What does "number of games over .500" mean?

[NAF]

So, I managed to derail a PGT today with my confusion over the use of this phrase.

Put simply, if a team is 10-0 (ignoring the loser point for simplicity), then how many games over .500 are they?

A) 5
B) 10

I hope it's fair to say that those who choose A) understand the phrase "number of games over .500" to mean "number of games more than half" and that people who answer B) understand it to mean "number of wins minus losses" or "number of losses it would take to reach .500".

I honestly have no interest in bickering any further about this. I'm just curious to see what the popular understanding is.

Thanks!

Click to read more...

 

[Bear of Bad News]

The standard definition in baseball (which is where this came from, at least in North American sports parlance) would give the answer of 10.

 

[NAF]

The standard definition in baseball (which is where this came from, at least in North American sports parlance) would give the answer of 10.

Yeah, that seemed to be the consensus in the PGT. I'd obviously encountered that usage before, but assumed it was a misuse, rather than what is standard. Huh!

 

[Bear of Bad News]

It's still confusing to me - when you posed the question, I had to think about it very hard (and almost chose "5").

 

[Tawnos]

Yeah, that seemed to be the consensus in the PGT. I'd obviously encountered that usage before, but assumed it was a misuse, rather than what is standard. Huh!

You need to approach it from the opposite example to really get the gist of it. A team 0-10 needs to win 10 games to reach a .500 record... thus they are 10 games below .500. If that is true, then a 10-0 team would have to lose 10 games to sink to .500, thus they are 10 games over .500.

Another way of thinking about it is that the phrase isn't about "what could've been in those ten games" but rather "what actually has happened in relation to any further play."

Really, though, if you think it's 5 games over .500, you misunderstand the phrase. I get what you're saying from a statistical point of view, but it's applying the phrase from the wrong end.

 

[NAF]

You need to approach it from the opposite example to really get the gist of it. A team 0-10 needs to win 10 games to reach a .500 record... thus they are 10 games below .500. If that is true, then a 10-0 team would have to lose 10 games to sink to .500, thus they are 10 games over .500.

Another way of thinking about it is that the phrase isn't about "what could've been in those ten games" but rather "what actually has happened in relation to any further play."

Really, though, if you think it's 5 games over .500, you misunderstand the phrase. I get what you're saying from a statistical point of view, but it's applying the phrase from the wrong end.

Yeah, I'm starting to get it. So, how does the phrase get applied when there is no possibility for further play (i.e. at the end of the season)?

If a team ends the year at 47-35, would you say that they were 12 games over .500 on the year?

I just have such a hard time not getting stuck at 82 x .500 = 41 and 41 + 12 = 53

 

[DL44]

I go with 10.

In fact when look thru standings, I don't bother looking at points any more.. i look at how many more wins a team has than reg losses.

i.e. i don't care the canucks are 5-6 pts back of the 4 ahead of them... I'm concerned that they a mere +3 while the 4 teams ahead of them are +9 and +10 in the differential.

They've got to swing 6-7 GAMES on them already to pull even.

 

[Caeldan]

Yeah, I'm starting to get it. So, how does the phrase get applied when there is no possibility for further play (i.e. at the end of the season)?

If a team ends the year at 47-35, would you say that they were 12 games over .500 on the year?

I just have such a hard time not getting stuck at 82 x .500 = 41 and 41 + 12 = 53

Yes.

 

[Tawnos]

Yeah, I'm starting to get it. So, how does the phrase get applied when there is no possibility for further play (i.e. at the end of the season)?

If a team ends the year at 47-35, would you say that they were 12 games over .500 on the year?

I just have such a hard time not getting stuck at 82 x .500 = 41 and 41 + 12 = 53

Think of "further play" as more of a hypothetical in the case of being towards the end of the season. "If they were to play more games, they would need to lose 12 games to sink to .500."

 

[Wizeman*]

x + y = 82

x= y +12

 

[hatterson]

Also remember that if you interpret it as "games better than if they had played .500" you run into half game issues, which is always annoying.

Is a team that's 12-11 a half game above .500? That just sounds odd.

 

[Dooman]

Ya, but what started this was someone who said "in order for The Oilers to get 57 points In the next 38 games, they would need to be 19 games above .500"
Only to find out, that in sports math, he's right.

 

[Tawnos]

Ya, but what started this was someone who said "in order for The Oilers to get 57 points In the next 38 games, they would need to be 19 games above .500"
Only to find out, that in sports math, he's right.

Yeah.. Points minus games played equals position relative to .500. That's the way it's always worked, even where there were ties, provided that you consider Wins vs Regulation losses as your benchmark for .500.

 

[Dooman]

Absolutely wild. I get it, but hate the terminology now that I see how horribly its used. Lol

 

[Dooman]

I think what catches me, is that they are using the wrong term. It should be "10 games to .500". not "ten over"

 

[Tawnos]

I think what catches me, is that they are using the wrong term. It should be "10 games to .500". not "ten over"

Well, it is just an idiom. Idioms aren't required to be semantically accurate.

This is also pretty analogous to +/-, by the way. +/- is a statistic measured in relation to a zero, which we call even. If you take a player on the ice for 45 goals for and 35 goals against, he'd be +10, which represents 10 over even. Replaces "goals for" with "wins", "goals against" with "losses" and "even" with ".500", you have the same statistic. (Please, let's not get into a discussion of the value of +/-... we're just talking about the way the stat works)

 

[Cawz]

I think what catches me, is that they are using the wrong term. It should be "10 games to .500". not "ten over"

Well, there is so much wrong with the term. For one, its not actually "five hundred", its "point five hundred", but should be "point five", since there are so many extra unnecessary significant digits, or point fifty, which works nice for whole percentages. Why isn't the term "fifty", since that would mean your record is 50-50.

That's why I never understood the phrase "batting one thousand". Shouldn't it be batting "one" the actual number, or "one hundred" for 100%?

But this is all a bit off topic. The term .500 is meaningless in hockey anyways due to the 3rd point. A team that is .500 is usually in the bottom 3rd of the league or so. Its not something to aim for.

 

[DyerMaker66*]

Also remember that if you interpret it as "games better than if they had played .500" you run into half game issues, which is always annoying.

Is a team that's 12-11 a half game above .500? That just sounds odd.

No, they're 1 game over .500. If they lose one game they are .500.

 

[Bear of Bad News]

No, they're 1 game over .500. If they lose one game they are .500.

You missed the key part of his post, which was "if you interpret it as".

He was demonstrating a problem with interpreting it in a fashion other than the customary way.

 

[NAF]

I think in the future, I'll just avoid referring to or thinking of actual games won and lost and stick to discussing points. The next time I read something like "in order for the Oilers to get 57 points in the next 38 games, they would need to be 19 games above .500" I'll just internalize that as "they would need to play .750 hockey" or "get 75% of the possible points in the next 38 games".

 

[DyerMaker66*]

You missed the key part of his post, which was "if you interpret it as".

He was demonstrating a problem with interpreting it in a fashion other than the customary way.

I guess, but how do you play .500 with an odd number of games and no ties? Just be aware that when there's an odd number you're always going to be X games above/below .500(assuming no ties).

 

[Bear of Bad News]

I guess, but how do you play .500 with an odd number of games and no ties? Just be aware that when there's an odd number you're always going to be X games above/below .500(assuming no ties).

Well, yes. Assuming no ties and an odd number of games, how would you expect any team to play exactly average (or what's represented as average)?

 

[Tawnos]

Well, there is so much wrong with the term. For one, its not actually "five hundred", its "point five hundred", but should be "point five", since there are so many extra unnecessary significant digits, or point fifty, which works nice for whole percentages. Why isn't the term "fifty", since that would mean your record is 50-50.

That's why I never understood the phrase "batting one thousand". Shouldn't it be batting "one" the actual number, or "one hundred" for 100%?

But this is all a bit off topic. The term .500 is meaningless in hockey anyways due to the 3rd point. A team that is .500 is usually in the bottom 3rd of the league or so. Its not something to aim for.

If you're measurement is 1.000 or 0.500 or 0.385, you're measuring to the thousandth decimal place. 4 significant figures, as we would say in the world of science. That's why 1.000 is batting one thousand. 0.500 is five hundred. It's not written as 5.00x10^1 or 100x10^-3. It's a numerical representation of what a batter or team would do if extrapolated out to having one thousand chances. The math to get that number happens to be very easy... much easier than, say, pro-rating for an 82 or 162 game season.

 

[NAF]

So, say there are two teams. One team finishes the season with a .500 record. The other team has two more wins than the .500 club and yet is four games over .500. Have I got it now?

The only way I've come to grips with this is, as Tawnos suggested, think of the phrase as an idiom, and not to be taken literally. When I say "are you pulling my leg?" I don't actually want to know if you are pulling my leg. I want to know if you're kidding. So, when someone says "number of games over .500" they don't actually mean "number of games greater than half (1/2)". They mean "number of wins minus losses".

So, it's an idiom. Fine. I still think it's an idiom that has come about because most people can't do math. Somewhere in the past, some sportscaster literally wanted to know how many games over .500 his team was and thought he could learn that figure by subtracting losses from wins. Or maybe he was just really stoked that his team had won 10 more games than they had lost and expressed it poorly.

 

[Bear of Bad News]

The only way I've come to grips with this is that the phrase is an idiom, and not to be taken literally. When I say "are you pulling my leg?" I don't actually want to know if you are pulling my leg. I want to know if you're kidding. So, when someone says "number of games over .500" they don't actually mean "number of games greater than half (1/2)". They mean "number of wins minus losses".

No, it's exactly what it means.

Suppose that you are 12-12; you're at 0.500. Then you win four games. Now you're 16-12, winning four games since you were at 0.500. You are now four games above 0.500.