Portality


Wednesday, October 10, 2007


Here are the results of my pre-season baseball bets:

Chicago White Sox under 87.5 wins
Chicago White Sox - 72 wins

I thought the White Sox offense would "regress back toward the mean", but they did more than that. They were last in the AL in runs scored.

Arizona Diamondbacks over 78.5 wins
Arizona Diamondbacks win NL West
Arizona Diamondbacks - 90 wins, won NL West

I correctly predicted that the Diamondbacks would be this year's Detroit Tigers, but I can't take too much credit for this since I didn't expect them to do so while being outscored by their opponents.

Los Angeles Dodgers under 88.5 wins
Los Angeles Dodgers - 82 wins

Here was my comment before the season started:
"The Dodgers had one of the best offenses in the NL last year, but I don't see how they're going to repeat that if they choose to play Juan Pierre and Luis Gonzalez over more talented players like Matt Kemp. Randy Wolf and Brett Tomko don't inspire much confidence at the back of the rotation."

The Dodgers were 10th out of 16 NL teams in runs scored.
Juan Pierre: 668 AB, .685 OPS
Luis Gonzalez: 464 AB, .793 OPS
Matt Kemp: 292 AB, .894 OPS
Randy Wolf: 102.7 IP, 4.73 ERA
Brett Tomko: 104.0 IP, 5.80 ERA

So that's 3 for 3 for my team over/unders, and none of these results were that close to the Vegas over/under mark. The Diamondbacks winning the NL West was 7-1.

Takashi Saito under 35.5 saves
Takashi Saito - 39 saves

I thought Saito would lose his closer's role, but I was totally wrong.

Justin Verlander under 15.5 wins
Justin Verlander - 18 wins

I thought Verlander would 1) pitch worse, 2) get less run support, 3) get less defensive support, and 4) get injured. I was wrong on all 4 counts.

0 for 2 for my player over/unders, with analysis that turned out to be wrong in every way possible.

I also made the following postseason bets:

Chicago Cubs to win division series against Arizona Diamondbacks
Arizona won series 3-0

The Cubs seemed to have the advantage in starting pitching and offense before the series, but it sure didn't turn out that way.

Cleveland Indians to win division series against New York Yankees
Cleveland won series 3-1

Betting on Cleveland paid out $16 more for every $10 wagered. I thought Cleveland was a slight favorite going into the series, so this was an easy bet to make.


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