How many people have to be in a room before the odds of two or more of them having the same birthday is greater than 50%. The answer is 23. How many players are on a major league team? 25
So more than half of major league rosters should contain two players with the same birthday (not year). I selected 20 winning teams, most of whom played in the World Series. I used the 30 players from each team which improve my odds of winning. What do you think happened?
Below is a grid of the Birthday Boy results. If you have a name, year and team that matches what I found, I will add it to the grid. If you add a pair not on my list and it meets the criteria described, I will add it to the grid as well. Given the premise above there are no doubt hundreds of birthday boys and my answers only cover twenty teams each in a specific year.
One team had three players with the same birthday
Team Yr_Brooklyn 1953_ :
Loes &
Erskine &
Shuba December 13th
One team had six players with three pairs of birthdays that matched
Team Yr __New York AL 1927_ :
Koenig_&_
Meusel Jul 19th :
Collins_&_
Reuther Sep 13th :
Paschal_&_
Gazella Oct 17th
One team had two players who were born on the same day, month and year
Team Yr _New York AL 1953_ : _
Rizzuto_ & __
Sain_ Sep 25, 1917
Another team also had two players born on the same day and two other players with the same birthday
Team Yr _Kansas City 1980_: __
Porter_ & __
LaCock_ Jan 17, 1952
and another matching pair: _
Chalk_ & _
Martin_ Aug 30th
And seven other teams had one pair each of matching birthdays
Team Yr _Chicago AL 1917_: _
Risberg_ & _
McMullen__ Oct 13th
Team Yr _Boston AL 1946_: _
Moses__ & _
Metkovich_ Oct 8th
Team Yr _Baltimore 1969_: _
Salmon_ & __
Dalrymple_ Dec 3rd
Team Yr _NY Mets 1986__: _
HoJo (Johnson)_ & _?
Anderson_ Nov 29th
Team Yr _San Fran 1993__: _
Burkett__ & _
Williams_ Nov 28th
WOW
Team Yr _Cleveland 1995__: _
Mesa__ & __
Tavarez___ May 22nd
Team Yr _Seattle 2001__: _
Halama_ & __
Sasaki__ Feb 22nd
If you add a pair not on my list and it meets the criteria described, I will add it to the grid as well.
So it works for this small sample with a total of 14 pairs of players on 20 teams with matching birthdays or 70%.
I used only 25 players instead of 23.
Over half the teams with 25 man rosters should have a pair of birthday boys. This is only a small, but representative sample. There are hundreds of birthday boys defined this way on Major League rosters.
I think the correct answer will surprise most people. So the next time you are in a bar or at a party with 25 people, place your bet and see how many takers you get. Most of the time you will win. Good luck.
I'll even give you a hint to get you started
Two of the teams in my grid faced each other in the 1953 World Series.