How tough will your competition bee this season?

It just dawned on me that most people don’t know how to get the team records of their opponents. Actually, for most schools it’s pretty simple.

MaxPreps has most scores, so try looking there. Here’s what I do.

Got to www.maxpreps.com/

If you don’t remember last year’s schedule, at the top of the page there’s a box titled “Find Your School”. Enter your school’s name there. After you choose the school from the list, choose “Baseball Var”. (I work with only Varsity) When you get to the team page, choose “More” on the left side of the page under “Team Links”. Then choose “2011-2012 Var”.

With any luck, you’ll see last season’s entire schedule. Once you’re there, it’s a cinch. Just click on any team you played, and that will take you to their page where you can see their “overall” record. From there, its only a matter of going back to the schedule and doing the same thing for all the opponents.

It usually takes me about 5 minutes to get the information, and the calculations are simple.

I'm guessing most people don't care. The team plays it's schedule. If the team is good the team goes to the playoffs. Regardless of team's records it's the schedule the team plays.

this years team makeups are different from last years---stats mean nothing

Kind of a fun idea, Stats. I wasn't sure whether you we're interested in looking at last year's strength of schedule, or this year's based on last year's performance, but I assumed the latter.

Son's team plays in KingCo 4A (4A is the highest level in Washington), one of the toughest 4A conferences in the State and one that usually does very well in the State Tournament. In addition, we play a non-conference game this year against the 4A State Champ as well as the 3A runner-up. Based on what MaxPreps shows, our 2013 schedule played to a .507 conference record last year, and a .530 overall record. Not as tough as yours, but not bad.

quote:

Originally posted by TRhit:
this years team makeups are different from last years---stats mean nothing

Of course the teams are different! But, in general programs don’t change a whole lot unless they change coaches. What’s the matter? Is your team scheduled to play a bunch of perennial pushovers, and you’re trying to justify a losing season?

quote:

Originally posted by EdgarFan:
Kind of a fun idea, Stats. I wasn't sure whether you we're interested in looking at last year's strength of schedule, or this year's based on last year's performance, but I assumed the latter.

You took it just as I meant it. It’s a fun idea that proves nothing. Our coach uses it to pump up the boys to make sure they take no one for granted and work hard to prepare for every game. The parents like it as a “chest beater” because we always play a fairly tough schedule. I also keep track of each team’s current record when we play them.

quote:

Son's team plays in KingCo 4A (4A is the highest level in Washington), one of the toughest 4A conferences in the State and one that usually does very well in the State Tournament. In addition, we play a non-conference game this year against the 4A State Champ as well as the 3A runner-up. Based on what MaxPreps shows, our 2013 schedule played to a .507 conference record last year, and a .530 overall record. Not as tough as yours, but not bad.

The thing about a conference that sometimes causes people to misjudge the quality of the opponents is, there are usually one or two weak teams in every conference, and that skews the numbers. Until realignment happened, the two weakest teams in our conference won a total of 61 games in 4 seasons, only 21 of them were conference wins, and 12 of them were against each other.

quote:

Originally posted by Stats4Gnats:

"You took it just as I meant it. It’s a fun idea that proves nothing. Our coach uses it to pump up the boys to make sure they take no one for granted and work hard to prepare for every game. The parents like it as a 'chest beater' because we always play a fairly tough schedule. I also keep track of each team’s current record when we play them."

I know what you mean. Back when I used to coach All Stars for our Little League - which was very small, with maybe half the kids that more "powerful" programs had (we were lucky to get 12 kids to play All Stars, much less have to choose among candidates) - I used to do something similar...and ultimately just as "meaningless." We had made a little run at the District level and we were coming up against a traditional power, not only at the District level but at the State level. Some of the boys who had played on my regular season team had played a team from that league in a Tournament of Champions, and both All Star teams were pretty well dominated by players from those two teams. I had pumped up that All Star team by telling them we had played evenly with those guys, who had been State Champs at younger ages and who had come within a run the previous year of representing Washington in the LL Regionals (losing to a team that got to the quarter finals at the LLWS), and that they should not be intimidated, they belonged on the same field with those guys, play hard and anything can happen, etc. You know what? It's only really "meaningless" if it doesn't work - but it did. Although we didn't beat that team, we played them tough, and we went further than any team from our LL had in 30 years. Funny thing is, too: the team that knocked out the team I was pumping our kids up to play at State, the one that went on to play deep into the LLWS, is now the nucleus of the team my son plays Summer ball with. He was never again intimidated by kids from "better" programs, and it turns out he does belong on the field with those kids. In fact, he's been one of their best players. Sometimes the meaningless stuff works pretty well.

quote:

"The thing about a conference that sometimes causes people to misjudge the quality of the opponents is, there are usually one or two weak teams in every conference, and that skews the numbers. Until realignment happened, the two weakest teams in our conference won a total of 61 games in 4 seasons, only 21 of them were conference wins, and 12 of them were against each other."

In our conference, that is very true. Seattle schools all used to be in the Metro League, and KingCo was the "eastside" (east of Lake Washington) league. Today, there are three Seattle schools that are 4A and they have all been moved into a bigger KingCo conference. And for years, they were terrible as compared to the eastside schools, who all have better facilities, and more and better practice fields, more select/summer ball options, etc. My son's school has been on a slow climb up from that cellar over the past four years, culminating with a State berth last season with a team mostly made up of Juniors who are now returning Seniors. They built up to that by realizing that, at first, all they needed to do was finish ahead of the other two Seattle schools (who are always in our division) and they would make the conference playoffs. Baby steps, build on success, that sort of thing. Last year they started to beat the teams that had treated us like doormats in previous years, and this year they're poised to make a decent run.

Anyway, long story short: of those other two Seattle schools, one went 1-14 in conference last year, and the other went 5-10. And, relatively speaking, this represented improvement (at least the 5-10 team, and my son's school, which finished 9-6). Even still, they are a relative "drag" on the perception of how "tough" that conference is, but one through eight or nine, it is MUCH tougher than it appears!

quote:

Originally posted by EdgarFan:
…Sometimes the meaningless stuff works pretty well.

Yes it does! That’s one of those “intangibles” that has so much effect on what goes on in the game. Its like how a bat “feels” to a hitter, or what confidence in throwing a certain pitch means to a pitcher. Its all between the ears.

quote:

… Anyway, long story short: of those other two Seattle schools, one went 1-14 in conference last year, and the other went 5-10. And, relatively speaking, this represented improvement (at least the 5-10 team, and my son's school, which finished 9-6). Even still, they are a relative "drag" on the perception of how "tough" that conference is, but one through eight or nine, it is MUCH tougher than it appears!

And that’s a big reason why I often take issue with people about how useless HS stats are because the range of opponents is so wide. Who you play in conference/league games is totally out of a team’s control. All the teams play all the other teams, and that’s just the way it is. But those non-conference games are a different issue.

In some places, the weather’s such that the number of non-conference games is only 5 or 6, but in places where the weather’s a lot nicer, there can be just as many non-conference games as conference games, and those games are under the control of the HC to a large degree. Sometimes, due to there not being a lot of schools in the area, a coach will choose to play lesser local competition rather than do a lot of traveling. But some schools, because of financial reasons, are able to do the traveling without much hardship.

But the thing is, no matter what the competition, every game has to be played, and every game that’s played can and often does bring surprises. That’s part of what makes the game great!