(05-01-2013 11:59 PM)Almadenmike Wrote:  

(05-01-2013 11:34 PM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  As predicted, with our win tonight, Warren Nolan has us at #31 in RPI, and I wouldn't be surprised if we're a couple spots higher still on Boyd's tomorrow morning. But we can il-afford a loss to UAB this weekend if we hope to evens obtain our position. Note-- USM lost ground in RPI after home sweeping UAB last weekend.

Does the RPI bump for a road win scale inversely with the RPI of the opponent? Or is it constant, even for weak, high-RPI road wins?

You can think of it as two independent factors. Your RPI is going to be affected in a certain (constant) way based on the W-L record of your opponent, whether you win or lose. On top of that, you will increase or decrease your own WP based on the game's outcome. All home wins now count as winning 7/10 of a game; likewise, all road losses count as losing 7/10 of a game. Conversely, a road win or home loss counts as 1.3 games.

There is no longer any bonus for beating the top 25/50/75 teams as of this year.

ETA: Put another way, we have 5 road games and 6 home games remaining. Our RPI will be the same for a given home/road W-L result. That is, if we go 3-2 on the road, 4-2 at home, it doesn't matter if the losses on the road come at UAB or at LaTech/TxState, and at home vs. Memphis or vs. Marshall.

(05-02-2013 07:18 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  A road sweep at UAB should bring our RPI down into the 20s for the first time this year.

Would it? Sure, the 25% of the marginal change coming from the road wins would be helpful, however 50% of the marginal change we'd see would be from factoring in UAB's WP, which is .370.

(05-02-2013 12:20 PM)texd Wrote:  

(05-02-2013 07:18 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  A road sweep at UAB should bring our RPI down into the 20s for the first time this year.

Would it? Sure, the 25% of the marginal change coming from the road wins would be helpful, however 50% of the marginal change we'd see would be from factoring in UAB's WP, which is .370.

It seems to contradict Walt's other fact, that USM swept UAB and their RPI went down.

(05-02-2013 01:30 PM)grol Wrote:  

(05-02-2013 12:20 PM)texd Wrote:  

(05-02-2013 07:18 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  A road sweep at UAB should bring our RPI down into the 20s for the first time this year.

Would it? Sure, the 25% of the marginal change coming from the road wins would be helpful, however 50% of the marginal change we'd see would be from factoring in UAB's WP, which is .370.

It seems to contradict Walt's other fact, that USM swept UAB and their RPI went down.

I wondered about that, too. Possibly the difference is that the Eagles' sweep was at home, while ours would be on the road?

This sort of situation was part of the rationale behind my question last night about any high/low RPI impact in the road-victory adjustment. NoodleOwl seemed to say that the adjustment was constant, independent of RPI: a road win (or home loss) has higher impact (= 1.3 games each) than a road loss (or home win) (= 0.7 game each).

I'd be interested in seeing the calculational details of how sweeping UAB would improve our RPI while USM's dropped after their home sweep of the Blazers.

Well I gather that 3 road wins is the equivalent of 3.9 games in the W column. 3 home wins is only equivalent to 2.1 games (for USM) in the W column. So over 40+ games the WP for a road sweep would be equivalent to an extra game won, or one less for a home sweep. Shouldn't be too big a difference, but I'm lazier than the Noodle.

More noodlin':

Our current WP: 28.1/42.4 = .6627
Current OWP: 925/1753 = .5277

Assuming a UAB sweep:

WP: 32/46.3 = .6911 (.0284 improvement * 0.25 = .0071 RPI boost)
OWP : 976/1891 = .5161 (.0116 decline * 0.5 = 0.0058 RPI drag)

This won't be exact, since our other opponents will be adding to the OWP as well this weekend, but ceteris paribus, the effect of a UAB sweep on the road for us is a 0.0013 point boost to RPI - probably not enough to crack the top 30, but it depends on what the teams around us do.

Thanks, Noodle!!

(05-02-2013 01:30 PM)grol Wrote:  

(05-02-2013 12:20 PM)texd Wrote:  

(05-02-2013 07:18 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  A road sweep at UAB should bring our RPI down into the 20s for the first time this year.

Would it? Sure, the 25% of the marginal change coming from the road wins would be helpful, however 50% of the marginal change we'd see would be from factoring in UAB's WP, which is .370.

It seems to contradict Walt's other fact, that USM swept UAB and their RPI went down.

Yes, but USM played UAB at home; not on the road and, consequently, only received 0.7 points for each win; whereas we'd be getting 1.3 points per win.

Boyd Nation has simplified this speculation somewhat by working out the kinks in and restarting his "RPI Needs Report". Here's May 3rd's report on Rice:

Quote:Rice

Remaining: 6 home, 5 road, 0 neutral
Current RPI: 32
ROWP: 0.433

Top 45:

3 home wins, 5 road wins
4 home wins, 4 road wins
5 home wins, 3 road wins
6 home wins, 2 road wins

Top 32:

5 home wins, 5 road wins
6 home wins, 4 road wins

Top 16:

No way to reach the threshold.

Top 8:

No way to reach the threshold.

The bottom line: Closing 8-3 might get the Owls into at-large territory, but 10-1 would be preferrable. Like I've been saying all season, it's going to be tough for Rice to get an at-large bid this year (and for what it's worth, Massey only predicts 7.73 wins the rest of the season, although we're favored in each individual game except the Texas State one). The time for losing even one game per C-USA series is over.

One caveat: none of these analyses include results from the C-USA tournament which, given Rice's marginal at-large position now, could have a major effect on the Owls' final RPI.

Since there is t a direct correlation between RPI and NCAA bids, I would find it highly unlikely that us finishing 8-3 (leaving us at 37-17 before conf tournament), MIGHT get us into at-large territory. I think it would ensure we were an at large bid.

(05-03-2013 01:32 PM)Jonathan Sadow Wrote:  

Boyd Nation Wrote:ROWP: 0.433

Anybody know how that compares to our current OWP?

(05-03-2013 02:18 PM)Gravy Owl Wrote:  

(05-03-2013 01:32 PM)Jonathan Sadow Wrote:  

Boyd Nation Wrote:ROWP: 0.433

Anybody know how that compares to our current OWP?

According to Warren Nolan, it looks like 0.526 (not including games against Rice) or 0.5244 (including games against Rice).

http://warrennolan.com/baseball/2013/sos

(05-03-2013 01:32 PM)Jonathan Sadow Wrote:  Boyd Nation has simplified this speculation somewhat by working out the kinks in and restarting his "RPI Needs Report". Here's May 3rd's report on Rice:

Quote:Rice

Remaining: 6 home, 5 road, 0 neutral
Current RPI: 32
ROWP: 0.433

Top 45:

3 home wins, 5 road wins
4 home wins, 4 road wins
5 home wins, 3 road wins
6 home wins, 2 road wins

Top 32:

5 home wins, 5 road wins
6 home wins, 4 road wins

Top 16:

No way to reach the threshold.

Top 8:

No way to reach the threshold.

The bottom line: Closing 8-3 might get the Owls into at-large territory, but 10-1 would be preferrable. Like I've been saying all season, it's going to be tough for Rice to get an at-large bid this year (and for what it's worth, Massey only predicts 7.73 wins the rest of the season, although we're favored in each individual game except the Texas State one). The time for losing even one game per C-USA series is over.

One caveat: none of these analyses include results from the C-USA tournament which, given Rice's marginal at-large position now, could have a major effect on the Owls' final RPI.

Here's Boyd's Saturday morning's "RPI Needs" report:

Rice

Remaining: 6 home, 4 road, 0 neutral
Current RPI: 36
ROWP: 0.442

Top 45:
4 home wins, 4 road wins
5 home wins, 3 road wins
6 home wins, 2 road wins

Top 32: 6 home wins, 4 road wins

Top 16: No way to reach the threshold.

Top 8: No way to reach the threshold.

RPI needs report May 6: Win out to be top 32, win 6 of 8 to be top 45.

So there are those in the know that see us as a 3 seed? That would make for one tough regional.

(05-06-2013 05:01 PM)owlsfan Wrote:  So there are those in the know that see us as a 3 seed? That would make for one tough regional.

??? Wno has us as a #3 seed at the moment? Heck, not even Brian Foley has us as a 3 seed.

If we need to be 8-0 to be in the top 32, doesn't that mean if we do not go 8-0, we will not be in the top 32? Am I missing something there?

BTW-the way we have played this year, we couldn't sweep a good middle school team in a 3 game series. There would be 1 game of the 3 where there would be a bout of wildness by our pitchers; some fielding errors; and an early 6 run deficit, ending in a 1 run loss with the tieing run at 3rd base.

(05-06-2013 05:04 PM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  

(05-06-2013 05:01 PM)owlsfan Wrote:  So there are those in the know that see us as a 3 seed? That would make for one tough regional.

??? Wno has us as a #3 seed at the moment? Heck, not even Brian Foley has us as a 3 seed.

2, 3, not much difference in the path needed to get to Omaha. If we are a 3, we'll one of the toughest 3s.

(05-06-2013 05:49 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(05-06-2013 05:04 PM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  

(05-06-2013 05:01 PM)owlsfan Wrote:  So there are those in the know that see us as a 3 seed? That would make for one tough regional.

??? Wno has us as a #3 seed at the moment? Heck, not even Brian Foley has us as a 3 seed.

2, 3, not much difference in the path needed to get to Omaha. If we are a 3, we'll one of the toughest 3s.

Unless you're overemphasizing RPI, most would consider us to be one of toughest #2s. Remember, just about everyone has us ranked somewhere in the Top 20.

(05-06-2013 05:57 PM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  

(05-06-2013 05:49 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(05-06-2013 05:04 PM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  

(05-06-2013 05:01 PM)owlsfan Wrote:  So there are those in the know that see us as a 3 seed? That would make for one tough regional.

??? Wno has us as a #3 seed at the moment? Heck, not even Brian Foley has us as a 3 seed.

2, 3, not much difference in the path needed to get to Omaha. If we are a 3, we'll one of the toughest 3s.

Unless you're overemphasizing RPI, most would consider us to be one of toughest #2s. Remember, just about everyone has us ranked somewhere in the Top 20.

In theory, it's better to be a 2 than a 3 because the first-round opponent would be easier. Likewise, it's theoretically better to be a 1 than a 2 or 3 because you are at home and play the weakest team, the 4. Some 1's hold back their top pitcher for the assumed 2nd game, whereas the 2's and 3's usually have to pitch their ace in game one.

But as many of our recent regionals have shown, once the games start those seeds don't matter too much; these are 64 good teams. If we're not hosting (very unlikely at this point), I just want to make the tourney. I don't really care if we're a 2, 3, or 4 (or even a traveling 1). I care way more about Kubitza being in a rhythm, Simms knowing his role, Ratt keeping his groove on, Hoelscher and Stringer returning to form, everybody staying healthy, etc.

I'd love to see McCanna and McDowell primed for important postseason roles. I'd love our clutch relievers to be Fox, Simms, and Lemond; we're tough to beat with those 3 guys rested and ready in the pen. That's it. Play ball. We've got better talent and coaching than most teams in the country. We can make it to Omaha if we play to our potential. Throw the ball, hit the ball, field the ball. :)