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A Mathematician at the Ballpark: Odds and Probabilities for Baseball Fans | 
 enlarge | Author: Ken Ross
Publisher: Plume
Category: Book
List Price: $14.00
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Avg. Customer Rating:  22 reviews
Sales Rank: 475285
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 224
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.1
Dimensions (in): 8 x 4.7 x 0.6
ISBN: 0452287820
Dewey Decimal Number: 519.2
EAN: 9780452287822
ASIN: 0452287820
Publication Date: February 27, 2007
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Product Description
In A Mathematician at the Ballpark, professor Ken Ross reveals the math behind the stats. This lively and accessible book shows baseball fans how to harness the power of made predictions and better understand the game. Using real-world examples from historical and modern-day teams, Ross shows:
Why on-base and slugging percentages are more important than batting averages
How professional odds makers predict the length of a seven-game series
How to use mathematics to make smarter bets
A Mathematician at the Ballpark is the perfect guide to the science of probability for the stats-obsessed baseball fansand, with a detailed new appendix on fantasy baseball, an essential tool for anyone involved in a fantasy league.
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"Approachable, understandable and entertaining look behind the numbers of baseball. Opens up the math behind Michael Lewis's bestseller Moneyball, in a way that anyone can read and understand. Filled with current and historical players, this is the first book that focuses on probability in baseball. Covers not only the formulas for computing batting average, on base percentage and the like, but also delves into odds and predicting recurring events. Here is a perfect introduction to the ideas of probability that baseball fans will love. Books on baseball give statistics and use language such as ""odds,"" ""likely"" and ""no chance"" without any explanation. Now professor of mathematics Ken Ross has written a guide to the beautiful and powerful science of probability for baseball fans who love statistics. In the last few years, revolutionaries armed with good old mathematics have changed baseball forever. Managers and coaches have refocused their attention on what statistics really measure and what they indicate about the probable performance of a player or a team. Now Ken Ross, himself a lifelong baseball fan, opens up the math behind Michael Lewis's bestseller Moneyball and shows how anyone can use probability to better understand the future of the game, in the next inning, or in the rest of the season, or in the rest of the World Series. See why the On Base Percentage and Slugging Percentage together are more meaningful than each is by itself (and why they are neither percentages nor averages). See how to calculate the probability that a seven-game series will go four, five, six or seven games. Learn how a mathematician adept in the arithmetic of probability can combine statistics to produce tailor-made analyses in answering questions about specific teams, players, and games. Filled with current and historical players, this is the first book that focuses on probability in baseball. "
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| Customer Reviews: Read 17 more reviews...
 Uses baseball to illustrate freshman statistics June 12, 2007
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Not intended as comprehensive statistical study of baseball. Rather, its goal is to teach a few of the freshman probability-statistics concepts via baseball examples. This may be too narrow a niche to appeal to many readers. But if you want such a book, this is a well written and easy to read one. Has several useful nuggets for the teacher (Derek Jeter and David Justice exemplifying Simpson's paradox; analysis of streaks data; analysis of a cute gambling strategy "bet on underdog whose fan base is relatively very small") and useful references to further statistical work on baseball.
 While the book is good, he should have dropped some of the derogatory references May 14, 2007
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Baseball is a very cerebral game, both on and off the field. Overall athletic ability is less a precondition for success on the field than in any other major sport. Off the field, baseball fans use statistics in their arguments more than in any other sport. If your audience is interested in baseball, then it is easy to create scenarios that can be used to teach probability and statistics.
In chapter one, Ross uses batting averages, slugging percentage, on base percentage and on base plus slugging to explore the question, "Who's the best hitter?" Like so many before him, he reaches no definitive answer and is only able to come to some general conclusions. Chapters two through four examine basic probability, odds and expectation. Chapter four is entitled "What Would Pete Rose Do?", which is a derogatory reference to Rose's history of betting on sports and then lying about it. Unfortunately, Rose's name appears nowhere in the body of the chapter, although the coverage of the topic is excellent.
The title of chapter five is "Will the Yankees Win if Steinbrenner is Gone?" and deals with conditional probability. As was the case with chapter four, the name Steinbrenner never appears in the body of the chapter. The chapter that I found the most interesting was number six, "How Long Should the World Series Last?" Given that the probability of each team winning a particular game is the same and the games are independent, it is easy to determine the probability that the series will go a certain number of games. Chapters seven and eight deal with streaks, sequences of victories and how likely they are and given a streak, the probability that it will continue. Whatever you call them: streaks, momentum or "being hot", they all describe the most misunderstood concept in sports. Ross reaches the same conclusion that all others who have studied it reached. Namely, that there is no such thing as momentum. Good teams win consecutive games because they are good, not because they are hot. Strings of consecutive successes are very predictable and the higher the percentage of victory, the more frequent and lengthy their winning streaks will be. It is only the perception of the situation that leads people to believe otherwise.
Overall Ross does a good job in using baseball situations to demonstrate the basics of probability and statistics. However, some knowledge of the game is necessary if you are to understand it. Unfortunately, he chooses to make the titles of two chapter's negative comments on two of baseball's major figures. I personally dislike Pete Rose and George Steinbrenner a lot, considering them both to have had an overall negative impact on major league baseball. Nevertheless, I see no benefit to making the negative references to them when it is only the title of the chapter and not the point of the chapter.
Published in Journal of Recreational Mathematics, reprinted with permission
Not enough baseball to satisfy... February 21, 2006
I seem to recall taking some freshmen math class from Professor Ross back in my days at the University of Oregon, but the details of that class remain as unmemorable as this book. If you already have a reasonable knowledge of basic probability, it's unlikely that you'll learn much here. His treatment of baseball betting in Chapter 4 is just about the most obvious idea imagineable (bet on underdogs) and not suprisingly doesn't work all that well. His analysis seems just to skim the surface of a very deep and complex game. There just isn't much to satisfy.
 If you want to read about "stats" and "at bats," there are better choices January 4, 2006
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
There's something good that can be said about any book, and in this particular case, perhaps it's worth pointing out that "A Mathematician at the Ballpark" is brief, at just 152 pages (excluding appendices). And it has large print on each of it's smallish 5x8 inch pages.
If you want a very readable account of how statistical analysis of player performance has been applied in the real world and changed the way teams are assembled and managed, I highly recommend that you buy "Moneyball" by Michael Lewis.
If you want to delve a little more into statistical inference and analysis of player performance and aren't afraid of math, then I highly recommend "Curve Ball: Baseball, Statistics and the Role of Chance in the Game" by Jim Albert and Jay Bennett.
"Curve Ball" and "A Mathematician at the Ballpark" probably compete a little more directly for the mathematically inclined reader. And, to my mind, "Curve Ball" is the more compelling book because it asks (and attempts to answer) more interesting questions, like: "Is there such a thing as streakiness or the 'hot hand?'" Can you measure "clutch play"? And, how confident can you be that the "best team" actually won the World Series. In "Curve Ball," the questions are of primary importance, and statistical concepts are introduced to the extent they help "answer" the questions. In "A Mathematician at the Ballpark," in contrast, the author's focus is on statistics first, and only secondarily on baseball. Indeed, baseball often comes across as tangential to the author's narrative. You'll pick up as much about statistics and MUCH MUCH MORE about baseball, from "Curve Ball."
It's not a "bad" book. There are just better alternatives.
A good probability and stats book November 6, 2005
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
There really are only a few connections to baseball, and even fewer on the field. However the author does a good job of explaining basic principles of probabilty. There are some good chapters about lotteries and other random games. Overall, a worthy book.
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