If you look at the Miami Player Pages for each Monday, you will see a precise accounting of how each player did for the week. A week's performances (the entire schedule of games in one day is called a performance in Quinella based pari-mutual Jai Alai) are quickly summarized by subtracting the figures for the beginning of the previous week from the figures from the beginning of the present week. You can do that yourself or you can check Tiger's Jai Alai Chalk Talk Discussion Forum, which has been active since 2003 and discusses all things Jai Alai (mostly in English). The discussion forum is supported by the Jai Alai Heaven website, which contains a very large and well organized collection of Jai Alai related information. The most important part of JAH from an information standpoint, is the One Stop Info page, which links to all the statistics you'll ever need regarding professional Quinella Jai Alai in the U.S. Tiger takes that info and distills it into a set of weekly data that is tremendously useful for whatever purpose you choose. That is the weekly data that he has so kindly given me permission to copy into my Miami (and soon also into another page for Dania) recurring results page.
One Stop Info, from a librarian's point of view, is about as perfectly organized a web page as you will find anywhere on any topic. In a very small amount of space, Tiger has linked to a very large array of statistics. It is completely intuitive, and for those who wish to follow this type of Jai Alai on a day to day basis, this is the essential bookmark.
I am going to spend a little time trying to explain Quinella Jai Alai in order to help you understand the magnitude of the week that Aritz Erkiaga had between August 31 to September 5, 2016. For those of you who are very familiar with the game, simply scroll down from here to where Aritz' day to day data is (Aritz Erkiaga, like all other players...).
Quinella Jai Alai is a very different discipline from the partido Jai Alai we have been following. It is set up like a horse race, because its main context and purpose is pari-mutual wagering. Each game consists of 8 (singles) or 16 (doubles) players, in other words, eight teams. Team 1 plays one point against Team 2. The winner keeps playing. The loser goes back to the bench and waits for its turn in the rotation to come up again. Games are played to 7 or 9 points. In the first round, each point is worth 1 point. In every subsequent round each point is worth 2 points. This means that a 7 point match can be won with anywhere from 4 to 7 actual points, a 9 point match with anywhere from 5 to 8. There are various types of wagers, the most popular being the trifecta (pick winner, place and show).
In this form of the sport mistakes are harshly punished. A mistake causes your team to be thrown out of the game for, I believe, the next 6 actual points. Games cannot be won from the bench. What this means to the players is that there is no time to get into a rhythm.
At Miami there are 12 games in each performance. Games 1-6 are usually played by the "B" players, games 7-12 usually by the "A" players. Games 1-6 consist of two singles matches, one 9 point match and three 7 point matches. Games 7-12 are a little different in that there are two 9 point matches instead of one. The key word about this set up is "usually." For various reasons, early game players play in late games, and vice versa. The two key variables, variables which change from game to game are "post position" (1-8) and partnerships in the doubles matches. In general, high number post positions such as 6-8 are more difficult to win from. First because a later post position takes longer to get in the game. Second because the number of opportunities to get back into the game after losing a point diminishes as the game progresses.
The uniforms of players are color coded and have two numbers, post position on the front and personal on the back. For anyone who has never watched Quinella Jai Alai, it can be quite confusing at first. The reason for all the confusion is to make the wagering interesting and entertaining. This also makes it more difficult for players to win matches. There is no consistency of anything from match to match.
Quinella Jai Alai at Miami is very demanding. It is played 6 days a week (Tuesday's are off days). Each game is completely different. It is one of the most mentally taxing sports imaginable. Grinding out game after game, day after day, in post position after post position, with partner after partner is extremely difficult. And of course this doesn't begin to deal with the physical demands of the sport.
Aritz Erkiaga, like all other players, usually has a base workload of 5 games a performance. He plays, for the most part, in the late games. For various reasons, his workload for the 6 days we will look at was 39 games, the second highest workload for the week of anyone on the 36 player Miami roster.
Of those 39 games, Aritz (his playing name) won 16. Four players tied for second for the week with 7 wins. Aritz more than doubled the wins of his nearest competitor for the week. If you look at the figures for the week ending August 29 (a "short week" because the Fronton was closed for two days by the threat of dangerous weather) and August 22, which is when I began the Miami page), or if you look at earlier weekly figures that are available at the discussion forum listed above, you will see what a normal spread between the leading winner and the second place winner usually is. Only then can Aritz' week be truly appreciated.
Another way to appreciate this achievement is to look at it a little more closely. I compiled each game Aritz played, day by day. This was more difficult than it might seem, because there were days when he substituted for another player. Tiger provides a list of these substitutions, making such a compilation possible. The substitution list is not guaranteed to be completely accurate, as Tiger explains, but it is the only list we have. Miami Jai Alai, inexplicably, does not provide an official list. So with the knowledge that this might not be the exact, true picture, lets take a look at Aritz' week.
Key:
Game Number (G1,2,...); Post Number (P1, P2...); Finish (F1 (win),2 (place),3(show) or X--out of the money); type of game (7D=7 point doubles, 9D=9 point doubles, 7S=7 point singles); Partner. Aritz plays the front court.
*=Substitute
Wednesday, August 31:
G2,,,,P7....FX....7D....Santiso
G3....P2....F3.....7D....Cisneros
G4....P1....F1.....9D....Alejandro
G7....P3....F1.....7D....Arriza
G8....P7....F2.....9D....Ricky
G10..P6....F3.....9D....Ladutxe
G11..P5....FX....7D....Aldazabal
G12..P2....F2.....7S
8 games, P1, P2(2), P3, P5, P6, P7(2)
2 wins, 2 place, 2 show, 2 out of the money
Won from P1 and P3
Won with Alexandro and Arriza
Thursday, September 1, 2016
G7....P6....F1....D7....Ladutxe
G8....P5....FX...D9....Cisneros
G10..P1....F1....D9....Irastorza
G11..P2....F1....D7....Ricky
G12..P6....FX...S7
5 games, P1, P2, P5, P6(2)
3 wins, 2 out of the money
Won from P1, P2, P6
Won with Ladutxe, Irastorza, and Ricky
Friday, September 2, 2016
G4*...P8....F1....D9....Sierra II
G6*...P3....FX...D7....Spinner
G7.....P8....FX...D7....Manuel
G8.....P8....F3....D9....Ricky
G10...P3....F1....D9....Ladutxe
G11...P1....F1....D7....Duke
G12...P6....F1....S7
7 Games, P1, P3(2), P6, P8(3)
4 wins, 1 show, 2 out of the money
Won from P1, P3, P6, P8
Won with Sierra II, Ladutxe, Duke
Saturday, September 3, 2016
G7....P8....FX....D7....Ricky
G8....P7....F3.....D9....Duke
G10..P8....FX....D9....Manuel
G11..P1....F1.....D7....Cisneros
G12..P3....F1.....S7
5 games, P1, P3, P7, P8(2)
2 wins, 1 show, 2 out of the money
Won P1, P3
Won with Cisneros
Sunday, September 4, 2016
G7....P1....F1....D7....Manuel
G8....P1....F2....D9....Cisneros
G10..P8....FX...D9....Duke
G11..P4....F2....D7....Irastorza
G12..P2....F1....S7
5 games, P1(2), P2, P4, P8
2 wins, 2 place, 1 out of the money
Won from P1, P2
Won with Manuel
September 5, 2016
G2....P4....FX....D7....Aizpitarte
G3....P6....FX....D7....Ladutxe
G4....P8....F2.....D9....Arriza
G5....P1....F1.....S7
G6....P1....FX....D7.....Irastorza
G7*..P6....FX....D7.....Guisasola
G8*..P7....F3.....D9.....Garro
G10..P2....F1.....D9.....Guisasola
G11..P7....F1.....D7.....Duke
9 games, P1(2), P2, P4, P6(2), P7(2), P8
3 wins, 1 place, 1 show, 4 out of the money
Won from P1, P2, P7
Won with Gusasola, Duke
39 games, 16 wins .(410 winning percentage), 5, place, 5 show, 26 in the money (.667 in the money percentage).
Won 4 singles out of 6
Place 1 singles out of 6
Out of the money 1 singles out of 6
Won 12 doubles out of 33
Placed 4 doubles out of 33
Show 5 doubles out of 33
Out of the money 12 doubles out of 33
Won from Post 1: 6 of 8
Won from Post 2: 3 of 5
Won from Post 3: 3 of 4
Won from Post 4: 0 of 2
Won from Post 5: 0 of 2
Won from Post 6: 2 of 6
Won from Post 7: 1 of 5
Won from Post 8: 1 of 7
Won with Alexandro, Arriza, Cisneros, Duke (2), Guisasola, Irastorza, Ladutxe (2), Manuel, Ricky, Sierra II
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