[blogguy]

Thanks IK...

It's amazing how vulnerable the strikeout props have been to regular old math and logic. It's got to be the most consistent thing I've seen in sports in years. It's just not brain surgery to ask the high strikeout pitchers to have success against the high strikeout teams. Put them in high strikeout environments...and you're even in better shape.

I guess I'll stop talking about it. We're only getting 6-8 reads before the games start...and nobody's sent me PM's asking for details about what goes into the convergences. If you've been playing around with them on your own...you know these elements already. If it's not your cup of tea...two weeks of watching things roll like this probably isn't going to change your mind.

Here's how the numbers went on the final night I'll post these in the TANK:

Bedard: 7 K's in 7 innings. The grading was for 1.5 higher than 5.5...and that's where things ended up. He actually got to 7 K's in 6 innings, but then didn't have any more in the 7th. That lined up with the math too.

Liriano: 12 K's in 8 innings. He topped the threshold after 6 innings (as the math suggested he would)...and kept on rolling even though the team couldn't win (that's what's great about these...you don't have to worry about run support, or unearned runs costing you....if you see a good K effort coming...those other things don't matter).

Hernandez: 5 K's in 6 innings...misses by half a K. As IK mentioned, Hernandez had a bunch of walks...so I'm guessing we had a 3-2 count or two that just missed going our way.

Pedro: clearly didn't have his stuff coming back from injury. He did settle down after a bad first inning. But, he wasn't striking people out. Sheets started slowly in his return in terms of K's...but then got a few in his later innings. So...I'd think Sheets is better suited to be strong in his next outing than Pedro is.

Myers: still rolling strong since returning. He had 8 K's in 8 innings, and made it past the 6.5 threshold even earlier. The boxscore I saw had Nolasco striking out twice...so knowing young pitchers can't hit help put this one over the top. Remember that advice from dinque about checking on the opposing pitcher's hitting ability. Looks like Vegas made a minor adjustment here...but it needed to be more because Nolasco ended up lasting longer than expected.

I've listed in a prior thread where to find the data you need to play with this prop. Neat to see theories you've worked on for years come together for something like this (medians over 7 games, looking for cocktails-- harmonic convergences of stats and other influences). I'd have to say this particular opportunity has less random noise getting in the way than anything else I've ever seen in any sport. Congrats to those of you who discovered it earlier...strong wishes for the rest of you to get involved with the possibilities here...

blg.