Tweet
Today’s winners in Stats & Analytics:
David Ortiz, Jim Lemon
Today’s losers:
The Home Run Derby “Curse”
Okay, let’s put this to rest for good. There is no Home Run Derby Curse. Yes, in 2005, Bobby Abreu smashed a record 41 batting-practice pitches over the wall at Comerica Park, then hit just six homers in real life over the second half of the season. Then the next year, after David Wright finished second in the Derby, he went through an awful power outage once he was back with the Mets, triggering a squawkathon that still hasn’t ended among the New York media. Various analysts, including a couple who should know better, have seriously questioned whether the Derby has a negative effect on its participants.
But if you’ve been reading this blog at all, you know about the power of the Bell Curve: the tendency of an astonishing variety of phenomena in this universe to distribute themselves in a hump-shaped pattern. (In fact, I’ve been thinking about calling this blog “Beyond the Bell Curve.” What do you think? Should I address you as “The Curve,” the way Stephen Colbert talks to his “Nation”?) And the Home Run Derby “curse” is simply regression to the mean, or the tendency for any extreme performance to mover closer to average — toward the hump in the Bell Curve — when it’s repeated. Various commonplace sayings, such as “He’s due,” or “Things will even out,” or “It can’t get any worse than this,” reflect the role of regression to the mean in our everyday lives, and you can find a helpful discussion of it here.
David Ortiz, Jim Lemon
Today’s losers:
The Home Run Derby “Curse”
Okay, let’s put this to rest for good. There is no Home Run Derby Curse. Yes, in 2005, Bobby Abreu smashed a record 41 batting-practice pitches over the wall at Comerica Park, then hit just six homers in real life over the second half of the season. Then the next year, after David Wright finished second in the Derby, he went through an awful power outage once he was back with the Mets, triggering a squawkathon that still hasn’t ended among the New York media. Various analysts, including a couple who should know better, have seriously questioned whether the Derby has a negative effect on its participants.
But if you’ve been reading this blog at all, you know about the power of the Bell Curve: the tendency of an astonishing variety of phenomena in this universe to distribute themselves in a hump-shaped pattern. (In fact, I’ve been thinking about calling this blog “Beyond the Bell Curve.” What do you think? Should I address you as “The Curve,” the way Stephen Colbert talks to his “Nation”?) And the Home Run Derby “curse” is simply regression to the mean, or the tendency for any extreme performance to mover closer to average — toward the hump in the Bell Curve — when it’s repeated. Various commonplace sayings, such as “He’s due,” or “Things will even out,” or “It can’t get any worse than this,” reflect the role of regression to the mean in our everyday lives, and you can find a helpful discussion of it here.
Interesting....
Comment