tatis Page 9 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
L.A. Kings PR Staff Plans To Withhold Stats From The Devils, Accidentally Tells Every Reporter About It
It's the responsibility of the home team's PR staff to compile statistics after each period, then rush print-outs down to both teams' locker rooms. It's not vital information, but it's nice for a coach to be able to quantify things like ice time and shots taken. During Saturday's game 5 in Newark, D...
Math! Says Hero Ball Doesn't Work
Some interesting research from the TrueHoop gang today, meant to address the non-flop-related issue of the 2012 playoffs: Who should be taking those crucial last shots? If the choice is between a covered superstar and an open non-superstar, the numbers say: give it to the open man....
Sex Offenders And NHL Success: An Astonishingly Accurate New Metric
I'm not big on advanced stats in hockey. It's not because I don't think they're valuable, but because it's tough to translate the concepts to what I'm seeing on the ice. It's my own ignorance, yes, but for a new generation of hockey metrics to take hold, they'll have to be more relatable to the aver...
Bristolmetrics: <em>SportsCenter</em> Mentioned Tim Tebow 18 Times Last Week, Somehow
This is a regular feature breaking down, minute-by-minute, the content that appears on ESPN's 11 p.m. edition of SportsCenter throughout the week. Graphic by Jim Cooke....
ESPN's <em>Numbers Never Lie*</em> Expects Every American To Drink 12 Beers Sunday
Here's a ridiculous segment by the usually-reliable Michael Smith on ESPN's Numbers Never Lie* in which he recites a series of absurd statistics about the Super Bowl (without citing where they got the information, of course)....
Bristolmetrics: Joe Paterno Was Mentioned 116 Times On <em>SportsCenter</em> Last Week; Jerry Sandusky Was Mentioned 8 Times
This is a regular feature breaking down, minute-by-minute, the content that appears on ESPN's 11 p.m. edition of SportsCenter throughout the week. Graphic by Jim Cooke....
Bristolmetrics: From Jan. 7-18, <em>SportsCenter</em> Devoted 13.5 Minutes to Hockey Total, And Other Fun Facts
This is a regular feature breaking down, minute-by-minute, the content that appears on ESPN's SportsCenter throughout the week. Graphic by Jim Cooke....
The Verducci Effect Is Overworked And Broken Down
Sports Illustrated's Tom Verducci came out with his annual "Year After Effect" column yesterday, based on his hypothesis that that young pitchers tend to break down the season after an increased workload. Specifically, a pitcher 25 and under is supposed to be at risk if he pitched at least 30 more i...
Kobe Is (Allegedly) A Better Womanizer Than He Is A Basketball Player: A Statistical Analysis
The National Enquirer dropped one of its perhaps-truth bombs this week on Kobe Bryant's marriage (here's a summary, since the Enquirer wants you to splurge in the supermarket and didn't put its story online): The tab reports that Bryant had affairs with 105 women during the 10 years he was married t...
We're Getting Closer To An Actually Useful Goalie Statistic
You weren't chased away by a post dealing with hockey and Sabermetrics? Good for you! Then you've probably watched enough icepuck to realize that save percentage is a pretty weak measure of a goalie's ability. All shots are not created equal—a slapper from between the circles is going to be harder t...
The Real Reason For The NFL's Passing Explosion
We're doing a season-long NFL roundtable with our friends at Slate. Check back here each week as a rotating cast of football watchers discusses the weekend's key plays, coaching decisions, and traumatic brain injuries....
There Is An NBA GM Out There Who Doesn't Know How To Use Google
Ever wonder if the men who run our professional basketball teams are as clueless as the men who were running our professional baseball teams (as depicted by Michael Lewis in his 2003 book Moneyball)? There is no definitive answer to that question, yet, but we do now know that at least one NBA GM doe...
The Curse Of Dopey "Curse Of The Bambino" References, And Other Dumb Things About The Red Sox's Stretch Run
Harvey Araton of the New York Times, reporting from Baltimore, sets the new/old standard for witless hackery today:...
Atlanta Braves Have Had A Rough September, According To Newspaper's Middle School Line Graph
This is a real graph that accompanied a real article in the real Atlanta Journal-Constitution today. The Braves lost to the Phillies 4-2 last night, and are now just a game ahead of the Cardinals for the NL wild card—all thanks to this carefully-plotted "September Swoon." It's really exciting that t...
Statistics Are Ruining Baseball
Back when I was a kid, you didn't need to bring a calculator to the game. You went, you cheered, and if you were lucky, the third base coach would share a pack of Chesterfields with you. But now everyone has computers, and stat guys, and the game has become unrecognizable....
Grantland's Jonah Lehrer Loves Intangibles So Much He Made A Whole Argument Out Of Them
Aren't sports statistics terrible? Of course they are. Sports has been overrun by number-nerds, and the number-nerds get angry if you point this out. So Jonah Lehrer, writing at Grantland about the pernicious influence of numerical analysis, makes sure not to bring up any actual examples of how numb...
Compiling The Absurd Box Score For <em>Space Jam</em>; Or, Shawn Bradley Sucked Against Cartoons, Too
This is Regressing, a numbers-minded column by our clever friends at the Harvard College Sports Analysis Collective. Over the next few days, they'll be applying rigorous statistical analysis to some of the finest basketball movies in the history of cinema (and also Hoosiers). Today: Space Jam by t...
Can Statistics Prove Once And For All Who Used Steroids?
Two labor economists released a study showing an increase in power numbers by Canseco's teammates which abruptly stopped when MLB instituted random steroid testing. Unfortunately, it also predicts another cycle of "I Guess We Have To Listen To Jose Canseco" talk. [Slate]...
Sabermetrics Prove Mom Always Loved You Best
Psychologists believe that younger siblings take more risks than their older brothers and sisters. The proof: Among Major League Baseball-playing brother duos, the youngest one stole more bases 90% of the time. Oh, science. You're adorable. [NYTimes]...
What Is Wrong With Our Fragile NFL Kickers?
There is an excellent chance that one of the two monumental playoff games this Sunday will hinge on a crucial field goal attempt—and an even better chance that whoever is asked to kick it will miss....