by Carl James • @jovian34 • May 24

Hoosiers still (barely) a 2-seed after early bounce from B1G Tourney

As expected, Indiana’s RPI drops to #34 after the Hoosiers are eliminated from the 2019 B1G Tournament. RPIs in the range 33-45 are generally considered 3-seed territory, but the B1G regular season title will likely give Indiana the bump they need to claim a 2-seed. The NCAA baseball committee values regular season conference champions, or at least has in the past and we expect this to be no different.

Arkansas not a top-8 seed?

One big area my field diverges from most of the national websites is in the failure to grant Arkansas a top-8 national seed. The Razorbacks get the #9 seed and may have to travel for a Super Regional. Now I have made changes to the model, but I make the changes across the board. If I change an adjustment, that applies to all teams. As I make those adjustments, Arkansas does not move up in the rankings.

The Razorbacks are #6 in the RPI and this model is highly RPI based. How did they end up 3 seeds lower?

Arkansas’s metrics in top-50 wins are not obviously better than four of the teams ahead of them (Vanderbilt, UCLA, Georgia, Mississippi State).

East Carolina, while lighter on the top-50 metrics (but still good), won the #5 league by a dominant 7 games. These issues wash in my model and keep the Pirates at a number 5-seed.

Stanford (RPI 13, seeded #6) Recent NCAA Tournament seeding has seen huge bumps in western teams in recent years over their RPIs. I had to account for that in some way. I found a way that worked for 2018 that uses a metric I know the committee would deny using. I’m sticking to it… but I could be wrong and this will be a great test for the model.

Louisville (RPI 9, seeded #7) The Cardinals won the #3 RPI league (the ACC) by two games. There is a boost for that as I mentioned in regards to Indiana and the 17-11 top-50 record is very good.

Texas Tech (RPI 10, seeded #8) The Red Raiders won the #2 RPI league (the Big 12) by a game and their top-50 metrics are solid.

So the conference and western adjustments are hurting Arkansas in this model. I have no good way to quantify the regional advisory committee reports (“the eye test”) so I may be missing that as well.

Automatic Bids

UCLA clinches the Pac-12, but that clearly does not change this model.

Stolen Bids

Right now the last at-large slot is at #47. With a borderline auto/at-large at #46. If a team that is currently assumed to be the automatic bid for their conference losses their conference tournament title to a team not worthy of an at-large bid, both teams will possibly make the field. This will “steal” the last at-large bid. Normally we would expect the line to be drawn at #45 which would happen with one or two stolen bids. in 2018 their was only one stolen bid, while in 2017 there were six. The last four in are all rooting for as few stolen bids as possible.

Steal Potential by Conference:

HIGH POTENTIAL STEAL 1. Big Ten (Nebraska only clear at-large left) MEDIUM POTENTIAL STEAL 1. Conference USA (FAU cruising so far) 2. Big 12 (West Virginia cruising) 3. Mountain West (Fresno State off to good start) 4. American Athletic (UCONN in good shape) 5. Big West - no tourney - leader UC SANTA BARBARA has a magic number of 1 with 2 games to go 6. Big East (Creighton off to good start) LOW POTENTIAL STEALS 1. SEC - most are at-large 2. ACC - most are at-large 3. Missouri Valley - at larges dominating the tourney

About the Model

Bracket predictions are all over the place now on just about any site that covers national Division I College baseball. This field is different. I am not “projecting” with this bracket. This is if the committee had to put the field together today. This is generated by a computer program that I wrote to rank the teams and take multiple factors like geography into account when assigning teams to regionals. This is results-based, using an approximation of techniques to try an match the priorities the NCAA committee showed in the 2018 tournament selection.

Hosts by conference:

SEC: 6, Pac-12: 3, Big 12: 3, ACC: 2, Big West and American: 1 each

Lasts in/firsts out:

Last Four in: 1. SAINT MARY'S COLLEGE 2. FLORIDA 3. FLORIDA STATE 4. UC IRVINE First Four out: 1. SOUTHERN MISS 2. MINNESOTA 3. LOUISIANA TECH 4. ARIZONA