CHART OF THE DAY: Spring Training Records Have No Correlation With The Regular Season

Last year, the San Francisco Giants finished with the best record in the Cactus League (Arizona spring training) and the Tampa Bay Rays "won" the Grapefruit League (Florida spring training).

Some will say that those performances helped set up their regular season in which both teams won their division. The Giants went on to win the World Series.

But how much of a relationship is there between how well a team performs in Spring Training and how many games they win during the regular season? Turns out not much at all. In fact, there is almost no correlation at all.

Below we have a chart that compares the Spring Training and regular season winning percentages of every team over the last eight seasons (data via ESPN.com). If teams won games during the regular season at a similar rate as spring training, we would see all the dots clustered near a line that moved diagonally from the lower-left to the upper-right. Instead, we see the dots are spread out and the "trendline" is nearly flat.

We can calculate the level of correlation using R-squared. Think of it as a scale from 0 to 100, where 100 means you can predict exactly what a team's regular season would be based on their Spring record, and 0 means no correlation at all. This chart has an R-squared of 6. In other words, there is almost no relation whatsoever.

The 30 MLB teams have played 240 seasons over the last eight years. Of those, 163 (67.9%) had a regular season winning percentage that differed from Spring Training by at least 100 points. For a perspective, 100 percentage points over the course of 162 games is the difference between finishing .500 (81-81) and winning 98 games (.605).

Almost one out of every five teams (18.3%) finished with a regular season record that was at least 200 points different than their Spring record. Over 162 games, 200 percentage points is the difference between winning 98 games and winning 64 games. In other words, one-fifth of the teams played like a playoff team in the spring and then lost nearly 100 games during the regular season (or vice-versa).

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See Also:

• CHART OF THE DAY: It Took His Retirement For Fans To Learn To Spell Andy Pettitte's Name Correctly
• CHART OF THE DAY: Cal Ripken Did Not Change The Shortstop Position
• CHART OF THE DAY: Albert Pujols And His Impending Power Outage

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/businessinsider/sportspage/~3/97YjnYOyYRY/chart-of-the-day-spring-training-record-regular-season-2011-2

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Daily Cupcakes: February 22nd, 2011

Source: http://www.milehighhockey.com/2011/2/22/2007254/daily-cupcakes-february-22nd-2011

Frans Nielsen Dwayne Roloson Jon Sim Jason Arnott David Clarkson Patrick Davis

DREAM JOB?: Watch (And Blog About) Every Single Major League Baseball Game This Season

Major League Baseball is planning to hire a blogger to fill a position the league calls "every baseball fan's dream job!" (The exclamation point is theirs).

The position will require the blogger to watch every baseball game this season and then write about those games and the experience.

Let me repeat. The person will be required to watch Every. Single. Game. including the All-Star game and playoff games. That is as many as 2,472 games over the course of seven months if each of the postseason series goes the distance.

With as many as 15 games and 45 hours of action each day, there would have to be some overlap. Jeff Heckelman of Major League Baseball said this won't be a problem.

"We’re still working out the details of the setting in which the person will hang out," said Heckelman. "But suffice it to say it will be a setting conducive to watching multiple games simultaneously."

The person that is hired for this job will have to relocate to New York City during the season. In addition to writing about the games and their experience, they will be part of a show that will air on the league's website and will participate in what Heckelman called a "live interactive experience for baseball fans."

Heckelman says MLB is looking for somebody that has an encyclopedic knowledge of the entire league, is entertaining, has a unique and humorous writing style and will be comfortable in front of a camera.

MLB is also looking to capitalize on marketing and promotional partnerships with what they are hoping is a popular project. "We’re certainly talking about such opportunities internally, but at this point we’re just focused on finding the right person and the rest will follow."

The right person? Do you think my wife and two kids would mind if I took the summer off to live in an MLB dorm?

If you are interested, you can apply for this position here: MLB Dream Job

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See Also:

• The Texas Rangers Have Sold 360,000 (And Counting) Of These Cool T-Shirts
• The New York Mets Rebuilding Strategy Is To Become The Oakland A's
• Mets Employee Allegedly Bet On Baseball

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/businessinsider/sportspage/~3/NeEjKmDxq6Y/mlb-job-blogger-every-game-2011-2

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Eagles Enter ACC Stretch Run Desperately Needing Win Over Miami

Source: http://www.bcinterruption.com/2011/2/23/2009079/boston-college-basketball-miami-hurricanes-acc-standings

Andrew McDonald Matt Martin Frans Nielsen Dwayne Roloson Jon Sim Jason Arnott

Tuesday Morning Fly By: Laying Down Some SOD

Source: http://www.broadstreethockey.com/2011/2/22/2007737/tuesday-morning-fly-by-laying-down-some-sod

bryce Salvador Wade Belak Martin Erat Marcel Goc Jamie Lundmark Nick Spaling

A ROLL IN THE HAY: Horse Of The Year Zenyatta Loses Her Breeding Virginity

In one of the most anticipated horse romances ever, 2010 Horse of the Year Zenyatta was bred to the 2006 Preakness winner, Bernardini, today.

Zenyatta, who was 19-0 before losing the final race of her career by a nose, won more money than any female horse in history, so naturally, the hopes for her offspring are quite high.

Her owner announced the event in the most awkward blog post you'll ever read about about horse sex. Farm handlers say it was a "smooth" and "textbook" hook up.

Bernardini, who is himself the grandson of Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew, gets an advertised stud fee of $75,000. Mares don't get fees, because if all goes well, her owner ends up with a new baby race horse. In about four years, we'll find out if was all worth it.

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See Also:

• END OF AN ERA: Off-Track Betting Shut Down In New York
• The State Of Maryland Ponies Up Millions To Save The Preakness
• CNET Founder Ignores Huge Tax Bill In Order To Buy Race Tracks

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/businessinsider/sportspage/~3/v0g6sswyanY/zenyatta-bred-to-berndinie-2011-2

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UH OH: Cardinals Ace Adam Wainwright May Need Tommy John Surgery

Adam Wainwright, the runner up to last year's NL Cy Young Award has left spring training after injuring a ligament in his pitching elbow.

Cardinals general manager John Mozeliak told the NY Daily News that he doesn't "want to speculate but usually when it involves the ligament," that means Tommy John surgery, which would sideline him for more than a year.

The news comes one week after Albert Pujols cut off contract negotiations, essentially announcing his free agency at the end of the season.

It's going to be a long 2011 in St. Louis.

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See Also:

• Albert Pujols Contract Deadline Passes: NO DEAL
• The Cardinals Have Severely Underpaid Albert Pujols So Far In His Career
• Albert Pujols' Contract Deadline Is 24 Hours Away, And There Are No Signs A Deal Is Close

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/businessinsider/sportspage/~3/KW0q47ye2PY/adam-wainwright-elbow-inury-2011-2

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