Excitement Index

The Excitement Index is the total distance the win probability traveled during a game. A blowout that was over in the second inning barely moves it. A game with lead changes and a walk-off moves it a lot.

Every play's change in win probability is added up, whichever direction it went.

• Higher means a more back-and-forth game. Extra innings add to it, since there are more plays.
• A game's rank is its place among that season's games in its division: 1 is the most exciting.

• team-schedule and team/{team_name}/game-log: excitement for each game.
• box-score/{game_id} and play-by-play/{game_id}: the value with its rank.
• lookup: search for games by it.

• It needs play-by-play, so a game without it has no value.
• It measures movement, not quality or stakes. A sloppy 14-13 game scores high.