Standings Not Accurate

[Lou Gehrig]

Originally Posted by Dyzalot

Your understanding is incorrect. The papers back in the day when they actually reported on baseball would show the standings in order of winning percentage, not by how many games back a team was. It rarely was different but sometimes because of rain outs you'd see a team in first that was a half a game back.

I understand. So I guess the question is what is the consensus? Is OOTP listing the standings properly by GB or should they use the percentages?

[majesty95]

I tried looking for the official rules and could not find anything. However, one could make the argument that if a team was ahead by winning pct but behind in GB, they should not be declared champions because the games that they are missing could have resulted in losses.

For instance, if one team plays 100 games and wins 70 they have a .700 pct. A team that played only 80 games and went 57-23 (.713) would be 3 GB in the standings. There is no guarantee that they would win 71% of their remaining games and, it could be argued, had an easier road with 20 less games. Why should they be handed the title when they played less games?

I think winning pct may decide a tie in GB when the games played are close. However, GB has a built in buffer to penalize teams that don't try to make up games and, IMO, should be the ultimate determination in declaring a champion.

[Dyzalot]

Originally Posted by RchW

It seems that there might be an issue with the schedule when there is a 7 game difference in games played.

Either a bug in the scheduling or the weather in the spring of 1967 in Chicago has been atrocious.

[Dyzalot]

Originally Posted by majesty95

I tried looking for the official rules and could not find anything. However, one could make the argument that if a team was ahead by winning pct but behind in GB, they should not be declared champions because the games that they are missing could have resulted in losses.

For instance, if one team plays 100 games and wins 70 they have a .700 pct. A team that played only 80 games and went 57-23 (.713) would be 3 GB in the standings. There is no guarantee that they would win 71% of their remaining games and, it could be argued, had an easier road with 20 less games. Why should they be handed the title when they played less games?

I think winning pct may decide a tie in GB when the games played are close. However, GB has a built in buffer to penalize teams that don't try to make up games and, IMO, should be the ultimate determination in declaring a champion.

What about strike shortened years then? I'm pretty sure winning percentage would trump GB.

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by Dyzalot

Your understanding is incorrect. The papers back in the day when they actually reported on baseball would show the standings in order of winning percentage, not by how many games back a team was.

The standings published in the early part of the 20th century in The New York Times showed only the wins, losses, and winning percentage. If I recall correctly the games behind wasn't added to the standings section until the 1920s. Neither the 1920 editions of the Reach Baseball Guide nor Spalding Baseball Guide showed games behind; only wins, losses, and winning percentage were shown.

[Dyzalot]

On rare occasions, it is possible (and has occurred) for the team with the second best winning percentage to lead the team with the best winning percentage in terms of games back. This usually occurs during the early portion of a season when teams have played an unequal number of games. For example, if Team A has a record of 23–13 and Team B has a record of 26–15, Team A would be recognized as having a better record by virtue of their .639 win percentage to Team B's .634 percentage, and would be listed first in the standings. However, Team A would still be one-half game behind Team B.

Games behind - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Dyzalot]

Originally Posted by Le Grande Orange

The standings published in the early part of the 20th century in The New York Times showed only the wins, losses, and winning percentage. If I recall correctly the games behind wasn't added to the standings section until the 1920s. Neither the 1920 editions of the Reach Baseball Guide nor Spalding Baseball Guide showed games behind; only wins, losses, and winning percentage were shown.

Sorry. By "back in the day" I meant back when I was a kid in the late '70's & early '80's.

[Lou Gehrig]

In the current modern day era, doesn't the official MLB standings place the emphasis on GB rather than percentages?

Another reason I can't wait for the season to start so I can watch the standings more closely.
I cannot recall seeing a team 1/2 game back listed in first place.

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by majesty95

I tried looking for the official rules and could not find anything. However, one could make the argument that if a team was ahead by winning pct but behind in GB, they should not be declared champions because the games that they are missing could have resulted in losses.

The division champions are determined by the winning percentage of the club in its games played during the regular season. This is expressly stated in the 2008 edition of the Major League Rules, as shown below (emphasis added).

Originally Posted by 2008 Major League Rules

Rule 33

QUALIFICATION FOR POST-SEASON SERIES

(a) DIVISION CHAMPIONS. The Commissioner's Office shall maintain a tabulated record of championship season games won and lost by each Major League Club as reported by the official scorers. The Commissioner shall award the championship of each Division to the Club in that Division that won the highest percentage of its games during the championship season. If two or more Clubs in a Division are tied in winning percentage at the close of the championship season as scheduled, the championship season may be extended by the playing of a tie-breaking game or games, as provided in Rule 33(c). Tie games shall not count as games played, won or lost for purposes of calculating the percentage of games won and lost during the championship season.

The 1913 National League Constitution said this (emphasis added):

Originally Posted by 1913 National League Constitution

Winning the Pennant

Sec. 56. The club which shall have won the greatest percentage of games in the championship series [i.e. the regular season], shall be declared the champion club of this League for the season in which such games were played. In the event that two or more clubs have won the same percentage of games, then the Board shall at once arrange a special series of three games between any two of such clubs, such games to be played at the close of the championship season, and the games so played shall be included in the championship record, and counted in determining the award of the championship.

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by Lou Gehrig

I cannot recall seeing a team 1/2 game back listed in first place.

That's because, again, it requires a rather unusual situation for it to happen. This is unlikely during a normal regular season in the major leagues. It's also unlikely in the minor leagues, though it can happen due to the greater frequency of postponed games and the use of the split-season format.

[Lou Gehrig]

Originally Posted by Lou Gehrig

Percentages are practically irrelevent in the standings.

I officially retract my poor choice of words. I was incorrect.
It may have been better to say the day-to-day standings place less emphasis on percentages in OOTP.

Thank you for clearing this up.

[majesty95]

Lesson to everyone, if you start out 1-0, find a way to rain out the rest of your games so you'll be the champ because of winning pct

[Markus Heinsohn]

We've had this discussion a few times in the past, and in the end settled to use GB instead of PCT.

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by majesty95

Lesson to everyone, if you start out 1-0, find a way to rain out the rest of your games so you'll be the champ because of winning pct

Except for the fact that league rules mandate that clubs must make every effort to make up postponed games. (Not the least of the reasons being unplayed games equal lost revenue. As private, for-profit businesses, earning revenue from playing games is the point of the enterprise.)

Originally Posted by Markus Heinsohn

We've had this discussion a few times in the past, and in the end settled to use GB instead of PCT.

That's fine colloquially, but as the excerpts I posted show, winning percentage is the technically correct method.

[Biggio509]

Originally Posted by Dyzalot

Your understanding is incorrect. The papers back in the day when they actually reported on baseball would show the standings in order of winning percentage, not by how many games back a team was. It rarely was different but sometimes because of rain outs you'd see a team in first that was a half a game back.

Having played a lot of 19th century with huge discrepancies in games played, I can verify up to 2015 at least winning percentage determined the champion.
I always hated that in years like 1873 when the Batlimore Marylands only played 6 games. If they were 5-1 they might be listed low in the standings but would win the championship.

The rankings are not true when there is a discrepancy in games played. This tends to work out itself out even in the 19th century after 1876 in the NL when games played are roughly equal.

I understand it doesn't look right but the game will determine the champion on winning percentage. It just displays the rankings in games back like modern standings do. I have seen many instances where the winner was a 1/2 or even a full game or more back due to differences in games played.(almost all pre-1901 pre-1892 to be more exact). The highest percentage still won. That is frustrating in the 1870's sometimes. The rules were different then. It was most games won won the championship. Technically in those days a team under .500 could win the championship by most wins.

Also for historical or semi-historical now that we can have rainouts and double headers scheduled I am using the as scheduled now whenever possible. Sometimes you have teams that were out of contention in real life who didn't make up games because they didn't matter but are in contention for that year in the game. The AP can result in weird results because of that.

[Questdog]

Originally Posted by Biggio509

Also for historical or semi-historical now that we can have rainouts and double headers scheduled I am using the as scheduled now whenever possible. Sometimes you have teams that were out of contention in real life who didn't make up games because they didn't matter but are in contention for that year in the game. The AP can result in weird results because of that.

I take it upon myself to do what they would have done then and manually schedule the make-up games that matter to the championship.

[gads]

I asked MLB and they confirmed that the ranking of teams are determined by win percentage.

[Biggio509]

Originally Posted by gads

I asked MLB and they confirmed that the ranking of teams are determined by win percentage.

The game does this for championship and the wild cards. It just doesn't display the standings that way. The standings are not correct sometimes but the game does determine champions and wild cards the correct way.

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by Biggio509

I understand it doesn't look right but the game will determine the champion on winning percentage. It just displays the rankings in games back like modern standings do. I have seen many instances where the winner was a 1/2 or even a full game or more back due to differences in games played.(almost all pre-1901 pre-1892 to be more exact). The highest percentage still won. That is frustrating in the 1870's sometimes. The rules were different then. It was most games won won the championship. Technically in those days a team under .500 could win the championship by most wins.

Ideally, OOTP would allow division champions to be determined by, and the standings display ordered by, either the number of wins, winning percentage, or games behind. Each of these yield different results.

Originally Posted by Biggio509

Sometimes you have teams that were out of contention in real life who didn't make up games because they didn't matter but are in contention for that year in the game.

It's more a case of the rules regarding when games could be made up. Originally, postponed games had to be made up in the same park. That often constrained the ability to make up those postponed games. Later, the rules were changed to allow postponed games to be made up in the other club's park. That cut down on the number of unplayed games. However, until the early 1950s postponed games had to be made up by the scheduled end of the regular season, regardless of their importance to the pennant race. The rule was subsequently changed to allow postponed games having a bearing on the pennant race to be made up after the scheduled end of the regular season.

In terms of the number of games played to a decision by real-life MLB clubs in 154- and 162-game schedules, see the table below.

Games Played to a Decision, Number of Teams
154-game schedule (1904-1961)

Year   Tms   154  153  152  151  150  149  148  147  146  145
-------------------------------------------------------------
1904    16     3    6    3    4    -    -    -    -    -    -
1905    16     3    6    4    1    -    1    1    -    -    -
1906    16     1    3    3    4    2    2    -    -    -    1
1907    16     1    3    3    2    1    1    3    1    -    1
1908    16    11    2    3    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1909    16     -    8    5    2    1    -    -    -    -    -
1910    16     6    6    1    2    1    -    -    -    -    -
1911    16     4    4    3    3    1    1    -    -    -    -
1912    16     2    6    5    2    1    -    -    -    -    -
1913    16     1    5    3    3    2    2    -    -    -    -
1914    16     9    6    1    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1915    16     5    3    7    1    -    -    -    -    -    -
1916    16     8    6    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1917    16     7    5    3    1    -    -    -    -    -    -
-------------------------------------------------------------
1920    16    10    4    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1921    16     5   10    1    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1922    16    14    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1923    16     8    4    4    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1924    16     5    7    3    1    -    -    -    -    -    -
1925    16     5    7    3    1    -    -    -    -    -    -
1926    16     7    4    1    2    2    -    -    -    -    -
1927    16     8    8    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1928    16     9    4    3    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1929    16     5    3    6    1    1    -    -    -    -    -
1930    16    16    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1931    16    10    2    4    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1932    16    13    -    1    2    -    -    -    -    -    -
1933    16     4    2    4    3    2    1    -    -    -    -
1934    16     3    2    5    3    2    1    -    -    -    -
1935    16     2    9    2    1    -    2    -    -    -    -
1936    16    11    3    1    1    -    -    -    -    -    -
1937    16     9    3    3    1    -    -    -    -    -    -
1938    16     1    -    6    2    4    2    1    -    -    -
1939    16     6    3    2    5    -    -    -    -    -    -
1940    16    10    4    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1941    16    14    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1942    16     7    -    3    3    -    -    2    1    -    -
1943    16     8    6    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1944    16    14    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1945    16     8    1    3    1    1    1    -    -    -    1
1946    16    14    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1947    16    16    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1948    16    11    4    1    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1949    16    16    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1950    16    12    4    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1951    16    16    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1952    16    14    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1953    16    13    1    1    1    -    -    -    -    -    -
1954    16    16    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1955    16    14    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1956    16    16    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1957    16    13    2    1    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1958    16    14    2    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1959    16    16    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1960    16    16    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
1961     8     8    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -    -
-------------------------------------------------------------
Total  888   498  180  110   53   21   14    7    2    0    3
  %         56.1 20.3 12.4  6.0  2.4  1.6  0.8  0.2  0.0  0.3


Games Played to a Decision, Number of Teams
162-game schedule (1961-2014)

Year   Tms   162  161  160  159  158
------------------------------------
1961    10     5    4    1    -    -
1962    20    13    4    3    -    -
1963    20    16    4    -    -    -
1964    20    20    -    -    -    -
1965    20    18    2    -    -    -
1966    20    13    2    3    2    -
1967    20    14    6    -    -    -
1968    20    18    2    -    -    -
1969    24    22    2    -    -    -
1970    24    22    2    -    -    -
1971    24    16    5    1    1    1
------------------------------------
1973    24    20    4    -    -    -
1974    24    20    2    2    -    -
1975    24    12    6    2    4    -
1976    24    18    4    -    2    -
1977    26    20    6    -    -    -
1978    26    19    5    1    1    -
1979    26    15    5    5    1    -
1980    26    18    4    4    -    -
------------------------------------
1982    26    26    -    -    -    -
1983    26    26    -    -    -    -
1984    26    22    4    -    -    -
1985    26    16   10    -    -    -
1986    26    19    6    1    -    -
1987    26    24    2    -    -    -
1988    26    13   10    3    -    -
1989    26    22    2    2    -    -
1990    26    24    2    -    -    -
1991    26    23    2    1    -    -
1992    26    26    -    -    -    -
1993    28    28    -    -    -    -
------------------------------------
1996    28    24    4    -    -    -
1997    28    24    4    -    -    -
1998    30    28    2    -    -    -
1999    30    23    6    1    -    -
2000    30    26    4    -    -    -
2001    30    27    2    1    -    -
2002    30    21    8    1    -    -
2003    30    28    2    -    -    -
2004    30    26    4    -    -    -
2005    30    30    -    -    -    -
2006    30    28    2    -    -    -
2007    30    30    -    -    -    -
2008    30    24    6    -    -    -
2009    30    28    2    -    -    -
2010    30    30    -    -    -    -
2011    30    28    2    -    -    -
2012    30    30    -    -    -    -
2013    30    30    -    -    -    -
2014    30    30    -    -    -    -
------------------------------------
Total 1302  1103  155   32   11    1
  %         84.7 11.9  2.5  0.8  0.1