Fishing in the Bay

Tim Lane is considered by many to be an elite sports commentator. And he is not at all afraid of bringing some quantitative insights to his analysis of the great game of AFL. Indeed, some claim he is one of the inspiriation for Stan the Statistician. Back in July 2005, he took it upon himself to add some quantitative meat to the laments of Victorian fans that too many foreign clubs were finishing too high up the ladder. The rather remarkable article is HERE.

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Probably the best known sporting statistic in Australia is Don Bradman’s career test average – 99.94. Oh the pain of that final duck. Even a poor score would have put his average over 100. Is there some way that a creative statistician might argue that the average is somehow biased downwards and that the “real’ average is greater than 100?

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From Westpac Australasian Daily.

Market themes & issues: DP data sends AUD soaring. The main focus today was the Australian Q1 GDP data. Market forecasts had been nudged higher as the partial data was generally stronger than expected, so the AUD was well supported heading into the number. In the event the market was not disappointed with the result coming in much stronger than expected. This sent the AUD through 0.8400 in quick order and from there it has been a steady grind higher towards the 0.8440 level, which we currently sit just below. This is the highest level for AUD/USD since 1989. Market pricing now puts the probability of a rate hike in August at 55% and over 100% by November.

(Thanks to Mark Crosby for the alert. )

Some of you may watch the program Mythbusters on SBS. There are many things that I like about the program. The sheer enthusiasm of the two presenters has to be admired in gentlemen their age. And I also sign on to the central premise of the show, namely that folklore and urban myths should be empirically tested and subject to the verdict of nature. Unfortunately, the whole endeavour came unstuck last night, because they do not know anything about experimental design in agricultural field trials.

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From today’s Age: It’s official: women are better drivers than blokes, at least according to one survey.Research by insurer AAMI, released today, shows men are more likely to drive dangerously and have been in more crashes.

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From today’s Telegraph:

JPMorgan economist Helen Kevans said steady producer prices could be a sign that inflation is not rising fast enough for the Reserve Bank of Australia(RBA) to raise interest rates next week.

It’s a precursor to Consumer Price Index (CPI), but there’s not a lot of correlation between the two series…

Ms Kevans said. By way of clarification, she went on to explain

We would expect a CPI on the lower side of our expectations.

* Thanks to Mike Smith for alerting me to these pearlers.

Maybe one-day cricket is not real cricket. Certainly it began as pure entertainment. There are several differences in the rules for the short form of the game. For instance, leg side bowling is not allowed, which doesn’t really bother me much though it does seem unnecessary. But I do have a major problem with a quite different one-day rule. And it is an ethical problem not a technical one.

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Warney is bowling around the wicket to a right hander. It is the one that keeps straight. It pitches one inch outside leg stump, hits the pad in front of leg stump, going on to hit off. Decision? Not out. If the batman was a left hander, the same ball has pitched outside off stump. Decision? Out. See the difference? I don’t!

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