SB Nation User Blog: Andy--01

Missouri = Poor ticket sales for bowls?

Andy--01 — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:44:33 -0000

Ed.: Bumped from FanPosts

Clearly that's our reputation, since we've been passed over in the last 3 years in favor of teams that we beat, ostensibly due to our inability to travel well. So, let's look at the bowls we've been in since 1983 (Holiday, Insight, Independence, Sun, Cotton, Alamo) and see if there is truth behind this reputation. Are bowl ticket sales hurt by having Mizzou as a participant?

Insight(.com) Bowl - location, Tempe, Arizona.

Missouri has appeared in this bowl one time (1998), our second bowl in 2 years (and, our 2nd in 15 years). Attendance: 36,417. Mizzou played West Virginia, so neither team was a regional draw. This was the lowest attendance at this bowl since 1991 and 4th lowest in the bowl's 20-year history. Average draw for the Insight Bowl: 42,481.

Holiday Bowl - location, San Diego, California.

Missouri has appeared in this bowl two times (1997, 1983). Attendances were 50,761 (vs. Colorado State 1997) and 51,480 (vs. BYU 1983) These are 2 of the 5 worst attendances in this bowl's 31-year history. Average draw for the Holiday Bowl - 57,809.

Independence Bowl - location Shreveport, Louisiana

Missouri has appeared in this bowl two times (2003, 2005). Attendances were 49,625 (vs. Arkansas 2003) and 41,332 (South Carolina 2005). The huge discrepancy in the attendance certainly suggests that the closeness of Arkansas provided a big bump to the attendance numbers in 2003. Attendance numbers are sketchy for the Independence Bowl (I could only find numbers for 20 of the 33 years of the bowl's history), but from what I could find, Mizzou has the 3rd largest attendance and the 7th lowest. Average attendance (of the 20 years I could find) is 43,020.

Sun Bowl - location El Paso, Texas

Missouri has appeared in this bowl one time (2006). Attendance was 48,732, and location would suggest that neither Missouri or Oregon State was a large local draw. This bowl has been around since the 1930s, so I have only looked at the last 25 years (for relevancy's sake). This ranks 11th of 25 years in attendance, but is only 2500 less than the best year. Average draw for the Sun Bowl - 47,643.

Cotton Bowl - location Dallas, Texas

Missouri has appeared in this bowl one time (2008). Attendance was 73,114. I can only find attendance records for 12 of the last 25 years for the Cotton Bowl, but the Mizzou year was the 4th highest of those 12 years. Comparing the attendance to the year before is impressive. Nebraska - Auburn only drew 66,777 people.

Alamo Bowl - location San Antonio, Texas

Missouri has appeared in this bowl one time (2008). Attendance was 55,986, which was the 6th lowest in the bowl's 16-year history. Even taking out teams from Texas, Missouri's attendance is still in the lower third of the bowl's history (6 of 9). The Alamo Bowl averages a draw of 58,706.

Conclusion

While different factors obviously affect each year's ticket sales, it is certainly easy to see a correlation between Missouri and poor ticket sales. ESPECIALLY for games that are on the west coast. I certainly cannot blame a California-based bowl from avoiding Missouri whenever possible. It should be that ticket sales for the 2000 Insight Bowl (Iowa State vs. Pittsburgh) was about 5,400 higher than the 1998 Insight.com Bowl.

Former Gov. Hearnes, 86, passed away Sunday

Andy--01 — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 13:53:39 -0000

Former Gov. Hearnes, 86, passed away Sunday

The Hearnes Center was named after him as he left office in 1972. And, no, it's not the Hearne's Center.

Spoon hitting about as hard as you can hit

Andy--01 — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 17:36:49 -0000

Spoon hitting about as hard as you can hit

1 month. 1 month.

John stull gets 5 years after pleading guilty

Andy--01 — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 17:13:16 -0000

John stull gets 5 years after pleading guilty

A former Missouri football player has been sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to burglary and possessing marijuana.

Twenty-one-year-old John Stull pleaded guilty Monday to charges of first- and second-degree burglary as well as the pot charge. The reserve defensive end was kicked off the Missouri team in January 2008 after playing sparingly as a redshirt freshman.

The first burglary involved the theft of a five-gallon can of gasoline and a fishing tackle bag worth $150. The second involved the theft of $4,000 worth of items from another home.

Stull was previously sentenced to two years' unsupervised probation after a February 2007 peace disturbance conviction and was arrested on suspicion of assault as a redshirt freshman in the fall of the same year.

Predicted paces for Triple Crown categories

Andy--01 — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 16:20:16 -0000

Inspired by Derrick Goold's look at Pujols' chances of winning the batting title, I have taken a look at the numbers regarding the NL HR and RBI race. I believe (and I dont' think it's an uncommon belief) the biggest obstacle to Pujols getting the Triple Crown this season is the fact that he will likely be walked more and more as the season begins. Unfortunately, I don't have a way of using that as a predictor - if anyone does, please enlighten me. Also, I noted to day that STL has played more games than every team except Florida, which could be inflating El Hombre's stats. So, what I did was look at the top 7 in each category and find pace based on team games as well as games played and also looked at career rates in an attempt to predict where players might end up.

Teams and players involved: Florida: Hanley Ramirez; Washington: Adam Dunn; Philly: Ibanez, Howard, Utley; Arizona: Mark Reynolds; Milwaukee: Prince Fielder; SD: Adrian Gonzalez; STL: Pujols. I also looked at Beltran (NYM), since he has a great BA and has played about 20 games less than almost everyone else on that list.

(All numbers as of this morning)

Pujols currently has an 8 HR lead and an 8 RBI lead, but has played the most games in the NL. If all players in the top-7 keep playing at the same rate they have been taking the field (i.e. games played / team games), the final rankings will look like this:

HR (HR/Team games * 162)

1. Pujols 59

2T. Gonzalez 45

2T. Reynolds 44

4. Ibanez 42

4T. Dunn 42

6T. Fielder 41

6T. Howard 41

8. Utley 39

RBI (RBI/Team games * 162)

1. Pujols 156

2. Fielder 145

3. Howard 122

4. Utley 118

5. Reynolds 116

6T. Dunn 114

6T. Ibanez 114

8. Ramirez 110

I figured that didn't account for any injuries that a player had suffered this season and wasn't likely to re-suffer, so I next looked at Expected HR (or RBI) if a player played in ALL remaining team games, based on their current pace of HR (or RBI) per game. With one major exception, the standings don't change that much:

HR (current HR + HR/Games Played * Remaining Team Games)

1. Pujols 59

2. Ibanez 50

3T. Gonzalez 45

3T. Reynolds 45

5. Dunn 42

6T. Fielder 41

6T. Howard 41

8. Utley 39

(Carlos Beltran should end up with 18 HR using this metric). Ibanez shoots up the rankings based on the fact that he has only played in 62 games so far this season.

RBI (current RBI + RBI/Games Played * Remaining Team Games)

1. Pujols 157

2. Fielder 145

3. Ibanez 133

4. Howard 122

5. Utley 119

6. Reynolds 117

7. Ramirez 116

8. Dunn 114

(Beltran should end up with 90 RBI using this metric) Some shakeup at the bottom, and Ibanez moves up the ranking solidly, but not nearly enough to surpass Fielder or Pujols.

How about career pace? A player could be hot right now, and over the course of a season, players tend to end up about where their careers show they should. Using career pace over the number of team games remaining (same calculation as last metric, but career numbers rather than season numbers), the numbers are significantly different, indicating how hot some of these guys have been. HR is a little more reliable,as it depends much less on team help than RBI (which is at least 50% team performance).

HR (expected, using career pace of HR/Game)

1. Pujols 52

2. Howard 45

3. Dunn 42

4. Fielder 39

4T. Reynolds 39

4T. Gonzalez 39

7. Utley 34

8. Ibanez 33

(Beltran should end up with 22 HR this season, based on career pace). While Pujols is still safe, you can really see who is playing out of their minds.

RBI (expected, using career pace of RBI/Game)

1. Pujols 144

2. Howard 130

3. Fielder 126

4. Dunn 114

4T. Utley 114

6. Reynolds 110

7. Ibanez 105

8. Ramirez 96

(Beltran should end up with about 91 RBI this season).

All standard disclaimers apply (injuries, hot streaks, teams pitching around Pujols, etc), but these numbers certainly make it appear that Pujols has a great chance, even if he doesn't get pitched to much, of winning the RBI and HR crowns.

There doesn't appear to be anyone else who can break 50 HR (Ibanez is the only one in these projections that gets past 45, and his career certainly indicates that 40 will be a stretch). So, 15 - 20 more HR in the next 74ish games for Pujols and he should be safe in that category. Another month like June, and he's sitting at 46 before you can blink.

RBI will be tougher, it looks like 150 should be impossible for anyone else to reach, and 140 might be safe. This means another 60 RBI in the next 2 1/2 months. Certainly possible, the way he's been playing this season. However, BOTH of these numbers would be career highs, which casts some doubt on his ability. I think that the batting title will be his best chance, unless Joey Votto is still hitting around .360 after another 280 AB. He's only 11 points behind a guy who is currently batting more than 15 points above his best season ever and is tied with a guy (Beltran) who is 30 points above his best ever season. The less teams pitch to him, the better chance he has of increasing his average.

Kelly Thames new head coach at Pattonville

Andy--01 — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 16:42:39 -0000

Kelly Thames new head coach at Pattonville

From what I can tell, this became official Tuesday night. Kelly will be a business teacher in addition to his coaching duties. Pattonville is about 3 times larger than his old school, but has been dreadfully bad - a 26.9% winning percentage.

Good luck Kelly!

[Promoted for Front Page Friday.]

Mizzou camp at DeSmet High on 6/7. Gallery can be found here but captions suck - all the same...

Andy--01 — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 22:47:35 -0000

Mizzou camp at DeSmet High on 6/7. Gallery can be found here but captions suck - all the same comment, no info about who the kids are.

For a larger image: CLICK HERE Mizzou's first Intercollegiate game vs. Washington University. ...

Andy--01 — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 00:44:51 -0000

For a larger image: CLICK HERE

Mizzou's first Intercollegiate game vs. Washington University. Mizzou would lose 28-0

Found this in the 1891 Savitar. These are the box scores of MU's first two football games. The...

Andy--01 — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 00:41:57 -0000

Found this in the 1891 Savitar. These are the box scores of MU's first two football games. The competition appeared to be intramural squads. MU won 42 - 6 and 90 - 0(!)

Bruce Feldman proven wrong in record time!

Andy--01 — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 22:10:37 -0000

Bruce Feldman proven wrong in record time!

Post-Dispatch reporting that Tyler Gabbert has committed to Nebraska.