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Baseball Statistics
Professor Barry C. Arnold
NASC 092 003
Call #: 16431
Friday, 1:10-2:00pm, STAT 2634

Baseball, over the past 130 years has continually refined the collection, analysis and interpretation of detailed statistics covering all aspects of the game. The accumulated records thus constitute an enormous, accessible repository of statistics, in the everyday sense of being arrays of related numbers and summaries of such arrays. But the word "Statistics" (with a capital S, to distinguish it from the everyday word "statistics") also denotes the science of developing improved methods for making decisions in the presence of uncertainty. It deals with inductive rather than deductive inference, since induction is the form of reasoning that necessarily involves uncertainty. In this seminar, the vast available mine of baseball statistics will be used to illustrate some of the methods, theories and controversies associated with Statistical Science.

Some Topics, not in order:

(i) Record values ( the home run record, Ruth-Maris-Bonds)
(ii) Income inequality ( Yankees and Expos )
(iii) Should you bunt to advance the runner ?
(iv) Markov chain models.
(v) Should you give an intentional walk to set up a double play ?
(vi) Is there an optimal batting order ( who should bat cleanup ) ?
(vii) Will the best team win the World Series ?
(viii) What is a good way to predict who will win a given game.
(ix) Regression models for prediction
(x) Rare events ( hitting for the cycle, triple plays, perfect games, . . . . )
(xi) Projecting end of season batting averages for the league based on May data.
(xii) Are there Statistics that should be collected, but aren‚t ?
(xiii) Simpson‚s paradox

Reading List:

Albert, Jim; Bennett, Jay : Curve ball. Baseball, statistics, and the role
of chance in the game. Copernicus, New York, 2001. xviii+350 pp. ISBN:
0-387-98816-5

Ken Ross 2007 A Mathematician at the Ballpark, Plume Books

Brief Biographical Statement:

Barry C. Arnold is a Professor in the Statistics department. He has been teaching a variety of statistics and mathematics courses for more than 40 years. He is a Fellow of the American Statistical Association , of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics and of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He is an elected member of the International Statistical Institute.He enjoys watching (not playing ) baseball.