Get in the Game

An award-winning math popularizer, who has advised the US Olympic Committee, NFL, and NBA, offers sports fans a new way to understand truly improbable feats in their favorite games. In 2013, NBA point guard Steph Curry wowed crowds when he sunk 11 out of 13 three-pointers for a game total of 54 pointsonly seven other players, including Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, had scored more in a game at Madison Square Garden. Four years later, the University of Connecticut womens basketball team won its hundredth straight game, defeating South Carolina 6655. And in 2010, one forecasteran octopus named Paulcorrectly predicted the outcome of all of Germanys matches in the FIFA World Cup. These are surprising eventsbut are they truly improbable? In Get in the Game, mathematician and sports analytics expert Tim Chartier helps us answer that questioncondensing complex mathematics down to coin tosses and dice throws to give readers both an introduction to statistics and a new way to enjoy sporting events. With these accessible tools, Chartier leads us through modeling experiments that develop our intuitive sense of the improbable. For example, to see how likely you are to beat Currys three-pointer feat, consider his 45.3 percent three-point shooting average in 201213. Take a coin and assume heads is making the shot (slightly better than Curry at a fifty percent chance). Can you imagine getting heads eleven out of thirteen times? With engaging exercises and fun, comic bookstyle illustrations by Ansley Earle, Chartiers book encourages all readersincluding those who have never encountered formal statistics or data simulations, or even heard of sports analytics, but who enjoy watching sportsto get in the game.