performance variance

E

evergruven

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
thinking about my pool game, my low gear, average gear, high gear
and wondering in general, how a player's performance might vary, and over time
I feel like I very rarely have a "bad" day at the table, but I'm also not very good ^_^
I do find that poor play can be contagious, and that if I miss one I really have to reset
top pros don't usually seem to miss much, but I guess it's all relative
missing a few balls, or even one ball in a match could mean the difference for them
whereas at lower levels, missing multiple balls in a game is not unusual

and what about fargos? that's meant to be our average level?
I wonder if/how fargos at different levels indicate how much a players performance could vary over time
etc...typing out loud. what say y'all? notice anything about how your/others' pool performance varies?
 
i couldnt find a link but i remember a mike page video
the gist of what i remember is we all have a 50 degree (for example ) variance in our best day and worst day
pro or amateur
difference is if you are a 750 pro your worst day is 700 which still looks very good to most people watching but you know you are not playing well
and if you are 550 player
there is a more obvious difference of you as 500 player and you as a 600 player
this was based on alot of data
 
Fargo definitely measures averages. However, I would be interested to see the standard deviation for each player as well. I think it would be very interesting to see if say a 700 player could ever hit an 800 level for a tournament or so.
 
LHP5 said:
Fargo definitely measures averages. However, I would be interested to see the standard deviation for each player as well. I think it would be very interesting to see if say a 700 player could ever hit an 800 level for a tournament or so.
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If you're into the math, check the FAQ on FargoRate website, where they go deep into this. Gleaming over, it's my understanding that 500 represents the median, meaning 50% of the total sample are above this and the remainder 50% are below. They currently have a sample size of 19 million games, and nearly 240K player profiles.

You can read the FAQ on Fargorate website, explaining all the math. In the user profile, there are player stats, including chart mapping out rating change. I remember seeing either a Mike Page or FargoRate post that Yapp, Gorst or one of the top pros had a potential 860 Fargo based on the string of recent wins.
 
evergruven said:
thinking about my pool game, my low gear, average gear, high gear
and wondering in general, how a player's performance might vary, and over time
I feel like I very rarely have a "bad" day at the table, but I'm also not very good ^_^
I do find that poor play can be contagious, and that if I miss one I really have to reset
top pros don't usually seem to miss much, but I guess it's all relative
missing a few balls, or even one ball in a match could mean the difference for them
whereas at lower levels, missing multiple balls in a game is not unusual

and what about fargos? that's meant to be our average level?
I wonder if/how fargos at different levels indicate how much a players performance could vary over time
etc...typing out loud. what say y'all? notice anything about how your/others' pool performance varies?
Click to expand...

A "normal" swing in ability day to day is 50 pts +- in Fargo skill rating. Which means about half a skill level, so a B can play like a C- or a B+ on various days but still be a B. Also keep in mind that layouts after the break can mean good or bad feeling racks. You can get a few tricky racks and not run out or take several innings, or get an easy rack and run out and feel like a pro.

The better one gets just means that the "bad" days can still be good play compared to others. A C player having a bad day can mean they look almost like a beginner, while an A player having an off day can still run out a rack, just maybe with some worse position play.

LHP5 said:
Fargo definitely measures averages. However, I would be interested to see the standard deviation for each player as well. I think it would be very interesting to see if say a 700 player could ever hit an 800 level for a tournament or so.
Click to expand...

There is no way someone can play 100 points over their skill rating over a whole tournament, and very very unlikely over even a race to 7. But... if in a match one player is shooting at their top ability and the other is playing on the lower end, it may look like there is a larger difference between their skill. For example I have watched Immonen almost lose to a B player in a race to 7, he was down like 5-2 or 5-3, just takes one to be playing good and the other to be playing bad.

To most players a 700 and an 800 can look almost identical if you think about it. All they see is someone making a ton of balls, the difference is when they get to the hard shots, kicking, banks, safety play. A 650-700 Fargo can string several racks, an 800 can string several racks, to some random player they look to be the same skill level unless they watch closely or for a long time comparing the players.
 
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I can play at an 800 fargo rate for half a rack (9B), what's that mean?

Hopefully it's the last half of the rack! 🤣:cry:

Unfortunately I believe the above scenario probably means I need more practice.

Kidding aside I'd rather play at 75% of my top level and never have the peaks and valleys. Consistency is great but not the easiest thing to achieve.
 
boogieman said:
I can play at an 800 fargo rate for half a rack (9B), what's that mean?

Hopefully it's the last half of the rack! 🤣:cry:

Unfortunately I believe the above scenario probably means I need more practice.

Kidding aside I'd rather play at 75% of my top level and never have the peaks and valleys. Consistency is great but not the easiest thing to achieve.
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your true fargo is 400 !!!!!!!!!!😂😂
jk
 
boogieman said:
I can play at an 800 fargo rate for half a rack (9B), what's that mean?

Hopefully it's the last half of the rack! 🤣:cry:

Unfortunately I believe the above scenario probably means I need more practice.

Kidding aside I'd rather play at 75% of my top level and never have the peaks and valleys. Consistency is great but not the easiest thing to achieve.
Click to expand...

I usually play like a pro for the first 6-7 balls in 9 ball then like a C player in the last few balls, so average out to a 550.
 
The old school of thought was that the better you got the closer your average and bad day got to your best day. Perhaps what fargo is saying in a different way.

A bigger gap between a five and five fifty than an eight and eight fifty?

Hu
 
ShootingArts said:
The old school of thought was that the better you got the closer your average and bad day got to your best day. Perhaps what fargo is saying in a different way.

A bigger gap between a five and five fifty than an eight and eight fifty?

Hu
Click to expand...
Fargo says 100 point difference works out to twice as many games won so a race to 10 will end 10-5. 50 points should be about 10-7.
bbb said:
difference is if you are a 750 pro your worst day is 700 which still looks very good to most people watching but you know you are not playing well
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Yes, a pro playing well may make an error per 20 shots and on a bad day may make an error per 10 shots. If I make an error once every 5 shots, I'm having a good day. I'd like to see Fargo referenced to TPA. When I'm at the table, I'm considering my likelihood of making a shot or safety more than my likelihood of winning games, it's easier to observe. TPA is analogous to a batting average, Fargo is analogous to wins above replacement.
 
tomatoshooter said:
Fargo says 100 point difference works out to twice as many games won so a race to 10 will end 10-5. 50 points should be about 10-7.

Yes, a pro playing well may make an error per 20 shots and on a bad day may make an error per 10 shots. If I make an error once every 5 shots, I'm having a good day. I'd like to see Fargo referenced to TPA. When I'm at the table, I'm considering my likelihood of making a shot or safety more than my likelihood of winning games, it's easier to observe. TPA is analogous to a batting average, Fargo is analogous to wins above replacement.
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What is TPA?
 
bbb said:
What is TPA?
Click to expand...
I think it means Total Performance Average. They have it on a lot of the older Accu-Stats matches. It's calculated (I believe) by dividing the successful shots, either pocketed balls or successful safeties, by total shots. I've only seen it done for individual matches, not as something that represents longer trends. There is some nuance in judging safeties and 2 way shots, similar to earned runs and errors in baseball. There may be a little more to it, but that's the general idea. I don't know if breaks are included.

Winning players often have a TPA of .900-.930. Losing players are often around .850-.900. Those numbers are for top pros in the later stages of a tournament so there is some selection bias towards the best players performing at their best, the guys that had a bad week got bounced in the early rounds. I don't see it used so much in recent tournaments, but I think I saw Joshua Filler had a .950 in one of his typically flawless performances.

Fargo is great but I think it's easier to assess a particular performance with TPA. I know if I make a successful shot 1 additional time in 10 shots my TPA goes up .100. I have no idea how many Fargos that is.
 
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Something i'm curious about is the evolution of a player's fargo rating.

Is a players FR more likely to peak then diminish or more likely to peak then level off, then diminish?

Are the up-and-coming players identifiable by the rate of change of their FR?

I attended a tournament about 4 or 5 years ago. John Morra, Thorsten Hohmann, Mika Immonen, and Shane van Boening were all playing. I noted that Shane was FR 817 or something, and John, Thorsten, and Mika were all around 785.

4 or 5 years later, Shane is over 830, but John, Thorsten, and Mika are all still around 785.

Mike Deschaine has been around FR 800 for years.

Tyler was 750 a couple of years ago but is now 760. Not climbing as fast as I expected.

Is this levelling of the FR attributable to less matches played?

It would be great if the FR app, or web site, allowed you to look at the monthly average of a players FR over, say, a 2-year period, with the number of monthly matches displayed in a bar chart below.
 
Those pro players’ ratings will basically never drop due to the huge number of games they have in the system and the fact that those games are never removed from the model.

Let’s say Shane got 50 points worse overnight and became a 780. He has almost 19000 games in the database. He would need to play literally thousands of games at the 780 level before his rating decreased appreciably. And in fact, because games are never removed from Fargo - their impact to the model is just down-weighted - he would *always* be rated over his actual 780 skill level.

This is especially problematic for pros with a ton of games, a career peak, and then a decline. Mike Dechaine is example A for this, with an unchanged world-class rating despite never playing, but the bigger issue is with pros who stopped playing tournaments because they got worse. And it will affect anyone whose skill has started to decline - their rating will never catch up to their skill level.
 
skip100 said:
Those pro players’ ratings will basically never drop due to the huge number of games they have in the system and the fact that those games are never removed from the model.

Let’s say Shane got 50 points worse overnight and became a 780. He has almost 19000 games in the database. He would need to play literally thousands of games at the 780 level before his rating decreased appreciably. And in fact, because games are never removed from Fargo - their impact to the model is just down-weighted - he would *always* be rated over his actual 780 skill level.

This is especially problematic for pros with a ton of games, a career peak, and then a decline. Mike Dechaine is example A for this, with an unchanged world-class rating despite never playing, but the bigger issue is with pros who stopped playing tournaments because they got worse. And it will affect anyone whose skill has started to decline - their rating will never catch up to their skill level.
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I understood games are removed from Fargo after two years, and within that two-year span, the the older the game the less weight it has on the rating.
 
gerryf said:
I understood games are removed from Fargo after two years, and within that two-year span, the the older the game the less weight it has on the rating.
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Games are never removed. Their impact on your rating decreases by half every 3 years.

So if you played 50 games in a tournament 3 years ago, those results contribute as much data as 25 games today.

This is why Mike Dechaine’s rating is not changing - his old games would be worth less relative to new games in creating his rating, but he doesn’t have any new games.

FargoRate -- a look behind the curtain - FargoRate Blog

News and usage hints for FargoRate.
fargorate.com
 
skip100 said:
Games are never removed. Their impact on your rating decreases by half every 3 years.

So if you played 50 games in a tournament 3 years ago, those results contribute as much data as 25 games today.

This is why Mike Dechaine’s rating is not changing - his old games would be worth less relative to new games in creating his rating, but he doesn’t have any new games.

FargoRate -- a look behind the curtain - FargoRate Blog

News and usage hints for FargoRate.
fargorate.com
Click to expand...
Thanks for the link. I think i understand that. And from the link, 6 year old games are rated at 1/4 of present day games, so a 3-year half-life.

That link you provided led me to the FargoRate Facebook page.

They do provide this graph showing the changes in the world's top four.

1665718880653.png
 
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skip100 said:
Games are never removed. Their impact on your rating decreases by half every 3 years.

So if you played 50 games in a tournament 3 years ago, those results contribute as much data as 25 games today.

This is why Mike Dechaine’s rating is not changing - his old games would be worth less relative to new games in creating his rating, but he doesn’t have any new games.

FargoRate -- a look behind the curtain - FargoRate Blog

News and usage hints for FargoRate.
fargorate.com
Click to expand...
Mike's not playing a lot. But he is playing. We have 5 events in ME and RI over the last year, and he has performed at 804 speed for those.
 
When I look at my FargoRate I can see a 50 point swing in my rating. However in a race to 4 I did beat a 724 4-1 then lost to him 3-1 and lost to a 709 4-1, So I’d say my swing is more like 75 but it’s rare for me to catch a big gear.
 
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