Home field advantage

[Curtis]

Originally Posted by fhomess

Actually, knowing how many games end without anyone batting in the bottom of the 9th is quite easy from the same data source as the data I posted above. It's also fairly easy to tell how many games were won in the bottom half of the 9th. I'm not sure what it tells you without also knowing how many games were won in the top of the 9th, though. That latter part is what's not easily discernible from my data source.

Thank you for the correction.

[Curtis]

Originally Posted by dkgo

1. travelling sucks and takes a toll on your body

In football the players arrive in the visiting stadium days before the game, so they have time to acclimatize and get over jet lag. It also gives them some days of practicing on the field before having to play there in the game.

I don't know about basketball, but I doubt they travel more often than baseball players. (In all cases I'm assuming professional sports.)

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by dkgo

2. those sports are more difficult to officiate with constant action and more subjective calls, and home field has an impact on referees

That in no way addresses the familiarity with the home field/court/rink aspect, however, which was the point I had replied to.

[Vinny P.]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Orange

That doesn't explain why the home field advantage in football and basketball, which have identical playing fields, is even higher than it is in baseball. It ought to be lower in those sports, but isn't.

How so? It is still familiar surroundings. Same could be said about the classroom children take tests in. The surroundings are different in different football and basketball fields. The field dimensions may be the same, but not the surroundings.

[Vinny P.]

Originally Posted by endgame

Help me out here. Was there somewhere earlier in the thread that provided data on how many games (%) of that ~5% ended without the home team having to bat in the ninth?

Originally Posted by Curtis

No, there was not. It was just mentioned that that information was not easily locatable.

Why does that matter? How should the the order of which you bat supposed to affect advantages/disavantages? I have heard that argument made before from somewhere that the away team gets to bat one extra time or whatever. Well, not really. Both teams get three outs per inning, and they only get one chance to bat each inning. I never understood that argument, nor why it should matter.

Only thing I could think of, is the visiting pitcher maybe gets a little bit extra time to rest, or "stew" on a situation in the 7th. That's about it.

[Vinny P.]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Orange

That in no way addresses the familiarity with the home field/court/rink aspect, however, which was the point I had replied to.

Yeah, but regardless, dkgo's argument about more subjective play-calling could still negate your argument about home field advantage in football and basketball.

However, I still maintain that just because field dimensions may be exactly the same, doesn't mean the surroundings are.

[Another Mike D]

I'm late to the thread, is this about the fact that we are in v11 and the WC team still gets home field in the 1st round because they have a better record?

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by Vinny P.

Yeah, but regardless, dkgo's argument about more subjective play-calling could still negate your argument about home field advantage in football and basketball.

How can play-calling be adversely affected when the playing surface is identical in each basketball and football venue? Baseball parks exhibit more variation in the playing surface than either of those two other sports so if familiarity is a primary factor then home advantage ought to be bigger in baseball, not lower.

Familiarity certainly may be a factor, but it would not appear to be the primary one.

In short, there's a host of influences at work. One can identify them, but definitively ranking them in order of importance is probably a never-ending argument.

[Childress]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Orange

That in no way addresses the familiarity with the home field/court/rink aspect, however, which was the point I had replied to.

Haha. You gotta love it. The majority has- grudgingly- accepted the reality of HFA but certain among us still strive to discover that elusive, rational and, preferably numeric, causality. Even if that doesn't exist.

Baseball naturally attracts stats freak, numbers oriented types. Computers, too. So you get a double whammy. What you have here is the discomfort of the binary minded in the face of the supra-rational. It is because it it is..

[endgame]

Originally Posted by endgame
Help me out here. Was there somewhere earlier in the thread that provided data on how many games (%) of that ~5% ended without the home team having to bat in the ninth?

Originally Posted by Curtis
No, there was not. It was just mentioned that that information was not easily locatable.

Originally Posted by Vinny P.

Why does that matter? How should the the order of which you bat supposed to affect advantages/disavantages?

You're reading contention where none exists. No one says it matters. What matters is that it hasn't been asked.

I'm in agreement with three basic components of the discussion: there is a home field advantage, the causal agents are difficult to identify or rank, and that each team has equal opportunity to score runs.

That being said, my curiosity goes to the advantage percentage. What do the percentages say about the comparisons after eight innings? Does the ~5% show up there? In that case, the argument about sudden death or a last at bat resurgence can be, it would seem to me, be quickly put to bed. In fact, the influence of the first eight innings become integral for further exploration. What about the contention - IIRC, it's been documented - in teams who score first tending to be victorious? Does the visitor vs home comparison tend to correlate with first scores by that ~5%? If so, maybe it's a case of home teams score first more often.

Questions are posed simply to pave the way for more questions, that's all. It doesn't matter until it matters and data, discussion, and inquiry prove it through the process. Not to go all Rumsfeld, but we don't know what we don't know. That's about it.

[kenyan_cheena]

How will OOTP 12 determine home ground advantage in the World Series? Just asking because in OOTP 8 there doesn't appear to be an option for this.

[Curtis]

Originally Posted by endgame

IIRC, it's been documented - in teams who score first tending to be victorious?

You are correct. Amazingly, it took Tony LaRussa to discover that in the '80s. He also discovered that if you score in four or more separate innings your chance of winning is better than 80%, even if you only total four runs.

Just so some of the more argumentative posters don't jump all over that, he did NOT say that teams which score four or more runs win 80% of the time; only when those four or more runs are scattered over four or more innings. Why how the runs are distributed matters is incomprehensible to me.

Originally Posted by Another Mike D

I'm late to the thread, is this about the fact that we are in v11 and the WC team still gets home field in the 1st round because they have a better record?

Originally Posted by kenyan_cheena

How will OOTP 12 determine home ground advantage in the World Series? Just asking because in OOTP 8 there doesn't appear to be an option for this.

Obviously you two didn't read (any) of the preceding posts, just the thread title. To make it clear, though, this thread is about whether the game gives the home team an advantage (which it does), not about who gets home field advantage in the playoffs.

[Another Mike D]

Originally Posted by Curtis

Obviously you two didn't read (any) of the preceding posts, just the thread title. To make it clear, though, this thread is about whether the game gives the home team an advantage (which it does), not about who gets home field advantage in the playoffs.

I believe I stated that in my post. I figured since people in this thread were likely in the beta, maybe they could help make sure the correct team gets homefield advantage in addition to debating what the effects of it are.

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by Curtis

Obviously you two didn't read (any) of the preceding posts, just the thread title. To make it clear, though, this thread is about whether the game gives the home team an advantage (which it does), not about who gets home field advantage in the playoffs.

Their point about home field assignment is nonetheless worth noting, and is related to home field advantage, albeit in a more loose way than the main thrust of the thread.

[Vinny P.]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Orange

How can play-calling be adversely affected when the playing surface is identical in each basketball and football venue? Baseball parks exhibit more variation in the playing surface than either of those two other sports so if familiarity is a primary factor then home advantage ought to be bigger in baseball, not lower.

Familiarity certainly may be a factor, but it would not appear to be the primary one.

In short, there's a host of influences at work. One can identify them, but definitively ranking them in order of importance is probably a never-ending argument.

No, no, no, LGO. That wasn't the argument about officiating. The argument is that football and basketball calls are a lot more subjective, since they tend to be harder to make. If an official has even a little bit of a bias in their own minds, psychologically speaking, they may make more favorable calls for the home team. But of course, the same could be said about baseball, but in baseball, it's harder to get away with bad calls than the other sports. And baseball umpires seems to be held a lot more accountable than other sports officials.

That's the theory, of course.

As for playing surface, as I have said, player performance may be affected by the surroundings, not necessarily by the playing surface. Any college team coming to play against Penn St. at Beaver Stadium will have a much tougher time than at home. The dimensions of the field may be the same. Hell, even the playing surface may be the same (not necessarily true, but for the purposes of this post, let's say it is.) But the surroundings at Beaver Stadium is a world of difference than the surroundings at....say....Temple University.

[Vinny P.]

Originally Posted by Childress

Haha. You gotta love it. The majority has- grudgingly- accepted the reality of HFA but certain among us still strive to discover that elusive, rational and, preferably numeric, causality. Even if that doesn't exist.

Baseball naturally attracts stats freak, numbers oriented types. Computers, too. So you get a double whammy. What you have here is the discomfort of the binary minded in the face of the supra-rational. It is because it it is..

But the "HFA" phenomenon is not just restricted to sports only. I have already pointed out that when it comes to education, students generally perform much better on tests in the very classrooms they learn in on a daily basis than anywhere else. Therefore, the best theory is "it has to do with the surroundings." If you are in a place that is familiar, it is much easier visualize right before your eyes certain actions and/or words spoken in the past that has the effect of triggering an associative pathway to the correct answer.

Same thing in sports. If you play half of your games in the same field in which you practice, it is probably much easier to locate the ball, or to focus on a certain area so you are not as easily distracted. Case in point: I forget which baseball stadium it was, but there was a stadium (Marlins?) in which they had to close the outfield seating areas to spectators, because they would wear white, which was a huge distraction to the players. Because the Florida players were used to this after playing so many games at home, they were able to learn to ignore it. Therefore, they were much better hitters than anyone else.

Another example: Let's say the stadium lights are pointing at a certain angle that happens to frequently serve as more of a distraction to the Right Fielder than any other position. The right fielder of the home team is used to this, and knows exactly where the worst blind spots are in the stadium lighting. Therefore, it is easier for them to avoid looking in that exact spot than it would be for the visitor.

Same could be said for all other sports and/or professions.

Of course, there are many other mitigating factors which contributes to better performance for the home team in the world of sports. In football, the home crowd will purposely get as loud as possible when the opponent has the ball and is in the huddle, or ready to snap the ball. Eagles and PSU fans are NOTORIOUS for this nasty bit of tactic. Makes it much harder for the visiting team to clearly hear the play-calling coming from the coach or QB.

But I think the familiarity of surroundings is the biggest factor.

[Vinny P.]

Originally Posted by endgame

You're reading contention where none exists. No one says it matters. What matters is that it hasn't been asked.

I never said you guys were in contention. I was just talking about the earlier claim that someone kept saying about how the home team has the advantage for batting second or whatever. I have heard other people make that same argument IRL in the past.

[Vinny P.]

Originally Posted by Curtis

You are correct. Amazingly, it took Tony LaRussa to discover that in the '80s. He also discovered that if you score in four or more separate innings your chance of winning is better than 80%, even if you only total four runs.

Just so some of the more argumentative posters don't jump all over that, he did NOT say that teams which score four or more runs win 80% of the time; only when those four or more runs are scattered over four or more innings. Why how the runs are distributed matters is incomprehensible to me.

Probably some sort of psychological effect of seemingly negative performance. If a team is able to score four runs in a singe inning, psychologically speaking, it probably doesn't come down as hard as if those four runs were scattered along four different innings. Not only that, with multiple runs in one inning, the losing team gets mad, and/or more determined to allow any more across.

Even if you allow a single run in an inning, it feels like a failure. Do it four time, you have "failed" for close to half the game.

[Curtis]

Originally Posted by Vinny P.

In football, the home crowd will purposely get as loud as possible when the opponent has the ball and is in the huddle, or ready to snap the ball. Eagles and PSU fans are NOTORIOUS for this nasty bit of tactic. Makes it much harder for the visiting team to clearly hear the play-calling coming from the coach or QB.

My best friend is a Vikings fan, and back when they were making the playoffs regularly they got hit with three or four penalties in one season, including twice in one game, for doing that in their dome. I may be wrong (not a football fan), but I think I remember that the Minnesota fans are the reason that excessive crowd noise became eligible for a penalty.

[Vinny P.]

Originally Posted by Curtis

My best friend is a Vikings fan, and back when they were making the playoffs regularly they got hit with three or four penalties in one season, including twice in one game, for doing that in their dome. I may be wrong (not a football fan), but I think I remember that the Minnesota fans are the reason that excessive crowd noise became eligible for a penalty.

Wait. That's a penalty? what? lmao. That's a new on on me. You should hear Beaver Stadium. It makes even Philly look like pee wee. lol.