100th Post!

After almost 3/4 of a year (with a month and a half layoff) this is finally the 100th post on Kobe, Tell Me How My Stats Taste (some of you who haven't been here for a while, aka the first post, may know it as Shaq's Big Brickhouse). While it's not easy to keep a sports statistics blog as a college student, it's so far been a fun experience. A lot of posts focus on looking forward at what will likely happen in sports, but for the one hundredth we're gonna look back at some of the best so far:

Five Top Innovations

All of the work here is unique, but sometimes even the methods used are K,TMHMST originals. Here's five of them that I'm most proud of:

1. The Rankings. A year and a half ago for Math of Sports class was really where the blog got it's start, and the rankings have shown over this year that they matchup well with the best of the business.

2. Random Chance in Sports. Originally I thought this would show just NFL parity, but it's already developed as a useful tool.

3. Comfortable Margin. 6*n^.5 has been super effective at knowing when to feel safe in basketball games.

4. Self Lineup Runs. This doesn't get as much play right now because it's not baseball season, but it has been a good indicator of batter performance. It also matches up surprisingly closely to OPS.

5. QB ratings. This was a challenge for our Math of Sports class, and a year later I finally did one I'm proud of.

3 Good Predictions

1. Pre-Season CF Predictions. There were a few rough spots, but many guesses turned out successful. Chief among them: the Stanford Cardinal at #13. My Dad made fun of me, but it turned out well.

2. Luckiest Big 10 Teams. Unfortunately my predictions of Michigan State success and Iowa failure turned out all too accurate.

3. True Hoop first round. Going 8 for 8 prompted the start of the blog. We won't talk about the second round.

3 Bad Predictions

1. The Unlikelihood of Sweeps. I was really proud of the math, but as Tyler Dawson pointed out here was an impressively large number of sweeps in the next round.

2. Thanksgiving Predictions. I thought it'd be a great idea to square up with and defeat my dad. Losing by 2 games after going 3-4 was not the plan though.

3. Dangerous Big Game. People at the time agreed that Cal at home would be a challenge, but the route was so bad I apologized to a Cal student I met on the airplane the next day.

5 Best Posts

1. Cubs Futility. Still my favorite post. There was some good math, some good research, and most significantly some interesting results.

2. 89 Games. An anonymous commenter said the article should be picked up by ESPN, and if any post ever could've been a media hit, it would've been this one.

3. Perfect Games. Suggested by Greg Siems, this was both relevant and informative. Still surprising that pitching against just Aramis Ramirez for an entire season should give you 3 perfect games.

4. Random Chance in the NFL. After a weird start to the season this answered my questions, and established a useful tool (used in 89 games too!).

5. Physics of Sports- Jump Balls. Capping off the best blog week of all time, this was straight out of my life. John Haskell still doesn't believe I won the tip.

There's a good look at the first 100 posts. Thanks to all of you who've stopped by to read, whether it's just once or repeatedly. Feedback, comments, and especially suggestions have often led to great posts. Hopefully the next 100 can be as good as the first.