The Baseball Gauge Glossary
Bill James' Favorite Toy (Career Assessments)
Intro
Favorite Toy is described in the Bill James Handbook as "A method that takes into account a player's age and performance level in predicted the probability that he will accumulate certain career stats." This method would later be referred to as "Career Assessments".
Remaining Seasons
Remaining seasons = 24 - .6 * age
* cannot be lower than 1.5
Established Level
Yr1 = Statistic in most recent season
Yr2 = Statistic in the year before the most recent season
Yr3 = Statistic two years before the most recent season
Established Level = (Yr1 * 3 + Yr2 * 2 + Yr3) / 6
* Established Level cannot be lower than 75% of the statistic from the most recent season
Projected Remaining Total
Projected remaining total = Remaining seasons * Established Level
Probability of Reaching Goal
Needed = goal - career total
Probability = Projected remaining total - (Needed / 2) / Needed
* cannot be higher than .97^(Needed / Established Level)