u/fritzperls_of_wisdom

I lost my Boykin buddy this spring.

I’m ready to start looking in hopes of getting another one in the next year.

For those who have gotten a pup the last couple of years…what did you pay?

I have gotten a couple of prices from breeders—granted, higher end breeders than I need as a non-hunter—that kind of shocked me.

I got my boy 12 years ago, and I know that prices can change a lot in that amount of time. So, I just wanted to gauge.

Regular Season (53 G)		Postseason (10 G)
6.6	Runs/Game	9.4
20	Scored 8 or More Runs	8
.280	Batting Avg	.340
.384	OBP	.420
.467	SLG	.600
.851	OPS	1.020
1.2	HR/Game	2.6

And keep in mind, this is a team that has faced nothing but 1 seeds except for 2 games. So, it's not like they have just put up huge numbers on 4 and 3 seeds.

This was an offense that was just average in pretty much every way this season. They started off strong, as 7 of their 8+ run games came in their first 7 games--3 in Arlington and then against some weak competition.

They were low-average in SEC-only stats.

I didn't see much of them but from the little I saw, this wasn't a team that I saw late and thought, "They are starting to get hot." The pitching coming on was something I think you could see, given how young their key arms are. But on offense? They had a few big outbursts in individual games but in the aggregate, their offense was pretty good late but nothing that stood out

The power, in particular, is something that is really surprising.

Credit to the Sooners, though. This has been one hell of an offensive display the last few weeks.

I posted this the last couple of years on Regional Monday and updated it.

This is for Game 7's (i.e., the winner take all game) in regionals going back to 2015.

The assumption is often that the winner's bracket team (i.e., team that started 2-0) still has an advantage here given that this will be their 4^(th) game vs. the loser’s bracket team’s 5^(th). So, is that the case? Does the winners bracket team generally win the Game 7?

I was also interested in how the teams who have to go 4 or 5 games do in Super Regionals.

I have more details below but if you want the TLDR:

• It’s pretty much a 50/50 deal big picture. Out of 58 game 7s (in 160 regionals) the winners bracket team has won 30 times and the losers bracket team has won 28. When you break it down a bit more by seeds....
  • The (theoretically) better teams (i.e., the 1-seeds) have done much better completing the loser’s bracket run by winning Game 7.
  • 2 and 3 seeds much less so….but maybe not as badly as you would expect—particularly considering that they are facing 1-seeds so often in these.
  • So, any advantage in a Game 7 for the team that started 2-0 may be more about seeding (i.e., theoretically who is the better rated team) than anything. If it gets to Game 7, I would probably just bet on whoever you think has the better team.
• Teams that go to a 5^(th) (6-14 against teams that swept regional) game in a regional and even a 4^(th) game (8-16 against teams that swept their regional) do not do well in Super Regionals. But some of this is likely due to the fact that the better teams generally sweep their regional.

More details:

• Out of the 160 regionals, the loser's bracket team has forced a final winner-take-all game 58 times.
• The winner’s bracket team has won this game 30 times vs. the loser’s bracket team winning 28.  So, it is pretty much even.  Diving a little more into this, though
• If we look at seeds for the LOSERS BRACKET teams:
  • 1-Seeds: 18-12
  • 2 Seeds: 5-12 (3-10 vs. winners bracket 1 seeds)
  • 3 Seeds: 5-5 (5-4 vs. winners bracket 1 seeds)
  • 4 Seeds: 0-1 (0-1 vs winners bracket 1 seed)
• And looking at seeds for the WINNERS BRACKET teams:
  • 1 Seed: 15-8
  • 2 Seed: 6-6 (interestingly, every single one of those has been against a 1-seed)
  • 3 Seed: 5-13
  • 4 Seed: 4-1 (3-0 vs 1 seeds coming out of the losers bracket)
• In the winner-take-all game, 1 seeds coming out of the losers bracket have historically done fairly well and are doing a lot of the work in that 28-30 record.
• Considering almost all of the games have come against the host, I’m actually a little surprised 2’s and 3’s have done as well coming out of the losers bracket. 
• Oddly enough 2's and 3's have rarely faced off in a final winner-take-all game--just 3 times....with the winner's bracket 3-seed winning each of these.
• If you compare records for winners bracket and losers bracket for 1's.....pretty similar (given the low sample size). If you combine 2s and 3s (which there isn't much difference between for the most part), it's pretty similar between winners and losers bracket. 4's obviously have done better coming out of the winners bracket....but really small number there.
• To me, it seems like once a Game 7 is forced, the advantage to the Winners Bracket team is mostly gone, and it probably comes down more so to who the better team is (which is USUALLY going to be reflected in seeding). Intuitively, that makes sense to me. Most teams' pitching staffs are likely to be running on fumes whether it is their 4th or 5th game in 4 days.

Another thing I was interested in was how do teams that fight through the loser’s bracket do in Super Regionals that following weekend.  This was a little more interesting, to me....

• Teams that go through the loser’s bracket (i.e., win regional in 5 games) have gone 11-17 in Supers….AND among those 11 wins, 3 of those came against other teams who played 5 regional games and 2 against teams that played 4.  So that puts them at 6-14 against teams that swept their regionals.
• What surprised me more is that the results aren’t much better for teams that played 4 games in a regional (i.e., the team in the winner’s bracket that won the final winner-take-all game), as they are 12-18 in Supers with 2 of those wins coming against other teams that played 4 games and 2 against teams that played 5. So, they have gone 8-16 against teams teams that swept their regional.
• Of course, a lot of this could be due to the better team sweeping their regional. Did not do that but would be interested to see.

Prepare yourself...it's long. But this was fun for me.

I wanted to look at the idea of balance (hitting and pitching/defense) in postseason teams to see if such balance can be a good way of identifying teams more likely to be successful in the postseason.

Simply put, you're likely to confront a lot of different types of games in the postseason. There will be times when your pitching gets hit and you need to score some runs or have the ability to run away from teams to save pitching. There are times when an opposing pitcher will shut your bats down and you need to have pitching to keep you in it. I think LSU was a great example of this last year.

So, will these teams have more success in the postseason? Yeah....this may seem intuitive but plenty of intuitive things are not indicated in the actual numbers. I was also interested in seeing to what extent it might make a difference.

A few things to start.

• Offense has gone up dramatically since 2022. Because of this, a team that averaged 7 runs/game in 2019 is not the same thing as a team that averaged 7 in 2024.
• To account for this, I used standardized numbers (i.e. z-scores) for where that team fell relative to the national average for that particular season. So, a team that has a runs scored value of +1 in 2026 was a standard deviation above this year's mean (which was 6.6).
• I just did the simplest stats: Runs scored and runs allowed.
• This includes 9 previous seasons--going back to 2015 (when the lower seam ball began to be used) and excluding 2021 (schedules so wonky that didn't seem to make sense to compare teams to national averages).
• These stats are all based on BEFORE THE NCAA REGIONAL .
• **Keep in mind: The meaning of the standardized numbers:
  • Positive = Good for runs scored; Negative = Good for runs allowed
  • 0 is the exact average
  • Between -1 and 1 = Normal or "average" range.
  • >1 is significantly above average (i.e., "good" for runs scored),
  • <-1 is below average (i.e., "good" for runs allowed).
  • Beyond 2 or -2 could be considered "elite". Beyond 3 or -3 is pretty much historic (see Georgia Tech's offense this year).
  • "BALANCED" = 1 SD better than average for both runs scored and runs allowed. So, +1 OR ABOVE FOR RUNS SCORED AND -1 OR BELOW FOR RUNS ALLOWED. THIS WILL BE REPRESENTED BY A GRAY AREA IN THE IMAGES.
  • Just for perspective, +1 SD for runs scored and -1 SD for runs allowed equates roughly to top 38-40 in national rankings.

Disclaimer: If I sound like I am definitively concluding or predicting something from this, I am more so walking out potential conclusions and got tired of using "maybe" or "based on this". Things like matchups, SOS, game-by game results and scores, etc. would also be good to include but I don't have that kind of time.

CWS Teams Since 2025

https://preview.redd.it/fo4i84iwap3h1.png?width=771&format=png&auto=webp&s=7dabe957d4f34a2290c92b390b47f289a4b79242

29 of the 72 Omaha teams fall in that "balanced category" in gray and many others right on the cusp. There have been only 91 teams who made the tournament who meet that "balanced" criteria, so 29/91 (32%) is a huge percentage when we are talking about the final 8.

1 seeds specifically: 26 out of 49 (53%) balanced 1 seeds in the tournament made it to Omaha vs. 22 out of 95 (23%) 1 seeds who were not balanced. So, among 1 seeds, that balance still seems to be important.

1 out of 8 4-seeds who met that "balanced" criteria went to Omaha (Oral Roberts in 2023). Last year's Murray State was right on that line but just below 1.0 for runs scored. Those are the only 2 4-seeds to make the CWS.

With 2's and 3's, the "balanced" criteria does not seem to predict much for whatever reason...though it's a pretty small sample. 2/22 "balanced" 2's have made Omaha (including Coastal, who won the title) and 0/12 3's.. Worth noting that both Ole Miss in 22 (title) and Michigan in 19 (runner-up) were approaching "balanced" with Michigan basically right on the line.

National Champions: Of the 9 title winners during this span, 5 fell into that balanced quadrant....1 was right on the line (LSU last year) and another (Ole Miss) was approaching it.

As you can probably see from the plot, there is a lot more "average" in runs scored than runs allowed. For the most part in the postseason, most everyone pitches it at a high-average or good level statistically.

Who Are the Balanced Teams This Year to Watch For?

https://preview.redd.it/261u7pk3up3h1.png?width=1696&format=png&auto=webp&s=234474f06eebe6d5f5726ed1d5d7bedf36ff6b2e

Since there were only 7 teams, I did stretch it out to include teams that are right on that cusp of 1 standard deviation difference (which brought A&M and Yale into the fold.

Outside of Yale, I don't think there are any surprises here. All the others are 1-seeds or a really good 2.

By the way, Georgia Tech's offense is about 3.8 standard deviations above the norm.....which is insane...especially for an ACC team. That is the second highest for a regional team in this time frame behind Tennessee Tech in 2018....which was at 4.7 standard deviations (that squad came a game away from Omaha).

Let's Just Look at Regionals Now....

"Who are the1 seeds likely to get picked off?"--a question we all love to ask this time of year.

Prior Years:

LEFT: 1 SEEDS THAT WON REGIONAL.....RIGHT: 1 SEEDS ELIMINATED IN REGIONAL

I wanted to put these side to side because it makes the story pretty clear

On the left (1 seeds that won regional), a lot more in or toward that "balanced" box than on the right (1 seeds eliminated in regional). So, 1 seeds are much more likely to win their regional if they are balanced.

Among 1 seeds, 38/49 (77.5%) in that balanced category have won their regional. This is compared to 51/95 (53.7%).

Hitting is the difference. No significant difference in pitching between 1 seeds that win vs. lose. But there is with hitting (mean of 1.19 SD above the mean vs. 0.87 SD above the mean). In other words, the vast majority of 1 seeds are good at preventing runs. Not as many are good at scoring runs...and the any difference in success for 1 seeds seems to be there.

Fun Challenge Here: I only have 2 teams who have fallen into the Elite-Elite category (+2 runs scored; -2 runs allowed). Can you name those 2 teams?

So, which 1 seeds this year may be more vulnerable, if we follow this out??

2026 Regional Hosts

Of course, none of this accounts for matchups or opponents.

Statistically, Alabama and Kansas would probably be the biggest ducks this year. You could put USM with them....but I think they are a little more complicated. More on them and Auburn below.

Then, there's the cluster of FSU, Florida, Oregon, and West Virginia.

Nebraska is approaching the sweet spot, but not quite on the line like A&M.

Auburn is comfortably in the "elite" pitching (2 SD above average) with average offense category. Not a lot of teams fall in this category, so very small sample size. Most of these teams (8/14) won their regional. 4/14 made it to Omaha (which is pretty good). Among 1 seeds, 7/9 won their regional and 3/9 made it to Omaha. Coastal was one of these teams last year. Other recent ones would include Arkansas 2024 (lost in regional) and USM in 2022 (lost in Super).

This year's USM is approaching that category, too--pretty much on the line. The offense is just....so very, very average that I would see them as a lot more vulnerable than Auburn.

Of course, you would still expect even most of the not balanced 1's (even if actually more vulnerable) to advance....and 1 or 2 of the "balanced" 1s to fall. But history suggests, this might be a helpful predictor.

Among 2 and 3 seeds, 6/34 (17.6) "balanced" 2s and 3s have won their regional...compared to 44/254 (17.3%) who are not balanced.....so again, this has seemed to mean less for 2 and 3 seeds for whatever reason.

Been tracking this for a while and just thought it would be a fun exercise. Hope it was interesting. Will probably try to look at earlier years eventually and see if anything is dramatically different and might be good to add in.