TheRealMattKain

For anyone interested, my brother and I competed on a new IGN/YouTube reality show called The Next Game Boss. The show is basically an elimination challenge between indie development teams who have to design and implement a video game. We even managed to sneak in a not-so-subtle (and cheesy) shout out to Wisconsin and the Packers. The show was a blast and the final product looks pretty slick (I was worried about what a show centered on a bunch of scruffy game devs would look like, but it was all put together by Reveille, the company that does the Office, the Tudors, the Biggest Loser, and a bunch of other stuff). Anyway, we're TEAM FIST PUNCHER. Check it out and feel free to poke fun since, come on, it's an internet reality show about making video games.

Being the lone "true" programmer must be pretty neat. I'd imagine it gives you quite a bit of freedom and latitude when working on projects. Based on your description, I assume your job requires interfacing and planning with people whose computer skills may be all over the board (office people, warehouse workers, management, etc.). Do you find this challenging? I work for a company that writes bio-tech and medical imaging research software. I've worked on a bunch of different projects in varying fields (confocal microscopy, fluorescent imaging, cancer research), but I currently focus on storage, retrieval and analysis of imaging modalities for cardiology (IVUS and OCT being the 2 big ones). We're a small company, so like you I have to wear a variety of hats (I might be coding on Monday, making a tradeshow banner on Tuesday, and writing technical documentation on Wednesday). My job also has many travel benefits. We sell world-wide so I've been lucky enough to travel around North America, Europe, and Asia on the company dime. Overall it's good work with many pros, but it's also a tough, competitive market with a ton of red tape (lots of regulatory and QC stuff that slows the process down). It sounds silly to think that I'd trade my current field to do videogames, but I guess I'm a dreamer. MattKain

Just out of curiosity, what sort of software do you work on for your day job? Figuring out the gaming workflow is definitely tough. It's very counter-intuitive to normal Windows programming. I first went through this issue when I was learning Flash actionscript programming. I had to wrap my mind around a model using a game-action-update state-machine that was triggered on the framerate. The good thing is this seems to be the model used by many game engines so the learning can be transferred to new environments. MattKain

Congrats on the win! That's awesome. We just submitted our game, Fist Puncher, to the Independent Games Festival. We don't expect to win, but the act of submitting is a success in an of itself. How do you like XNA? I've been learning it too. The biggest hurdle that I have is spending 40-50 hours a week working in Visual Studio for my day job, and then coming home and trying to jump back into the same environment for "fun" coding. Not easy. MattKain

There's a lot of discussion in the comments section on gamasutra, but I don't think they have a dedicated forum. IndieGamer has a nice forum: The app hub forum for Xbox dev is pretty popular: I know there are some very active sites where people discuss indie game dev on classic consoles as well. AtariAge.com for example has a large community of individuals making new Atari 2600 games (cart and all). I'm not sure what else is out there. MattKain

If anyone's interested, here's a couple of pre-release trailers for the game titled "Fist Puncher" that we're working on: MattKain

If you're ever interested in trying to throw something together but don't want to get too into the programming there are some good game development apps like Stencyl or GameMaker that work well for the non-programmer. As far as making money, the scene is really hit or miss. Something like "I Made a Game with Zombies in it" was all done by one guy (art, coding, and the amazing soundtrack that he sang himself) and he made a fortune on it. On the other hand, I'm shocked at how many little studios or indie developers put a year or more of their life into a great little game only to see the game get buried and only sell a few hundred copies at a buck a piece. Anyway, here's a few of my current favorites indies: I Made a Game with Zombies in it Dead Pixels Kung-Fu Fight Canabalt http://www.adamatomic.com/canabalt/ MattKain

Sort of an obscure question, but with the recent renaissance of indie game developers on the Xbox, PC, and other platforms, I was wondering if anyone else out there shares my hobby. I've actually started a little 2-man operation with my brother and we'll be releasing our first Xbox Live Indie Games title hopefully by first quarter 2012. So, anyone else dabble in game design in their spare time? Or is there anyone here that follows the indie game scene on any platform? MattKain

With 2011 looking to go down as one of the top seasons in Brewers history, what do fans rank as the top 5 greatest Brewers seasons? Obviously 1982 has to be number one, but what about after that? Without including 2011 (since it's not over yet) I'm thinking maybe '82, '81, '08, '79, '92. What do others think? Here are some highlights from some of the more memorable seasons: 1978 Brewers win 93 games in first winning season Mike Caldwell wins team record 22 games and sets team records for complete games and shutouts 1979 Brewers set team record for Wins and Winning Percentage, finish in second place Gorman Thomas leads league in Homeruns 1981 Brewers make playoffs - lose in Division Series Rollie Fingers wins MVP and Cy Young awards 1982 Brewers make their only appearance in the World Series Brewers tie team record for wins Robin Yount wins MVP and leads league in WAR, Slugging, Total Bases, Runs Created, and OPS Pete Vuckovich wins Cy Young award Yount, Cooper, Molitor finish 1-2-3 in league standings for hits Gorman Thomas leads league in Homeruns 1987 Brewers tie MLB record with 13-0 start. Juan Nieves throws only no-hitter in Brewer history Paul Molitor has 39 game hitting streak Paul Molitor sets team records for batting average and on base percentage 1989 Robin Yount wins MVP 1992 Brewers finish 92-70 - miss playoffs by 4 games Yount gets 3000th hit Pat Listach wins Rookie of the Year 2007 Brewers finish over .500 and break streak of non-winning seasons Ryan Braun wins Rookie of the Year and breaks MLB rookie record and Brewer record for slugging percentage Prince Fielder becomes first Brewer to hit 50 homeruns, leads league in Homeruns Francisco Cordero sets Brewer save record 2008 Brewers win Wildcard - first playoff appearance in over 25 years CC Sabathia has dominant second half for Brewers setting team record for ERA 2011 Brewers have 3 All-start game starters Prince Fielder wins All-Star game MVP Ryan Braun has 30-30 season Brewers win division(?) Ryan Braun wins batting title(?) Ryan Braun wins MVP(?) John Axford sets Brewer save record(?)

http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=1943&position=P#pitchtype

I've been in the software business for about a decade. Some brief comments from my experience at work and at home: Dell: Terrible, terrible laptops. They *are* cheap, but they do not last. My GF had a Dell Inspiron which ended up having issues with the power board which prevents the system from charging the battery (check it out online - this is VERY common). Bought her another Dell Inspiron and it ended up having the same problem within a year of purchase. Sony: I've had great luck with both Sony desktops and laptops for both personal and work use. I know the price tends to run a little higher than Dell or HP, but again, I've had good luck with them. Lenovo: no experience with their laptops, but I've had great experience with their desktops. Cheap and very durable. We have a couple of Lenovos that we use for trade shows. These systems get shipped all over the country and get heavy, heavy use. No problems. Fujitsu: had a few Fujitsu tablet laptops. Pretty reliable, but the batteries didn't last long. Had a few quirks with the screen response as well. I'm on the fence with them and wouldn't feel comfortable recommending them. Macs: Personally feel that they are not worth the price. Like all Apple products, excellent marketing has created tremendous demand, but there are many, many better options out there if you're willing to do a little research. I don't want to have a Mac/PC debate, but I would say if you have deep pockets and want a fashion accessory, get a Mac. HP: I currently have an HP laptop that I use for work and at home. It's been great. System gets heavy use, runs CPU and RAM intensive apps well (high-end image analysis, video editing, and MS software development apps), and I lug it with me around the world on business. No problems at all over about 2 years. Also I do have a warranty and the warranty has already saved me. Quick story: inadvertently smashed my laptop screen (so, yes, a problem, but totally my fault). Sent it in for repair on Monday, had it back on Thursday. Cost me $0. Without warranty would have cost about $400 to repair locally. The lesson here might be the same as the previous poster said: get a warranty. Overall advice: -if you're using a laptop for basic stuff like music, internet, word processing, etc. there is NO reason to spend a lot of money. I constantly see people buy powerful laptops so they can surf the internet and look at pictures from their cell phone. Don't make this mistake. You can get a solid laptop for around 500 bucks (or less) that does everything you need. -if you want the laptop to run long term without worries, get a warranty. -make sure to run reliable anti-virus software and be careful what you install on your system. I have plenty of friends who hand me their laptop and tell me it's dead or unusable only to discover that the system is bogged down with bloatware and malware.

6-1 in the 3rd? Unreal. After all this controversy the Brewers are now stealing signs on the road? When will it end?

So what is going on with the home/road splits? I thought it might be fun to look into this a little deeper. Runs per Game at Home vs. Runs per Game on the Road Below is a list of each team's runs per game at home and on the road and the percent increase from the lower to the higher. http://images.yuku.com/image/bmp/0fd15b9c8d65dd32b0fbc6839c65641272b2859.bmp Are the Brewers numbers so skewed that they must be cheating? Based on the numbers above, the Brewers are scoring about 32% more runs at home than they are on the road. This is high, but not improbable. Teams playing in traditional hitters parks are seeing similar jumps (Texas scores 34% more at home, Colorado 37%). Similarly teams in pitcher's parks are seeing similar jumps when they go on the road (Tampa 36% more on the road, SF 29%, SD 26%). It's also important to mention that these numbers only show differences. A huge difference in home and road splits could be due to park factors, over-performance in one setting, under-performance in one setting, random variation, or who knows what. Note that Oakland plays in a pitcher's park yet scores 22% more runs at home than on the road. They must be stealing signs too. 2011 Team Results vs. Expected Results Now if the Brewers *were* stealing signs at home then we'd expect to see performance similar to the predicted results on the road and a huge increase from predicted results to actual results at home. In 2010 the Brewers were 4th in the league in Runs per Game. In 2011, the following happened: -The top 5 offensive players (Braun, Fielder, Weeks, Hart, and McGehee) all returned. -The starting catcher would be entering his sophomore year and age 25 season where one would expect improvements in offensive stats. -The starting center fielder returned. -The worst offensive player, Escobar, was replaced with Betancourt. Although Betancourt is in no way remarkable, his offensive track record implied that he would out-perform Escobar's 2010 offensive numbers. Based on on this, it's fair to say that one would expect the Brewers' run production to be near the top of the league in 2011. Again, let's look at the numbers. In 2011, the Brewers are 3rd in the league in Runs per Game at Home. Nothing unexpected there. However, on the Road the Brewers are 15th (!!) in Runs per Game. Far, far below reasonable expectations. What this implies is not[/i] that the Brewers are scoring a ridiculous amount of runs at home, but rather[/i] they are scoring an improbably low number of runs on the road. 2010 Individual Results vs. Expected Results The same as above, if the Brewers were cheating at home, then we'd expect to see several players with unexpected and potentially suspicious inflated offensive numbers since individuals would be getting this huge home field boost. Below are OPS+ ZiPS projections and the actual results from 2011 for Brewers with 200 PA (I threw in Kotsay who has 199). http://images.yuku.com/image/bmp/7601579a8269da32bfe82796b1b788d75b51f7a.bmp 6 brewers are exceeding their ZiPS projections, 4 are below their projections. Braun and Fielder are having awesome years. Not shocking - they're offensive superstars. No Brewer is having a ridiculous outlier season (other than McGehee who is suddenly terrible) and Morgan who has been pretty good in a small number of PAs. All of the overall results seem attainable. Conclusion It actually appears that team offensive numbers look pretty reasonable. If anything, the Brewers' offense is performing abnormally terrible on the road (rather than abnormally amazing at home). The way I see it one of two things is happening: -Due to random variance over roughly 50 home games and 50 road games the Brewers' offense is performing about as one would expect at home and terrible on the road. -All other teams have joined together and are cheating when the Brewers come to town. This is most likely done by using mirrors to shine light into the eyes of Brewers' batters just like in the movie Back to School. In fact, based on my research I think we can all agree that it's almost statistically impossible for other teams not to be cheating when the Brewers are on the road.

Looks like Dickerson *is* getting his chance. NY called him up and he's starting in RF today.

We're at the 25% mark for the season so I thought it might be fun to take a look at the 2 big trades the Brewers made this past offseason. Shaun Marcum for Brett Lawrie Brett Lawrie (AAA Las Vegas) .325/.381/.578/.960 14 2B, 8 HR, 9 SB, 7 E Lawrie is tearing it up offensively in AAA and should be up in Toronto's Bautista-led lineup in the next couple months. Couldn't find much in the way of advanced defense stats, but his 7 Errors speak for themselves. His bat may be ready, but I would question his glove. Shaun Marcum 5-1, 56.2 IP, 2.54 ERA (149 ERA+), 1.059 WHIP, 54K, 13BB 1.6 WAR With Gallardo scuffling and Greinke still in preseason mode, Marcum has been no less than a rotation savior. His K9 and K:BB ratios are the best of his career. Marcum is in the top 10 in the league in ERA, ERA+, WHIP, Wins (for those who still use them), Ks, BB/9, K:BB, Win Probability Added, and a whole bunch more. Exactly what you would expect when a top-tier pitcher transitions to the NL. Greinke/Betancourt for Escobar/Jeffress/Odorizzi/Cain Alcides Escobar .217/.252/.266/.517 (47 OPS+), 7 2B, 0 HR, 5 SB -0.2 WAR Brutal, brutal offense. Somehow he's worse than last year when he put up an ugly 67 OPS+. Baseball-reference has his OPS+ at 92 out of 94 qualifying AL hitters. Not good. It'll take some time to get a good grip on his defense, but, from the little bit I've seen, his D looks fine. End of the year metrics will probably show that it is closer to the good-great range. Still, his WAR is atrocious and Fangraphs even did a piece on Escobar's "incompetence": http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/alcides-escobars-magnified-incompetence Jeremy Jeffress 15 IP, 3.60 ERA (112 ERA+), 1.27 WHIP, 13K, 8BB 0.1 WAR He got roughed up last night in the 19-run debacle against Cleveland, but otherwise he's been solid and his 96.7 mph average fastball would be a nice addition to our bullpen. As expected lots of Ks and, of course, lots of walks. Jake Odorizzi (A+ Wilmington) 3-0, 36.2 IP, 2.45 ERA, 0.982 WHIP, 55K, 8BB Yikes! I hope this one doesn't haunt us. It's only high A, but 55K with only 8 BB in 36.2 innings is fantastic at any level. Lorenzo Cain (AAA Omaha) .283/.362/.460/.822 10 2B, 2 HR, 5 SB His AAA numbers look good. Not sure how long KC plans to hold him down and keep playing Melky Cabrera. I guess as long as Melky is hitting, there's no reason to rush Cain. Zack Greinke 2-1, 15 IP, 6.60 ERA (58 ERA+), 1.20 WHIP, 20K, 2BB 0.5 WAR The superficial stats, like ERA, are deceptive. 20K and 2BB in 15 innings has me guessing that Greinke could be getting ready to go on a dominant stretch. It stinks that he missed the first month of season due to a fluke injury, but now that he's back I'm a lot less worried about the front of our rotation. Yuniesky Betancourt .225/.248/.326/.574 (58 OPS+) 2HR, 0 SB -0.3 WAR Apparently in a battle with Escobar for worst offensive contribution. With 2 HR, his power is nowhere near advertised. Baseball-reference has his OPS+ at 86 out of 92 qualifying NL hitters - so, yeah, not much better than Escobar. There's plenty of argument on this board about Yuni, and we all know he is capable of the occasional flashy play: http://mlb.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=14645257 Still, we've also seen plenty of defensive misses as well. I'll just let his -0.3 WAR speak for itself. It might be fun to look at some of the other deals and signings too (Saito, Morgan, etc.) EDIT (added two more) Nyjer Morgan for Cutter Dykstra Cutter Dykstra (A+ Potomac) .217/.238/.233/.471 2 2B, 0 HR, 5 SB The move to the Nats organization has not been kind to Cutter. He's been absolutely abysmal so far. He's spent a little time at second and third, but most of his playing time has come at DH. A crummy hitting DH trying to move up in an NL organization - not good. Nyjer Morgan .379/.419/.586/1.006 2 2B, 2 3B, 15 games .8 WAR When he's been healthy, he's been terrific. Sadly, that hasn't been much. No way he can keep this up when he returns, but there is almost no way that he doesn't make the team better. If we get a return to his 2009 form, I think most fans will be happy. Sergio Mitre for Chris Dickerson Chris Dickerson (AAA Scranton) .248/.370/.354/.724 7 2B, 1 HR, 8 SB, 21 BB He's showing some good on base skills in AAA but his power is almost non-existent. If Swisher, Gardner, and Jones continue their mediocre play, he might get a shot in the bigs again this year. Sergio Mitre 14.2 IP, 1.84 ERA (209 ERA+), 1.0.23 WHIP, 6K, 5BB 0.0 WAR Mitre's been one of the best in our somewhat unpredictable bullpen. His 1.2 K:BB ratio makes me a little nervous. Is he really this good or is he getting lucky? I would suspect that there is certainly some luck involved. Still, in 54 innings in NY last year he managed to give up very few runs while putting up similar K and BB numbers.

Your belief is based on some very bad logic.Really? So what you're saying is you have no problem at all with your leadoff hitter striking out 184 times per season? Ok, I disagree with your "logic" then. If Weeks has a strong OBP (in other words he makes outs at a low rate), has good power, and runs the bases well, why does it matter *how* he makes his outs? Would you argue that he is a "good" leadoff hitter if, instead of striking out, he grounds out to third 184 times? Please explain why you think that the type of outs he makes negates the fact that he is good at getting on base and good at hitting for power?

I feel like there are two separate discussions going on here that are periodically being conflated and confused. Group 1 is interested in knowing how good or bad of an offensive and defensive player Yuni is overall. This group is interested in looking at a large sample of statistical data and scouting information from the past several years to be able to make an educated guess at predicting how well Yuni can be expected to perform over a large number of games (say a season). This is really similar to the analysis that occurs when deciding "should we sign Player A" or "should we trade for player B"? This group doesn't care if Yuni hits a three-run, game winning homer tonight. This group doesn't care if Yuni turns a game-ending, web-gem double-play. This group is primarily concerned with ranking Yuni's overall skill set and making predictions about how well Yuni can be expected to perform over a large number of games. Basically, it appears that these people are trying to say "it doesn't matter how well Yuni has performed over 22 games as a Brewer, statistical evidence shows us that most likely Yuni will be terribly both offensively and defensively for the rest of the season and the Brewers should start looking for a replacement shortstop if they want to make the postseason." Group 2 simply wants to know how well has Yuni performed as a Brewer *so far* and maybe try to extrapolate a little about how he'll do over the course of the rest of the year. In this case, yes, we are looking at a small sample, and, yes, of course it has meaning. That small sample tells us unambiguously exactly what Yuni has done as a Brewer. In 22 games Yuni has a .267/.290/.337 slash line. There is no debate here. That is what he has done. He also has an 8 game hit streak with 5 multi-hit games during that stretch. Yuni is a Brewer, and he's been hitting well the past 10 days. Being a Brewers fan, I'm tickled pink about this. Does this tiny sample say anything about what Yuni is going to do the rest of the year? Maybe a tiny bit, but not much. Does this tiny sample indicate how Yuni is going to perform next year? Not really. Should the Brewers sign Yuni to a 3 year extension based on his 8 game hit streak? No way! But should Brewer fans be happy that Yuni is starting to hit a little? I sure think so. Basically, it appears that these people are trying to say "I don't care about estimating Yuni's overall value or looking at how well he is going to perform over the course of the next 2-3 years. I only care about what he’s done in 22 games as a Brewers and what he does the rest of the year as a Brewer. The Brewers are not going to resign Yuni for next season, but sadly it looks like there is not currently a better SS upgrade out there. Let's hope that Yuni has a successful, outlier year and when he does have solid stretches or great games let's cheer for him and give him a pat on the back because he is, after all, a Brewer."

I'm going to skip any parenting advice or moralising, and simply give you my opinion as a software engineer. Desktop Shark. I've used it. It works. http://www.desktopshark.com/

I think there is a huge misunderstanding in how defensive metrics work here. If he positioned himself well his range would look really good. Fantastic. Braun has played on mostly mediocre or bad teams. He must not be a good player. In fact the Brewers had a losing record after his call-up in 2007. Must be his fault they missed the playoffs that year. Thanks for saying exactly what I wanted to say. Roenicke's comments are just plain depressing. Does he really not understand how defensive stats work? Or is he just ad libbing in a desperate attempt to defend one of his players? And his comments on Cabrera... Player A is on Team A. Team A is good. Therefore Player A is good. Really?! Great. On the other hand, at least we'll be running the basepaths this year! Hopefully Roenicke will pull out some A+ management and bench basecloggers like Fielder. Ugh.

RBIs are a team statistic. Given enough opportunities, anyone can drive in 78 runs. Betancourt's OPS with RISP was .659 last year. That is bad. Put just about anyone else in the same position and they would have had more RBIs. This only proves that the Royals were foolish or desperate enough to send Betancourt to the plate far too many times (588 times to be precise). Why the obsession with strikeouts? Why not grounders to third or flyouts to left-center? The bottom line is Betancourt made an out 71.2% of the time in 2010. For his career Betancourt has made an out 70.4% of the time. Those numbers are bad, very bad. I do agree that he did show a little pop last year. I'm willing to accept that he'll hit more homers than Escobar in 2011. That's at least something. No one said that. People are arguing that a guy who makes tons and tons of outs is a bad thing and will hurt the team no matter *where* you bury him in the order. To a small degree you can mitigate the flood of outs that Betancourt will make by stashing him near the end of the order (fewer plate appearances). However, a better way to deal with this is to replace him with someone who is good (or even average) at baseball. I'm a little confused. You make it sound as if rallies are never started or runs are never scored from the bottom of the order. They are. Games are in fact sometimes decided by the bottom of the order. True. Brewers’ pitchers should strike out a large number of batters. However, you're making it sound as if having a slow, un-athletic shortstop with no range will not hurt the team. It will. If Betancourt costs the Brewers 15-20 defensive runs over a replacement level shortstop, it will hurt the team. I don't see how this can be argued (unless you want to argue that Betancourt is a good defensive shortstop that will not cost the team runs on defense). Sadly, Counsell can only play so much at his age. I would imagine that he can provide around 300 PA - no more. I don't understand this kind of thinking. Wins are worth the same in April and May as they are in August and Spetember. So for some reason because we will have good pithing, losses in April and May will not count? I was not aware of this rule. Seriously, what if Betancourt and Gomez cost the team 2-3 wins over using some replacement player obtained in a trade, picked up via free agency, or promoted from the minor league system? Divisions are often determined by one or two games. That is the reality of baseball.

All of the examples that you listed are absolutely quantifiable and can be described by stats. Just because a certain statistic can't be found in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel or on Yahoo Sports, does not mean that it doesn't exist or that the action isn't quantifiable. If it can be observed and if it can be counted, then it can be described using a statistic. It's that simple. For example, you said "If there's a "good pitches to hit not taken advantage of by the batter" stat out there, I'm not aware of it." Sounds like Z-Contact% to me. Z-Contact% is defined as the "Percentage of times a batter makes contact with the ball when swinging at pitches thrown inside the strike zone." Prince's numbers can be found here: http://www.fangraphs.com/statss.aspx?playerid=4613&position=1B#platediscipline I was surprised to discover that his Z-Contact% in 2010 was actually the highest it has been since 2007! You also provided some base running examples that are not commonly accounted for in popular statistics. I did a Google search and found Bill James' "Net Gain" which factors in some of the very things that you mentioned are not accounted for by stats. https://www.billjamesonline.net/toursite/StatisticsReport_new.aspx?Type=111&Team=0&Player=1&men=2 I'm sure we could search some more and find that someone is keeping track of a statistic that accounts for each and every base running item that you mentioned. Stats have become very sophisticated and there are very few elements of the game that are not monitored, counted, and recorded (or in other words, rolled into a statistic). Still, I agree with you. I don't think that we have reached the point where we have ideal stats that account for and describe the game with complete perfection. We may never have - describing a subtle, nuanced, complex system like baseball is hard, very hard. This doesn't mean that elements of the game can't be quantified. It just means that some things might be difficult to quantify or objectively say "Player A is better at this than Player B" (like defense). Nonetheless, stats and baseball analysis have come a long way over the past 2 or 3 decades. Long gone are the days of our youth when we thought "baseball card stats" (RBI, BA, RUNS, etc.) were the end-all-be-all and a majority of "serious" sports writing consisted of waxing poetically about a player's "heart" or "grit".

I've had the same problem with 2 Dell laptops. There are three possible things wrong here. 1. Bad AC adapter/power cord. Usually not the problem, but if it is, it can be easily replaced. The only thing to keep in mind is that there are many complaints with using offbrand AC adapter replacements. If this is the problem, then go with something name brand (or at least read reviews of what you are buying). Before buying one, I’d borrow someone else’s AC adapter and test if this is really the problem (or go to Best Buy and have Geek Squad do the test – they’ll usually do little things like this for free). 2. Battery is dead. If you've had the laptop for a while or use the battery frequently, the battery may be dead. Again, easy to replace. Again, you probably want to test with a different batter first to see if this is really the issue. 3. Bad powerboard. The powerboard is a component attached to the motherboard that contains the jack where the AC adapter is plugged into the laptop. Some bad news here. This component is VERY poorly made on Dell laptops and breaks VERY easily with every day use (the powerboard contains a very fine pin which is used to detect if an AC adapter is connected - this allows the battery to charge. This pin can break from strain or pressue on the jack when the AC adapter is plugged in or from normal plugging/unplugging of the AC adapter. Once broken, you’re battery will not charge). If you search Google, you’ll see that thousands of people have this problem with various models of Dell laptops. Dell is very well aware of this and knowingly ships laptops with shoddy components. Despite complaints, they refuse to address the issue or do anything about it (several groups are trying to get a class action suit against Dell for selling laptops with components that are known to be defective or of poor quality). There are three ways to fix this: - Have Dell or someone replace the part. Prices can vary here (free if you have a Dell warranty), but I would expect to pay 100-200 bucks. - Try to fix the powerboard by reconnecting broken pin. Requires precision soldering (I know I don't have the guts to do it). - Replace the powerboard yourself. Replacement powerboards can be had for 30-60 bucks. Luckily in most models the powerboard is only connected to the motherboard with 2 screws. It's not a very hard fix. If you've ever replaced something simple like a hard drive or CD/DVD drive, then you could probably replace the powerboard. I know it's too late, but my advice is to avoid Dell laptops. They're poorly made and suffer from known problems that Dell refuses to address. Pay the extra hundred bucks to get an HP, Toshiba, Sony, etc. You won't regret it. I know I haven't.

No, you are less likely to score 1 run, you are more likely to score more than one run. What exactly are you saying "No" to? Please tell me what I wrote that you think is wrong. I repeat, (based on the data that you presented) with no outs and a runner on first you are more likely to score a run (any number) than with 1 out and a runner on second. Are you disputing this? Do the math - add up the percents in the cells. Who cares if you're less likely to score just one run? Since when do you get penalized for scoring more runs? In all of the other cases that you're ignoring (scoring 2 runs, 3 runs, 4 runs, etc.), not only did you score one run, you scored more! If you're down by a run then scoring 1 run is nice and scoring 2 runs is even better, and scoring 3 runs is even better, etc. If you hit a homerun with the bases loaded the odds of scoring just 1 run are 0%. So you should never hit a homerun with the bases loaded? Of course not, because if you hit a homerun with the bases loaded the odds of scoring 4 runs is 100%. Now I agree, that it's far more complicated than the chart that you posted, but please help me understand. Based on your chart, are you disputing that with no outs and a runner on first you are more likely to score a run (any number) than with 1 out and a runner on second?

And he was wrong if you are talking about the chances that the runner himself will score, only of course based on the average outcome of thousands of in-game situations. For any one given scenario many things need to be considered before making a decision and there is not absolute right/wrong decision or formula that can account for the uniqueness of every in-game situation. I think people are misreading the chart. You cannot simply compare the two bolded cells. They only show the percentage that a single run was scored. However, we can assume that in cases where 2, 3, 4, etc. runs were scored that "the runner himself" scored as well. And anyway, the important question is really "what are the odds that we'll score in a given scenario?". All we really care about is scoring runs (and scoring more runs is better so I'm not sure why you're ignoring these cases). I'm assuming that this is what Earl Weaver was really concerned about (regardless of how the earlier poster paraphrased his comments). Based on your chart, we need to add ALL the cells where a run is scored (or we could just subtract from 100 percent the cell showing what percent 0 runs were scored). Percent of time a run is scored with a runner on first and no outs = .176+.132+.067+.034+.028 = .437 Percent of time a run is scored with a runner on second and 1 out = .23+.098+.0045+.018+.014 = .405 In other words, with a runner on first and 0 outs at least one run is scored 43.7% of the time. With a runner on second and 1 out at least one run is scored 40.5% of the time. You can argue semantics, but it's pretty clear in my mind and it's pretty clear from the numbers that you presented that Earl Weaver was right. Is summary: When you bunt and move a runner over at the cost of an out, historical data shows that you are less likely to score 1 or more runs in the inning. Your chart very clearly proves this.

Why? 2 quick reasons why I like him: 1. He shows up as a guest on sports talk shows on San Francisco AM 680 every so often and comes across as a humorous, intelligent, and down-to-earth guy. I like him more and more every time I hear him and really hope he turns to a career in broadcasting when his MLB days are over. 2. A few years back I was at an A's game and some bozo ran onto the field to enjoy his 5 seconds of fame. At first it was one of those ha-ha type things, but after a few minutes of avoiding security it started to get old and annoying (I paid to watch a ballgame, not to see some drunk jerk get chased by security). Anyway, at some point the guy made a sprint towards right-field and started to climb the wall (I assume he thought he could get back into the stands and avoid security). Eric Byrnes was playing right-field that day and as soon as the joker tried to climb the wall, Byrnes ripped him down and restrained him until security came. Oh... and later on in the game Byrnes made a diving attempt at a foul-ball that he missed by about 5 feet - it was awesome and hilarious.