Jacob deGrom	NYN	10	5	5	4	2	CIN	Keyvius Sampson	13:10
Ubaldo Jimenez	BAL	5	5	4	4	3	BOS	Henry Owens	13:35
Aaron Harang	PHI	1	4	4	5	7	WAS	Gio Gonzalez	13:35
Danny Salazar	CLE	9	5	5	4	1	KC	Chris Young	14:10
Martin Perez	TEX	6	6	8	10	9	HOU	Dallas Keuchel	14:10
Tyler Cravy	MIL	2	4	5	6	6	STL	John Lackey	14:15
His. Iwakuma	SEA	8	4	6	8	2	LAA	Jered Weaver	15:35
Chris Heston	SF	4	5	4	4	0	OAK	Sean Nolin	16:05
Zachary Godley	AZ	3	5	4	4	5	SD	James Shields	16:10
Alex Wood	LAN	5	5	5	4	4	COL	Chris Rusin	16:10
A.J. Burnett	PIT	5	6	6	5	10	CHN	Jake Arrieta	20:08

* = Fewer than 10 IP, NERD at discretion of very handsome author.