 Aloha and welcome to figments the power of imagination season two episode eight. This is actually the 25th episode of the two types of figments. So that means something to me, maybe not to you, but it's been a lot of fun. And this will be fun because I'm talking with my great friend Ross Roli about postseason baseball. It's October. I love baseball. I love the postseason. And I'm going to go to a couple of national league division series games. So there, and I'm looking forward to that. So joining me again is Colonel retired US Air Force Ross Roli. Hey Ross Aloha. Aloha fig. Thank you for having me on this is like the trifecta. This is my third time. Three time convicted figments guest. Good and we are going to talk about imagining postseason baseball we're going to use your knowledge of statistics. Everybody is watching before knows that you were a math major a math professor at the Air Force Academy. We'll call you an instant replay influencer because you influence the adoption of instant replay and major league baseball through your statistical analysis. And like you said three time guest first, first that I've had. We both love baseball. And you can see in this photo that I've shown on the previous two episodes. I'm a bruise fan. This is a different shirt so I have more than one shirt. Ross wearing his Cardinals cap. That's whole number two isn't it Ross. Yes, you made a hole in one on that hole. Thanks for bringing that up. But that that's that that time I won money but I lost money to you because we had a bet between the Cardinals and the first that which team would have the best record from August 13th on and yours had a lot to do with the health of the team. I had faith in my brothers that seemed like a good bet and then your Cardinals went on a 17 game winning streak. Did you enjoy that. I loved it that was great and I was asked recently by someone. Is this the most fun season I've had as a fan and I had to think about it and it's up there you know it's probably in the top five but between Mariners and the Cardinals going right to the end and the 17 game streak was amazing. And it was spurred by your brewers walk off. You've got to know that Ross does not believe in real time information so I don't care if I'm going to watch a game on DVR whatever I want to know what's happening now. I'm not very patient. So I get watch updates phone updates karma updates of the status of games and Ross is very insistent, especially in our golf group on Saturday that he not hear any score from any sport other than soccer which he doesn't appear to care about. So I waited a couple hours after the brewers walked off the Cardinals with the Grand Slam home run by Daniel Bogobar and just send him a smiley face with sunglasses that's all. And it made him upset. There's a ruined my day. It was right after that what happened. It made my season is what happened after that ruined your day major season and you are very welcome. Yeah, that was a great day for the birds I rewatched that video that and then that that 17 game streak. It wasn't just a 17 game streak. I mean they played consistently excellent baseball in every phase of the game. And that's fun to watch I don't care if it's your team or not. Well, like you said, I felt like they were going to go on some kind of run because of injuries and they I got Jack Clarity back and Miles Michael is back and a couple others Harrison Bader was injured earlier in the year and he was already back. And I felt like they had all the pieces together so I guess I was right in that sense but I nobody can predict 17 game winning streak. And it was, like I said fun to watch, but let's talk numbers because that's a lot more interesting than numbers other than 17. Your use of statistics as I thought about our previous conversations I came up with some questions I'd like you to address and regarding statistics were any of them just not predictive or wrong in 2021. Is there anything where this year was an outlier and what usually works didn't work. Yes, and it's every year there's something that doesn't work. Let me just preface it with that fan graphs is probably the industry leader and and projections for MLB baseball. Just like everybody else, nobody predicted the San Francisco Giants would be as good as they were they ended up with 108 wins their playoff odds at the beginning of the season was 5.7%. They were only projected for 76 wins and they exceeded that by 100% playoff odds now I think. Yes, there you are. If you look on the fan graphs, I'll tell you that. And that brings me to the team projections which I think are difficult because there are two influences that don't. Well, maybe three influences that aren't well represented statistically one is injuries because you don't know who's going to get hurt. The other is acquisitions and trade losses but if you're the Cubs it's trade losses if you're most teams it's acquisitions. And the third thing is the chemistry of a team. Because you don't know that in spring season you don't in spring training you don't know how they're going to come together so are those you know those predictions that say the Giants are going to win 76 games I think it was. Are those any good at all or you know if you want to dream about your season in March just disregard that and hope for the best. I think it's the latter is what you should do everybody you know on opening day everybody's zero and zero they're all in first place. And so hope for the best like my Mariners made a big run even though they exceeded their predicted wins they're only predicted for like 78 wins or something they ended up with 90. They did it with a minus 50 run differential and we talked about that last yeah how important that was for success going forward even discusses with my nephew was when I was on vacation. I predicted in July that this wasn't going to be sustainable and one my nephew said you're right the other one said no you're wrong and the I was wrong they they were able to sustain that success and nearly made it to the playoffs. We'll talk as I said more about that later. And as I said acquisitions make a big difference they certainly did for the brewers. One team we haven't talked about that was statistically projection wise hugely disappointing is the Minnesota twins I mean they shouldn't suck shouldn't have suck. Yes. Yeah, for example but the burrs were mired in what looked like exactly what people predicted for them an average season 80 something wins. And then they acquired willy Adamas from the Tampa Bay raisin by the way there's one of the best win win heels ever. Because of what that allowed the race to do what it did for the brewers but may 22nd is officially willy Adamas day and in Milwaukee because they've had one of the best records and baseball since then. And as somebody watches every game is my wife will verify every game. He had a tremendous team effect can you predict that can you can you look at how somebody plays in a certain ballpark or what they bring to a game and say this guy is the right fit for this team or is it just magic baseball. No there's been a lot of debate in the statistical community over the years about is there a clubhouse effect you know we're bringing. Raul Ibanez for example to the Mariners or can Griffey junior as he's aging is that going to boost the team and pull them together and everything and the answer is maybe but you cannot quantify it so willy Adamas the effect can be quantified because he when he ended up with four war on the season the guy he was traded for which he thought was a win win JP fire eyes and only had 0.2 war for the Tampa Bay Ray so I'm not sure if you're a Tampa fan you would call that a win win the problem was they had the number one prospect in baseball coming up wander Franco and so willy Adamas didn't have a place to play in Tampa so it was a win for Willie it was a win for the Brewers and it was sort of a get what whatever you can for Tampa Bay. Well we're sure glad that they got what they could. And we got what we got because he made an incredible change for the team. Shohei Otani who kind of ruined your Sunday in his in the lead off position has had a year that it defies comparison. We can't just say Babe Ruth really you can't say anybody because of not just homeruns but pitching and base stealing and just total baseball player. Was there data to suggest that that was possible. No and I will say you know people who compare him to Willie to Babe Ruth do a disservice to Otani because he exceeded Babe Ruth when Ruth was pitching and hitting. But for the first three seasons of Otani's career he was mostly injured. He was mediocre when he was on the field he wasn't able to pitch most of the time because it was injuries. And so the statistical projection systems can't just assume a guy is going to be healthy is he always going to be injured. Right. So they assume his performance going forward based on his previous performance and it said 1.4 war for as a hitter 1.3 as a pitcher ended up with 8.1 overall war instead of the 2.7. So and if you tell me that you could see that coming whether an angels fan or somebody else that you knew that was going to happen. No way. Yeah. Yeah. The predict trying to predict future performance based on past performance. We sound like stockbrokers now. Well it's the only way you can do it to be honest. It is so difficult and you look at the challenges that Christian Yolich has faced. He was an incredible ball player for several years and he's been an average ball player and then was a bellinger the MVP for the Dodgers who's less than average and may not even be on the postseason roster. Possibly we can't predict it just happens and I think that illustrates this is a really difficult game. Yeah. That's part of why I love it. Are there any statistics that become more valuable in the postseason? So if I'm looking say at the Brewers and Braves series which of course I am. Is there anything that as I hope for a Brewers win I should say well this gives me hope or oh I'm worried about that. I like to say yes I have a theory but it's not supported by statistics and so when we get into the projections I'll give you my theory well I'll give it to you now but I'll support it later with my gut feel. I believe that starting pitching is the most important thing in the playoffs and I believe if you have two really good starters then this theory started developing back when the Diamondbacks won in 2001. And then Danny Johnson and Kurt Schilling if you pitched them twice in each series and maybe once in relief that's four wins if they're dominant. And the same thing happened with Schilling and Pedro Martinez with Boston and I see that with Max Scherzer and Arias and Walker Bueller in Los Angeles and I also see that with your team Corbin Burns and the starters they have. And Brandon Woodruff and Eric Lover Lover who's been surprisingly strong. But the next thing I need to do is figure out how to quantify that theory, and then how to test it statistically, which I haven't figured out. Corbin Burns who's a psi young candidate I'm not sure how that'll work out because that is truly subjective I'm sure that the baseball writers of America use some statistics but the only pitch to an ancient it was called a manager's decision when Craig Council took him out. And that brings into focus the importance of managers decisions in the postseason in the postseason. When it's all on the line and it's winter go home. Well yeah you're going to pitch them on short rest or you're going to send them deeper into a game that you might do or you're going to put pitch Josh Hader for example for two instead of one ending. At the end of the game now we have to start to say because the death of Williams injury but this the human element statistics interact in a way that's very difficult to reconcile it seems. Yeah and I will praise your manager Craig Council for seemingly picking the right reliever at the right time going back three or four years when they were against the Dodgers in the playoffs. He had a lefty starter opener and then he kept on bringing lefties out of the bullpen because the statistics showed that Cody Ballinger and all their left handed hitters John Peterson and so forth. They couldn't hit left handed pitching and so he just took advantage of that and they won that series. Well we could we could go on and on and we are and we're already behind and we have several slides to show, including your statistical reality sort of the ground troops of baseball is what this is. And why don't you talk about those fairly briefly so we can get to our predictions. Sure it relates to your last question is there anything predictive about that you can get to the playoffs and, like I said, statistically we can't figure it out. Really being in the book Moneyball basically said my stuff my expletive doesn't work in the playoffs implying that this is a crap shoot. It's a 5050 proposition and to support that I wrote a blog article back in 2008 and I've updated it here. 34 of the 34 teams have won 100 games in the wild card era only six won the World Series. Seven wild card teams. Yeah, seven wild card teams won the World Series so you're better off being a wild card team than a team with 100 wins. That's how crazy the postseason is. I don't know and I look at my own team the Mariners 116 wins at an all time record they didn't even make it to the World Series. Whereas my other team the Cardinals won the World Series after winning only 83 games. And then for that blog post I actually calculated all the playoffs series and it's a 49% chance of victory if you're the winning team and it's probably gone up maybe a couple percent since then. That's basically a flip of the coin. Yeah, which is why you should watch the next game and the next game. Exactly. Yeah, you never know what's going to happen. That's the beauty of baseball in particular. I don't I like watching the Green Bay Packers Packers and Milwaukee Bucks and but baseball's nuances are what attract me so much. Yeah, so you put that to a scatter scatter plot cart chart. I think we call it to prove what you just said and these plots are all over the map and they mean they mean everybody has a chance right. Exactly on the vertical scale you have a number of wins and it's graphed against the horizontal scale which is the number of postseason wins so regular season versus postseason. And you can see on the column of dots on the right side those are teams that won 11 games meaning they won the World Series. But those dots are you know pretty much distributed like all the rest of the dots are around the mean of about you know 90 something wins for each of the playoff teams. And if you were to draw a line you know it should be an increasing bottom left upper right correlation line. That doesn't appear to be a line a matter of fact you can do the statistical analysis which I did you can do the statistical analysis I can. And the correlation coefficient is only 0.18 which is bad it's basically there is no correlation really you get small correlation around 0.25 to 0.3 and then obviously 100% correlation means it's going to happen all the time but this. Once again this means turn on the TV or go to the stadium and watch postseason baseball because anything is possible. Yes, and I love that. Okay, quick break very quick break because we've got to get to our predictions to tell you that I'm going to take my own break take a couple weeks away from figments this is the 25th episode of the two types. And get refreshed and I'll be back on October 25 with more figments on reality is some non political commentary on whatever is happening I don't even want to think about what might be happening other than postseason baseball that time. So I'm going to come back to on November 1 to figments the power of imagination trying to entertain and inspire with an extraordinary guest talking about I imagine effective leadership happens to be my daughter who didn't get the gene because she's a much richer and one of the very experienced military and civilian leader, it will tie into what I've said before about Afghanistan so please tune in to that. So, back to baseball. Let's talk about the lock up the bracket. Here it is not filled in we don't know until tomorrow when they start. The big disappointment as I look at where the starting palette for postseason baseball is that there were no playing games today. And yesterday there could have been two playing games to the playing game in the AL East and a game 163 in the National League West and none of that happened tell me about your Sunday Ross how was that did you watch any baseball yesterday. It was, I was in baseball heaven. I'm so glad that Major League Baseball decided to start all the games at the same time. Yeah, that way there's no. Let me explain that on the last day of the season the only time during the year, maybe an opening day they try to do it a little bit, but every game starts within five or 10 minutes of each other. So, there are no spoiler alerts required, and it all matters to the very end. Go ahead. I had four devices going I was watching the mirrors on DVR had my laptop with the Red Sox game I had the iPad with the Yankees game on I had my cell phone with the Toronto Blue Jays game on. And then when that one, you know, sort of was a blowout that I switched over to the Cardinals and saw their final game. So it was, it was great and it was exciting until show he up Tony, it'll lead off home run and dashed by hopes and I was swearing at the screen, and then they scored again and then two more in the next inning so it was for nothing before you knew it. But even then, you know, I watched the Mariners enough to know that they can come back it's only a second inning they're down for, they can come back and they have. And I was encouraged when the Red Sox were down 5-1 and the Yankees and the Raids were playing a scoreless game. Right, and the Raids were killer, right? Yeah. But in the end of the day, you know, Red Sox pulled it out in the top of the ninth with a two run home run, the Yankees pulled it out in the bottom of the ninth with a walk-off single. The Mariners lost, the Blue Jays lost, so there's no play-in game. Blue Jays won, but because of all the teams that aren't in the playoffs that belong in the playoffs, I think the Blue Jays are really up there. They had an extraordinary year under very difficult circumstances with three different home parks because of COVID and I think they've got a bright future. My biggest disappointment is that the New York Yankees are in it at all because I go back. Brewers and Braves play on Friday, October 8th at now American Family Field. It will be the Braves first playoff game in Milwaukee since Game 7 of the World Series in 1958, where they lost the Yankees and lost the series, having won in 57. And I'm still mad. Just to be clear, as a six-year-old boy, I listened to that game on the radio and my father's 57-4. I'm still upset about that. Well, that points out another part of my theory is that your team had two great pitchers. Milwaukee Braves had Warren Spahn and Johnny Sane, right? Johnny Sane and Pray for Rain, yep. Yeah. And so they were able to be dominant during that time with those two guys that could throw five games between them in that era. I wonder what their arms look like later in life. Yeah. So the truth of the matter is they didn't, people weren't throwing as hard and they weren't stressing their arms physically. The way they are now sort of the extreme pitching into the era is really, it's extreme and puts a lot of stress on the arms. And we've talked so about the importance of pitching. Let me get to my picks, which are mostly gut feel. And of course, let's start at the end where I picked the Milwaukee Brewers to win the World Series because I want the Milwaukee Brewers to win the World Series. And then going to the World Series, I don't know if I told you, I entered two sweepstakes, and I'm pretty sure that I've got to win one of those. I'll be at a game somewhere with their fair and hotel taken care of by publishers, Clearinghouse or somebody. I've got to look at my slides to remember my logic. I picked St. Louis in the wildcard game against the Dodgers because LA chasing those unbelievable giants has just had to keep the pedal to the metal so long that at some time the rubber band breaks. And they lost Muncie yesterday that got some questions in pitching. It's only one game. Now we're going to pick an outlier I picked the I picked the cartons and neither of us picked the white socks as we said I haven't getting to the LCS but I find Tampa. They're just relentless. They're at the plate their powerhouse and again they made that trade that enabled what they line up they put together. So I think Tampa's there, having said that, by the time they get to the World Series against the Milwaukee Brewers in my dreams. And then they're out of the they run into pitching and that they can't beat. I realize it's folly, perhaps to pick against the Giants this year. But I do it anyway because I want the Brewers to win so let's take a look at your predictions, it had to be hard for you not to go with your heart and advance the cardinals all the way. The Cardinals are going to LA and they're playing against the Dodgers and the pitcher is Max Scherzer who is the most dominant pitcher in either league this year. He's got like one point something ERA with the Dodgers and undefeated with them and he's a St. Louis native and I just don't see the Cardinals winning that game if they do great I'll be happy but my heart is with the Cardinals. My mind tells me they're going to lose that game and going back to the dominant pinching thing. My prediction is LA all the way through. Brewers are going to beat the Braves because of Brewers dominant pitching and I feel like in the American League Yankees will win the wild card because Garrett Cole is a better pitcher than Nathan of Aldi. Although I have some friends who will think otherwise they're Red Sox fans and then the Yankees are going to lose to the Blue Jays. Blue Jays have had, not a Bay Rays. The Rays have had their number for the last two years and they're going to keep winning but then they'll run into the Houston Astros who I think have the best combination of starting pitching and offense to take them to the World Series. But not as good as the Dodgers. I'm picking the Dodgers to win. Are they still stealing signs in Houston? I don't follow them closely. No. So two things quickly about the Cardinals winning streak. There was a great fan graphs article last week about what's the relationship predictive value between a long winning streak and how you'll do in the playoffs. Is that going to carry you into the playoffs? And the answer was no. There's no indication that it will. And then another one related to the cheating is that, I don't know if I mentioned this in our first episode, but there was a study on fan graphs that indicated the cheating really didn't help the Astros that much because there were so many false positives that you're swinging at pitches that you're sure is a strike, right? Well, no, it's not. I mean, I assure as a fastball, no, it's a curveball and you look like a fool. And so the overall effect of that advantage is really not very bad. Not an advantage. It had to be a huge distraction too and it's such a mental game. Well, sadly, we're out of time. We have to get together at some point, maybe in spring training to review our predictions and see how right or wrong we were. I will tell you, as I think about my own figment, you can tell me your base postseason figment. If the burrs down in advance, I'd love to see Wayne Wright and Molina together in a game seven. And I think Yattie and Molina is one of my favorite players ever, even though he kicks our butt sometimes. So what's your postseason dream, your figment? Well, I would love to see Wayne Wright and Molina in a game seven again. They've done that though. So that's sort of, I've been there, done that kind of thing. One of my past figments that's ever going to happen is to see Felix Hernandez put in a playoff game in Seattle, but you know, he's retired now. So I guess I'm just not this year, but going forward, I just want to see the Mariners in a playoff game in Seattle. One time during my lifetime. Well, I hope that comes true for you. Okay, Ross, thanks. It's always a pleasure. We're going to enjoy the next few weeks and we'll see how right or wrong we're and we'll enjoy it either way. All right, have a good trip. All right. Thanks. Folks, that is the end of episode 25 of various flavors of figments and it goes by so quickly always. I'll be back in a couple of weeks. Figments are brought to you by Think Tech Hawaii. We're all nonprofit in this. Don't make any money. As a citizen journalist, as Jay Fidel likes to say, hopefully we provide both entertainment and information and I'd like to remind you that as a nonprofit, Think Tech Hawaii can use your support, financial, not just emotional, financial. And let me close with my usual aloha and go brewers.