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Subject: crazy baseball occurrence


Date: Mon Jul 15 11:42:49 2013
User: TNmountainman
Message:
This just blows my mind....

Link: astonishing feat

Date: Mon Jul 15 12:04:10 2013
User: xeena
Message:
You get the first "not boring" award of the day. A trillion to one. Wow. I'm speechless. And it's a sports story.

Date: Mon Jul 15 12:09:05 2013
User: TNmountainman
Message:
I just did a very, very, very rough odds estimate of my own, and I came up with something like between one chance in 20 million, and one chance in a billion. But that seems too optimistic, especially the lower number. But once chance in a trillion seems slightly extreme, too. So much of the final number one comes up with is based on the initial conditions, of course.

Date: Mon Jul 15 12:19:05 2013
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Actually, I take back some of what I wrote above. I think 1/trillion *is* about right. I blame my "smart"phone calculator. My assumptions turned out very close to what this linked ESPN article used. I came up with ~1/1000 for any particular foul ball, based on my guesstimates of # of foul balls per game, and average attendance in the prime foul ball areas. Having a glove increases one's odds, but not materially compared to all the other factors. So (.001)^4 = 1/trillion.

Link: 1 in a trillion

Date: Mon Jul 15 12:19:46 2013
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Now can I please be put back in the "boring" camp again?

Date: Mon Jul 15 13:13:58 2013
User: xeena
Message:
Well, if you're gonna talk statistics.

Date: Fri Jul 19 08:29:43 2013
User: joeygray
Message:
Whoa, and I thought this other one from last year was astounding....

Link: First two career homeruns

Date: Tue Jul 7 11:55:13 2015
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Ok, this is way bizarre, too. The Red Sox have played over 17,000 games in their history, and this has never happened.

Link: Whole game, with 0 putouts by the first baseman

Date: Tue Jul 7 22:08:58 2015
User: Kaos
Message:
Well, one in a trillion assumes all those fans really want to catch a baseball but in reality, maybe one third don't. After all, who wants to spill that $9.75 Budweiser? That immediately drops the odd to 198 billion to one. Then, this guy picked one ball off the ground. Seems like his neighbors were pulling for him. So, since they have nice fans in Cleveland, that drops the odds to 137 billion to one. Of course, batters now are taught to work the count way more than in the past so maybe foul balls are up 10%. That drops the odds to 89 billion to one.

Date: Tue Jul 7 22:35:51 2015
User: firenze
Message:
And, if you're at Tropicana Field, your odds would be cut to one in 30 billion because of the lack of competition.

Link: Tampa Bay Rays Home

Date: Wed Jul 8 00:33:02 2015
User: Kaos
Message:
In the other b-ball game, is this story featuring the NBA MVP. It's escaped most blogosphere attention that Steph Curry made 77 consecutive three-point shots in a row during practice. OK, it's practice but 77 in-a-row??? if you assume an average elite NBA 3-point shooter at 40% accuracy from three-point range, the odds end up as a billion times x a gazillion to one. if you assume a freak Steph Curry shooter at 45% accuracy the odds end up as a thousand gazillion to one. Curry shoots over 50% from right(?)-side corner threes so that's just a gazillion to one. OK, it's practice, so there are no freaks with 40" vertical jumps and pterodactyl wing-spans jumping out at you to block the shot so, you are now 60% accurate. The odds drop to just 121 quadrillion to one! At making two of three, the odds become almost believable: 36 trillion to one. Wait, it's Steph. Let's go to 70%. The odds now drop below a trillion to one at 846 billion...

Link: Even crazier basketball occurence

Date: Wed Jul 8 02:50:54 2015
User: TNmountainman
Message:
.....I'm mildly skeptical of that, but as far as I know Curry's an honest up straight-up dude, and to my knowledge no one (who is in a position to know) is disputing it. Apparently there's no video (at least that I or others can find) of the whole thing. 77 in a row is indeed stupefying, BUT.................that's not even the record - by a long shot (pun intended). It's 209 - by a guy who was 60 when he did it. But I don't know if those were NBA-range or just college. So, in that light..........77 is only pretty darn good. LOL. So is that more crazy than a team playing over 17,000 games without the first baseman making a putout? In my mind, yes, as I think about it right now. And I do not understand how that 77 didn't get brought up a lot during the playoffs, with every reporter trying to get every Curry angle. I may come back tomorrow and throw around some alternative assumptions; too sleepy at the moment.

Link: 209 beats 77?

Date: Fri Aug 7 17:31:43 2015
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Looks like a little bit of a short(ish) fence, but still.............. Wonder if Eddie Feigner and his crowd ever did this?

Link: Going wrong and long, as a switch(?)hitter

Date: Tue Apr 12 12:51:46 2016
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Well, the feat that began this thread has now been exceeded - sort of - and I think. Not a lot of detail here, and it looks like he was 'roaming', but still.......

Link: 5(!) foul balls in one game

Date: Tue Apr 12 23:15:39 2016
User: joeygray
Message:
Heh, yeah, I thought of this thread too when I saw that story... but you beat me to it. Which is no surprise at all, you are the king of resurrecting old threads! .grin

Date: Fri Apr 15 04:26:34 2016
User: TNmountainman
Message:
"Significant Digit: about 1 in 262 trillion. That’s the estimated likelihood of catching five foul balls at the home of the Detroit Tigers, Comerica Park — a feat achieved by Tigers’ fan Bill Dugan at a game on Monday." So.........their odds are less than what I calculated way back up top. Not to mention, (snagging at least) *four* now happened (at least) twice in less than 4 years. And if the 1 in a trillion odds are approximately on target (big if), then backregressing gives a value of 1/1000 for each ball, which may be low, or may be close to accurate for 'proper seating'. But then that would mean that *five* foul balls would give odds of 1000 times 1 in a trillion, i.e., 1 in a quadrillion. Backregressing that number gives a value of 1 chance in about 765 for each foul ball. Reasonable, for good foul-ball territory. But I argue that since this guy was "roaming", that the odds would go up significantly. And now that 4 or more has happened thrice (at least, since Dugan claimed he had gotten 4 earlier at another game), we must consider that it's actually more likely than 1 in 765 (per game) to get each ball. When one considers that oh, maybe 10-15 or so foul balls per game go to the prime areas, then the odds really jump up a lot. Without "doing all the math", I'm guessing the odds, instead of 1 in 262 trillion, are *much* higher, maybe closer to 1000 to 100,000 times that.

Link: (see quote above at end of linked story)

Date: Fri Apr 15 14:13:37 2016
User: Klepp
Message:
Baseball's history is so varied and rich that it's just chock full of statistical abnormalities, even statistically undreamt of stuff. This one still blows my mind: (I won't give it away before clicking upon, but even some casual fans recall the ludicrous statistical abnormality of this otherwise nondescript, regular season match-up.)

Link: An almost perfectly unbreakable statistic (defensively, that is)

Date: Sat Apr 16 11:25:53 2016
User: BuzzClik
Message:
Not certain what is special defensively about that game. On the offensive side -- oh, yes. I guess there's the very negative side for Park and the Dodgers. Is that it? The positive side is far more interesting.

Date: Sat Apr 16 12:03:12 2016
User: Proverb
Message:
Fernando Tatis hit two grand slams in one inning. I am not sure it qualifies as a statistical abnormality as much as a statistically unique occurrence, at least until the next player does it.

Date: Sun Apr 17 11:17:54 2016
User: deadwing
Message:
JD Drew also made 2 outs in one inning - not quite as rare as 2 grand slams but probably not a breakable record (tied for sure).

Date: Sun Apr 17 19:42:51 2016
User: Klepp
Message:
It would take the confluence of a terribly depleted/overused staff, a manager's insistence on leaving whomever on the mound (to be fully embarrassed), as well as the almost unthinkable occurrence of a team hitting *three* grand slams in a single inning, in order to "break" Chan Ho Park's "record" of allowing two grand slams in a single inning (regardless same individual's grand salamis or no). If three grand slams are ever given up in the same inning by the same individual, they will almost certainly have been given up by a position player, taking lumps for his beaten down staff. (With no slight to the great DiMaggio himself, his legendary record will be broken before that will ever happen. I know, I know, to say such borders on blasphemy to some. But by the reference I'm merely trying to stress the ridiculousness of the above (flabbergasting) occurrence.)

Date: Mon Apr 18 02:16:21 2016
User: Tasmanianmom
Message:
Woody and Scharrell (sic?)Maclaren live around the point here in Maui.And I'm not positive about spelling their names, but they won two Canadian POWER Balls!..., With 1,000 dollar bills sticking out of his pants, Woody , terrified us, hoping we weren't interested in the same the property we were trying to buy. we laid low, and quietly bought our" Kamaaina fixer upper".. The upshot of winning the two power balls was the Maclarens are not allowed to win again..

Date: Mon Apr 18 17:40:55 2016
User: TNmountainman
Message:
I remember well when Cloninger hit the two grand slams in the same game (1966). Thought they were joking at first. I was listening to it on the radio. I believe it was the Braves first year in Atlanta. Without researching, I'd bet a lot of money he's still the only pitcher to have done that - and with the way things are these days, almost certainly the only one who ever will.

Date: Sat Jun 11 13:56:08 2016
User: hotnurse
Message:
TN, 1966...you must have been a wee little guy...and a great remembry.

Date: Sat Jun 11 16:47:51 2016
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Well, since you've met me.......you know I ain't *that* young. But that said, I tend to remember things that are large numbers of standard deviations from the normal - and even if I wasn't maybe cognizant of standard deviations by that point in time, I knew instinctively that it was a supremely rare and odd event. Sort of like Bob Beamon's leap, or Secretariat's stupefying Belmont race, especially prodigious snowfalls or weather, Sir Pape's (supposed) 3 4x4 wins in a row, etc. Some of those things you just know when they happen. As I matter of fact, just out of curiosity, I just now checked, and found this in Wikipedia: "On July 3, 1966, in the Braves' 17–3 win over the Giants at Candlestick Park in San Francisco, Cloninger helped his team's cause with two grand slams and nine RBIs.[1] Cloninger became the first player in the National League, and the only pitcher to date, to hit two grand slams in the same game." So....I would have won that bet, and since it's never happened since (and may never again), it was pretty memorable since I was listening to it live.

Date: Mon Jun 13 10:59:47 2016
User: Snowguy
Message:
Made me wonder about another set of odds. The Pens won the Stanley Cup last night, four total so far. Every one was won with a first-year coach behind the bench. I somehow doubt any other pro sports franchise with at least four titles had a first-year guy in charge in every one. Probably three titles, and maybe even two. Just wondering...

Date: Mon Jun 13 11:34:57 2016
User: TNmountainman
Message:
I was wondering how long it'd take you to get something on here about the Pens. I would say what you're theorizing has never happened (before).

Date: Wed Jun 15 23:07:16 2016
User: Kaos
Message:
Ichiro Suzuki has passed Pete Rose as major-league professional baseball's all-time hits leader at 4,257. This includes almost 1,300 hit in Japan's major league and Pete Rose has already pooh-poohed the achievement. Pete should count his blessing as the major league season length's in Japan when Ichiro was playing there were only around 130 games long instead of MLB's 162. That's 25% longer for MLB here and Ichiro has had no problem hitting MLB pitchers in the U.S. - especially when he was younger and faster. I think if Ichiro had played his entire career in MLB he'd have passed Pete a few years ago and be sitting around 4,500 hits now.

Link: 4257

Date: Wed Jun 15 23:34:37 2016
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Well done. Totally amazing. I guess that number will be considered a hybrid, depending on how one looks at things. More comparable/translatable than what Sadaharu Oh did. Such a sweet stroke.

Date: Thu Jun 16 12:45:18 2016
User: BuzzClik
Message:
Ichiro is a great talent and a solid contributor to every team on which he's played. His 2,979 hits rank him 31st in Major League Baseball.

Date: Fri Jun 17 02:39:07 2016
User: Kaos
Message:
Oh Buzz, that almost sounds like a back-handed dis. Ichiro's 262 hits in one season in 2004 is 1st and everyone else in the top ten (Oh, except for Ichiro again) played back in 1930 or earlier. He's one of the three best hitters (for average) ever.

Link: Hits in a season

Date: Sat Jul 2 08:55:31 2016
User: TNmountainman
Message:
I think Coastal Carolina winning the College World Series qualifies as a "crazy baseball occurrence". But as highly improbable as that may have seemed, how can you *not* win with this going for you?

Link: funky handshake to beat all other pretenders

Date: Sat Jul 2 15:19:32 2016
User: SilvioManuel
Message:
Is Sadaharu Oh the home run king since he had 868 or does he need at least one in the U.S. to qualify?

Date: Sat Jul 2 15:37:04 2016
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Date: Wed Jun 15 23:34:37 2016 User: TNmountainman Message: Well done. Totally amazing. I guess that number will be considered a hybrid, depending on how one looks at things. More comparable/translatable than what Sadaharu Oh did. Such a sweet stroke. ---------------------------------- That said......my personal bias would be that Oh would not be considered the home run king, because there's no way to 'translate' the numbers, and *most* observers consider the talent level, all things considered, to be higher in the U.S. than in Japan. Certainly that would include the era in which Oh played. Maybe it's comparable here to the "king of winnables" vs. the true "king"? And admittedly that's my bias, but it's based on copious reading by various analysts and commentators from the time when Oh was approaching Aaron's record - which shaped my viewpoint back then. I don't think if Oh had hit *1* home run in the U.S., or 100, that would change that perception. As an aside, it's pretty disgraceful how Japanese teams tried to pitch around several American players who were on the verge of breaking Oh's (Japanese) single season record.

Date: Sat Jun 10 03:33:54 2017
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Ok, here's 5 in one (post) - albeit one author's (not me) admittedly biased opinions. One caveat, if you watch #1, where Molina hit for the cycle..................his double and triple are both questionable - as to them being hits or errors. Having been an outfielder of some skill (not bragging - just fact), and/but more importantly as an official scorekeeper in another life (it seems), both those are borderline calls. I think I'd give an error on the double, and wouldn't argue someone giving an error on triple. (In fact if it came down to it, I think I would give an "E" on both of them.) If my lifetime, scorekeeping has become a bit more lax on giving hits, in my observation. But anyway, that's a tangent...... Very strange things can happen on a baseball diamond.

Link: 5 weird baseball games

Date: Mon Jun 26 18:25:35 2017
User: Klepp
Message:
I'm still waiting for the greatest walk-off imaginable: World Series, Game 7, bottom of the ninth (or later), home team three down, two out, bases juiced, full count, with a wicked CRACK! of the bat, and a long, long fly ball, dead center, going, going, and, PULLED BACK (à la the clip below) FOR THE VISITORS' ELATION: (Lucky to say I saw it live, un-pre-hyped, jumping off my couch, squealing like a little girl.)

Link: It doesn't get old seen again (and again)...

Date: Mon Jul 10 06:54:55 2017
User: Klepp
Message:
Cervelli smacks a GS in the first inning while second in the lineup, sixth time only in the modern era.

Date: Sat Jul 15 11:16:09 2017
User: Snowguy
Message:
This one made me chuckle. A Cardinal player hit a two-run blast into the outfield stands yesterday. A Pittsburgh fan caught it, immediately turned around and threw it over the wall. He had always said he hoped to someday catch one from a visiting player and throw it into the Allegheny River. :)

Date: Sat Jul 15 11:17:45 2017
User: Snowguy
Message:
(He displayed a good arm. No small feat to get it over the wall, it being a number of rows up and the wall higher still.)

Date: Sun Jul 16 10:20:04 2017
User: BuzzClik
Message:
Here's a good one from just before the All Star break: Pirates at Phillies, bottom of the third, nobody out, man on first. Philly Andres Blanco whiffs on a pitch and loses his bat. The bat flies into the stands. The Bucs' catcher snaps the ball to first to pick off the runner, but Josh Bell (first baseman) is watching the bat. The ball rolls into the right field corner. The runner scores on a three-base error. Video below.

Link: Ball's in play, Josh. Hello?

Date: Wed Jul 26 03:54:57 2017
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Here's another crazy one, but there is an error in the story. The first sentence of the story states "New York Yankees third baseman Todd Frazier drove in what may be the most interesting run of his career.....". However, one does *not* get an RBI for driving in a run when one hits into a double play. I was pretty positive, from back when I was an official scorekeeper, but thought that could have been changed. But it hasn't. And yes, a triple play counts, as that is just a special case of what is also a double play: RUNS BATTED IN 10.04 (a) Credit the batter with a run batted in for every run which reaches home base because of the batter's safe hit, sacrifice bunt, sacrifice fly, infield out or fielder's choice; or which is forced over the plate by reason of the batter becoming a runner with the bases full (on a base on balls, or an award of first base for being touched by a pitched ball, or for interference or obstruction). (b) Do not credit a run batted in when the batter grounds into a force double play or a reverse force double play. See the link below for the full details. Source(s): http://mlb.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/mlb/offici...

Link: run scores on a triple play (but it's NOT an RBI)

Date: Wed Jul 26 07:33:12 2017
User: BuzzClik
Message:
When they reviewed this play on ESPN last night, the announcer was careful to say, "... but he created a run..." rather than "drove in a run." Even that description is not accurate but avoided the suggestion of an RBI.

Date: Sun Aug 6 02:28:14 2017
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Don't know if this qualifies as "crazy" or not, but it's certainly noteworthy and remarkable. "The Dodgers' current winning percentage of .709 has them on pace to win 115 games. The 1906 Chicago Cubs and 2001 Seattle Mariners hold the MLB record with 116 wins in the regular season, though neither went on to win the World Series."

Link: Dodgers go 43-7 over 50 games

Date: Sun Aug 6 03:11:51 2017
User: TitanicTony
Message:
Yea Dodgers!! I was born in LA, but I haven't lived there since 1962. I moved to Switzerland in 1965.

Date: Sun Aug 6 03:56:07 2017
User: Klepp
Message:
Taylor doesn't get the respect he deserves.

Date: Tue Aug 22 13:58:42 2017
User: Klepp
Message:
Sort of a contrived stat, but not too much: OF Curtis Granderson (now LAD, erstwhile NYM, DET) becomes first player in modern era (1900-current) to hit a GS at leadoff and cleanup, in the same season.

Link: Curtis Granderson

Date: Fri Sep 8 14:57:18 2017
User: Klepp
Message:
Arizona Diamondbacks--13 game winning streak Cleveland Indians--15 game winning streak Never before in the modern era (1900-present) have two teams had active, concurrent winning streaks >12 games. (IMO, current odds of a D-backs/Indians WS matchup: 2 in 11.)

Date: Tue Sep 12 18:00:29 2017
User: TNmountainman
Message:
The D-backs streak was stopped at 13 (6 of those wins being against the used-to-be-red-hot Dodgers). The Indians go for their 20th in a row tonight. Lots to chew on regarding this streak. Some gaudy stats there (see link). (And here's hoping that I'm not blessing them with the SI jinx for posting this, even tho it's from ESPN, not SI.)

Link: How good is this Indians streak?

Date: Tue Sep 12 22:20:01 2017
User: TNmountainman
Message:
Indians win 20th. Relevant statistical geekology for those of us so oriented.....

Link: Nate Silver's guy's evaluation

Date: Wed Sep 13 19:54:47 2017
User: Punster
Message:
Indians win 21 in a row !!!!


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