Reverse Sweeps #2

[Kushiel]

As an old guy normal to me was no wild card teams at all in MLB. That is why baseball plays 162 games. If it was normal/traditional, we would not need this conversation. But what we do have in PT is what seems to many players to be an inordinate number of wild card winners.

[PunishedF2P]

The argument about wildcards doesn't seem to be very strong, all things considered...

You all realize that the Wild Card Texas Rangers are playing the Wild Card Arizona Diamondbacks in the World Series, in real life, right now?

EDIT: Since 1997, and including this year, 8 Wild Card teams have won the World Series. That's 8 out 27, so about 30% of the time. That's a lot. And from my experience at least, it's similar to what happens in PT.

[Hwilensky]

Originally Posted by PunishedF2P

The argument about wildcards doesn't seem to be very strong, all things considered...

You all realize that the Wild Card Texas Rangers are playing the Wild Card Arizona Diamondbacks in the World Series, in real life, right now?

EDIT: Since 1997, and including this year, 8 Wild Card teams have won the World Series. That's 8 out 27, so about 30% of the time. That's a lot. And from my experience at least, it's similar to what happens in PT.

I think it is happening more times then that.

[PunishedF2P]

Originally Posted by Hwilensky

I think it is happening more times then that.

I think you have a great point about reverse sweeps (the topic of the thread); that's happened one time in about 40 series that were 3-0 in the MLB.

So you should have to be up 3-0 40 times and lose just ONE of those to a reverse sweep. We all know it happens a lot more frequently than that.

I haven't played tourneys at all until the last month, so before that it was just the playoffs (when I got there), and I've been reverse swept twice in the playoffs - I've probably had half a dozen 3-0 leads this year, so that's 33% of the time

But as far as WCs winning championships, I'm not personally seeing more than 30% of WS winners being WC teams. Hasn't happened in my last 6 seasons in diamond.

[Hwilensky]

Originally Posted by PunishedF2P

I think you have a great point about reverse sweeps (the topic of the thread); that's happened one time in about 40 series that were 3-0 in the MLB.

So you should have to be up 3-0 40 times and lose just ONE of those to a reverse sweep. We all know it happens a lot more frequently than that.

I haven't played tourneys at all until the last month, so before that it was just the playoffs (when I got there), and I've been reverse swept twice in the playoffs - I've probably had half a dozen 3-0 leads this year, so that's 33% of the time

But as far as WCs winning championships, I'm not personally seeing more than 30% of WS winners being WC teams. Hasn't happened in my last 6 seasons in diamond.

I can not go back and look at all my recent years, but I know in 3 out 4 last years, I had the best or 2nd best record , and lost to a wild card team, who went on to with the world series. Maybe its just my luck...

Too many wonky things happen with this game from wild card "magic" to reverse sweeos to even the pack opening of cards...hard to believe in randomness...but maybe I am reading into things too much..

[rburgh]

Suppose you have a 94 win team that gets a bye, and the WC team you face in the LDS won 85 games. They will sweep you one time in 25, and you will sweep them about 1 time in 10. For the math for this, see:

https://stats.stackexchange.com/ques...from-win-rates

That says that a win rate for you (ignoring home field advantage adjustments) is about 56% for any one game. So your sweep rate is (0.56)^4 and his is (0.44^4). But either of you can start a 4-game win streak not only in the first game of the series, but also after losing the first 1, 2, or 3 games. So even if you win the first 3, you still only have a 96% chance to win the series. And these probabilities ignore the possibility that your opponent may have the opportunity to adjust his lineups or pitcher usage to take advantage of weaknesses in your team that he finds by reviewing the play by play results of his losses.

Given that there are upwards of 600 leagues in play here, and four times that many LDS every week, and twice that many LCS every week, there are at least 4200 7 game playoff series that occur every Sunday. 4% of that is 168, so there are likely somewhere close to 168 pure reverse sweeps (lose the first 3, then win the next 4) here every Sunday. And there are likely 90+ series where the favorite loses in 5 despite winning the first game, and 5 or 6 series where the favorite wins the first two and loses the next 4.

Of course if the difference in win totals is greater, reverse sweeps are less likely and if the difference in win totals is less, reverse sweeps are more likely. Take, for example, Bailey's 100 win team having a 2:1 lead in their series against the 115 win team. There was still a 22% chance that he would lose the series in 6 games and a 26% chance that he would lose in 7. So he was only a 52% favorite to win the series if you ignore any home field advantage.

[HRBaker]

Originally Posted by Kushiel

As an old guy normal to me was no wild card teams at all in MLB. That is why baseball plays 162 games. If it was normal/traditional, we would not need this conversation. But what we do have in PT is what seems to many players to be an inordinate number of wild card winners.

As another old guy, I remember "old time" baseball. As Kushiel says, the 162 game schedule (or 154 games before) is plenty of time to determine who should go to the world series. Allowing WC teams to get into the playoffs allows teams that made late season changes or got lucky to suddenly have a die-roll chance to win everything.

Fun fact; the 154 schedule-to-162 games, and the addition of wildcards was for only ONE purpose, to extend the length of the season and increase profits for the MLB. The downside is it watered down what winning the most games in the season truly meant.

In the perfect world, we'd go back to the way it was. In a near-perfect world wild cards would at least have to win a 9 game series to even get into the world series.

[PunishedF2P]

Originally Posted by rburgh

Suppose you have a 94 win team that gets a bye, and the WC team you face in the LDS won 85 games. They will sweep you one time in 25, and you will sweep them about 1 time in 10. For the math for this, see:

https://stats.stackexchange.com/ques...from-win-rates

That says that a win rate for you (ignoring home field advantage adjustments) is about 56% for any one game. So your sweep rate is (0.56)^4 and his is (0.44^4). But either of you can start a 4-game win streak not only in the first game of the series, but also after losing the first 1, 2, or 3 games. So even if you win the first 3, you still only have a 96% chance to win the series. And these probabilities ignore the possibility that your opponent may have the opportunity to adjust his lineups or pitcher usage to take advantage of weaknesses in your team that he finds by reviewing the play by play results of his losses.

Given that there are upwards of 600 leagues in play here, and four times that many LDS every week, and twice that many LCS every week, there are at least 4200 7 game playoff series that occur every Sunday. 4% of that is 168, so there are likely somewhere close to 168 pure reverse sweeps (lose the first 3, then win the next 4) here every Sunday. And there are likely 90+ series where the favorite loses in 5 despite winning the first game, and 5 or 6 series where the favorite wins the first two and loses the next 4.

Of course if the difference in win totals is greater, reverse sweeps are less likely and if the difference in win totals is less, reverse sweeps are more likely. Take, for example, Bailey's 100 win team having a 2:1 lead in their series against the 115 win team. There was still a 22% chance that he would lose the series in 6 games and a 26% chance that he would lose in 7. So he was only a 52% favorite to win the series if you ignore any home field advantage.

Nice job on the math!

Of course, IRL, only 1 MLB team has ever come back from 3-0.

Like I mentioned earlier in the thread, teams should get a 'cold' or 'hot' modifier when they are up 2-0, 3-0, etc, to get more realistic outcomes. Because the math doesn't add up in real life, and it never will. Teams down 2-0 and 3-0 ARE effected by it negatively and vice versa.

In the NBA, there has been 151 series that went to 3-0, and ZERO comebacks, ever - I imagine the odds should work out about the same as it does for baseball. But there's a serious human element to being in a hole like that.

In the NHL, about 4 out of 200 - so 1 in 50. Less than half of the expected odds.

All put together, the three major sports it's 5 in around 400, just above 1%, only a quarter of the expected outcome based on the math.

It should be something that is incredibly rare in the game.

[bailey]

Originally Posted by PunishedF2P

Nice job on the math!

Of course, IRL, only 1 MLB team has ever come back from 3-0.

Like I mentioned earlier in the thread, teams should get a 'cold' or 'hot' modifier when they are up 2-0, 3-0, etc, to get more realistic outcomes. Because the math doesn't add up in real life, and it never will. Teams down 2-0 and 3-0 ARE effected by it negatively and vice versa.

Maybe they have taken your advice. How would you know, definitively?

They do tinker with the game and don't tell anyone, but it is rare to be able to prove it. For example, did you know 2046 was a "steroid year"?
Check the top 50 diamond league "team batting home runs". Prior to 2046 only 1 team slugged more than 300 HR in diamond. In 2046, 19 teams slugged 300+ HR in diamond. The record since 2046 is 252 in 2052. Don't invest in power.

[PunishedF2P]

Originally Posted by bailey

For example, did you know 2046 was a "steroid year"?

That's hilarious. I 100% did notice the crazy power numbers in 2046. Gibson, A-Rod, Mantle all hit 40+ dingers for me, and that's the only season any of them have ever reached 40. And the next year, it was back down again. That was wild.

And yeah, who knows, maybe they have - I was just mentioning it again in regards to the point that while the odds/math may indicate one thing, reality tells us that the math doesn't add up. And hopefully the game can figure out how to account for that in some way.

[MathBandit]

Originally Posted by PunishedF2P

Nice job on the math!

Of course, IRL, only 1 MLB team has ever come back from 3-0.

Like I mentioned earlier in the thread, teams should get a 'cold' or 'hot' modifier when they are up 2-0, 3-0, etc, to get more realistic outcomes. Because the math doesn't add up in real life, and it never will. Teams down 2-0 and 3-0 ARE effected by it negatively and vice versa.

In the NBA, there has been 151 series that went to 3-0, and ZERO comebacks, ever - I imagine the odds should work out about the same as it does for baseball. But there's a serious human element to being in a hole like that.

In the NHL, about 4 out of 200 - so 1 in 50. Less than half of the expected odds.

All put together, the three major sports it's 5 in around 400, just above 1%, only a quarter of the expected outcome based on the math.

It should be something that is incredibly rare in the game.

I don't think it's so much about the human element, but that in the NBA/NHL, going up 3-0 means you are almost certainly the better team, and probably a much better team.

In the MLB, going up 3-0 means you won 3 coinflips that were 44-55 at worst. MLB is also different from the other two in that the team you are in games 1-3 is very different than the team you are in game 4, game 5, and game 6, and game 7.

[Hwilensky]

At the end of the day, it is VERY disheartening when you see your team get reverse swept time and time again. More times that statically probable. I have been in too many tournaments or playoffs to just see my team lose. I am in a tournament now, where my team swept the first two rounds, well rested, and was up 2-0, against a team that had just played 12 straight games, and everyone of his players are exhausted, only to get reverse swept. It may happen once in a blue moon, but not as much as it does in this game.

[Tinkerman]

Originally Posted by Hwilensky

At the end of the day, it is VERY disheartening when you see your team get reverse swept time and time again. More times that statically probable. I have been in too many tournaments or playoffs to just see my team lose. I am in a tournament now, where my team swept the first two rounds, well rested, and was up 2-0, against a team that had just played 12 straight games, and everyone of his players are exhausted, only to get reverse swept. It may happen once in a blue moon, but not as much as it does in this game.

If you're F2P, riding high in the quick tourney charts, done well on live spec and have a good PT roster, you've probably got the PT equivalent of Sauron's Eye on you!

[rburgh]

No. 7 Pitt volleyball (23-4, 14-2 ACC) kept its ACC regular season championship and top-four seed in the NCAA tournament hopes alive as the Panthers defeated No. 4 Louisville (23-4, 14-3 ACC) in an epic reverse sweep in front of a record-setting [home] crowd.


Pitt's VB team also reverse swept Georgia Tech in early October, on the road. Georgia Tech was ranked #11 at the time and was #9 in the latest coaches' poll.


And one reason it happens in our game is that a lot of teams make major roster improvements during the season. It's a safe bet to say that if you jump out front early and do nothing with your team, one or more guys is going to make a run at you.


Note that, in real life, 3 1/2 of the last 10 seasons have seen the team with the best record win the World Series. In 2013, the 97 win Red Sox faced the 97 win Cardinals in the series, the only time that both league top seeds have made it to the WS in that time frame.

[Kushiel]

And all of those were reverse sweeps? Nope. Nobody is talking about underdogs winning.

Oh yeah, college volleyball has nothing to do with OOTPPT reverse sweeps. But, I do love watching the ladies play volleyball.

[Hwilensky]

Again, I just don't get it....Reverse sweeps are insane...I have lost 5 Tournaments across two teams to reverse sweeps in the semi-finals....Just insane...continue on as you where..just venting..

[bailey]

Originally Posted by Hwilensky

Again, I just don't get it....Reverse sweeps are insane...I have lost 5 Tournaments across two teams to reverse sweeps in the semi-finals....Just insane...continue on as you where..just venting..

Don't you ever win one by reverse sweep? You have to check every round, not just the one you lost. It's hard to have sympathy for someone who has won 911 tournaments.

[Hwilensky]

Originally Posted by bailey

Don't you ever win one by reverse sweep? You have to check every round, not just the one you lost. It's hard to have sympathy for someone who has won 911 tournaments.

The amount of tournaments I have won shouldn't matter. Yes, from time to time, I have won on a reverse sweep. But I have lost waaay more that I have won..

[rburgh]

As an old guy normal to me was no wild card teams at all in MLB. That is why baseball plays 162 games.

Baseball only had 162 game seasons with no league playoffs for the 10 team leagues that existed from 1961 (AL only) through 1968. When they expanded to 2 12-team leagues in 1969, they immediately went to 2 divisions with a 2-team playoff. And they haven't looked back since.

[Kushiel]

I was already watching baseball for many years before they changed to 162 game seasons. I remember the Roger Maris 162 game controversy as it happened.

Before that that it was 154 games to decide who deserved the WS, not a short series where anything can happen. My statement does not change.

When baseball started making changes, the great game lost the spotlight to football. Baseball was built on tradition, not fads. They try to run it like a Ringling Brothers center ring act now.