Here come the days without live MLB games. The season is almost over, and it is time to recap and discuss the highest BWRI scores of the season. The most exciting games.
Entering 2024 I migrated the BWRI project from R and Retrosheet to Python and Savant. That allows me to get BWRI scores almost live.
The most exciting game of the season according to BWRI it’s Padres at Pirates in August the 7th.
If you watch at the score, doesn’t seem to be that exciting, even though it’s the game with the most Win Probability Added. From 7th to 9th just one run that ties the game at the top of the 9th. San Diego scores three on the top of the 10th, and Pittsburgh’s rally in the bottom of the 10th falls short for just one run.
But sometimes it’s not the runs, it’s the traffic on the bases: in the top of the 8th, Pittsburgh filled 1st and 3rd with no outs, but couldn’t cash any runs. Bottom of the 8th 1st and 2nd with just one out, no runs. Bottom of the 9th based loaded with one out, but Pittsburgh couldn’t put it on the books. And finally, bottom of the 10th, with based loaded, a wild pitch gives Pittsburgh a run, and at this point, the Pirates have a 75% chance of winning the game.
So the game was really pure drama and really enjoyable, even though most of this scoring positions didn’t end up becoming runs. The graph speaks for itself. Look at those spikes, the gray area is the total added win probability.
A score of 87.2, the 11th highest score overall since 2016.
The second-highest score of the season is Blake Snell’s no-hitter. As I always mention, BWRI pays attention to no-hitter situations and ranks high those games, even though they usually lack of drama. The game rates that high also because there were 25 K in total, 11 from Snell, but also 14 from the Reds pitching crew. That made some difference. A score of 85.8
The third-highest score it’s a classic rivalry game: Yankees-Red Sox, July 26th. After a couple of home runs during the top of the 7th, Yankees took the lead, 7-4, opening a gap in a game that already had scattered runs and ups and downs until then. Red Sox scored two in the 7th and three in the 8th to rally and take the game.
It’s interesting to mention that the game is not even rated in the top 10 with the most added WPA for the season, but benefits from basically the most rivalry points a game can have, and also the score gets an extra push from a 4 stars outfield defensive play.
Here you have the 4 stars defensive play of the game, 50% catch probability according to Statcast. Does it deserve the 4 stars? I don’t know, but after paying attention to some of those 4 and 5 stars plays, some of them are not quite spectacular. Maybe the next year I will have to change how that factor weights on the final score, maybe smooth it with an average of all the defensive plays of the game would be better.
Postseason
And what about the postseason? As you could predict, the most exciting game of the postseason had the Mets involved, but not in a win! It turned out to be the second game of the Division Series against the Phillies. Quite a rollercoaster.
Mets were on top during most of the game, but back to back homers from Castellanos and Harper in the 6th tied the game. Nimmo scored in the 7th, and Philly scored three in the 8th. The game seemed to be finished at that point, but Vientos homered in the 9th, what made think of another impossible Mets win. Finally, Philly walked it off in the bottom of the 9th. Fantastic game, especially because the Mets took the two games after that 😉
Another interesting thing about the postseason is that the second most interesting game according to BWRI is Game 4 of ALDS between Guardians and Yankees. You might think the third was better, and the truth is that it gets slightly more added WPA than the fourth, but BWRI likes how the pitchers were more dominant in the fourth with 24 K’s in total.
The most exciting postseason game since 2016 keeps being Game 4 of 2020 World Series, remember that crazy ending? Arozarena sliding slowly at home after that messy play, bottom of the 9th, two outs. That came after a set of back and forth late innings. Look at that graph:
Finally, have in mind that BWRI scores grade from 0 to 100, but are not a percentile score. When I finished the math, I realized the distribution was very asymmetric, with most of the games having scores between 20 and 40, and very few of the achieving scores over 80. So I decided to apply a power 0.5 to the series, what makes the distribution more centered and increases the scores of the most exciting games.
Even though, in 9 seasons just 4 games achieved and score over 90, so have in mind that scores over 70 are rare, and even if you see a score over 60 you might be in front of a quite interesting game, maybe the most exciting in a common baseball week.
You can check every score on rewatchbaseballindex.com. Enjoy the offseason!