150th Post : Milestones and Cliffhangers

As I have mentioned several times in the last few weeks, the blog re-read that I've been doing has been a lead-up to another milestone on the blog. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the 150th post! It is also the final post for 2015 (I'm banking on no games next week, otherwise I'm going to break my commitment of blogs every week for the rest of the year).

Completely random stats

Much frustration ensued this morning when we were asked to change our game-time for tonight - the third consecutive week that has happened. There are no stats on that, but I think that might be a record. Additionally, we were then told that if we didn't change, we would have no game tonight, and a double-header next week - then we were told we didn't have to change. Everyone loves the organisation at Weston.
To calm the angry hordes, here is a blog. Given that I don't have time to put together anything proper, here is a small selection of random stats.

Winning and Losing Streaks

Here we go... the first blog taken from the blog suggestions page. Don't forget that if you have an idea, get onto that page and post a comment suggesting some stats for a future blog.
Gareth has posted a few ideas to do with wins and losses - so to start with, here's a look at the winning and losing streaks of the Popped Collars.

Season 2014-15 (part 2)

Today we continue (and conclude) the write-up of our performance over the incredibly long season that recently finished. Last post discussed the team's overall performance and looked at individual batting stats - today we do the bowling stats and player contributions.

Season 2014-15 (part 1)

'Tis the end of another season. Number 11 for the Popped Collars (number 21 if you count all the predecessor teams, and number 22 if you count the side project, GG)
As always, stats for the season just gone must be blogged about, so here we go...

Mini stats

After last week's semi-final loss, I thought it was time for another end-of-season blog. But today's game is a "consolation final", and therefore still part of the previous season. So instead, here's a few random little bits and pieces that I've thought about or been asked about over the last few weeks and months.

Winning on your own

Last week's match was a comfortable win for the Popped Collars. The team posted a moderate total of 101 but defended it with little trouble, thanks mainly to Gareth producing supreme bowling figures of 7/-25. After the game, Trompf noted that Gareth's contribution of +44 was significantly more than the team's winning margin of 25. Hence the topic of today's blog.

Disgraceful

Apparently we were a week early with the use of the word "disgraceful"... here's the stats and records from the most recent game. Warning... this post contains graphic stats which some players may find disturbing. Please refrain from reading further if you do not wish to be reminded of this particular match.

(Not) Disgraceful

Last week's "word of the night" was supposed to be 'disgraceful', but after completing a 130 run demolition of It's On Like Donkey Kong there was not much disgrace going around. In fact, records tumbled, primarily during the final pair. The 'disgraceful' was originally a reference to the lack of blog posts recently - and given the existence of this one, even that can no longer have the word applied to it.

Graphs - bowling

See the introduction to last week's post... except this time the graphs are for bowling figures.

Graphs - batting

Here they are, as requested: graphs of players' batting performances over their career. They're pretty simple, no additional information such as running average, and not even any labels on the horizontal (time) axis. The graphs include both Popped Collars and GG games.

A most unlikely victory

Last match for the Popped Collars was another one of those that will surely go down as a classic!
From a position that was seemingly hopeless, the Collars somehow managed to work back into the game against Kerwin's Mob, and pull off one of the great indoor cricket victories!

The batting quiz - answers and more questions...

For those who played along (i.e. who read) last week's "Stats Quiz" post, I will now provide the answers. If you want to go and have a stab at answering the questions before seeing the answers, go here first. For most answers I give, I will also pose a follow-up question... for those who want to keep testing their knowledge of the team/stats!

Stats Quiz (batting edition)

While we play a double-header tonight, if everyone is are getting bored (i.e. "sick of this stupid game"), here's a few Popped Collars stats-related questions. Discuss, suggest some answers, and see who knows (i.e. can guess) the most about our team, and our matches.

My guesses (made before I looked up the answers) are below the questions.
Answers available at the game...

Milestone games

Last week was Gareth's 200th match for the Popped Collars and we celebrated with a good win over a very good opposition. Presumably we were inspired by Gareth personal milestone! If a few weeks time, Sanjit will reach 200 and Xavier 250 during the same match (assuming they both play all matches between now and then). Will we be inspired on that occasion as well? Will the individual players perform well? Or will the crumble under the pressure and emotion of the situation?
The stats cannot answer these questions (yet), but they can look at how players have performed in their milestone games in the past.

2014 Season Stats

Two weeks ago, season 2014 came to an end with It's On Like Donkey Kong defeating Popped Collars in the B-Grade grand final. That match brought to an end the 10th season of existence for the Popped Collars team. In the coming weeks, there will be some blog posts to commemorate the milestone, but before that here are the stats for the season just gone.

Inspirational Stats

It's semi-final week, and time to inspire the troops to perform well. Here are a few quick stats to get you fired up for tonight's big game.

>7

Last week's match against Thrill Killers was indeed a thriller, and contained several instances of balls having more than 7 runs scored off them. Or, in the case of the final ball of the match, almost having more than 7 runs scored off it. Today's very brief blog entry is about scoring more than 7 runs off a single ball.

Contributors in wins and losses

Last week, Popped Collars won a thrilling game, getting home by just 2 runs after Gareth safely wafted at the final ball wide outside the off stump, while Rian invoked Gandhi at the other end. When the stats were compiled, it turned out that only 2 players from the winning team made positive contributions - and one of them was only +1. With that introduction, I'll leave you to deduce the obvious topic of this post.

Everyone's s**t bowling

A continuation of last week's blog about everyone's worst performances with the bat. Today, it's the same thing for bowling.