The Sim is Feeling Smug; Predicted Phillies-Dodgers NLCS Looking Good

Here's a recap of today's predictions from The Sim, Imagine Sports' simulation software, along with the real-life results from the games:

RAYS-WHITE SOX, game 1:  Well, our Diamond Mind simulation picked the Rays and that the James Shields would deliver.  That he did, and so did the Rays.  The Sim gave the best odds of a big game for the White Sox was Juan Uribe and Paul Konerko.  Uribe came up empty at the plate, but Konerko did go 2 for 4 with a homer.  Also, The Sim projected that Evan Longoria most likely to be the big offensive star of the series, and he certainly got off to a good start there - 3 for 3 plus a walk, 2 HR and 3 RBI.  The Sim is smiling.  (see the full prediction here)

BREWERS-PHILLIES, game 2:  Our preview of game 2 of the Phillies-Brewers series focused almost entirely on C.C. Sabathia for a reason - our simulation showed a wide variation for the Brewers' chances if fatigue started catching up with him.  Sure enough, Sabathia did not have his stuff, and the Brewers are in trouble.  As we stated:

"And if the Phillies get to the Brewer bullpen early, they become the favorites, according to The Sim." (see the full prediction here)

Sabathia didn't even get through 4 innings, yet he threw 98 pitches.  On 3 days' rest after pitching 122 on Sunday - too much for him, clearly.  So, was it a good decision - or should the Brewers have waited and started C.C. in game 3?  Well, waiting until gam 3 would mean that Sabathia could only start one game for the series, and our simulations showed that the Brewers didn't have much of a chance unless they could get 2 good starts from him.  It was probably a risk they needed to take.

Oh, and did we say Sabathia's durability is a key factor?

DODGERS-CUBS, game 2:  Our Diamond Mind simulation called this one a toss-up, with the Dodgers having a 50.2% chance of winning... but The Sim was even better at predicting how it would happen:

"...indicates we might see a high-scoring shoot-out and a good chance that one team will score a big win."
10-3, Dodgers.

"The Sim sees a decent but not dominating performance from Chicago starter Carlos Zambrano, with a fair number of times of him getting hit hard..."  (see the full prediction here)

7 runs in 6 and a third.  In all fairness to Big Z, four of those runs were unearned.  In any case, not a dominating performance.

and the bullpen struggles again. 

The Cubs' pen gave up 3 more runs tonight.

 This time, however, Cub pitchers project to have better control.

Only 1 walk!  Small consolation, however.

Manny Ramirez also had another big night, as The Sim predicted. 

The Sim Bonus

And to really top things off, there is a stat I didn't include in the blog post for the projection of this game - Zambrano's stats averaged for the 1,000 times we ran The Sim:  6 1/3 innings pitched and an ERA of 4.26, 3 earned runs on 6 hits.  I didn't get that precise in the write-up, but guess what Zambrano's stats were for the game?  Exactly the same.  We'll chalk that up to luck for now.

So far, so good.  The Sim is feeling smug.  Of course, that's when baseball's version of Lady Luck turns on you.  But the odds of that Phillies-Dodgers NLCS predicted by The Sim are looking mighty good.  But with that said, it's on to tomorrow's sim runs!

Still not sure about The Sim?  See how we did in Tuesday's games.

Want to know more?  Check out our LDS predictions on ESPN (ALDS, NLDS), or here:

NLDS

Phillies-Brewers NLDS

Phillies-Brewers Game 1

Phillies-Brewers Game 2

Dodgers-Cubs NLDS

Dodgers-Cubs Game 1

ALDS

Angels-Red Sox ALDS

Angels-Red Sox Game 1

Rays-White Sox ALDS

- Dayne

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