There was an interesting thread posted on ORG the other day about the accuracy of models when it comes to predicting the number of HRs hit.
Here a link to that thread: http://www.redszone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=80750
A well-respected sabermetrician by the name of Tom Tango (Tangotiger) has devised a model which is used to predict player performance. He is justifiably proud of his model, which he has named Marcel after the monkey on the TV show Friends. In support of his model he gives the example of how his modeling system almost exactly predicted the number of home runs that were going to be hit by the 13 players whom Marcel felt would hit the most homers in 2009. At the end of his blog he writes this:Hey, let's hear it for the monkey!As you can see, it runs the gamut from Delgado’s 4 to Pujols’ league-leading 47. These 13 hitters were forecasted to hit a combined 401 HR in 2009. And how many HR did they actually hit in 2009? 400. That’s right, Marcel nailed it.Almost predictably, this brought the saber-haters, err skeptics, out of the woodworks. The word "fluke" was opined early and often. So, was it just a fluke? Who knows?
But I think it might be fun to have a little contest and see if anyone out there is really 'smarter than a Monkey'! I went into the 2010 Marcels and with a little sorting magic came up with this list of the players who The Monkey feels will hit the most homers in 2010. Tango used 13 players in his 2009 example and so I went with the top 13 and ties, resulting in 15 players in total. If anyone from either board (including 6-year old sons) feels that their baseball acumen tops simian savvy every day of the season, now is your chance to prove it. Below is a list of the players and their predicted HR totals.
Simply copy, add your prediction and then paste back into the thread. I would really like to see your predictions for each hitter instead of just posting a single total. This will eliminate the "Price is Right" strategy of simply predicting one more or one less than Marcel did. I will put the predictions into a spreadsheet (on Opening Day) and we can check them periodically throughout the season. This is supposed to be a fun thing so hold off on all snarky comments until after the season. Then have at it. And may the best Man or Monkey win.
Code:NAME mHR HOWARD, R. 39 FIELDER, P 37 PUJOLS, A. 34 DUNN, A. 34 BRAUN, R. 32 PENA, C. 32 RODRIGUEZ, A. 31 TEXEIRA, M. 31 REYNOLDS, M. 31 CABRERA, M. 30 GONZALEZ, A. 30 LONGORIA, E. 28 WERTH, J. 27 BAY, J. 27 UGGLA, D. 27 TOTAL-2010 470
