Alec Zelenovic
7th Grade, Gunston Middle School
Arlington, VA
A Multivariable Math Model for Predicting Win Probability in 12U Travel Baseball
Runs scored and runs allowed predict whether a professional baseball team wins a game. Alec wanted to find out what predicted wins for players 12 and under. He developed a mathematical model based on real data and showed that free bases, avoiding strikeouts and good pitching contributed to a win.
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Project Background
Alec has been playing baseball for seven years. While older players use runs scored and runs allowed to predict a win, Alec plays for a 12U team, where everyone is under 12. “I have been in many games where one inning, one walk, or one strikeout changed everything,” he says. “I wondered what really drives a 12U team to win.” Alec was also learning about linear regression in his math class. He decided to create a mathematical model that could tell him what factors mattered most for players 12 and under.
Tactics and Results
Alec started with public data from the GameChanger app, collecting data from 82 12U games played by various teams. For each game, he collected hitting data, including at-bats, runs, hits, walks, strikeouts, doubles or triples and home runs. He also collected pitching data, including strikeouts, total pitches and total strikes. He checked this data for correlations, relationships between different pitching and hitting characteristics and wins. Then, Alec built a mathematical model to test different combinations and find out which patterns were most likely to win a game. His model showed that in 12U, winning a game isn’t really about batting average. Instead, winning teams earned more free bases, avoided strikeouts, added extra-base hits, and pitched with good control. Alec hopes that his model can help players and coaches better analyze their games and put ideas into practice.
Beyond the Project
Baseball is a very big part of Alec’s life. He has played travel baseball for years, and represented Virginia in baseball tournaments for the last two summers. He also really enjoys playing chess and designing and engineering things. “My favorite example was designing and building a gravity car big enough to hold a person,” he says. He would like to become an environmental engineer. “Environmental engineering interests me because I could use similar problem-solving skills for bigger issues rather than baseball, like pollution, clean water, climate and protecting nature,” he says.
