Pitch Count

I was continuing to think about the baseball salaries. I'm not picking on Tom but just using him as an example.

Major League baseball pitchers are typically limited to about 100 pitches per game (if they are doing well enough to stay in that long). Therefore, if you take the $250,000 per game that Tom Glavine will average and divide by 100 (knowing that he won't throw 100 pitches in all his starts) then with each pitch he makes $2500.

These kinds of calculations help students get an idea on how big the number 8 million is. Free agency has driven up salaries until multiple year contracts totaling over $100 million dollars seem common place. It is really hard to get a grasp on how big that number is. I'm not sure the players themselves have thought through how much they are making.

You can do all kinds of baseball math. You could have students calculating batting averages, ERAs for pitchers, each player's percentage of the total payroll, it goes on and on. If you love stats, there are lots to do. It is a great way to get boys involved in a math project.