(Press-News.org) Now that Major League Baseball's regular season has ended with the exciting one-game tiebreaker that got the Rays to the next round, and with the Rays and the Pirates winning the one game playoff for the wild card team, NJIT math professor Bruce Bukiet has once again begun analyzing the probability of each team advancing through each round of baseball's postseason. "The Los Angeles Dodgers, who many thought were out of contention early in the season after a poor start, have the best chance to win their series (63%) against the Braves while the Detroit Tigers have a 59% chance to eliminate the Oakland A's. The Red Sox have a 55% chance of sending the Rays home and the Pirates have a 53% chance of defeating the St. Louis Cardinals in the best of 5 game Division Series round.
At the season's start, Bukiet used his mathematical model to project the number of wins each team should earn (see: http://m.njit.edu/~bukiet/baseball/SeasonProjections2013.html). Bukiet's model picked 2/3 of the ten post-season teams back in March (there were some ties in the original projections leading to the fraction), a result that beat nearly 90% of the experts (at Yahoo Sports, Sports Illustrated, ESPN and the Examiner) and that for the third year in four placed him first at Baseballphd.net's annual contest to pick the teams who would make it to the playoffs. Bukiet updates the probabilities of each team taking their series throughout the Major League Baseball post-season at http://m.njit.edu/~bukiet/baseball/playoffs13.htm.
On Bukiet's website, he provides the likelihood of each team taking the series in a given number of games. Going into the series, the most likely outcome (25%) is for the Dodgers to defeat the Braves win in four games. The Tigers' best chance (23%) is to win in 4, while the Red Sox' best chance (22%) is to win in 5 games. The Pirates' best chance (24%) is to win in four.
This is Bukiet's 13th year using his model to determine whether it is worthwhile to wager on games each day during the baseball season. His picks (posted on http://www.egrandslam.com) have led to positive results for 9 of the 13 years (counting 2013's thus far positive performance).
The method uses a Markov process approach which he originally published in the journal Operations Research. The method enables one to assess prospective trades and evaluate who should win the Most Valuable Player and Cy Young Awards among various other applications. Bukiet's MVP and Cy Young results and the updated method to produce them have appeared in the International Journal of Performance Analysis in Sports. The model computes the probability of a team with given hitters, bench, starting pitcher, lineup and relievers scoring any number of runs along with home field advantage to compute the chance each team has to win a game.
###
NJIT, New Jersey's science and technology university, enrolls 10,000 students pursuing bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees in 120 programs. The university consists of six colleges: Newark College of Engineering, College of Architecture and Design, College of Science and Liberal Arts, School of Management, College of Computing Sciences and Albert Dorman Honors College. U.S. News & World Report's 2011 Annual Guide to America's Best Colleges ranked NJIT in the top tier of national research universities. NJIT is internationally recognized for being at the edge in knowledge in architecture, applied mathematics, wireless communications and networking, solar physics, advanced engineered particulate materials, nanotechnology, neural engineering and e-learning. Many courses and certificate programs, as well as graduate degrees, are available online through the Division of Continuing Professional Education.
NJIT professor offers math-based projections for MLB postseason
2013-10-08
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Research shows 'advergames' promote unhealthy foods for kids
2013-10-08
Not only do some online video games promote a less-than-active lifestyle for children, the content of some of these games also may be contributing to unhealthy diets.
A team of Michigan State University researchers took a closer look at what are called advergames and found they have a tendency to promote foods that are chock full of fat, sugar and sodium.
An advergame is defined as an online video game that promotes a particular product, service or company by integrating it into the game, and is typically offered for free.
The researchers located hundreds of advergames ...
Microsatellites are repetitive, but the lab work doesn't have to be
2013-10-08
Microsatellites are molecular markers with numerous applications in biological research. In studies of both plants and animals, they can be used to investigate speciation, gene flow among populations, mating systems, and parentage, as well as many other questions. A new protocol created by researchers at the University of Cincinnati and several other institutions improves the efficiency of current methods, allowing quicker and cheaper development of microsatellite markers for any species of interest.
Microsatellites, which consist of repeating units of two to six base ...
CWRU researchers test biofeedback device in lowering grandmothers' stress
2013-10-08
In a pilot study by Case Western Reserve University's Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing, 20 grandmothers were able to lower their stress levels with a biofeedback device that tracks breathing patterns.
According to U. S. Census data, the number of children living with their grandparents has increased 64 percent in the past 20 years. Prior studies at the Case Western Reserve nursing school have found that many grandmothers suffer stress and depression from having to serve as full-time child-care givers at this stage in their lives.
Looking at ways to reduce such ...
Rhode Island Hospital uncovers pathway linking heartburn and esophageal cancer
2013-10-08
PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Got heartburn? More than 60 million adults in the U.S. have acid reflux, or heartburn, and approximately 10 percent are at risk for developing esophageal cancer, due in part to complications from Barrett's esophagus. But researchers at Rhode Island Hospital discovered a pathway they believe links Barrett's esophagus to the development of esophageal cancer. Their data suggest that blocking this pathway, such as with a proton pump inhibitor (e.g. omeprazole), may prevent the development of esophageal cancer. The study is published online in advance of print ...
Better robot vision
2013-10-08
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Object recognition is one of the most widely studied problems in computer vision. But a robot that manipulates objects in the world needs to do more than just recognize them; it also needs to understand their orientation. Is that mug right-side up or upside-down? And which direction is its handle facing?
To improve robots' ability to gauge object orientation, Jared Glover, a graduate student in MIT's Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, is exploiting a statistical construct called the Bingham distribution. In a paper they're presenting ...
Study shows how neurons enable us to know smells we like and dislike, whether to approach or retreat
2013-10-08
Cold Spring Harbor, NY -- Think of the smell of freshly baking bread. There is something in that smell, without any other cues – visual or tactile – that steers you toward the bakery. On the flip side, there may be a smell, for instance that of fresh fish, that may not appeal to you. If you haven't eaten a morsel of food in three days, of course, a fishy odor might seem a good deal more attractive.
How, then, does this work? What underlying biological mechanisms account for our seemingly instant, almost unconscious ability to determine how attractive (or repulsive) ...
Long-term care seniors at high risk of head injuries
2013-10-08
A study by Simon Fraser University researchers has found seniors in long-term care facilities are at high risk of head injuries – nearly 40 per cent of those who fall experience head impact.
The researchers studied video footage of 227 falls among 133 residents at a local long-term care facility. They found 37 per cent of falling residents struck their heads upon falling, and hit the ground – most often, linoleum or tile flooring – more than 60 per cent of the time. The researchers conclude: "By any measure, this is an alarmingly high prevalence."
More should be done, ...
Legislation may cause data deficit for researchers, small businesses
2013-10-08
Small farms and businesses may be the unintended victims of legislation aimed at cutting the federal budget by eliminating certain sets of local and county-based economic data, according to a group of economists.
"This local data is really what we use in our lab," said Stephan Goetz, professor of agricultural economics and regional economics, Penn State, and director of the Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development. "And, at the end of the day, we're using this information to try to understand how our world is changing."
The researchers, who report their findings ...
Wedded bliss or blues? UC Berkeley scientists link DNA to marital satisfaction
2013-10-08
What makes some people more prone to wedded bliss or sorrow than others? Researchers at UC Berkeley and Northwestern University have found a major clue in our DNA. A gene involved in the regulation of serotonin can predict how much our emotions affect our relationships, according to a new study that may be the first to link genetics, emotions, and marital satisfaction. The study was conducted at UC Berkeley.
"An enduring mystery is, what makes one spouse so attuned to the emotional climate in a marriage, and another so oblivious?" said UC Berkeley psychologist Robert ...
Making Martian clouds on Earth
2013-10-08
CAMBRIDGE, Mass-- At first glance, Mars' clouds might easily be mistaken for those on Earth: Images of the Martian sky, taken by NASA's Opportunity rover, depict gauzy, high-altitude wisps, similar to our cirrus clouds. Given what scientists know about the Red Planet's atmosphere, these clouds likely consist of either carbon dioxide or water-based ice crystals. But it's difficult to know the precise conditions that give rise to such clouds without sampling directly from a Martian cloud.
Researchers at MIT have now done the next-best thing: They've recreated Mars-like ...