Another Measure of Conference Balance

Boyd's World-> Breadcrumbs Back to Omaha-> Another Measure of Conference Balance About the author, Boyd Nation

Publication Date: March 14, 2006

Brooms

This week I'm starting up a couple of space-consuming weekly features, so for my main topic you're getting a hopefully interesting data dump, which serves as a followup to the ten-year conference standings from a couple of weeks ago. First of all, though, let me recognize an error in that piece: Oregon, of course, dropped baseball after 1981; they had always been listed in place of Oregon State in the 1996 standings for some reason, and I didn't catch that in the listings. Oregon State was actually an even 120-120 for the 1996-2005 stretch.

One of the interesting topics to me from that list was the notion of balance as more than a "who's on top?" glance, so I thought I'd take a look at the number of series sweeps that occur in each league. It's somewhat complicated by the fact that everyone has their own scheduling philosophy, but here's the chart:

                        4G/2D         4G/3D         3G/2D         3G/3D
Conf                  #   S   %     #   S   %     #   S   %     #   S   %

ACC                    0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0   48  26 54.2  243 129 53.1
America East         125  33 26.4   14   3 21.4   54  23 42.6    2   1 50.0
Atlantic 10            0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  306 159 52.0   28  11 39.3
Atlantic Sun           0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  195 142 72.8   29  27 93.1
Big 12                 0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0   61  23 37.7  310 159 51.3
Big East               0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  226 120 53.1   21   9 42.9
Big South              0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  149  77 51.7   70  39 55.7
Big Ten               38  13 34.2  228  51 22.4   19  13 68.4    5   5 100.0
Big West               0   0  0.0    1   0  0.0    5   2 40.0  254 104 40.9
C-USA                  0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0   46  28 60.9  357 187 52.4
CAA                    0   0  0.0    1   0  0.0   54  20 37.0  178 103 57.9
Horizon                6   2 33.3   56  29 51.8    7   6 85.7    2   2 100.0
Independents           9   2 22.2    7   3 42.9   31  17 54.8   18   7 38.9
Ivy                   75  19 25.3   15   3 20.0    6   1 16.7    2   1 50.0
MAAC                  20   0  0.0    6   0  0.0  209 135 64.6   34  22 64.7
MAC                   93  12 12.9  101  62 61.4   32  15 46.9   83  44 53.0
MCC                   14   0  0.0   37   0  0.0    2   0  0.0    1   0  0.0
MEAC                   9   1 11.1    2   0  0.0  125  45 36.0    3   0  0.0
MVC                   53  10 18.9  170  53 31.2   21  13 61.9   37  34 91.9
Mid-Continent        139  22 15.8    2   1 50.0    8   2 25.0    0   0  0.0
Mountain West          4   0  0.0    4   1 25.0   29  15 51.7  132  56 42.4
NEC                    1   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  158 105 66.5   20   9 45.0
New York               3   0  0.0    0   0  0.0    5   4 80.0    0   0  0.0
OVC                    0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  262 118 45.0    3   1 33.3
Pac 10                 1   0  0.0    5   0  0.0   20  10 50.0  284 129 45.4
Patriot               97  23 23.7   18   6 33.3    1   0  0.0    1   1 100.0
SEC                    0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0   27  16 59.3  435 215 49.4
SWAC                 129  38 29.5    2   0  0.0   44  19 43.2    3   1 33.3
Southern               0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  231  96 41.6  172 112 65.1
Southland              0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  176  70 39.8  162 107 66.0
Sun Belt               0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  108  26 24.1  191 121 63.4
TAAC                   0   0  0.0    0   0  0.0  175  44 25.1    8   1 12.5
WAC                    0   0  0.0    7   0  0.0   30   8 26.7  252  67 26.6
WCC                    4   0  0.0    5   0  0.0  122  20 16.4  169  96 56.8

"G" is the number of games, "D" is the number of days, and "S" is the number of sweeps, so, for example, the ACC had 26 sweeps in the 48 series played where 3 games were played in 2 days.

There's a slight bit of dirt in the sand of this study, since I didn't take the time to eliminate cases where teams played three games against each other in the conference tournament, but there don't turn out to be enough of those cases to really matter.

All told, the ASun appears to be the least balanced conference, which matches up pretty well to the mental picture of a league with two or three teams playing on the edges of the national picture and some real dregs at the bottom.
Despite Oral Roberts' presence, the Mid-Con is fairly balanced otherwise.
The rate doesn't seem to change much between two- and three-day series, so there's no real argument against doubleheaders here.

Tournament Watch

This means absolutely nothing, ignore it.

This is one generic layman's predictions for who gets in the tournament. I'm not going to bother picking a team from the one-bid conferences, since the conference tournament will just be a crapshoot, but if I only list one team from a conference, they'll get an at large bid if they don't get the automatic bid.

America East   North Carolina        Winthrop             UCLA
Atlantic 10    Wake Forest           Liberty              Washington
Atlantic Sun   Miami, Florida        Purdue               Stanford
Horizon        Florida State         Ohio State           Georgia
Ivy            North Carolina State  UC Irvine            Arkansas
MAAC           Virginia              Long Beach State     Mississippi State
MEAC           Oklahoma              Cal State Fullerton  Alabama
Mountain West  Texas                 Old Dominion         Louisiana State
NEC            Kansas                Rice                 Florida
OVC            Oklahoma State        Tulane               South Carolina
Patriot        Baylor                Kent State           Tennessee
Southland      Nebraska              Oral Roberts         College of Charleston
Sun Belt       Kansas State          Wichita State        Hawaii
SWAC           Texas A&M             Arizona State        Fresno State
Georgia Tech   Notre Dame            Oregon State         San Diego
Clemson        St. John's            Southern California  Pepperdine

Pitch Count Watch

Rather than keep returning to the subject of pitch counts and pitcher usage in general too often for my main theme, I'm just going to run a standard feature down here where I point out potential problems; feel free to stop reading above this if the subject doesn't interest you. This will just be a quick listing of questionable starts that have caught my eye -- the general threshold for listing is 120 actual pitches or 130 estimated, although short rest will also get a pitcher listed if I catch it. Don't blame me; I'm just the messenger.

Date	Team	Pitcher	Opponent	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	AB	BF	Pitches
2/04	Fresno State	Andy Underwood	UCLA	8.0	3	0	0	4	4	25	31	127
2/08	Tuskegee	Rickey-12	Alabama State	7.0	9	4	3	9	6	28	37	145(*)
2/10	Miles	McGaughy	Alabama A&M	9.0	7	3	1	5	12	33	39	152(*)
2/10	Fresno State	Doug Fister	Pepperdine	7.0	9	5	3	3	6	30	33	121
2/10	Hawaii-Hilo	Ryan Olszewski	Wichita State	9.0	10	4	3	2	3	39	41	132(*)
2/11	New Mexico State	Tyler Sturdevant	Washington	9.0	12	5	5	1	6	38	40	134
2/17	Winthrop	A Wilson	Evansville	8.1	4	2	2	6	5	27	36	132(*)
2/17	Gonzaga	Patrick Donovan	New Mexico State	6.1	6	4	4	3	6	26	30	131
2/17	New Mexico	Nate Melek	Arizona	6.2	7	5	3	2	3	26	29	129
2/18	New Mexico	Danny Ray Herrera	Arizona	9.0	7	3	3	1	6	33	35	130
2/25	Kentucky	Craig Snipp	Lamar	9.0	6	1	1	4	8	33	40	144(*)
2/25	Florida	Bryan Augenstein	Ohio State	7.1	8	2	0	1	10	32	34	125
2/25	Texas Christian	Sam Demel	Wright State	5.2	7	5	3	4	7	26	30	127
2/26	Vanderbilt	Matt Buschmann	Kansas	9.0	9	4	2	2	7	36	40	137(*)
2/26	San Jose State	Josh Amberson	Loyola Marymount	7.2	4	1	1	4	8	26	31	121
2/27	Prairie View A&M	Matthew Chase	Texas Southern	9.0	8	4	4	3	9	31	37	135(*)
3/01	Arkansas-Pine Bluff	Bryant Garner	Louisiana Tech	9.0	11	14	10	6	6	40	48	168(*)
3/03	Chicago State	Jonathan Kohn	Lewis Clark State	7.0	9	6	4	3	3	26	33	128
3/03	Texas Christian	Jake Arrieta	Florida Atlantic	8.0	2	0	0	2	13	25	27	122
3/03	Manhattan	Chris Cody	Tulane	9.0	10	0	0	4	10	35	41	151(*)
3/03	Florida International	Walker Whitley	New York Tech	9.0	7	4	0	2	10	33	36	132(*)
3/03	Oral Roberts	Nick Jones	UC Davis	9.0	5	2	2	2	10	31	34	122
3/04	Arkansas-Little Rock	Matt Bates	Murray State	9.0	10	5	5	1	3	33	36	123
3/04	Murray State	Michal Perconte	Arkansas-Little Rock	7.0	2	0	0	3	8	23	26	126
3/04	Florida Atlantic	Chris Salberg	Texas Christian	5.0	6	6	6	8	9	19	29	121
3/04	Texas Christian	Sam Demel	Florida Atlantic	7.0	6	3	3	2	14	27	30	129
3/04	Winthrop	H Rollins	Kent State	6.2	14	12	7	2	10	33	37	135(*)
3/04	Birmingham-Southern	David Horne	Miami, Ohio	9.0	5	2	2	4	6	28	35	121
3/04	East Tennessee State	Jeremy Hall	St. John's	9.0	5	3	3	3	10	33	37	137(*)
2/26	Alabama A&M	Antoine Williams	Mississippi Valley State	8.0	9	5	4	7	3	30	38	136(*)
3/05	Central Michigan	Josh Collmenter	Northeastern	8.0	4	3	2	5	11	28	33	133(*)
3/05	Lipscomb	Matt Schnelly	Florida A&M	8.2	6	4	3	2	13	33	37	141(*)
3/05	Miami, Ohio	John Ely	Birmingham-Southern	9.0	5	1	1	1	14	31	32	122
3/05	UCLA	Tyson Brummett	North Carolina State	8.0	6	2	1	0	12	30	30	121
3/07	Troy	Mike Felix	Jacksonville State	9.0	4	1	1	4	14	34	39	128
3/09	Chicago State	Kohn Jonatha	Washington State	9.0	7	5	2	2	7	34	40	137(*)
3/09	North Carolina-Asheville	Tim Johnson	Texas Tech	5.2	10	9	9	5	3	28	33	122
3/10	Florida Atlantic	Mickey Storey	Mercer	6.2	11	6	6	3	11	31	35	133(*)
3/10	Alabama	Wade Leblanc	Nebraska	8.0	5	1	1	1	6	27	29	126
3/10	Birmingham-Southern	Brandon Hynick	Auburn	7.0	6	1	1	0	11	27	27	123
3/10	Lamar	Steve Macfarland	Southeastern Louisiana	7.0	8	4	4	4	11	28	34	129
3/10	Southeastern Louisiana	Mizell	Lamar	7.1	8	0	0	1	9	27	28	129
3/10	UCLA	Hector Ambriz	Mississippi	8.0	3	1	1	2	10	26	29	121
3/10	Rhode Island	Steve Holmes	Seton Hall	9.0	7	2	0	3	11	33	37	139(*)
3/10	Louisiana-Monroe	Ben Soignier	Stephen F. Austin State	7.1	2	3	1	2	11	23	27	121
3/11	Coppin State	Matt Bellon	Furman	6.0	10	11	9	7	2	30	38	134(*)
3/11	Kennesaw State	Bubba Blalock	Gardner-Webb	9.0	8	2	2	3	6	33	38	132(*)
3/11	North Dakota State	Jake Laber	Kentucky	7.0	7	8	5	7	4	31	39	152
3/11	Belmont	Josh Moffitt	Jacksonville	7.2	8	5	3	3	4	29	35	126
3/11	Texas-San Antonio	Josh Ruffin	Illinois	8.0	7	3	3	3	5	31	35	125
3/11	William and Mary	Joe Kantakevich	James Madison	6.2	10	6	6	5	6	29	37	121
3/11	Seton Hall	Dan Merklinger	Long Island	9.0	2	0	0	7	12	25	33	140(*)
3/11	Louisiana-Lafayette	Hunter Moody	Texas A&M	9.0	3	1	0	3	2	29	33	133
3/11	Florida State	Tyler Chambliss	Maryland	9.0	7	2	2	2	15	33	36	123
3/11	UCLA	Dave Huff	Mississippi	7.2	7	5	4	3	9	30	33	124
3/11	New Mexico	Danny Ray Herrera	Oregon State	8.0	11	2	2	0	9	33	34	131
3/11	Cal Poly	Bud Norris	UC Santa Barbara	8.0	6	2	2	3	6	29	33	126
3/12	South Alabama	P.j. Walters	Georgia Southern	8.0	9	4	0	1	15	35	38	145(*)
3/12	Belmont	Carlo Testa	Jacksonville	9.0	3	1	1	6	7	29	36	151
3/12	Lipscomb	Smith	East Tennessee State	9.0	4	3	1	4	11	30	38	145(*)
3/12	Southeastern Louisiana	Jwaguespack	Lamar	7.2	7	4	4	1	5	30	31	124
3/12	UCLA	Tyson Brummett	Mississippi	7.0	6	3	3	6	7	23	31	122
3/12	Cal State Sacramento	Mick Joyce	Northern Colorado	9.0	4	0	0	3	8	31	34	152
3/13	Indiana	Josh Lewis	Northern Iowa	9.0	9	1	1	0	7	35	36	127
3/13	Yale	Matt Fealey	Eastern Illinois	9.0	22	14	9	1	10	49	53	177(*)

(*) Pitch count is estimated. As always, I welcome actual pitch count corrections.

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Boyd's World-> Breadcrumbs Back to Omaha-> Another Measure of Conference Balance About the author, Boyd Nation