04-16-2020, 09:03 PM
(This post was last modified: 04-16-2020, 09:04 PM by LordMacharius.)
1.5x Draft Media
Yesterday, I posted an article analyzing the draft through a lens of gritty football analysis and my own accumulated sim league knowledge. However, I realized that that was not objective enough and needed to be substantiated by numbers. I racked my brain to think about what I could do to truly measure which team had a more valuable expansion class. And then I figured it out.
We are moving into an age of remarkable data analytics. With things like StatCast powered by Amazon Web Services, we are able to get incredible insights into the way football is played. We are quickly being able to determine aspects of the game that enthralls us every Sunday/every Monday, Wednesday and Friday that were unimaginable just weeks ago.
However, those wonders of the game have not made themselves into the scouting reports and mock drafts and media articles that I’ve seen. No one’s been talking about the statistics over the player, the function over form, the crunch over the fluff!
With that in mind, and inspired by the upcoming expansion draft and all of the articles that have come out of that, I have decided to put together a list of all the top players in this, the season 20 expansion draft.
However, as linguistics are an incredibly important yet undervalued aspect of baseball, I’m going to focus on the names of each player, and the names alone. Each of this year’s prospects will be ranked based on name and name alone.
I will be using Scrabble scoring, to determine the value of each player, assigning each letter in their name a point value based on rarity. This does mean players will have a bonus based on longer names, but I’ll make sure to rank on points per letter as well. Additionally, I will be assigning bonus points if the names add up to something or spell out a phrase or something like that (within reason).
We will start with a team by team analysis, and then transition to a macro-level positional analysis. This will all make sense quickly and will be incredibly self explanatory as I continue, so let’s just jump into it! I will start with the Honolulu Hahalua — the format will be the following:
Player, Position: Total Points (Points per Letter)
Honolulu Hahalua Selections
Mack Arianlacher, LB: 28 (1.87)
Jed Podolak, WR: 25 (2.5)
Jayson Kearse, DE: 26 (2.17)
Jacoby Clay, WR: 29 (2.9)
Victor Moreno, CB: 19 (1.58)
Ruff Ruff, RB: 20 (2.5)
Venus Powers, K/P: 19 (1.73)
Emondov Emoji, CB: 27 (2.25)
Jaylen Storm, LB: 23 (2.1)
Joseph Wozniak, S: 41 (3.15)
James Bishop, WR: 27 (2.45)
Sandip Bakshi, LB: 24 (2)
This isn’t even close — the Hahalua’s best pick is, obviously, the safety Joseph Wozniak. With a whopping 41 points, his name is incredible and the only player selected by the Hahalua that crosses not just the 40 point barrier but also the 30 point barrier. Wozniak also racks up an insanely high points per letter, clocking in at 3.15. As a user, however, Wozniak may not be in the best position to take advantage of his fantastic and high-scoring name. Unfortunately, he has been inactive since November of 2019. A stand-out on the opposite side of the spectrum Venus Powers is a max earning kicker that has a pitiful 19 points for their entire name. With a meagre 1.73 points per letter, Venus Powers’ pretty cool sounding name is actually, statistically, a bad play on the scrabble board. Powers’ is a very active user, and the name Venus Powers is very cool, but statistically they won’t be getting a lot of usage However, even with that terrible statistical showing CB Victor Moreno actually is as bad a play and slightly less efficient, with also 19 points but an awful 1.58 points per letter. Outside of those two players, the only player with an efficiency rating less than 2 is my own player, Mack Arianlacher. Arianlacher has a really inefficient name, because he actually has a total score that is the third HIGHEST on the team (and the third worst efficiency rating). Its because he has 3 As in his name. Gotta get those As down, I should’ve considered this before I made my character. Back to the top tier players, Jacoby Clay is actually a lowkey baller when it comes to his name value. 10 letters, 29 points, 2.9 points per letter is close to both 30 and 3, two very high scoring values in Total Points and Efficiency. That is good for the second highest in both values for Hahalua. His user is a bit of a gamble so it still remains to be seen whether or not he will be able to make the most out of his great and efficient name, as I discussed in my earlier analysis of the draft. However, I do have faith and he’ll be a really solid addition to the total score of the Hahalua and the average efficiency. Speaking of, the composite data is as follows. Right now, there is very little context for this data but after the next section we will compare.
Total Score: 308
Average Efficiency: 2.27
Sarasota Sailfish
Dexter Banks II, WR: 27 (2.08)
Fabricio Baldari, DE: 25 (1.67)
Steco Ocewilder, DE: 22 (1.57)
Jordan Andrews, CB: 25 (1.92)
Laszlo Forty-Two, WR: 32 (2.29)
Beat, S: 6 (1.5)
Lucas Knight, CB: 21 (1.91)
Mike Franchet, DE: 26 (1.86)
Chase Jensen, S: 23 (2.1)
Freezer Riposte, DT: 28 (2)
Johnny Blaze, TE: 35 (3.18)
Diego Espinosa, K/P: 17 (1.31)
I will be analyzing this group in a vacuum as well — the composite analysis will follow. Let’s start, again, with the best player on the team: Johnny Blaze. Blaze clocks in with a really great 35 total score and an astounding efficiency (points per word) rating of 3.18. Blaze is an active user even if he doesn’t update a ton, so he really will make the most of his name (despite the fact that he’s only got two or three seasons left before he's auto-retired). Unlike the Hahalua, the Sailfish have another 30+ total point player in WR Laszlo Forty-Two. However, Laszlo does not have nearly the same efficiency as Blaze, clocking in at an impressive but not record-breaking 2.29 efficiency. On the other end of the spectrum is K/P Diego Espinosa, who’s name belies a measly 17 on the Scrabble Index. His name is also an abysmal 1.31 efficiency rating, which ranks the lowest on his team. By both metrics, this name is the lowest of the draft class. Many of the players in this Sailfish expansion draft class, however, have longer names but lower scores. This means that their efficiencies are overwhelmingly skewed to 2 or below — Freezer Riposte, Fabricio Baldari, Steco Ocewilder, Jordan Andrews, Lucas Knight, and Mike Franchet all fit the archetype of the player that ranks in the 20s in total points but does not cross the 2 points per letter threshold. Sarasota really stocked up on these guys, which will probably lead to an inflated total points value for the class and a deflated average efficiency. But oh wait — I forgot about the biggest outlier to them all. Safety Beat has a point value of… 6. 6. His name is 4 letters, one word. He can get his name out quickly, but ease of saying is of no value to the Scrabble Index and the scrabble-o-metric perspective. That’s going to hurt when we have to tally up the scores.
Total Score: 287
Average Efficiency: 2.03
Composite Analysis
Now it’s time to compare each draft class to each other in a Scrabble Index in a section I’d like to call the Scrabbledome. Let’s pair the top earners off: Johnny Blaze vs Joseph Wozniak. Wozniak is the heavy-weight of both draft classes — his 41 total points set a record for the class and destroy Blaze’s 35. However, Blaze is far more efficient in point accumulation, leading to Blaze’s 3.18 efficiency which is 0.03 points better than Wozniak’s 3.15. This matchup is a wash. Let’s now pair off the two worst scrabble earners — Venus Powers vs Beat. This feels unfair, like a 12 year old facing off with a 5 year old, but Venus does win on both counts. Venus’ total points are 13 greater than Beat’s 6, and their efficiency is 0.21 points better than Beat’s. This one clearly goes to the Hahalua. Finally, lets discuss both classes on a macro level. Hahalua is the clear winner in the Scrabbledome — with a total score 21 points higher than the Sailfish’s draft class and an average efficiency nearly 0.24 points higher. The Scrabble index has decided: the Hahalua are the better team!
Obviously, this whole analysis comes from a humorous angle and anything I write about a player is mostly a joke. Hopefully people enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing this and the jokes associated with it, but even if you didn’t enjoy reading it… I got paid for writing and you didn’t get paid for reading it ;P.
Yesterday, I posted an article analyzing the draft through a lens of gritty football analysis and my own accumulated sim league knowledge. However, I realized that that was not objective enough and needed to be substantiated by numbers. I racked my brain to think about what I could do to truly measure which team had a more valuable expansion class. And then I figured it out.
We are moving into an age of remarkable data analytics. With things like StatCast powered by Amazon Web Services, we are able to get incredible insights into the way football is played. We are quickly being able to determine aspects of the game that enthralls us every Sunday/every Monday, Wednesday and Friday that were unimaginable just weeks ago.
However, those wonders of the game have not made themselves into the scouting reports and mock drafts and media articles that I’ve seen. No one’s been talking about the statistics over the player, the function over form, the crunch over the fluff!
With that in mind, and inspired by the upcoming expansion draft and all of the articles that have come out of that, I have decided to put together a list of all the top players in this, the season 20 expansion draft.
However, as linguistics are an incredibly important yet undervalued aspect of baseball, I’m going to focus on the names of each player, and the names alone. Each of this year’s prospects will be ranked based on name and name alone.
I will be using Scrabble scoring, to determine the value of each player, assigning each letter in their name a point value based on rarity. This does mean players will have a bonus based on longer names, but I’ll make sure to rank on points per letter as well. Additionally, I will be assigning bonus points if the names add up to something or spell out a phrase or something like that (within reason).
We will start with a team by team analysis, and then transition to a macro-level positional analysis. This will all make sense quickly and will be incredibly self explanatory as I continue, so let’s just jump into it! I will start with the Honolulu Hahalua — the format will be the following:
Player, Position: Total Points (Points per Letter)
Honolulu Hahalua Selections
Mack Arianlacher, LB: 28 (1.87)
Jed Podolak, WR: 25 (2.5)
Jayson Kearse, DE: 26 (2.17)
Jacoby Clay, WR: 29 (2.9)
Victor Moreno, CB: 19 (1.58)
Ruff Ruff, RB: 20 (2.5)
Venus Powers, K/P: 19 (1.73)
Emondov Emoji, CB: 27 (2.25)
Jaylen Storm, LB: 23 (2.1)
Joseph Wozniak, S: 41 (3.15)
James Bishop, WR: 27 (2.45)
Sandip Bakshi, LB: 24 (2)
This isn’t even close — the Hahalua’s best pick is, obviously, the safety Joseph Wozniak. With a whopping 41 points, his name is incredible and the only player selected by the Hahalua that crosses not just the 40 point barrier but also the 30 point barrier. Wozniak also racks up an insanely high points per letter, clocking in at 3.15. As a user, however, Wozniak may not be in the best position to take advantage of his fantastic and high-scoring name. Unfortunately, he has been inactive since November of 2019. A stand-out on the opposite side of the spectrum Venus Powers is a max earning kicker that has a pitiful 19 points for their entire name. With a meagre 1.73 points per letter, Venus Powers’ pretty cool sounding name is actually, statistically, a bad play on the scrabble board. Powers’ is a very active user, and the name Venus Powers is very cool, but statistically they won’t be getting a lot of usage However, even with that terrible statistical showing CB Victor Moreno actually is as bad a play and slightly less efficient, with also 19 points but an awful 1.58 points per letter. Outside of those two players, the only player with an efficiency rating less than 2 is my own player, Mack Arianlacher. Arianlacher has a really inefficient name, because he actually has a total score that is the third HIGHEST on the team (and the third worst efficiency rating). Its because he has 3 As in his name. Gotta get those As down, I should’ve considered this before I made my character. Back to the top tier players, Jacoby Clay is actually a lowkey baller when it comes to his name value. 10 letters, 29 points, 2.9 points per letter is close to both 30 and 3, two very high scoring values in Total Points and Efficiency. That is good for the second highest in both values for Hahalua. His user is a bit of a gamble so it still remains to be seen whether or not he will be able to make the most out of his great and efficient name, as I discussed in my earlier analysis of the draft. However, I do have faith and he’ll be a really solid addition to the total score of the Hahalua and the average efficiency. Speaking of, the composite data is as follows. Right now, there is very little context for this data but after the next section we will compare.
Total Score: 308
Average Efficiency: 2.27
Sarasota Sailfish
Dexter Banks II, WR: 27 (2.08)
Fabricio Baldari, DE: 25 (1.67)
Steco Ocewilder, DE: 22 (1.57)
Jordan Andrews, CB: 25 (1.92)
Laszlo Forty-Two, WR: 32 (2.29)
Beat, S: 6 (1.5)
Lucas Knight, CB: 21 (1.91)
Mike Franchet, DE: 26 (1.86)
Chase Jensen, S: 23 (2.1)
Freezer Riposte, DT: 28 (2)
Johnny Blaze, TE: 35 (3.18)
Diego Espinosa, K/P: 17 (1.31)
I will be analyzing this group in a vacuum as well — the composite analysis will follow. Let’s start, again, with the best player on the team: Johnny Blaze. Blaze clocks in with a really great 35 total score and an astounding efficiency (points per word) rating of 3.18. Blaze is an active user even if he doesn’t update a ton, so he really will make the most of his name (despite the fact that he’s only got two or three seasons left before he's auto-retired). Unlike the Hahalua, the Sailfish have another 30+ total point player in WR Laszlo Forty-Two. However, Laszlo does not have nearly the same efficiency as Blaze, clocking in at an impressive but not record-breaking 2.29 efficiency. On the other end of the spectrum is K/P Diego Espinosa, who’s name belies a measly 17 on the Scrabble Index. His name is also an abysmal 1.31 efficiency rating, which ranks the lowest on his team. By both metrics, this name is the lowest of the draft class. Many of the players in this Sailfish expansion draft class, however, have longer names but lower scores. This means that their efficiencies are overwhelmingly skewed to 2 or below — Freezer Riposte, Fabricio Baldari, Steco Ocewilder, Jordan Andrews, Lucas Knight, and Mike Franchet all fit the archetype of the player that ranks in the 20s in total points but does not cross the 2 points per letter threshold. Sarasota really stocked up on these guys, which will probably lead to an inflated total points value for the class and a deflated average efficiency. But oh wait — I forgot about the biggest outlier to them all. Safety Beat has a point value of… 6. 6. His name is 4 letters, one word. He can get his name out quickly, but ease of saying is of no value to the Scrabble Index and the scrabble-o-metric perspective. That’s going to hurt when we have to tally up the scores.
Total Score: 287
Average Efficiency: 2.03
Composite Analysis
Now it’s time to compare each draft class to each other in a Scrabble Index in a section I’d like to call the Scrabbledome. Let’s pair the top earners off: Johnny Blaze vs Joseph Wozniak. Wozniak is the heavy-weight of both draft classes — his 41 total points set a record for the class and destroy Blaze’s 35. However, Blaze is far more efficient in point accumulation, leading to Blaze’s 3.18 efficiency which is 0.03 points better than Wozniak’s 3.15. This matchup is a wash. Let’s now pair off the two worst scrabble earners — Venus Powers vs Beat. This feels unfair, like a 12 year old facing off with a 5 year old, but Venus does win on both counts. Venus’ total points are 13 greater than Beat’s 6, and their efficiency is 0.21 points better than Beat’s. This one clearly goes to the Hahalua. Finally, lets discuss both classes on a macro level. Hahalua is the clear winner in the Scrabbledome — with a total score 21 points higher than the Sailfish’s draft class and an average efficiency nearly 0.24 points higher. The Scrabble index has decided: the Hahalua are the better team!
Obviously, this whole analysis comes from a humorous angle and anything I write about a player is mostly a joke. Hopefully people enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing this and the jokes associated with it, but even if you didn’t enjoy reading it… I got paid for writing and you didn’t get paid for reading it ;P.
![[Image: vTEB08x.png]](https://i.imgur.com/vTEB08x.png)
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![[Image: jZiqO11.png]](https://i.imgur.com/jZiqO11.png)
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