Because you really needed another one!

(Apologies in advance: this is a block of text. I just didn't have time to liven it up with graphics, which have never been my strong suit. I may add some images later, but that's unlikely. If you want the tl/dr takeaway, skip ahead to the "Overall Statistics" section.)

Intro

Ken Pomeroy's site (which is abundantly worth the 20 bucks it costs now that it's subscription-only; the value is pretty amazing) includes, among other things, a tool known as FanMatch.

In theory, this is a proprietary metric intended to rate the most viewer-friendly games of a given day (for instance, Cal-UNLV got a "thrill score" of 74.0 and was the highest rated game of last Friday) based on a combination of the scoring prowess and pace of the teams, their overall skill level, and how close the game is projected to be. However, there is another extremely neat thing you can do with it: go back to PAST days and find out what results were really surprising at the time.

This is a lot of fun to fool around with. For instance, we can see that UNLV went into its game with North Carolina with a 43% chance of pulling the big upset. It did just that, and you have to point to that as great scheduling. A 43% chance of a major resume boost, and a 57% chance of a loss that will do little to hurt you? Sign me up, Scotty!

Methodology (of sorts)

Every good analysis needs defined terms. So I'm going to divide the Pac-12's nonconference games into six categories: Coups, Predictable Wins, Toss-Up Wins, Toss-Up Losses, Predictable Losses, and Disasters. A Coup will be any game which involves a win over a team when the Pac-12 team entered with a win probability of 35% or less. A Toss-Up Win will be any win where the Pac-12 team entered with a win probability between 35% and 65%. A Predictable Win will be any win over a team where the Pac-12 team entered with a win probability over 65%.

You should be able to figure out the opposite: a Disaster is losing a game which would have been a Predictable Win, a Toss-Up Loss is losing a game which would have been a Toss-Up Win, and a Predictable Loss is losing a game which would have been a Coup.

How many of each kind of nonconference game does each team in the Pac-12 have? How has each team done, and how has the conference made out overall? (You can probably guess from the title...)

To evaluate the subjective "joy factor" of each team's season, I'm going to arbitrarily assign a value of 3 points to a Coup, 2 to a Toss-Up Win, 1 to a Predictable Win, -1 to a Predictable Loss, -2 to a Toss-Up Loss, and -3 to a Disaster. This has no relevance to anything predictive, or indeed any validity outside of this fanpost, but I think it does a decent job for what it's trying to do, which is measure the collective mood swing of a fanbase.

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We're down to the last round of games to determine places in this year's Pac-10 men's basketball season, and there are some interesting scenarios that have been created as a result of the conference "clustering" into three groups of teams (okay, you could make an argument for four). Let's run through them to determine what outcomes on Saturday could lead to which matchups in the Pac-10 tournament.

First, a refresher course on the Pac-10's strange tiebreaker system. Head-to-head record among tied teams is the first tiebreaker, but as is often the case (especially with two-team ties; we'll get to the three-team tie scenario involving Cal in good time, folks), those records tend to end up being the same.

When head-to-head decides nothing, the next tiebreaker is record against the highest ranked team outside of the tie. And, if two teams are tied for highest rank, it's your record against both of them! In other words, you don't break a tie at one spot in the standings and then use that tiebreaker to resolve later ties. (Which is probably necessary, because otherwise I think you could conceptualize scenarios with two ties where neither tie can be broken without knowing how the other one is broken.) I'll spare you the logical conundrums and skip straight to the point-- or rather, points. Twelve of them, to be exact.

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Most Stanford fans' eyes this weekend will still be focused on the football team, which has one final hurdle to climb in order to reach Ye Olde Place From Whence Ye Disappointment Springeth, also known as BCS limbo, or simply "hell" to playoff advocates like myself. Fortunately, you can distract yourself with an actual tournament-- and Stanford is even in it! (Those of you who like Cal, such as myself, and those of you who hate it, such as... well, probably everyone here who actually went to Stanford-- by the way, if you want my story, ask about it in the comments-- can cheer them/their enemies in the Old Spice Classic, another ESPN-sponsored event happening on the same three days this weekend.)

I like these early season tournaments, partly because they are great for assessing the progress of a team, and partly because they're a welcome relief from the usual parade of patsy-pounding powerhouses pompously plodding through the early part of the season. Win a game and you actually (gasp) have to play a tougher opponent in the next one! Who would ever have thought of such a system?

Let's take a look at what we can expect this weekend.

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All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

Ed's note: I was too distraught to write up a recap yesterday, and PaulThomas said almost everything I was going to say in the following post.  Monty agrees with Paul and me; here's a quote from the CoCo Times:

"They shoot 70 percent in the second half and we shoot 27 (percent). I think that's the tale of the game. It's no more complex than that."

Cal now needs to win AT LEAST one more regular season game, and Thursday night's game against USC seems like the time to do it.  Hopefully we will not look back on a season sweep to 7th place OSU as the reason we were kept out of the tournament.  - CBKWit

People do still use that for sunburns, right?

I couldn't help but look at the stats from today's game, because I didn't feel like the Bears had played all that badly. And, turns out, they didn't.

Let's toss out the two ridiculous Randle heaves at the end of the game (although he's capable of hitting those). Other than those two shots, Cal took 50 shots in the game and made 17 of them. On the season, Cal's shooting percentage is very near 50%-- but let's call it 48% for ease of handling. That means Cal should have made 24 shots.

On the season the team's 3 point percentage is (now-- it dropped 1.7% just from this game alone) 44.1%. The Bears took 18 3s. Basically, they should have made 8 of them; in fact, they made 3.

Add up those missing points and on a normal shooting day, Cal wins this one easily, 73-65. I suppose you could dock Cal a few points for making more free throws than average, but Oregon State got a bundle of easy points off end-of-game FTs too.

Now, I know you can't just get up and say bad shooting = bad luck. But come on. You'd have a hard time arguing that the quality of looks the Bears got today was worse than average. Oregon State's defense was porous at best and Cal was regularly getting wide-open 3s. I'm not even going near the officiating, Oregon State's own shooting (highlighted by four second-half plays which would put any baller 80% of the way to winning a HORSE game) or anything else the team couldn't control. If Cal does what it normally does, HORSE shots or no, Oregon State goes down.

I hope Montgomery's message to his team was that sometimes these things just happen. The worst thing that could happen is for the Bears to overthink things. This isn't a game they need to explain away (unlike the first one). It just-- happened. One presumes Ben Howland is busy telling his team the same thing-- sometimes Taylor Rochestie scores 33 points. Accept it and move on.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

as long as someone else hasn't done it first, of course. Well, depending on who you are, it might be worth it to trade up to get him!

Skelton is the most attractive position player Rule 5 candidate I've seen in some time. Let me explain why.

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All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

Yes, we've rolled around to the point at which I actually go out on a limb and say things about the current A's roster. Nice things? Well, I don't know yet, to be honest. Incidentally, I'll be updating the prior three fanposts on the rest of the division, mostly to reflect the gold mine of information which can be found in Sean Smith's defensive projections, here and here. They're unreliable for very young players, so unfortunately they won't do wonders for the A's, but they're a great assimilation of the defensive information we know about guys who've been around a while. The usual caveats: I'm assuming NO transactions other than guys going back and forth to the minors and options being exercised (which isn't an issue for this year's A's). Let's roll.

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All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

And what a debut it was.

6 IP

3 H

2 ER (both coming on solo HR)

0 BB

12 K

Anderson K'd every batter in the opposing lineup at least once within the first 4 innings. The California League seemed to be a bit of a bugbear for Anderson, as evidenced by the bad luck thumb injury, but he's surmounted that hurdle. He appears to be fully back on track in the town where he was born.

What are your expectations for Anderson once he reaches the major league level? Is he a #1? A #2? A back-of-the-rotation guy? Doomed unless he locates his shaving razor, which he appears to have left behind in Stockton?

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.

All content from this post has been removed in accordance with my decision to leave Athletics Nation. It is my sad duty to report that I no longer wish to create content for, or share it with, this site as currently run. I cannot, in good conscience, square the site's policies with what I consider to be the bare minimum requirements for free and fair discussion, and I have no wish to engage in unfree and unfair discussion. Goodbye.