The Guardians beat the White Sox 5-0 on Tuesday. They need to win eight more games to finish with a higher winning percentage than the 1962 Mets (.250). Now the three generous estimates of their intrinsic winning percentage and probability of no more than 40 wins stand at:
Method | Intrinsic WPct | Probability of No More than 40 Wins |
95% Confidence Interval based on actual wins | 0.296 | 0.931 |
Replacement Level | 0.296 | 0.931 |
95% Confidence Interval based on Pythagorean wins (+7) | 0.347 | 0.847 |
Chicago only needs six more wins to finish with a better winning percentage than the 1916 Athletics. That team went 36-117, a .2353 winning percentage. If the White wind up 38-124, they would own a .2346 winning percentage, and set the modern record for lowest winning percentage in a season. Here are the probabilities for that happening:
Method | Intrinsic WPct | Probability of No More than 38 Wins |
95% Confidence Interval based on actual wins | 0.296 | 0.673 |
Replacement Level | 0.296 | 0.673 |
95% Confidence Interval based on Pythagorean wins (+7) | 0.347 | 0.500 |
They are almost certain to finish worse than the 1962 Mets, and only the most generous probability based on their bad luck gives then a 50/50 chance than of finishing ahead of the 1916 Athletics.