PECOTA (Player Empirical Comparison and Optimization Test Algorithm), what the hell does that mean? It’s pretty simple, you’ve heard of analytics in baseball haven’t you? Of course you have! It gets shoved down our throats more and more with each passing season. It’s become a valuable tool used in every level of a major league organization, from drafting players right up to the major league clubhouses across the game. PECOTA was established back in 2002 by a man named Nate Silver. It was used by Baseball Prospectus in 2003 with Silver managing it until 2009 when BP assumed control of it. It’s a major tool used in fantasy baseball player projections, using advanced sabermetric categories created by BP for their annual report on not only each individual player, but each team as a whole prior to a season. That’s a lot of info, and in theory, it has a relatively significant amount of accurate information when reviewed at seasons end. So what’s the problem you ask? Analytics and sabermetrics are only a part of the game, but what can’t be factored into there fancy algorithms is the human element.
