A total of 694 people entered the 32 Predictions contest, including Ben Lindbergh and me, but not including the nine of you who didn't leave a name and the 10 of you who entered after the deadline. Those weren't good strategies for winning.
Sixty-nine percent of you thought Ben would score better than I would, which, frankly, is pretty insulting. He did enter before me, so he owns the tie-breaker.
The most lopsided question was Runs + RBI by Bryce Harper over Carlos Beltran at 96% to 4%. There were five questions within 51/49, and the only 50/50 question was James Shields Wins vs Wil Myers HRs
Below is a list of frequencies for every question, sorted most to least lopsided. Some participants decided not to answer every question, which, again, wasn't a good strategy.
| Q# | More Popular | Less Popular | ||
| Q4 | RBI + Runs by 20-year old Bryce Harper | 96% | RBI + Runs by 36-year old Carlos Beltran | 4% |
| Q10 | SOs by Stephen Strasburg | 94% | SOs by Pedro Alvarez | 6% |
| Q30 | Tim Lincecum's actual ERA | 93% | Tim Lincecum's projected PECOTA ERA of 3.04 | 7% |
| Q23 | PA by Giancarlo Stanton for the Marlins | 92% | PA*2.5 by Giancarlo Stanton NOT for the Marlins | 8% |
| Q19 | Swings and misses by Marco Scutaro | 90% | Bases stolen on Yadier Molina | 10% |
| Q25 | TAv by Anthony Rizzo | 82% | TAv by Yonder Alonso | 18% |
| Q27 | K-BB for Jesus Montero | 82% | K-BB for Michael Pineda | 18% |
| Q12 | MLB hitters suspended for PED use | 73% | MLB pitchers suspended for PED use | 27% |
| Q5 | BBs by Jeff Francoeur | 72% | BBs by Mariano Rivera | 28% |
| Q22 | Outs made by Michael Young | 71% | Outs made by Delmon Young | 29% |
| Q32 | Correct answers by Ben Lindbergh | 69% | Correct answers by Sky Kalkman | 31% |
| Q3 | Adam Dunn's three true outcomes rate | 66% | Craig Kimbrel's strikeout rate | 34% |
| Q1 | WARP by Mike Trout | 64% | WARP by Miguel Cabrera | 36% |
| Q9 | Managerial changes in August-September | 64% | Managerial changes in April-July | 36% |
| Q16 | HRs by any two other Yankees | 64% | HRs +10 by Robinson Cano | 36% |
| Q31 | IP by Dustin McGowan | 63% | HRs by Ben Revere | 37% |
| Q15 | Matt Cain’s FIP-ERA | 63% | Zack Greinke's ERA-FIP | 37% |
| Q21 | Most runs scored by one team in 9-inn G | 62% | Most times caught stealing by any one player | 38% |
| Q26 | SLG*10 by cheating Melky Cabrera | 61% | ERA by cheating Bartolo Colon | 39% |
| Q13 | First time MVP and Cy Young winners | 60% | Repeat MVP and Cy Young winners | 40% |
| Q14 | Games played by the concussed Carlos Santana | 58% | Games played by the concussed Justin Morneau | 42% |
| Q17 | TB+BB by beard champion Jayson Werth | 58% | TB+BB by beard champion Josh Reddick | 42% |
| Q11 | SLG by Brendan Ryan | 57% | OBP by Brendan Ryan | 43% |
| Q18 | SOs by the 6'5" starter Clayton Richard | 57% | SOs by the 5'7" reliever Tim Collins | 43% |
| Q6 | BPro's Top 101 hitting prospects to get MLB PA | 57% | BPro's Top 101 pitching prospects to get MLB out | 43% |
| Q7 | MVP voting points for Matt Wieters | 55% | MVP voting points for Ben Zobrist | 45% |
| Q29 | Average speed of Felix Hernandez's curveball | 54% | Average speed of R.A. Dickey's fastball | 46% |
| Q24 | Most wins by an Astros starting pitcher | 51% | Most losses by a Nationals starting pitcher | 49% |
| Q2 | HRs by B.J. and Justin Upton | 51% | SBs by B.J. and Justin Upton | 49% |
| Q20 | AVG by Albert Pujols | 51% | OBP by Alexei Ramirez | 49% |
| Q28 | IP by Roberto "Fausto Carmona" Hernandez | 51% | IP by Scott Kazmir | 49% |
| Q8 | Wins by James Shields | 50% | HRs by Wil Myers | 50% |
I calculated a groupthink score for each entry by averaging the overall popularities of each of the entry's choices. A higher number means an entry looks more like the consensus entry (non-answers counted as the average, 59.3%, which is also then the average groupthink score across all entries.) The most groupthink entry belongs to oltarzewskt1 at 65.8%, and the least conforming entry (by far) goes to Scott Pelarski at 44.3%. My entry is 59.0% groupthink, Ben's is 61.2% (what a hack).
You can find a full list of entries here, sorted by time of entry, with Ben's entry and my entry at the top. It includes the groupthink score, too.
Thanks for entering. I have a lot of fun with this contest every year. I may post standings part way through the season, or November may be the next time you hear about this, when the free year of Baseball Prospectus is handed out to the winner.
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At least I was on vacation at a beach.
Did you make any sort of effort to pick less popular options? It's certainly a solid strategy when trying to win vs just trying to score well.