Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics - A comparison of Missouri Class Six boy's basketball teams

 I normally hear from the small, class one or two school fans when I post some controversial Braggin' Rights ratings.  Those small town fans don't have a lot going on other than rooting for their home team and when you dish on their home team, they occasionally get nasty.

I guess I should have expected a negative response from the Springfield Central Bulldog fans too.  LOL.

I had both 3-7 Cardinal Ritter and Staley, who lost their opening game at home by 44 points, to Springfield Central.  Of course, I deal in statistics, not opinions, although I do use my judgement in weighting the games played.  But the bottom line is that Gramp's bases his ratings on game scores, not opinions, such as Coach Johnson suggested.  I assume Coach Johnson is unfamiliar with my ratings or he would not make such a laughable suggestion.

Mark Twain once said that "There are lies, damn lies and statistics".  Actually, I believe he stole that line from Disraeli but it seems to fit.  I have used statistics throughout my career and I have seen people twist statistics to fit their hypotheses.  We can spin the statistics to fit our narrative but I try to avoid that whenever possible.

I will even go back and do a deeper dive into a few teams when a controversy like this hits the fan.

I took a look at Central's schedule along with Oak Park, Staley, and Cardinal Ritter.  There are some other great class six teams and Central will have to play one of them, Kickapoo, on January 30th, so the Bulldog fans might be crowing or crying in the beer on February 1st.

Oak Park is my #1 team, with one loss to nationally ranked Little Rock Central.  I looked at Oak Park's Strength of Schedule (SOS), which is the average of their opponent's ratings (using my statistical model).  They have played a tough schedule with LR Central and Vashon and rank at 133 SOS and 155 raw rating.  I had weighted their ratings at 156 so Oak Park is fairly rated.

Springfield Central was rated #7 in my class six ratings and have had two tough games with Link Academy and Vianney, a solid class five team.  The rest of the schedule has been softer than Oak Park, with a SOS on 129.  I calculated Central at a 150.5 raw rating but had weighted their rating with their loss to Vianney, dropping it to 143.  I need to relook at the weighting factor because Central should probably be closer to 150 but that would mean raising all the St. Louis teams by five points to properly put Vianney above Central.  Gets complicated when you have one team losing one game but having an outstanding season overall.  The opinion comes into play of when to weight and when not to weight.

So that brings me to Staley and that God-awful 3-7 Cardinal Ritter.  I heard some folks on Twitter (or X) saying that there was NO WAY Ritter could be a top-three team!  But let's start with Staley.

Staley had a bad start to their season at home against Central, losing by 37 points.  I don't know the specifics but Staley could have had players out injured or still playing football or whatever.  Since that inauspicious start, Staley has rounded into form and has losses to Springdale Arkansas, and #1 Oak Park.  I had Staley at a weighted rating of 147 with a SOS of 134.  Their schedule has been slightly tougher than Oak Park and significantly tougher than Springfield.  Their raw rating is 144 but I had minimized the first game loss but Springfield probably belongs above Staley.  I hope that helps allay the concerns of those Springfield Central readers that I offended (I assume they are actually reading this and not just spouting off on Twitter).

How about Cardinal Ritter?  Well, they were rated 146 with an astounding SOS of 155.  Their raw rating is 152.5 but I was not using that because I had avoided trying to calculate the ratings for their nationally ranked opponents.  I went back and estimated the ratings for these nationally ranked-teams.

Instead of playing teams like class six Ozark, Skyline, Ash Grove, and Sparta, all good lower-class teams, Cardinal Ritter played the #1, #15, #52, and #76 rated teams in the nation.  Lost to #1 Paul VI by 13.  

If Springfield Central played the same schedule, they would have won two or three games too.

So anyone who doubts putting Cardinal Ritter in the top five in class six is not dealing with statistics, they are talking opinions based entirely on looking at a 3-7 record and dismissing this team.

Watch out, folks.  The state tournament might be really interesting with Cardinal Ritter playing Kickapoo or Lee's Summit West in a semi-final and Oak Park or Staley in a final championship game.

Time will tell.  

You might not want to be beating that drum until the end of March.  Too sure is too bad.  

As for me, I will just keep cranking out statistics.  I will let the fans have their opinions.