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Sunday, February 05, 2012
I’ve been running the Scouting Report and the Community Survey balloting because I firmly believe in their value. The scouting report gives “shape” to a player’s fielding description, while I’ll put up the Community up against any one’s playing time forecasts.
But for the Forecaster’s Challenge… well, I’m wondering if I’ve said everything that needs to be said about that. Am I doing it simply to keep doing it, or am I learning something new. I don’t think I’m learning something new any longer.
What say you?
Sunday, January 29, 2012
I asked the game creator to give me a non-marketing view of his game. And he delivered. (pdf). On pages 2-3 of his 15 page response(!), he talks about “Gamer-led strategizing”, which is a fantastic feature to consider. I’ve never heard about it being offered in such detail.
Anyway, he’s offering a couple of free trials to me, but I declined, and instead, I will forward that offer to two Straight Arrow readers. This is how you qualify:
1. email me at tom~tangotiger~net
2. be prepared to play this game for several hours, if not dozens of hours
3. be prepared to write a review of this, that I will post to my blog; I want you to be fair, and honest, and review from the perspective of what kind of person would enjoy this game (rather than if YOU enjoyed it or not)
Anyway, I love how much and how detailed he wrote me, easily the longest email response I have ever received on any subject.
UPDATE: Offer has been closed! I got a bunch of emails, so, I’m going to pick out two semi-randomly. I’ll send an email out tonight.
Monday, November 28, 2011
There was one official competition, and three unofficial one.
The consensus pick among the other 21 pro forecasters ended up in 2nd place, by a single point, against the official winner (which I’ll reveal tomorrow).
When looking at the four competitions overall, the consensus pick finished #1. Marcel finished 12th among the 22, and the Fangraphs community was a sliver behind at 13th.
The consensus also finished #5 last year over the 4 competitions.
My main takeaway is that the best thing to do is take a consensus of the pros. No one is really consistently providing value-added.
By the way, using my points system, tied for 1st place among players were Justin Verlander and Matt Kemp.
Monday, August 22, 2011
Someone asked me how I convert the ordered list of ballots into an implied dollar-value list.
I think we’ve discussed this in the past. And perhaps there are better ways to do it. I’ll show you my way, and you can figure out if it works for you, or if you can improve it:
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Friday, August 19, 2011
As you know, we have 4 competitions: 3 unofficial ones, and one official one.
The first unofficial one is: 22 pros, all in one cage match (I used to run 1000 drafts, but now I only run 100). So, all 21 are in league together, and the 22nd is a “consensus” pick of all 21. Below are the current results.
“Value_ct” is the standings points earned, and what you should look at primarily.
“points_ct” is the average points the players earned in each draft.
Right now, it looks like a three-horse race between Consensus, RotoWorld, and Steamer.
As I get time, I’ll be running the results for the other 2 unofficial competitions, and of course, the official one.
fan_id points_ct wins_ct value_ct fan_tx
299 1135 37 577 Consensus
122 1110 27 460 RotoWorld
118 1042 20 306 Steamer
116 1053 5 223 KFFL
113 1030 2 128 FEIN
112 987 4 112 Mike Podhorzer_FantasyPros911
133 970 3 104 Rotochamp
102 1007 1 101 Ask Rotoman
106 995 0 58 CAIRO
120 888 1 51 Razzball
135 956 0 36 Pat Senechal
125 976 1 33 BigScoreSports
115 950 0 19 John Eric Hanson
131 804 0 5 Fangraphs Community
132 875 0 0 Fantistics
126 856 0 0 Bloomberg Sports
134 851 0 0 Geoff Buchan
217 830 0 0 Marcel
127 819 0 0 Future of Fantasy
111 765 0 0 Statspeakblog
119 729 0 0 PECOTA
130 721 0 0 Baseball Info Solutions
Thursday, March 24, 2011
I feel like Craig’s list! Anyway, for those interested, details below the fold:
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Thursday, March 03, 2011
Someone alerted me that there’s a Saber kind of league. Interested people should email: jacobtulloch~gmail~com
I’m not involved in this at all.
Here’s a snippet of rules:
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Monday, February 28, 2011
A reader asked:
This year ESPN has 6 fielding scoring possibilities.
Dp, Errors, Outfield Assists, Assists, Put Outs, Total Chances.
Bearing in mind I’m not a statistician or a maths geek, I took a rough guesstimate of the median figures for all those categories at each position for regular players, set up a series of aimultaneous equations where each one equalled it’s position run value, then tested out the results. The combined figures were tweakable for total MLB value in terms of fielding WAR, but absolutely awful for individuls, loads of noise.
Was that an OK way to go about it?
If as I suspect there just isn’t enough info in just those six stats then what would be the minimum no and which ones, to make it even half reasonable.
I ask because I want to e-mail the powers that be at ESPN with some suggestions, since they are already down the fielding route and seem more open to saber ideas.
Any feedback gratefully received, especially since I’m determined to finally get a saber league set up the way I’d really like it, and the 100 points per WAR would be a key component amongst other things.
Thanks
I’ve never had to think about this. The central idea would be to use assists for infielders and putouts or putouts+assists for outfielders. You’d also want to know the number of balls in play, or innings played.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
In replying to a BPro reader, I said:
I agree, it would definitely have been a bug. When I do my valuations, I don’t do a RP/SP split, and simply let the forecast and league structure dictate the value. And that value is what I said, that the top relievers would come in at 15-20$.
Now, if the league dictated that each team select at most 2 relievers, then I don’t see how you will get the top relievers at 17-20$. Maybe if you have 12 teams in an AL-only league? I’d have to work it out.
The fantasy product is blocked at the office (am I the only one? maybe something other than “fantasy” can be in the URL?), so maybe you can try this for me. Re-run forcing 1 RP, 2 RP, 3 RP, 4 RP, and then report back how much the top 6 relievers get under each setting. Just guessing, but I’m thinking the numbers should be something like 7$, 10$, 13$, 16$ respectively. Something like that. It certainly cannot be fixed.
Or, if you want to make it even clearer, do it with 1 SP, 2 SP, 3 SP, 4 SP. You should see a similar situation, where the numbers might be 10$, 14$, 18$, 22$ or something.
I’m going to lunch now, but when I get back, I might work it out myself, using my own system.
Monday, February 14, 2011
Tango,
Would you please consider letting your readers know that a free yahoo league has formed using the categories and points from your post a few years ago (http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/yahoo_fantasy_linear_weights_league/)? The league is called Tango! Tango! Tango!, and it auction drafts on March 20th. I made it a 12-team league because it seemed to fit yahoo’s schedule best. I know that affects the point values. If it’s significant, I’ll change them. I’d also be happy to increase the size of the league to 22 teams, as I think you originally used in your calculations.
Thanks for your consideration. The site is great!
Laffitt
Thursday, January 13, 2011
The following 19 past participants have confirmed their entries for 2011:
217 Marcel
132 Fantistics
131 Fangraphs Community
130 Baseball Info Solutions
127 Future of Fantasy
126 Bloomberg Sports
125 BigScoreSports
124 Oliver / Brian
120 Razzball
118 Steamer
116 KFFL
115 John Eric Hanson
113 FeinSports.com
112 Mike Podhorzer_FantasyPros911
111 Fantasy Scope
109 Chris Gehringer
106 CAIRO
105 Brad Null
102 Ask Rotoman
There are 4 new entrants who are in the queue (I’ll have to verify the order based on their email timestamps):
Joe Kendall
Rotochamp
Pat Senechal
Geoff Buchan
(I could have sworn there was a fifth that preceded all of these guys, and if you are out there, please let me know. I must have misfiled your email.)
I am still waiting to hear back from two past forecasters. As soon as they can confirm or not their participation, I will select from the queue.
If I made a mistake with anyone else, please let me know.
As always, I am going with 22 entrants.
Monday, January 03, 2011
I just sent out the following email. For those who also want to participate, please send me an email at tom~tangotiger~net , and I’ll put you in the queue. I will go with 22 entries, just like the past two seasons.
As a past participant, I am once again inviting you to the Forecasters Challenge. The rules will follow the same form as last year: http://tangotiger.net/forecast/rules.html .
Please be kind enough to reply, yes / maybe / no, if you will participate, within the next two weeks.
Thanks, Tom
Persistent reader:
Hi all,
I realize this is off-topic, but I was hoping to benefit from some of the collective intelligence here (I didn’t study stats, and I’m afraid it doesn’t come naturally to me). If it’s inappropriate here, please just tell me to shove off.
That said, I think this is a pretty basic question (probably embarrassingly so), and it involves calculating inflation in fantasy Keeper Leagues.
Based on a lot of information found in Tom’s post and the comments here (http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/the_worth_of_sb_hr_and_all_other_categories_in_fantasy_baseball/), I have created a spreadsheet that uses projections to calculate auction values for my keeper league.
My questions:
1) If, say, my spreadsheet calculates Buster Posey to be worth $25 of the available auction dollars, but I know that he will be kept at a salary of $5, how should I account for that knowledge? Should I remove Posey from the list of available players entirely, thereby removing that available “value,” (along with removing the $5 from the available dollars)?
2) If the league starts 12 catchers, should I then also assume that we will be bidding on only 11 catchers specifically, so as not to change the value of the replacement-level catcher?
I hope these questions make sense.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Tango- I just read through this whole thread after I saw it referenced in two separate spots had I had two questions: 1. Are you still comfortable with the positions you took here? 2. Do you see your position as optimal or convenient? Thanks much.
I am ONLY comfortable to the extent that there is a continuous distribution of talent. (We can assume this is pretty much true, and so what follows is a theoretical objection to my model, but one that is more relevant the more gaps there are in talent.)
I’ll tell you where I am not comfortable: say that there has to be 25 2B and 25 SS drafted. And let’s say that the top 24 SS are all Jeter and Nomar and Trammell and Larkin and on and on, each of which is indistinguishable from each other. And the 25th SS is Mario Mendoza.
And let’s say the 25 2B who are all the same, each indistinguishable from each other.
It would be insane to value the 24 SS relative to Mendoza (meaning they’d all be 20$ SS) , while you would value the 25 2B relative to the bottom guy, meaning they’d all be worth 1$.
This doesn’t make any sense. Why would you bid 20$ for Trammell, if you can get Larkin or Jeter or… BUT, if it came down to two SS, and you had Nomar and Mendoza, then you would pay 20$ for Nomar. So, you don’t want to be the last guy left to make the decision. If you had Nomar and Trammell and Mendoza, do you bid 18$ for Trammell, and the guy who doesn’t up that bid does so realizing he’s only going to get a chance for 20$ of Nomar or 1$ for Mendoza? Or, does Trammell get bid up to 20$. And if he does, then what happens when you have Nomar, Trammell, Larkin and Mendoza available. How much is Larkin bid? 17$? 15$? or 20$? How much does the first SS go for? 1$? 20$?
I would love to hear more about how economic theory would play a role here. Teach me.
Friday, December 17, 2010
David asks, in part:
How do you choose the player pool for averages and standard deviations? Do you use last year’s stats? Do you use projected stats? Do you use iterations? Do you use empirical data from similar fantasy leagues?
What you cannot do is just use the projected stats on its own to figure out the standard deviation. Imagine, for example, that every pitcher is forecasted for between 8 and 12 wins. That would set one standard deviation to be pretty low, say 0.5 wins, and so the top guy will be say 3 or 4 SD from the mean. But, he’s only 2 wins above average. That guy forecasted with 12 wins will win say between 6 and 18 games. Now. imagine all base stealers are forecasted for between 8 and 12 steals. And, if we presume stealing is far easier to forecast (for this illustration… if you can’t get past that, then call it quatlus), then the guy with 12 steals will also be 3 or 4 SD from the mean. And in reality, he will end up with between 11 and 13 steals.
So, that’s why you can’t use the standard deviation of the forecasted stats. You need to include the standard deviation from the uncertainty of the forecast and the random variation in the stat.
The easiest thing to do is just look at the empirical data from prior seasons, and take the standard deviation of those observed data. Then calculate your z-scores. It’s going to be pretty stable each year. For example, I pretty much stick with a 3/3/1/1/ model for RBI/R/HR/SB in terms of weighting. Things change every year of course, and you can feel free to create a model that uses the forecasted data to determine the expected standard deviation. That would be fun to do. Until then, take the easy way out, day tripper.
Friday, December 03, 2010
Fangraphs launches once more. Go there, and I’ll be including the group in my next year’s challenge.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
I haven’t played Fantasy Baseball since I graduated college, and I stopped playing Fantasy Hockey when I moved out of Canada. So, take what I am about to say as a novice. This was a post from Justin asking how to handle a keeper league if you do draft (not auction). And his idea is to just bump players up one draft slot. In auctions, I think the standard is to increase the cost by 5$ each year. The problem with the slots+1 is that the slots at the low end have similar value, and so, it’s not really a big cost to bring someone up from the 18th round to the 17th round.
Here is how I convert ordinal rankings to auction dollars. Now, note that this only works for what I need to do, which is 550 players drafted, and 262$ spent per team for 22 teams, minimum 1$ per player. And, for the very top players, it’s not going to work if someone is really much better than someone else. That said, it’s easy enough to create a generic equation for any kind of league:
power((549/(548+order_id)-0.5),1.56)*100+1
So, as an example, the 396th drafted player (last player in 18th round) would be worth 3$ in this league. If you wanted to “keeper” him, it should cost you an extra 5$, or 8$. That would make him the equivalent of a 12th round pick.
I also don’t see the need to limit it to the number to only 4. I think the limit should be that you can’t have two guys at the same round level. So, if you want to keep your 8th and 9th round pick, they would both cost you a 6th round pick. So, one now becomes a 5th round pick, and the other is a 6th. 1st round picks remain as 1st round picks. If you end up with two 1st round picks, well, then you have to discard one of them.
Therefore, it would be easy to simply create a chart that shows something like this:
1st -> 1st
2nd -> 1st
...
8th -> 6th
9th -> 6th
...
18th -> 12th
And so on. Does this make sense? Or is that too complicated?
Note: to reverse that, to go from dollar value to ordinal ranking, you do:
549/(EXP(LN((dollar_value-1)/100)/1.56)+0.5)-548
I’m surprised I remembered all my LN and EXP rules. Kids, stay in school.
Wednesday, October 06, 2010
Marcel did extremely well. And in one of the four competitions, it actually won. But, Marcel did not win the official competition. Who did? The same guy who won last year: Eric Hanson (who posts here as JEH). Chone had an extremely strong showing as well. Full results here:
http://tangotiger.net/forecast/results2010.html
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
There are four different setups, one is official, and the other three unofficial. Depending on how you see things, feel free to choose the setup that makes the most sense to you.
John Eric Hanson is the only forecaster to finish in the top 5 in all four setups. Hanson also won the official competition last year, and I think finished fairly high up in the other unofficial competitions I ran. So, yeah, he done good.
The baseline comparison point should be Marcel. Marcel finished middle of the pack in 3 of the competitions, and IS LEADING in one of the competitions (the head-to-head one… the setup that was the official competition last year).
The results. First the three unofficial setups:
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