Playing head games can be a brain drain

Bill James was in the house, but his computer probably was already exhausting enough megabytes trying to explain how Bronson Arroyo was gone three batters into the fourth inning while the rest of the Red Sox managed just one hit in 10 at-bats with runners in scoring position during last night's 7-2 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays.

Mrs. Koykka, my high school Algebra II teacher, didn't have much use for baseball or for me, so she wasn't an option, either.

I could have taken a crack at the problem, but having already displayed my ignorance of David Ortiz's favorite hip-hop/rap music -- it's reggaeton, not reggaetron (sorry Daddy Yankee) -- there was no point in showing my inability to handle a pocket calculator in the same week.

Fortunately, when in Boston, you don't have to look far for someone smarter than a sportswriter, which is how my search took me from Yawkey Way to Hemenway Street, where I enlisted David Malouf, a Tufts grad with a degree in economics, and two of his buddies, both with degrees from MIT, Carter Powers and Cory Zue, to answer the question surely vexing many Sox fans this morning: What is the probability of the Red Sox returning to the playoffs?

''No problem," said Malouf, who's taking a year off before going to dental school and has tickets for Saturday's game against the Yankees. ''I took statistical probability, and these other guys are both brainiacs. We'll get back to you in no time."

With four games left, the Red Sox have a record of 92-66, which leaves them a game behind the Yankees in the American League East but tied with the Cleveland Indians for the wild card. A fourth team in the equation, the White Sox, have a record of 95-63 and lead the Indians in the AL Central by three games.

The Red Sox host the Yankees for the last three games of the season, while the White Sox play their final three in Cleveland. In the event of ties at the end of play Sunday, there were possibilities of a one-game playoff on Monday, or even back-to-back playoff games Monday and Tuesday, in the event of a three-way tie.

Johnny Damon's head isn't the only one spinning over the possibilities.

Malouf said give him a few minutes, and he'd call back.

Truth be told, it took him a while longer than he imagined.

''We're still working on the wild-card probabilities, but here is the breakdown for the divisions," he said. ''American League East, the Yankees have a 67.4 percent probability of winning, the Red Sox 32.6 percent. American League Central, Chicago has a 93.75 percent chance of winning, Cleveland 6.25 percent."

Zue took the phone. ''Do you want to know how we arrived at that?"

Well, yeah.

''We're assuming that all the teams are equally likely to win [today]," he said. ''We gave each team a two-thirds chance of winning, based on the records. The last three games, we gave each team a 50-50 chance of winning each game, because they're playing equivalent teams."

Zue added a qualifier. ''This is not an exact science, obviously."

So true. Where's the equation that would have predicted the Sox would lose back-to-back games on the same homestand for the first time since mid-July, or that Arroyo would lose for the first time this month, or that Frank Catalanotto could whack seven straight hits off Sox pitchers over the course of two games? Does Ortiz trying to bunt his way on in the seventh compute?

And that's just last night. How about tonight? Does Aaron Small, the gypsy pitcher who was going to quit in July, run his record to 10-0 for the Yankees in Baltimore? Do the Indians, the hottest team in baseball until Grady Sizemore lost a line drive in the sun Sunday afternoon in the bottom of the ninth in Kansas City, really get swept at home by the Devil Rays? Does Kevin Millar, who left runners on base by the handful last night, turn the boos to cheers tonight?

And that doesn't even begin to address the weekend series against the Yankees, the most eagerly awaited season finale since 1978. And how can anyone trust the numbers after what happened last October, when the Sox made a mockery of precedent and probability with their outrageous comeback against the Bombers after trailing three games to none.

It was 11:55 p.m. when the phone rang again. It was Malouf.

''We can't make this calculation," he said. ''We tried putting together a computer program and everything, but there are a number of permutations, and there just isn't enough time. We're so sorry."

The brainiacs go down swinging. We'll just have to let the baseball sort itself out. See you at 7:05.