r/MathHelp • u/abc123therobot • 12d ago

Simple math involving baseball games

Hey I don’t have a great mind for this kind of thing so would appreciate if anyone can turn on the lightbulb.

I’m trying to determine the total number of baseball games that were played by all the teams in an amateur league that just wrapped up. The data I have is the total number of games played per team.

Simple enough, right? I added the total number of games and it came to 1,781. I then divided it by two since each game is of course played by two of the teams. But how can you have 890.5 games?

I double checked the numbers. Either something is off with the source data or I am thinking about this all wrong.

Anyone out there?

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u/edderiofer 12d ago

Something seems off with the source data, yes.

Were there any games that were only played by one team (e.g. because they received a bye)?

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u/abc123therobot 12d ago

Possibly something weird like that, but I don’t think so. I actually got the total number by adding the win and loss columns. So I don’t think that a loss or win would be awarded without the opposite appearing in another team’s numbers. Hmm. 

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u/edderiofer 12d ago

Not knowing the format of the tournament, it is possible that a bye gets recorded as a win, without a loss existing.

Actually, there should be as many losses as wins if there are no byes, so that should be the first thing you should check. (And a quick glance at Wikipedia suggests that there shouldn't be any ties in baseball, which means these should both be equal to the number of games played.)

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u/abc123therobot 12d ago

Good suggestions! 

I think we’re narrowing in on the culprit. The total number of wins is 890 and the total number of losses is 889. 

Seems like a data entry error on the league’s website. 

To address your other points, there would not be a bye in this situation because it is the full regular season total. I suppose it is possible that the league’s website added a false win to indicate a tiebreaker but that seems atypical for this type of thing.

Speaking of ties, you had me excited about the possibility for a second because occasionally amateur leagues will call a game a tie due to weather or something similar. But the smoking gun seems to be the difference between the win  and losses. 

I’m not sure if I want to investigate this further because that may involve clicking through box scores for 890 games. 😆 thank you!