A warning on using Baseball Prospectus' Postseason Odds

[Post-Oak]

As usual, BP is using a pseudo-scientific approach which will cost gamblers money if they blindly follow these "projections".

They run a Monte Carlo simulation of the rest of the season (playing it out 1 million times), but they count ties as 0.5 of a championship for each team.

This is why their projections on the Tigers have been way too pessimistic for a while now. In actual fact, if the Tigers and Twins finish with the same record, the Tigers will be named AL Central Champions.

When both teams are making the playoffs anyway, the heads up record is the tie-breaker. With only a handful of games left, this is an important consideration. To ignore it is an absolute joke.

This also has an effect on the NL West race. For example, if the Padres and Dodgers finished with an identical record, and that record is good enough for the Wild Card (in other words the Phillies have a worse record), then SD will be the NL West Champs.

Any Monte Carlo simulation which does not take this into account is an absolute joke.

I keep seeing sports columnists, as well as posters on this board, refer to BP's flawed projections, so I thought I should point this out.

Edited to add: And of course they are not simulating the extra game which would have to be played when teams tie for
1. the Wild Card
2. the Division, where both teams are not already assured of making the playoffs