Monday, January 09, 2012
Me vs. reality: 2012 edition
Posted by Chris JaffeThis year, as is my annual tradition, I predicted how the BBWAA Hall of Fame vote will go. I don't just say in/out, but give actual predicted percentages. Well, the vote is out, so how did I do? Let's see.
Below is a chart comparing the actual BBWAA vote totals versus my predictions for the 2012 elections - plus the difference between the two (saying how high/low my predictions were compared to reality).
Name BBWAA Me Diff. Barry Larkin 86 82 -4 Jack Morris 68 65 -3 Jeff Bagwell 56 54 -2 Lee Smith 51 52 1 Tim Raines 49 52 3 Edgar Martinez 37 39 2 Alan Trammell 37 32 -5 Larry Walker 23 27 4 Mark McGwire 20 24 4 Fred McGriff 24 24 0 Dale Murphy 15 19 4 Don Mattingly 18 18 0 Rafael Palmeiro 13 15 2 Bernie Williams 10 12 2
14 guys predicted, and I was within five percentage points with all of them. I was off by an average of 2.6 percentage points. Yeah, I like that.
In all:
Guessed perfectly twice (Don Mattingly, Fred McGriff).
Off by one percentage point once (Lee Smith).
Off by two percentage points four times (Jeff Bagwell, Edgar Martinez, Rafael Palmeiro, Bernie Williams)
Off by three percentage points twice (Jack Morris, Tim Raines)
Off by four percentage points four times (Barry Larkin, Larry Walker, Mark McGwire, Dale Murphy)
Off by five percentage points once (Alan Trammell).
That's another year I can claim to know what I'm talking about.
History instructor by day, statnerd by night, Chris Jaffe leads one of the most exciting double lives imaginable; with the exception of every other double life possible to imagine. Despite his lack of comic-book-hero-worthiness, Chris enjoys farting around with this stuff. His new book, Evaluating Baseball's Managers is available for order. Chris welcomes responses to his articles via e-mail. Oh, and now he's on twitter.
Chris, is Morris’ enshrinement now inevitable?