Scoring opportunities per hour

The Game Room
1

Lately I’ve been wondering if there’s a correlation between the scoring opps/hr and the popularity of a sport.

People say that cricket and basketball have too much scoring while soccer has too little. Baseball and football, it seems, are just right. If you score too often, then scoring isn’t that exciting. If you hardly ever score, then the fans never get that payoff exhilaration or they don’t get it enough.

But it’s not just the scoring that counts toward excitement, it’s opportunities. If the defense comes up big, then the game is still exciting. Witness a Super Bowl goal line stand or Jermaine Dye’s home run robbery to preserve Buerhle’s perfect game. So I think you should really look at how often a team has a chance to score, even if they fail.

We’ll need some metrics. Here’s what I’ve come up with:

Baseball - Plate appearances w/ RISP.
Football - FG range appearances.
Soccer - Shots on goal, only one shot per attack counts.
Hockey - Shots on goal, only one shot per attack counts.
Cricket - ???
Basketball - Shots, not counting rebounds.
Golf - Long putts?

After that’s counted up, you divide by the average length, in real time, of the game and get an “excitement quotient”.

Benefits: Allows exciting failures to count. Expresses how often a fan can expect to be excited in one game.
Flaws: Doesn’t account for out-of-nowhere scores like solo home runs or defensive touchdowns. Doesn’t consider close finishes, comebacks, or other tense non-scoring moments.
Comments? Improvements? Data?

2

Every plate appearance is a scoring chance in baseball, as any batter might hit a home run.

Likewise, every offensive snap is a scoring chance in football, as the ball carrier could go all the way. Or the defense could strip/intercept and return for a score.

3

Right, which is why you can’t count those. That’d be an unrealistic number. You’d end up concluding that the entire game is exciting because there’s always a chance to score. So we need some way to filter out the long shots.

You can’t just look at the number of scores because that doesn’t count all the drama when a team could score but fails to do so. You’d miss all those “Ooh, so close” moments. And there’s also the problem of a three-run hit, for example. That should count once. Lastly, you can’t count every single shot on goal because they’re not all close and sometimes you get, like, three shots in 5 seconds. That should count once, too.
Imagine if you had a plot of opportunities/hour on the x-axis and popularity on the y-axis. Imagine if you found that it resembles a normal curve around, say, 5/hour. That’d mean something, right? That’s what I’m after.

4

My first thought: this is impossible and kinda silly. Disparate sports have dramatically different definitions of “action”, and attempting to normalize them wrt time is foolish.

My second though: the only way I could see this working is to have experts and fans of a given sport analyze games after the fact with something like those approval dials used during political debates. One could perhaps determine the average excitement level of a given match, as well as the range within the match. I know of no studies that attempt to do this.

In the end though, I think you’d find that aficionados, by and large, find their favored sports exciting and other sports dull. Finding consistent objective reasoning for this misses the aesthetics involved, as well as other cultural factors that are often more significant than the games themselves.

5

People say this? Americans may say this, but this ignores the fact that out of the five sports you listed the three you think of as imperfect are by far the most popular. Admittedly that’s a guess as to basketball being significantly more popular worldwide that baseball, but I would think it highly likely.

6

There’s a cultural aspect as well. I think baseball used to be more popular when it reflected the agrarian nature of American life. However, when life became more hectic, basketball became more popular. Football, imho, reflects the competition inherent in all aspects of American life, and how difficult it is to achieve small goals.

Americans don’t like soccer because it involves fair play, sportsmanship, etc. :smiley:

7

Remember with cricket (at least in the long form of the game) you don’t win by scoring runs, you win by taking wickets.

This means that over the course of a 5 day test a maximum of 40 wickets could fall over the course of the (roughly) 35-ish hours of actual play. So an average of 1 per hour perhaps. Not too dissimilar from goals in football.

Therefore rather than concentrating on the numbers of 4’s or 6’s. The equivalent “scoring opportunity” is likely to be dropped catches, near run-outs or (more recently) referrals.

All of which are probably more rare (per hour) than in something like basketball and so each takes on a huge significance.

8

Red zone appearances would be a better measure of the kind of scoring chances that get fans excited. When your team gets into FG range, it’s calming and reassuring. When they move into the redzone, you get excited.

I like your idea for baseball. I would compare getting into FG range to getting a runner on first. Getting into the redzone is having a guy on second, and getting a 1st & Goal is equivalent to putting a guy on third.

9

The word is spelled “real” not “long.” Otherwise, I largely agree.

10

I’ve always insisted that Tennis has the highest amount of “key” or “potentially” exciting points.

With the match broken down into sets, games, and points, every point contributes to the current game and every game contributes to the current set and every set contributes to the current match, all in key ways. Tennis is designed so that every point is essential.

Having said that, it is not the most popular sport.

11

On cricket: This will be tricky because at any given moment each team can score in two very different ways. And the value of each particular “score” will change according to the match situation.

Batsmen are trying to score runs, bowlers (and the fielding team generally) are trying to take wickets. Generally speaking, any given ball is more likely to see a run scored than a wicket taken. Equally, while there are no restrictions in the laws about how many (or how few!) runs may be scored, you can only win a cricket match by taking 20 wickets. So any ball which takes a wicket is more exciting, and has a potentially bigger effect on the match, than any given ball which gets hit for runs (even if it’s a boundary).

So it might be tempting to argue that the relevant factor in cricket should be wickets - or, to allow for opportunities as well as scores - wickets and near-misses (e.g. dropped catches, near-run outs, appeals for LBW, or, most crucially, beating the bat). But there will be situations where this is misleading.

The most obvious is the run chase. Take the 1992/3 Australia vs W. Indies Test at Adelaide. Australia, in their second innings, have been set a target of 186 runs to win. They have 10 wickets in hand. If they score the runs, they win. If they don’t reach 186, but lose less than 10 wickets, it’s a draw. If they lose all 10 wickets, they lose the match. Despite losing 7 of those wickets for only 74 runs, they struggle on to 102/8 and then 144/9. With one wicket to go and 22 runs needed, each and every run is thrilling. A boundary unbelievably so. And the score mounts up, past 160, past 170, one or two runs at a time, occasionally four, all the way to 184. When finally, the bowler strikes and the match is won by one run. But of course, the nearer Australia got to their target, the more exciting each run became.

The second area where runs are thrilling is the general situation where bowlers are on top. In the recent South Africa vs India series, Dale Steyn took 5 for 75 - and in the same innings, Tendulkar scored a century (145, IIRC). When wickets are coming easily, it’s thrilling to see a batsman soak up the pressure, ride his luck, and start counter-attacking when the time comes.

Finally, of course, it’s possible for the batsmen to pile on so many runs (say, a 180-ish partnership) that taking a wicket won’t really make much difference to the game.

The upshot of this is that, for cricket, the metric would have to be weighted according to the game situation, to show the relative value of each “score”.

12

I agree with the sentiment that this is all but an impossible venture. It’s an interesting thought (though not one I personally believe there’s any truth to), but the method is far too simplistic to accurately measure what is intended to be measured.

That said, I have to disagree with the methodology in scoring for hockey:

Shots on goal are a tricky stat. Does one consider all shots, including the ones that are blocked or deflected and never actually make it on net? The official scorers don’t. What about shots that hit the goalpost (one of the most exciting moments in any game, btw)… they don’t count as official shots, even though they’re as close to scoring as one can possibly get without actually scoring. Does one go by the entirely arbitrary “scoring opportunities” stat? And what about rink bias (a known phenomenon by which, there being no “official” method of determining what counts as a shot or a hit during play, stats are recorded differently by the scorers in each rink)?

And why would only one shot per attack count? A very good portion of goals in the NHL are scored off of a rebound or during a scrum in front of the net after the initial shot.

Additionally, not all goals (or shots or scoring opportunities) are equal. The “dirty” goal scored out of a mass of humanity in front of the net is generally far more exciting for a fan to witness than a shot from the point. A 5-on-3 power play goal is almost always more exciting and interesting than a standard 5-on-5 goal.

A lot of the enjoyable part of hockey isn’t even in the act of scoring, it’s in the lead-up: the strong forecheck or the great individual effort or the tic-tac-toe passing that leads to the shot, etc.

13

Some good points above. Tennis is a good example of a scoring system that enhances the appeal of the game. At any time, a player can score a few crucial points to change the direction of a set. If it was simply “first to 50” it would be much harder to overturn a defecit. You’d also probably see a much more conservative game, because eliminating errors would be more important.

Frequency of scoring and scoring opportunities isn’t a very good metric for judging how exciting a game is to watch. For example, if one team is dominating another they will usually have frequent opportunities to score, but it doesn’t make for an interesting spectacle, because there is no tension. A better metric might be how closely the game is contested, or how frequently upsets are achieved. But none of that captures the nuances of how the games are actually played, and a lot of what actually interests people. A close game isn’t automatically an interesting one, people also want to see skillful play.

14

I think, for me at least, my appreciation for the scoring opportunities actually relates to a feeling of progression and non-randomness.

By that I mean - when I watch soccer or hockey, they’re moving the ball/puck up and down the field and occasionally taking a shot at the goal. Some go in, some don’t. It feels essentially random, although obviously there’s a skill/teamwork element to it.

Football, on the other hand, has you methodically marching down the field. You gain ground, getting closer to your goal. Obviously you can have 50 yard scoring passes or defensive touchdowns on any play, but generally there’s a very clear correlation and progression between marching down the field and scoring.

Baseball is somewhat similar - there’s always the chance for a home run, but you build up scoring opportunities by getting people on base and advancing them.

In both cases, there’s also a hard limit to the offensive attempts - you get 3 outs in baseball, and four downs in football. Whereas games like hockey and soccer just sort of go on and meander until the clock stops.

So in one type of sport you have one team in clear possession of the ball, trying to advance towards their goal, while giving the offense hard limits by which the defense can stop them, and others where it just seems like mostly random back and forth, where the chance of success of a scoring attempt is low and essentially feels random.

Basketball is closer to hockey/soccer in this regard, but has a much higher number of attempts on goal with a much greater success rate. This at least gives the appearance of being less random - with a larger sample size, the score tends to reflect the skill of the teams more. Basketball also has a much harder limit on the offense than those two other sports in the form of the shot clock.

Incidentally, that doesn’t directly correlate to my preferences. I generally don’t even like sports except football, but I’d rather watch basketball than baseball. Soccer is definitely at the bottom, with hockey a significant step up due to the speed and violence.

15

Since basketball features scoring on roughly half of the possessions, a better metric to judge a basketball team is points per possession (and it’s corollary, points allowed per opponent’s possession). If a team is lousy at scoring, they’re probably pretty boring and frustrating to watch, especially if they combine their poor shooting with a grinding defense that limits their opponent’s scoring.(AKA Wisconsin Badgers basketball).

16

I think this one is pretty easy to calculate. A pro golfer will hit the green in regulation roughly two-thirds of the time, meaning he is putting for birdie or eagle. That means he has about 12 theoretical scoring opportunities per four hours of play.

And very roughly speaking, about 30% of those will result in “scores” (birdies or eagles). So that’s about one actual score per hour.

17

For hockey I’d go with power plays.

I disagree on the tennis analysis. Losing points when it isn’t your serve isn’t a big deal. You’re expected to win the games you serve and lose the ones you don’t. As evidence by such terms as “on serve” and “up a break.”

18

I think SenorBeef hits the nail on the head here. I think part of the reason why Football and Baseball are so popular is due to the fact that each sport has quantifiable progress in every play, on both offense and defense. In baseball, you’ve got strikes on one side, and getting people on base on the other side. In football, the offense tries to gain as many yards as possible and the defense tries to hold them back. The closer they get to the end of the field, the better chance they have of making a score. In games like soccer or hockey, just get the ball/puck down to one side of the field doesn’t seem to increase your odds. (I’m not saying that’s true, I’m say that’s what it seems like to the average viewer.)

19

Your nitpicking does you credit. :slight_smile: (I agree with you)

And Stanislaus, good post. You put in the leg work that I couldn’t be arsed to do.

You are absolutely right. There is an ebb and flow to cricket that makes a mockery of conventional sporting narrative.
It also explains why theDuckworth-Lewismethod appears less than logical sometimes.

20

Rugby union is a hard one, as teams can score in two different ways: via kicking, and via scoring a try. Scoring a try, however, also counts in both categories, as a try is converted with an attempt at goal. In practice, any penalty or free kick in the opponents half (or even in the very last yards of your own half) is worth a shot at goal. Tries are harder, as they’re scored in one of two common ways: by the forwards piling pressure on a defence from inside the opponent’s 22, or by the backs running the opposition ragged from virtually any position on the pitch.

I can’t really see any easy way to quantify “excitement” here. For instance, this video demonstrates the point. The Australian forwards were pouring pressure on the English defensive line, nearly scoring themselves, until the English defence turned the ball over, with the backs putting in a run-away try.