Handicapping the World Series Matchup Between the Rangers and Giants

Numbers sooth me, so to help overcome the jitters of the World Series I have attempted to project the odds of each potential game outcome.

To do this I used the lineup Analysis tool from Baseball Musings to give me runs per game for each lineup. The Giants lineup at least on paper is slightly below that of the Texas Rangers but that in its self is not surprising. What is surprising at least to me when you do an adjustment for home road splits the Giants at home project to score nearly the same amount of runs!

On the run prevention side I used the tRA stats from Stat Corner to give me the runs allowed for both teams. To give an idea of how long each pitcher went is innings pitched divided by games started. Then this number is multiplied times the tRA/9 to give the number of runs per inning pitched.

I did the same thing for the bullpens and had them pitch the remaining innings of a 9 inning game.

Both runs scored and runs allowed are adjusted for home and road splits and it is these adjusted numbers that I used the Pythagorean winning percentage to determine each times odds of winning using the log5 method.

Here are the results:

Game 1	xIn	tRA	tRA/9	xRA	XRA Total	w/ Adjustmet		Runs Scored	w/ Adjustmet		Win %		Odds Of Winning
Tim Lincecum	6.43	3.04	0.338	2.17	3.074851	2.9248602		4.73	4.8374656		0.732293		0.527848
Bullpen	2.57		0.351	0.9
Cliff Lee	7.58	2.61	0.29	2.2	2.82197	2.8860848		4.746	4.5144901		0.709876		0.472152
Bullpen	1.42		0.44	0.62
Game 2	xIn	tRA	tRA/9	xRA	XRA Total	w/ Adjustmet		Runs Scored	w/ Adjustmet		Win %		Odds Of Winning
Matt Cain	6.77	3.58	0.398	2.69	3.476325	3.3067501		4.73	4.8374656		0.681538		0.593055
Bullpen	2.23		0.351	0.78
CJ Wilson	6.18	3.5	0.389	2.4	3.642631	3.725392		4.746	4.5144901		0.594895		0.406945
Bullpen	2.82		0.44	1.24
Game 3	xIn	tRA	tRA/9	xRA	XRA Total	w/ Adjustmet		Runs Scored	w/ Adjustmet		Win %		Odds Of Winning
Jonathan Sanchez	5.86	4.17	0.463	2.71	3.818121	3.9048682		5.35	5.089027		0.629419		0.337412
Bullpen	3.14		0.351	1.1
Colby Lewis	6.28	2.94	0.327	2.05	3.246766	3.0883885		5.515	5.6403008		0.769338		0.662588
Bullpen	2.72		0.44	1.19
Game 4	xIn	tRA	tRA/9	xRA	XRA Total	w/ Adjustmet		Runs Scored	w/ Adjustmet		Win %		Odds Of Winning
Madison Bumgarner	6.17	3.85	0.428	2.64	3.633472	3.7160249		5.35	5.089027		0.652232		0.520863
Bullpen	2.83		0.351	1
Tommy Hunter	5.82	4.82	0.536	3.12	4.514369	4.2941579		5.515	5.6403008		0.633059		0.479137
Bullpen	3.18		0.44	1.4
Game 5	xIn	tRA	tRA/9	xRA	XRA Total	w/ Adjustmet		Runs Scored	w/ Adjustmet		Win %		Odds Of Winning
Tim Lincecum	6.43	3.83	0.426	2.74	3.639555	3.7222458		5.35	5.089027		0.651473		0.297443
Bullpen	2.57		0.351	0.9
Cliff Lee	7.58	2.61	0.29	2.2	2.82197	2.684314		5.515	5.6403008		0.81533		0.702557
Bullpen	1.42		0.44	0.62
Game 6	xIn	tRA	tRA/9	xRA	XRA Total	w/ Adjustmet		Runs Scored	w/ Adjustmet		Win %		Odds Of Winning
Matt Cain	6.77	3.58	0.398	2.69	3.476325	3.3067501		4.73	4.8374656		0.681538		0.593055
Bullpen	2.23		0.351	0.78
CJ Wilson	6.18	3.5	0.389	2.4	3.642631	3.725392		4.746	4.5144901		0.594895		0.406945
Bullpen	2.82		0.44	1.24
Game 7	xIn	tRA	tRA/9	xRA	XRA Total	w/ Adjustmet		Runs Scored	w/ Adjustmet		Win %		Odds Of Winning
Jonathan Sanchez	5.86	4.17	0.463	2.71	3.818121	3.6318726		4.73	4.8374656		0.639521		0.489739
Bullpen	3.14		0.351	1.1
Colby Lewis	6.28	2.94	0.327	2.05	3.246766	3.3205322		4.746	4.5144901		0.648929		0.510261
Bullpen	2.72		0.44	1.19

 

The Giants are favored in 4 of the 7 games, game 1,2, 4 and 6 lean in their favor with the best odds in games 2 and 6. Games 3 and 5 heavily favor the Rangers in Arlington with game 7 essentially a toss up.

This should be a very close series.

When you put together a probability true the closeness becomes very apparent. The following table shows the odds of each team winning in that number of games.

Games    Giants    Rangers

4    5.47%    6.15%

5    7.28%    17.94%

6    16.92%    14.85%

7    15.52%    15.89%

Total    45.2%    54.8%

The Rangers are rightly being favored by the media but I still think that the Giants chances are pretty good. If I had done this for the Phillies series it would have been very similar maybe even more leaning toward the Phillies then this series.

The Giants best chances rest on taking the first 2 games and making sure to get at least one in Texas, that will be the path of least resistance. Winning a game besides game 4 in Texas could be a tall order so hopefully they don't go in their needing more than one.

Go Giants!