Science has proven that the Guardians can win the WS this year

Does the "Best" Team Win the World Series?

November 9, 2012 Freakonomics

By Dave Berri

To answer this question, we need to specify what it means to be the "best" baseball team. And here are three ways we can define "best":

1. Winning percentage: This may seem like the most obvious definition of "best." Across a 162 game season the team that wins the most could be thought of as the very "best" team.
Then again, we could consider…

2. Pythagorean Win-Loss: Baseball-Reference.com defines this as the expected win-loss record based on the number of runs scored and allowed by the team.

3. Simple Rating System: Baseball-Reference.com defines this as the number of runs per game they are better (or worse) than the average team (average ML team for years with inter-league play and just their league for other years). The specific formula – which takes into account strength of schedule – is as follows: SRS = Run Differential (R_diff) + Strength of Schedule (SOS)

Two NBA playoff teams from the last decade are drawn at random and play one another in a "best-of-7" series – what is the probability that the better team wins out?

Turns out, it’s about 80%. In other words, the best NBA team advances, on average, in roughly four of five series.

That’s a pretty high number – how does it compare to other sports?

Given what we’ve learned in previous posts, it’s no shock to find out that both the NHL and MLB hover just above 60% in "best-of-7" formats, which is notably lower. However, let’s switch that question just a bit:

How long would postseason series need to be in NFL, MLB and NHL to match the NBA’s "better team advances" rate of 80%?

Here’s what Ben, Greg, and I found.

In the NFL, a "best-of-11" series is needed to match the NBA’s better team advances rate.

In the NHL, a "best-of-51" series is needed to match the NBA’s better team advances rate.

And in MLB, an astounding "best-of-75" series is needed to match the NBA’s better team advances rate.

Thus, irrespective of the higher talent levels of some of the teams we will be facing and because of the out-sized role luck plays in the outcome of games and therefore series, we have a decent chance of winning it all this year. We have had the best team in some playoff series we lost. Maybe the actuarial tables owe us one this year.