There's also an ongoing debate about if the Rockies have a road disadvantage. Pitches move less in Colorado (due to the thin air), and thus move more in other parks, relatively speaking. It's not definitive, but Rockies hitters appear to take time to adjust to being on the road.Broncos and Colorado Rockies are highest in their particular sports. Seems like a higher altitude is helpful.
Seems to me that if you built a team to take advantage of the unique aspects of your home field/court/rink, you would be unusually advantaged at home and disadvantaged on the road. Not surprising that teams that play at altitude, as well as baseball teams that play in unusual parks (such as the Red Sox), would therefore show up as having relatively large HFAs.There's also an ongoing debate about if the Rockies have a road disadvantage. Pitches move less in Colorado (due to the thin air), and thus move more in other parks, relatively speaking. It's not definitive, but Rockies hitters appear to take time to adjust to being on the road.
Edit: The methods used in the article and for most HFA calculations would not know the difference between a home advantage and a road disadvantage.
True, but there's a difference between building a team to take advantage of a park (Adrian Gonzalez? David Ortiz?) and the effects that the environment have on everyone who plays there. The theory goes that Rockies hitters spend a week in Colorado watching curveballs that don't curve and then can't hit curveballs that do curve when on the road. That's not really an aspect of teambuilding if it affects everyone (which we don't have enough evidence to speak to).Seems to me that if you built a team to take advantage of the unique aspects of your home field/court/rink, you would be unusually advantaged at home and disadvantaged on the road. Not surprising that teams that play at altitude, as well as baseball teams that play in unusual parks (such as the Red Sox), would therefore show up as having relatively large HFAs.
Colorado Avs?Calgary is 3400 feet and the highest NHL team.
Edmonton is 2100 feet and middle of the pack.
Sorry, confusing nomenclature. I didn't mean highest elevation for Calgary, I meant highest home field advantage.Colorado Avs?
As someone who's watched the Rockies since day 1 (I was at Mile High Stadium on April 9, 1993; EY Homerun!), there's no doubt this is the case. This has been discussed on previous SOSH threads, and there was a study done on this, but I can't find it now. Basically, hitting at Coors probably adds about .100 to a player's home OPS (a good hitter, that is), and subtracts .050 from a player's road OPS. The fact that 3 of the 4 other teams in the NL West play at or below sea level makes this more extreme.There's also an ongoing debate about if the Rockies have a road disadvantage. Pitches move less in Colorado (due to the thin air), and thus move more in other parks, relatively speaking. It's not definitive, but Rockies hitters appear to take time to adjust to being on the road.
There's an even bigger study suggesting home court advantage is diminishing because players are drinking less on the road.There has been discussion how the home team advantage in the NBA has been dimished somewhat by phone apps, which means that opposing teams can have, err, "companions" waiting for them at their hotel instead of having to stay out at bars all night looking for company.
Has there been any research on this? I'm guessing this study did not take this into account.
To be fair, the metric is based on odds of beating a team of comparable caliber, so for the Browns it’s probably a small enough sample size that we can write-off any results as mostly noise.Browns ahead of the Packers, Steelers (I have to change my bet this week), and a few other marquee teams.
Did anyone check Tatum's splits for signs of this problem?Let's not forget examples of players performing better on the road because their newborn is keeping them awake at home.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/split.fcgi?id=varitja01&year=2001&t=b