I haven't done much with the MDS Model recently, so this summer's BIG3 basketball league seemed like a good test case to break it out again. I applied my standard methodology on the 8 teams in the league, and I'll be using the typical techniques to project win probabilities and margin of victories as well. The nature of scoring in BIG3 does necessitate a deviation on the normal distribution I use to project spreads for other leagues, since in BIG3 teams play to a set score (60, win by 2). Based on my observations with Ultimate Frisbee (which has a similar end of game structure), I tweaked the formula to the log-normal distribution, which gives more weight to the extremes.
With that in mind, here's how the standings currently look (only based on margin of victory right now, since the teams aren't "connected" yet in the graph network):
| Rank | Teams | PF | PA | Pyth | Matrix | MDS |
| 1 | Trilogy | 60 | 45 | 0.650 | 0.5 | 0.650 |
| 2 | 3s Company | 61 | 51 | 0.595 | 0.5 | 0.595 |
| 3 | Power | 62 | 59 | 0.527 | 0.5 | 0.527 |
| 4 | 3-Headed Monsters | 62 | 60 | 0.518 | 0.5 | 0.518 |
| 5 | Ghost Ballers | 60 | 62 | 0.482 | 0.5 | 0.482 |
| 6 | Tri-State | 59 | 62 | 0.473 | 0.5 | 0.473 |
| 7 | Ball Hogs | 51 | 61 | 0.405 | 0.5 | 0.405 |
| 8 | Killer 3s | 45 | 60 | 0.350 | 0.5 | 0.350 |
I then used this to project the next round of games in Charlotte, NC on July 2:
| Team A | Team B | Pick | Win Prob | Pick By |
| Ball Hogs | Tri-State | Tri-State | 56.91% | Tri-State by 2 |
| Trilogy | 3-Headed Monsters | Trilogy | 63.37% | Trilogy by 4 |
| Power | Killer 3s | Power | 67.37% | Power by 5 |
| 3s Company | Ghost Ballers | 3s Company | 61.19% | 3s Company by 3 |
The Colorado Rockies are having a bit of a strange giveaway tomorrow: all fans will receive an LED light bulb from Xcel Energy as they leave the stadium after the game. This odd promotional item spawned a tongue-in-cheek conversation about how a fan should approach their buying decision from an economic perspective, relative to the value of the free light bulb. What is the break even price a fan would be willing to pay if all they cared about was the light bulb?
According to this site comparing LED light bulbs to CFLs and incandescents, a household with 25 bulbs would save $6668.75 in energy savings, or $266.75 per bulb. The cost of the bulb itself should be factored in as well, and an LED bulb is equivalent to roughly 40 incandescent bulbs, over the lifetime of the bulb. Incandescents cost about $1 each at the Home Depot, whereas LED bulbs cost about $4 each. So we'll take the lower cost of these two options, i.e. purchasing 1 LED bulb for $4.
This adds up to $270.75 in the value of the LED bulb, between the energy savings and actual cost of the bulb. There are currently tickets available for as low as $17 on StubHub, which falls well below the calculated value of the giveaway. For simplicity, I'm going to assume that the utility of enjoying the actual baseball game is exactly equal to the cost of the fees on the ticket (so $6.90 worth of enjoyment on the $17 get-in ticket). So since there are over 1,000 tickets available at less than $270, get out there baseball fans in the Denver area!
