Dashdebater: Let me give you and some of the "randomers" some things that I feel may be inconsistant with your assesment, and your opinion on these would be greatly appreciated.  Let me just add that these are merely observations. The propensity for rookie pitchers as a collective unit (not as an individual) to get "somewhat" better as a season progresses (shouldn't happen with random generation). Certain 25 plus homerun hitters (an observation only) more consistantly falling withen ten homeruns  plus or minus of their projections. Schmidt 1986 very consistant, Larry Sheets 1987 consistant Reyes 2006 (he could hit 4 or 30).  Sosa (I went half an OL and he hit just one when his stats said over 35 (performance history numbers). Just imagine a .300 hitter going 4 for 300 or 20 for 300 for that matter instead of 90 for 300, (extraordiarily rare ) .(probability states that the odds on an event happining 1 out of 300 times when it should occur 20 in 300 times is in the thousands)  Bonds, Morgan same thing. Surely you've noticed some players to be more consistant at anything for that matter. That's what I mean about the Standard deviations being high. Lastly, why are some players chosen consistantly more often than others Joss, Roberts, HoJo, Segui, M Brown.  If people believed that each and every players stats would simply "randomly play out". Error in assigned cost?, No because you don't doubt the Simgods remember.

Ok, here is a prime example of whether or not to dump a player.  I have 85 Wade Boggs in an $80 mil pick your own WAA AAA. Now mind you, 85 Boggs has a performance history of .366 avg. 436 obp. and a .457 slg. pct.  However, for my team, halfway through the season, even though he plays half of his games at Palace of the fans (an extreme hitter's park), after 372 ABs, he's hitting only .255 with a .316 obp and a .309 slg pct.  Now, are you telling me that his performance is just plain "randomness" and bad luck......for an entire half of the season.  If so, then that's bull#$%* because he should no doubt be dumped.  The only thing that's keeping him on team is that I'm in first place and the fact that he was a AAA pick.

Posted by llamanunts on 6/6/2011 3:07:00 PM (view original):
This is all senseless.

You program a game which uses random number generators to decide outcomes.  Random number sequences include streaks.

Why on earth would you then program streaks in?  It's already there.  Anything you toss on top of that is just more code that can screw things up.

Please understand: Even if you wanted to make sure there are streaks, you don't have to do anything.  They're already there.  It's just extra pointless work.

This.

Posted by crazystengel on 6/6/2011 10:25:00 AM (view original):
Newest conspiracy theory: WIS "boosts" and "poisons" Sparky too!  Ever notice that when Sparky manages your team like an idiot for half a season, he'll usually continue to manage like an idiot for the rest of the season?!?!

lol

I'm glad we had the once a year conspiracy theory thread. Entertaining as always. Thanks to all who participated!

I have this cool "gift" of being able to look at situations from an "overview" and see things others don't seem to be able to. One of the things that stands out to me is the types of people on the two sides. The people who are more clever/better at math and understanding numbers and probability are all on the same side. It seems to me that if there was something going on outside of pure randomness, that the more clever/better at math group would actually be the ones to have discovered this and support it. Not the less clever (honestly no offense)/ less good at math group who use emotions and small sample size (that they think is actually large) to justify their theory.
I mean really. When the nerdy number crunchers who are all independent thinkers (happy 4th of July) having no reason to declare anything other than exactly what they believe say "We've looked at the numbers and they support randomness" then its probably accurate (within a 95% confidence level  )