2014 Seattle Mariners name coolness chart

Required reading: Arbitration by Jeff Sullivan at USS Mariner.

A Plus/Minus Glossary

Plus/minus (+/-) = The amount of cumulative goals over the course of a season a club scores with a particular player on the field. For example, should Manchester United score 50 goals over a season with Ryan Giggs on the field while conceding 34, his Plus/minus score would be +16.

Scored/90 (S90) = The amount of goals scored per 90 minutes a player is on the field. This varies slightly from goals scored per game, as often football players don't play entire games. Scored/90 allows us to observe the rate at which a team scores goals while a certain player is on the field.

Using the same example as above, were Ryan Giggs to play every minute of every game (ie. 3420 for the season), his Scored/90 and Goals-per-game rates would be the same at 1.315. However, if Giggs played only 3000 minutes for the year over those 38 matches, his Scored/90 rate rises to 1.5.

Conc/90 (C90) = As for Scored/90, only tracking the rate at which a team concedes while a certain player is on the field. Any of these numbers adjusted for rate allows us to compare players within teams - if Giggs' Conc/90 is 1.0 and Nani's stands at 1.1, we can suggest that United are better off defensively on the wing with Giggs on the left wing.

Goal Difference (GD) = As calculated by leagues for years, Goal Difference (sometimes here you'll see it denoted as Team GD) is the season-long difference between goals scored and goals conceded. Adjusted slightly, it becomes GD/game, or how many goals on average a club scores or concedes than their oppositon per game. You (really should) know how it works.

+/- per 90 (PMP) = Adjusts Plus/Minus for rate, allowing us to judge a player by his compatriots. Using Ryan Giggs again, with a Scored/90 rate of 1.315 and Conc/90 rate of 1.0, his +/- per 90 stands at 0.315.

Impact Rating (IR) = Assesses the difference between a team's performance while a player is on the field, with their overall performance.

Again, using the above example involving Ryan Giggs, if United score 16 goals more than their opponents for the season when he plays, but have a goal difference of +7 for the season, his Impact Rating is his PMP compared to his team's GD/game. For this example, if Giggs played 1500 minutes over 30 games, his IR would rate at 0.324 - or Man U would be 0.324 goals per 90 minutes better than their opponenets when Ryan Giggs was on the pitch.

Graphic: Name quality vs. talent level, Seattle Mariners

click to embiggen

How far we've come (part one of many)

Before the blogosphere, there were spreadsheets.

For me, at least.

The picture below comes from an exploratory dig into the darkened reaches of my computer's hard disk - a saved spreadsheet that documents my leanings at the time towards the All-Time teams for each major Test-playing nation.  And my, how long ago it was!

Now, many of these players would barely trouble the subs' bench while history has chosen to remember the likes of others (coughMatthewHaydencough) more fondly.  But still it stands, a stark reminder of the era in which I - and hopefully we all - used to live.

click to enlarge

PS.  Gut changes without further examination include: cutting Frank Tyson, Peter Pollock and Romesh Kaluwitharana, adding Kumar Sangakkara, MS Dhoni, Virender Sehwag, Graeme Smith, Hashim Amla, Zaheer Khan and Ross Taylor.

Yet more miscellany

Apologies for the lack of recent posts - it's finals week for a hideous quarter of neurophysiology, limbs anatomy and functional skills.  Hence ... a dearth of time for writing.  Hopefully I'm back up and running in a week.

In the meantime, this may provide some more explanation.

Sixteen Is in one post make you seem rather egotistical...

Hi.

For much of the past two-plus years, I've been unemployed.  Hardly revelatory news, I know, but there it is.  This time next week, that status officially changes as I begin graduate school and re-training as a Physical Therapist (or Physiotherapist).  It'll be nearly three years at a world-class school in a completely new education system, a challenge I'm very much looking forward to and think I will enjoy.

Over the existence of Balanced Sports, I've really tried to avoid talking about me.  So why change this now and tell you all that I'm going back to school?  Partly, because it's liable to effect you, my readers.

While I think I'll be able to handle the academic workload and balance my life well enough throughout the next three years, one of the first areas that will need to be streamlined will likely be my writing.  As much as I enjoy it, and it's been - and will continue to be - a productive hobby, over the next three years passing grades are going to be more important than the perils of Pauline Manchester City.

Writing is my a hobby.  Much of what I produce over the next three years will fulfill my continuing work with the Montreal Gazette's Goal Posts blog (and then re-posted here).  Sadly, the result is likely to be a reduction in content based around sports other than football.  I'll continue to comment on whatever sports-based stuff takes my fancy on Twitter - @balanced_sports.

Rather than discarding Balanced Sports, I'm actually hope to use the opportunity to take a fresh approach to composition and use each post as an opportunity to experiment and grow as a writer.  However, I expect a reduced frequency of postings: quality over quantity and all.

Thanks for reading my stuff.  Some of it - I think, anyway - is pretty good.  Some of it, well, at least it tries to be good.  I hope you'll enjoy the next eleven consecutive quarters of reduced portion - but hopefully very rich - content.