The Moneyball Effect Teaching AP Statistics through Sports

The Moneyball Effect: Teaching AP Statistics through Sports Paul Buckley Gonzaga College High School Washington, DC pbuckley@gonzaga. org 1

Why? �Growth of Statistics 2

Why use Sports? 3

So how can Sports help us learn AP Statistics? 4

Statistical Inference Through Sports Miguel Cabrera vs Austin Jackson Who is really responsible for Detroit’s success? 5

Two-Proportion Z Test 6

The Data 7

Simulate the Games Stat. Key Fathom 8

Simulation results Likelihood = p-value 9

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Experimental Design Through Sports Which is the better putter? 11

The Experiment �Control – putter, ball, ‘course’, swing �Randomization – prevent ‘hot hand’ �Easier to identify the response variable and what would affect it �Replication �Blinding �Blocking 12

Experimental Design Through Sports Which is the better putter? 13

Regression Through Sports Moneyball scene: http: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=y. Gf 6 LN WY 9 AI 14

Regression Through Sports Offense vs Defense Which is the better predictor of wins? 15

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Think of the possibilities… �Soccer: Free Kicks vs Goals �Hockey: Power Plays vs Goals �Golf, which is a better predictor of success, greens in regulation or number of putts? �Tennis: unforced errors or 1 st serve percentage vs points won 17

What else? �Putting together a relay team (track, swimming) – lesson in z-scores, normal distributions �Game strategies – situational hitting – conditional probabilities �Layups vs jumpers vs 3 -pointers – non -linear regression �And ……? 18

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