2016 NCAA Baseball Regional Projections (April 26th)

The Cougar staff’s on base % and slugging % allowed seem to play up a bit more than Fullerton’s because the Cougars have a bit softer schedule. But they have a case for being the top staff right now too.

Given that obp is about 58% of offense and slg is about 42%, and in reference to a team’s obp and slg amidst all teams’ obp and slg, it’s possible to put standard indexes on how well a team prevents and produces runs. The average of the two indexes is an index of how well the team plays.

Fullerton’s offense is about 0.54 standard deviations below average in obp and slg. That’s works out to be the 29th percentile. Ouch. But there are 87 theoretically worse offenses.

Their defense index is 2.695 standard deviations above average, meaning they allow opponents 2.7 deviations below average offense. That’s the 99.7th percentile. There is only one team expected to be found at this distance from the mean.

When defense and offense are averaged, Fullerton is observed to play at 1.07 stand deviations above average which is the 85.9th percentile. There are 295 teams, so Fullerton is the 42nd ranked team, since 295*(1-0.859)= 41.65. Suppose a rational correction of every team’s index due to strength of schedule, in this way Fullerton is plausibly ranked near 22.

But if they lose any of the remaining series, then their goose is cooked.