Wednesday 2 April 2014

Baseball Hotbeds

In case this Nate Silver article hasn't got much circulation, I thought I'd post a link to it.

I like the way he has related Google searches to the size of television markets. This strikes me as one of the best methods people who have no money to pay for surveys have available to identify where the interest in baseball might be considered weak or strong. The results it gives largely meet my expectations. The Tigers are kind of average. The Cardinals and Reds are strong. The Diamondbacks and Marlins are weak. To me the anomalous results are the poor outcome for the Angels and the strong showing by the Pirates. Silver noted that there might be some kind of problem with the way the data is accumulated for the Angels. Pittsburgh, however, has always seemed so much a Steelers' town, and has done so badly until very recently, that its appearance ahead of the Reds, Tigers and Indians looks incredible.

Sad to say, the Nationals rank pretty poorly, behind even the Tampa Bay Rays and the Toronto Blue Jays.

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