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Home field, or not home field... that is the question

Posted By RobG

All this discussion about home field advantage is quite humourous.

The belief that just because a team is home they should "play" better is amusing. Sure, some teams are built for certain parks so naturally they will play better at home. But to suggest that there is bias in the robot simply because your team imparticular did not win a majority of it's home games is silly.

I'm not saying that home field advantage does not exist... just ask the Chicago Blackhawks about home field advantage... I bet they'd love to return to Chicago Arena (what was the name of that one room apartment anyway?)

But homefield advantage is MORE than just a statistical quirk - it is about intangibles that just cannot be worked into a statistical game.

It is about:

1. A comfort level the player have at a park they plat 50% of their game in
2. The bonus of the ownership being able to build a team for the park they play in
3. The cheers of the fans and the rush the hometown fans can give a team

These are a few of the things that are cleansed from any statistical recreation. ome players just perform better at home because of the rush of being "at home." In fact, I believe Dynasty League baseball was one of the few tabletops that actually created "home and away" tags for players.

So does PB follow real life and the often hinted at "home field?" No... it couldn't possibly! PB is a pure statistical simulation, and as far as I know nobody has been abel to figure out how to translate intangibles into pure raw data.

RobG
W9 - Port Huron