A huge hat tip to Joe Budd at Amazin’ Avenue for pointing me to this blog post from Masters of WAR, evaluating statistically The Simpsons’ Waylon Smithers’ ability to put together the best possible company softball team given a massive amount of resources at his disposal.

Smithers, the post points out, failed pretty miserably, frequently opting for players who were past their primes, who were about to regress, or who were simply overrated. It almost looks as if Montgomery Burns’ interminable yes-man put together a team built to win in the realm of public perception, more than one built to win games over Shelbyville.

It still should have been enough to easily beat Shelbyville in the episode, of course, but the players on Springfield’s club fell victim to a series of weird injuries and unforeseen circumstances, and Smithers had lined up no reasonable roster depth beyond scrubs like Lenny and Carl.

The happy ending, of course, is that even despite the misappropriation of resources in compiling the roster, despite the loss of so many star players, and despite a bizarre managerial decision based on maximizing platoon splits where none likely existed, Springfield prevailed in the end.

Homer Simpson earned the glory — when he came to, of course — but certainly Smithers ultimately earned a contract extension for his efforts, however ineffective.