Overthinking It: PECOTA Through The Looking-Glass

As backronyms go, “Player Empirical Comparison and Optimization Test Algorithm” is squarely on the intimidating side. That’s why it’s somewhat comforting that our BP-branded projection system also has a human face, even if that face couldn’t muster a very convincing mustache. For those who’ve joined us late, PECOTA’s name is jack-of-all-forecasts Nate Silver’s nod to Bill Pecota, a light-hitting utility infielder of the 1980s and ’90s whose scrappy play earned him entrance to even the most hardened of baseball analysts’ hearts, despite questionable artistic taste and the kind of stat lines that normally invite ridicule from the sabermetric set (especially when they’re associated with someone wearing a Kansas City uniform).

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