Brilliant Reader Elmaquino5 just put into absolutely perfect words why I find that anti-stats crowd so baffling. He puts it it perfectly in back to back sentences in a comment, the first sentence his own, the second sentence a famous quote by Vin Scully:
First sentence: "That's why I'm content with averages, HRs, etc. I just don't see why you have to get too specific."
Second sentence: "Statistics are used much like a drunk uses a lamppost: For support, not illumination". --Vin Scully.
Why do people who so dislike advanced baseball statistics not realize that counting home runs is figuring a statistic. Batting average is a statistic. Wins -- statistic. RBIs -- statistic. Not only that, they are statistics first figured by the cellar-dwelling, skivvies-wearing drips of the late 19th century and early 20th century. They are the best statistics people had before computers, before the Baseball Encyclopedia, before Bill James, before Pete Palmer, before Rob Neyer, before Fangraphs, before Baseball Reference, Retrosheet, before smart people did a little figuring and determined, "These statistics are fuzzy, and they are often unrevealing, and they can lead us in the wrong direction."
I've often heard people do what Elmaquino does -- use the poetic Vin Scully quote to defend their own desire to avoid and jeer at the advanced statistical world. And that's fine. I've always said that people should enjoy baseball the way they want to enjoy baseball. It is a sport, and it is meant to be loved, and if you love it by doing spreadsheets, if you love it by sitting down the third base line with a beer and without even knowing the players names, if you love it for its history, for its pace, for its drama, for its familiarity, for its connection to spring, for its apparent simplicity, for its apparent complexities, for the way the game reveals character, for the way the game reveals talent, for the way the game rewards consistency, for batting average and wins and RBIs, for UZR and Runs Created and FIP, for whatever ... that's great. Love the game your own way.
But Vin Scully did not first say that quote. It was probably -- though this is somewhat hazy -- Scottish poet Andrew Lang who said, "An unsophisticated forecaster uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts -- for support rather than illumination." Lang died in 1912, long before WAR or VORP or xFIP or wOBA or Win Shares or any of the other stats people try to mock with the quote. Even when Vin Scully first said it, that was also before WAR or VORP or xFIP or wOBA or Win Shares.
In other words: Stick with batting average if you like. Quote wins if you want. Enjoy the game because, damn it, that's why they play the game. But I would suggest that at the very least you keep the superiority levels to a minimum. Because there's a pretty good chance when you quote batting average and wins and RBIs and the like as definitive and authoritative and certain ... well let's just say you probably ought to hold on to a lamp-post.
Circle Me Brick Tamland
ReplyDeleteObviously, I'm biased because I love math and science, but I've never understood how anything that can help us better understand the game is bad. My enjoyment of the game is enhanced by understanding what makes a player good (or bad), but immersion in stats doesn't take away from the sheer joy of watching a great play. But the game is played on different levels, from a devoted fan standpoint. The great throw from deep in the hole is my favorite play in sports, but when wondering which player my Cubs should sign, I'd rather look at a number (or, more precisely, set of numbers) that tells me whether he's a good signing or not, and BA, RBI, HR are not determinative.
ReplyDeleteAs I remember from Moneyball, no one needs advanced stats to tell me that ARod or Pujols is a great player. (Although they're useful for talking about the greatest players.) I need them to see whether Carlos Pena is a better 1-year risk than Derrek Lee.
Is there anywhere else where people so fervently cling to old technology?
ReplyDelete"Yes, I know there are remote controls now, but you people are lazy for using them. I'll just keep getting up."
"Yes, I know we've developed wonderful medicines for illness, but you people are wimps for using them. I'll just stick with leeching and purgatives, thank you very much."
Because that is what this all boils down to. What was once seen as cutting edge technology is now known to be limited, and so we've moved beyond it. Why are so many sportswriters flat-earthers?
"I've never understood how anything that can help us better understand the game is bad"
ReplyDeleteI think because anything that challenges mainstream thinking, anything that isn't widely accepted, forces people to rethink what they know.
Deep down that scares or confuses people because they have to look at baseball (or whatever is being challenged) in a way they haven't thought of and are uncomfortable with.
@nospam, I don't think people don't accept advanced stats because it "challenges mainstream thinking," but with everything else I think it's quite a bit more nuanced.
ReplyDeleteFor the vast majority of us our baseball careers last until we've finished high school. There is no way to figure out stats like OPS+, ERA+, WAR, FIP, Plus/Minus for leagues that the vast majority of people actually played in.
So how can you tell if a player is good defensively or not? Errors and "the eye test." Offensively? BA/HR/RBI. Granted OBP and SLG are simple enough to do but there is no way to "normalize" OPS in a high school league (at least that I'm aware of).
I think it's the same thing with intentional walks and sac bunts. Over the course of 162 games, they might not be the best strategy. MLB is so unlike any other sport in that the very best of the best teams still expect to lose 40% of the time so you have to take the long view. In highschool you are trying to win every game, and you play so few (relatively) that everything gets amplified.
I might be rambling a bit but my main point is that so many advanced stats aren't applicable to anything the vast majority of people have been exposed to so it's at least understandable as to why it would be difficult to catch on.
MLB has been around 125+ years, long enough to give a good sample size.
ReplyDeleteMain arguments for people against new stats
1) it doesn't support their preconceived notion of what is/isn't valuable
2) they tend to argue that they are used by people who haven't played the game. That one is a complete red herring.
3) they think what they know and are afraid to look at something new objectively
Not sure how any of that is skewed by games at levels below Single A.
"An unsophisticated forecaster uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts -- for support rather than illumination."
ReplyDeleteI love how people who use this quote often omit the first three words of it. It's like the people who use Homer Simpson's "Statistics can be used to prove anything" quote without realizing that that's supposed to be a reference to Homer's stupidity, not a jab at statistics.
While we are quoting famous philosophers here, we might want to remember Mark Twain: "There are lies, damned lies and statistics."
ReplyDelete@Robert--
ReplyDeleteAs a stats guy, I hate that quotation. It is usually uttered by know nothings (no offense, I don't know what you know).
I tried to write a long version of this, but it was eaten by the interwebs. Short version: Changing minds is a generational process. Folks think they understand their own line of work, even when they don't (usually). So keep pushing in the right direction and undermining the conventional wisdom. That is the best one can do.
And . . . baseball is almost back. Going to Opening Day in Cincinnati. Soooo looking forward to it. And a great 2011 season.
OUT
Bill James: "I would say generally that baseball statistics are always trying to mislead you, and that it is a constant battle not to be misled by them."
ReplyDelete@Number Three --
ReplyDeleteAmusingly, before I made my post (directly above Robert's) I spent about 15 minutes looking for a great chart that I saw a number of years ago. It was a bar graph with the title "usage of the lies, damn lies quotation" with 99% representing "people who don't understand statistics. " I wish I could find it, but it's funny that directly afterwards it gets brought up.
That lamppost quote from Lang's era (or perhaps earlier) has become rather outdated. The modern-day street drunk has evolved to the point that he or she now sits on the concrete while leaning back against a brick or stone wall. Circle me, Charles Darwin.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the acknowledgement, sir! Probably the best baseball writer out there, and I always say 'The Power to Believe' is like my 'Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu.'
ReplyDeleteI am looking to be a baseball/sports writer when I'm out of school and would appreciate it if your readers would check some of my stuff out: http://bit.ly/dUWxCA. Thanks again!
Anyone ever leaned against a lamppost? Damn things are round and not really good for any support. Especially when drunk.
ReplyDeleteI think the Bill James quote above is pretty accurate. You have to read a lot and really be possessed and passionate about this stuff to really understand it and really know who to read, who to trust and who is full of it.
The critics, whatever they may be, for the most part aren't that passionate about finding a deeper understanding of whatever it is they are watching. Like Joe says, that is ok, but it is incredibly ridiculous to criticize those of us who are.
elmaquino, Joe may have been acknowldging you, but he wasn't complimenting you.
ReplyDeleteI think people are missing a key point. I love the new stats, but for a measurement to broadly take hold it must be transparent enough to be easily understandable. Wins and losses, strikeouts, home runs and RBI, batting average and on base percentage-they all are essentially "visual" and easy to calculate. When you start normalizing stats across ballparks, when you quantify fielding and give it a value in the calculation of someone's WAR, there seems to be a little voodoo in it. Baseball is made up of countless individual acts. Most are mundane. Some are memorable, and our appreciation of, say, Ozzie Smith going into the hole and throwing out the runner on a one hop bounce exceeds the number you put on it. What sticks in the memory are the big counting numbers, and the great plays. For people who want a deeper understanding of the numbers, the new math is great. But for sheer enjoyment, going to the park, seeing the big hit, watching the third base coach spin his arm, the runner and the ball arrive at the catcher at the same time-that's hard to beat, and can't be quantified.
ReplyDeleteThere's good and understandable reason why people mistrust advanced statistics. For almost all of us, there will always be someone who understands the numbers better and is able to use numbers to mislead us for their own agendas. Unless you understand how the data is compiled well enough to run your own regressions and make your own analysis, you're basically being presented information by someone else and taking their word for it. And it's not like intellectual dishonesty is a new concept.
ReplyDeleteFor example, as a Braves fan I've been around Braves blogs quite a bit. After the Dan Uggla trade, there was a great number of people defending his defense with the justification, "His away UZR splits are positive." People who don't understand the limitations of UZR or how it's calculated might take that as evidence that Dan Uggla is, indeed, a good defender away from Florida. This actually persisted even after being shown a quote from MGL to disregard the home/away UZR split.
There was something from another poster-one whom I know understands better than this-also advocating moving Heyward up from #6 to #2 in Fredi Gonzalez's projected line-up. He's often using graphs and charts to present lots of data and projections, and people respect that he's good with numbers. Basically, he said that over 162 games, Jason heyward is going to end up with 72 fewer plate appearances, resulting in reaching base 28 fewer times with 17 fewer hits and 2 fewer home runs, and the end result makes the Braves 0.5 WAR worse. Hopefully I don't have to go over all that's wrong with that assumption. The point is that people likely took it at face value because he's a "numbers guy." And his motive was likely just to prove how much smarter he is than Fredi Gonzalez.
"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing," so having only a surface understanding about advanced stats is often worse than knowing nothing. Not everyone has the time or ability to understand statistics intimately. Heck, I'm a big advocate for advanced stats, but I have to accept at face value things like the relative run values of events that form the basis of wOBA-the braintrust behind most advanced stats are smarter than I. Heck, think about how often you might look at a WAR leaderboard and take it absolutely for granted-for example, accepting that Ryan Zimmerman was 0.3 WAR more valuable than Jose Bautista, even though the error margin for UZR means they were essentially indistinguishable. Clearly, wOBA is an improvement on batting average, but the beauty of batting average is that anyone with a 5th grade education can calculate it-hits/ABs.
elmaquino, after visiting your blog I see you use a star based system to rank baseball players. Why do you do that when stats like batting average and wins already exist?
ReplyDelete@Robert & @Number Three --
ReplyDeleteActually, Twain credited that statement to Benjamin Disraeli; however, there is nothing in any of Disraeli's works like that phrase, and it didn't first become popular until after his death. Currently, best evidence points to another Englishman, Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke (1843–1911).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lies,_damned_lies,_and_statistics
Drunks and lampposts also figure prominently in explanations of the random walk theory (and, no, that's got nothing to do with Dusty Baker).
@firsttimelongtime I only did that one time. Just wanted to give a general overview instead of predict 3 stats for 25 guys.
ReplyDelete@joepo I think you have me wrong. I don't look down on people who like metrics. like you said, if that's your thing, it's cool. but for me personally, i just like to keep it simple and watch a guy play to determine his worth, on the way using triple crown stats as a filler. And I don't think ANY stat is authorative or certain.
Hope you see this! Don't want the best in the biz to think I'm a jerk or an idiot or anything!
clashfan said...
ReplyDeleteelmaquino, Joe may have been acknowldging you, but he wasn't complimenting you.
People in glass houses should certifiably not throw stones. Try not to be a douche when your writing is public for everyone else to see.
@Mike
ReplyDeleteAn understanding of newer stats and appreciating the experiential things you noted are not mutually exclusive and comments that suggest they are mutually exclusive are as tiresome and lazy as the mom's basement strawman set up by Bruce Jenkins.
For example, you say, "our appreciation of, say, Ozzie Smith going into the hole and throwing out the runner on a one hop bounce exceeds the number you put on it." I know of no stat person who would suggest otherwise. By comparison, I can fully appreciate Jeter going into the hole, making his characteristic leaping, twisting throw, and nipping a runner at first all while knowing that despite that fabulous play I just witnessed, it was a fabulous play by a below-average MLB shortstop.
I know of no stat person who would be drawn away from action on the field to calculate the effect of a six-hopper bleeding into CF on a second baseman's UZR or a pitcher's BABIP so that they missed "watching the third base coach spin his arm, the runner and the ball arrive at the catcher at the same time."
As Joe noted, the old stats are, well, stats. Joe also has posted numerous times (recently, too:http://joeposnanski.blogspot.com/2011/03/my-guide-to-stats-offense.html) that few of the new, "complicated" stats are as complicated as batting average once you account for all of the exceptions, and exceptions to the exceptions, for what counts as an "at bat." No one says the old stats are useless, but if one is trying to compare players, or trying to determine how much a player can be expected to contribute to the offensive success of his team, there are stats that are imperfect but pretty decent at describing a player's value, but the Holy Trinity of Avg./HRs/RBIs is incomplete, at best, and misleading, at worst.
@ Bryan: I disagree about the lamppost not being a friend to drunks. As you point out, they (the lampposts) are normally round so with no sharp edges the drunk is less likely to hurt him/herself when hanging on, twirling around, etc. Sometimes you need that extra centrifugal force after a good lamppost twirl to get yourself headed off swiftly to the nearest tavern.
ReplyDeletefunny....
ReplyDeleteI thought that lamppost was a foulpole. I must of had too much to drink.
Numbers will say anything if you torture them long enough.
I am 47 years old. I own my own home, have a family and have been a taxpayer for over 30 years. I played baseball until age 22 when a relative lack of skill ended my playing days. I am also a stats geek.
ReplyDeleteI don't subscribe blindly to every advanced metric. I don't arrogantly think any one stat is the be all end all. I like the math and those stats enhance my understanding of the game I love. I generally go to the game with friends who are simple fans. They know the home team and the other team's stars, and like to have fun and down a few frosty beverages.
However, there is a difference between a simple fan and a flat earther. A flat earther is happy to be ignorant, fears anything new, and is jealous of those who might know more about something than he does. In order to combat their own insecurity, they must belittle those who speak of anything out of their comfort zone. (As the reporter in the previous post felt the need to do)
While it matters little to me whether anyone cares about or uses these metrics, and how people feel about baseball matters little to the world, flat earth thinking is not usually limited to baseball. On a larger scale it holds back the entire world, as it has throughout history.
The "Scully quote" is not a put down of stats, it's a put down of people who use them in unsophisticated ways--like, um, people who think batting average is more important than OPS (even if OPS didn't exist when Vin said it). Right?
ReplyDeleteIt would be remarkable if during the past 100 years we've had incredible advances in technology, moviemaking, athletic achievement and music to name a few, yet an understanding of statistics in professional sports remained constant.
ReplyDeleteEvery anti-new-stats person I've ever seen is driven fundamentally by the fear of not understanding. It's actually a window onto a lot of our society -- people fear and object to things they don't understand. It's sad, really, because the world can be SO AMAZING, but you have to be willing to feel dumb while you're figuring it out.
ReplyDeleteBut at the end of the day, the flat earthers end up disappearing when new things WORK. And modern baseball statistics work -- they make for better talent evaluation, they improve tactical operation, and they (yes) illuminate previously misunderstood complexities.
There will come a day when it will be remembered exactly as Joe describes above -- "We used *batting average* to determine the best hitter?!"
I'm amused at the idea of some sportswriters talking about how BA and RBI have been used for over 100 years, we've gotten by great using pitcher W-L, the old ways were just fine and there's no reason to change ... all while checking their Twitter on their latest smart phone.
ReplyDeleteAlso, it's funny to imagine a time -- maybe 20 years from now, maybe sooner -- when the newer generation says things like "Wow, you still pay attention to things like WAR and UZR? Get with the times, grandpa."
I think the fear in the traditionalist set is that they don't know where the big, scary "statistics revolution" is going, and where it will end. They think out lot wants to take over the world, and sap any enjoyment out of the game. No matter how much anyone tries to reasonably argue otherwise, there will be some Jenkins-type neanderthal (also applies to guys like Jon Heyman and Murray Chass) who think that the stat guys want to see the game played with robots and computers.
ReplyDeleteWe still love the beauty of baseball as much as anyone did in the 1920s, we still love watching great players make great plays. If, after the game, we try to supplement and enhance what we saw on the field, gain some more clarity and understanding -- where's the harm in that?
My late father, when I'd point out a talented rookie, would ask "is he a .300 hitter?". That was his standard of excellence. New standards can supplement the old. But baseball needs all the fans it can get, and how they enjoy the game is far less important than their passion for it. We can embrace the new without trashing the old. Let the Luddites have their opinions. If you look at some of the best of Joe's writing (and Bill James as well), it's not just numbers-it's the enthusiasm of a fan.
ReplyDeleteNewbie here . . .
ReplyDelete@Ben
I would agree with your assessment; I hear the traditionalists with a slightly bemused confusion.
I played baseball as a kid (but my defense at 2nd resembled more of a hockey goalie’s work) but didn’t really love baseball until I met my husband, who’s taught me a greater understanding and appreciation of the game, including how farm systems work, defensive strategies and a very rudimentary understanding of stats. I’m reading Joe’s blog now as kind of a tutorial—and what I’m learning helps me understand the game better. For me, more understanding = more appreciation and more enjoyment.
However, enjoying a game by understanding is only one part of loving baseball. Stats can’t, could never, take away from the experiential enjoyment of the game. I can love advanced stats but the mental game can’t replace how the sun feels on my back when I settle into my seat at the local minor league stadium in mid-July, or how good the cold drink tastes going down my throat, or how the crack of a line drive sounds, or how the smell of my old little league glove leather brings my Dad’s words back to me (“You should always be asking: ‘What will I do if the ball comes to me?’ ”) when I hold it to my face as I hope for a foul ball in my direction (and hope to be less of a goalie and more of a fielder if it does).
Understanding and evaluating players and games with stats can’t replace how it feels to watch my team on TV make a great play in a close game, can’t help me dance around my living room like a jubilant lunatic. Stats can’t take the place of the connection I can make with a perfect stranger in line ahead of me at the grocery store who’s wearing my team’s colors, with whom I can strike up a conversation, share a story or send on his/her way with a silly grin.
It doesn’t matter how advanced the stats get; we can do all kinds of thinking about the game and it won’t replace how we experience the game. For some of us, the stats enhance our experience. So I hear and read the traditionalists with a shy smile and a scratch of my head: How on earth could the mental aspects of the game threaten the sensual aspects of the game? I just don’t get it.
Puquerda,
ReplyDeleteYou're right. I was being a jackass for no real reason. Apologies to all, especially Elmaquino.
@clashfan
ReplyDeleteyou're good man! honestly I didn't realize I was being berated by Joe until I came back and finished the whole post.
But just so everyone knows, I am definitely not "Anti-Stats." I just prefer simple stats to advanced ones. Maybe that wasn't communicated well enough?
Some of the assumptions that go into the advanced stats are questionable. They assume all players are affected equally by park (was Ichiro more affected by SAFECO than Damon was affected by Comerica?), that players can not adjust to hit better in their park, that a players batting order position has no effect on the value of certain events(are JD's walks really so valuable batting 7th), nor does a players team (is Ichiros IF hits really so valuable with the 2010 Mariners).
ReplyDeletePitching stats assume that pitchers have no effect on the result of a BIP, but the data that serves this assumption is imperfect since it does not measure speed off the bat. Also, fielders may be positioned based on the pitcher throwing to a certain location, and if a pitcher has poor command, and throws inside instead of outside, the BIP may end up being a hit more often than if the pitcher had hit his spot.
The other thing about traditional counting stats are they almost never change. However, advanced stats change whenever "improvements" are made to estimators or adjustments. Just have to look at UZR's change to Jason Bays 2009 season which was adjusted in 2010.
ReplyDeleteI use both stats, but have noticed in some discussion boards an intolerance to anyone using some traditional stats. I got booted off SOSH for claiming that RBI's have value because they change the scoreboard, and that SSS UZR, despite it's uncertainties, should not be much different than SSS offensive stats. A 700 OPS hitter can have a 2 month stretch where he hit 900 OPS, same thing in fielding, where a great fielder can have a poor year. This does not mean that the SSS OPS or UZR reflects his talent level, just that it shows what the player did (either due to luck or just playing over/under his talent).
Intolerance and ridicule of those who dare question others beliefs is a sign of the times I guess, and it is just as prevalent amongst those who place their faith in advanced stats as to those who disdain advanced stats.
I use both.
"elmaquino said...
ReplyDeleteThanks for the acknowledgement, sir! Probably the best baseball writer out there, and I always say 'The Power to Believe' is like my 'Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu.'
I am looking to be a baseball/sports writer when I'm out of school and would appreciate it if your readers would check some of my stuff out: http://bit.ly/dUWxCA. Thanks again!"
Joe is the best, but elmaquino5 is probably my favorite stand-up comedian. Sadly he is seemingly unaware of his considerable talent. Elmaquino5, we definitely do not need to raise a new crop of sportswriters whose notion of analysis involves burying their heads in the sand and embracing intellectual laziness. Let me give you some advice on covering sporting events when you become a writer: Do not get too specific. People love having their intelligence insulted in print.
One thing I'm curious about that I think would be definitive on the value of these more sophisticated stats, is do general managers use them for determining what they are willing to pay for players? Both in trades and salary?
ReplyDeleteIf they do, that is basically putting their money where the stats are. If they just use batting average, wins, and rbi's, that's important to know also.
Also, one of the big problems with these advanced stats is the confusing standards they bring, and the lack of agreement on which stats actually matter most. The traditionalists had a point when they talk about the value of hitting .300, in that the average fan needs some kind of benchmark that is commonly agreed upon to separate out the good from the fair and poor players. Right now, there is no such stat. Maybe ERA for pitchers is about it.
ReplyDeleteIs there any hope that there will be some kind of universal set of stats that we can all use and learn, that will be posted in the newspapers or on ESPN's website, listing the leaders in these state, as batting average once was? And what would be that definitive stat, or stats?
This is really important for the game, you know?
Broken Yogi,
ReplyDelete"One thing I'm curious about that I think would be definitive on the value of these more sophisticated stats, is do general managers use them for determining what they are willing to pay for players? Both in trades and salary?"
Yes.
"Is there any hope that there will be some kind of universal set of stats that we can all use and learn, that will be posted in the newspapers or on ESPN's website, listing the leaders in these state, as batting average once was? And what would be that definitive stat, or stats?
This is really important for the game, you know? "
We're already seeing a move towards this. Quite a few televised games now include OBP in the stat line. I wonder if you read the article. Joe lists some of the stats that are currently held to be better measures of a player's value. I know. It is important.
Not that I don't blog in my skivvies sometimes, but the basement/underwear argument from those with an axe to grind against the hardcore numbers has always gotten a certain amount of sympathy from me.
ReplyDeleteSimply because it's a personal attack, which reciprocates the attacks you so often see from the less professional aspects of the sabermetric community.
Present company excepted, of course, but sabermetricians do themselves no favors when they impugn the intelligence of the average baseball fan. And Joe may not do it, but it gets done a lot. I mean, if Fire Joe Morgan is going to say all these mean-spirited things about the substandard intelligence of certain commentators, then why the hell shouldn't someone fire back with insults of their own?
The whole sabermetric thing gets called a revolution all the time, and it is a revolution, but it's a shame that some of the revolutionaries can be a bit on the arrogant side.
OK, Value over Replacement Player, we get it. It is well and it is good. But no-one needs to be lectured about RBIs. An RBI is no more and no less than the number attached to it. Even hardcore sabermetricians can probably tell you Tommy Davis had 153 RBI in 1962. But what was his VORP?
And, since I've gone there, what exactly is the correlation between RBIs as they approach league-leading levels and RBI percentage?
And people know that Colorado is a hitter's park, or (if you're talking to the right people, and why wouldn't you be?) that the Baker Bowl was, so we can skip the whole Dante Bichette thing.
I think it's Bob Costas who said that the steroid era will need no asterisk because baseball fans will know what the period represented. And it's like that already. Fine, figure your park effects and figure your era effect, no harm done, but people already know about the deadball era.
If Ken Tremendous and his ilk could stop the snide lecturing to people who they simply assume are stupid, then maybe I'll be less sympathetic to asswipes like Jenkins.
@Viki --
ReplyDeleteYour husband is a very, very lucky man.
Most folks grasp of statistics are none-too-good. They think that outliers invalidate the bigger picture. They think that lack of omniscient predictive power is proof that statistics tell you nothing. Lots of fans feel like stats are just a meta- part of the game; they’re part of the story of the game and it’s history, but the real game exists in the folk wisdom about playing the game right, the fundamentals, the character of the men who play and so forth. Stats are at best extraneous, at worst, a perversion of the forces that actually shape winning and losing.
ReplyDeleteStats are there to describe the game and also to be predictive, but predictive of a range of possibilities. They are not intended to be some infallible crystal ball. When you understand that, they become less opaque. But since most fans don’t really understand stats, they attack them. It’s sort of the republican/democrat divide revisited in baseball. Which is a shame because the qualitative and quantitative are not inherently incompatible. I feel like, just as I learned how to do division as a kid by figuring out batting averages, advanced baseball analytics have given me an opportunity to learn more about statistical theory in a way that’s fun an more easily understandable than in the abstract without baseball as a lens. What’s more, baseball does tend to reflect society at large and a lot of the ways that massive data crunching is shaping the way we see baseball is also present in the wider world. Stats and economic theory a la Moneyball are everywhere out there, so it helps understand other stuff too.
What I can't figure out is why Joe and everyone else even CARE what the anti-stats folks say. WHO CARES? Sticks and stones ...
ReplyDeleteWe'll never convince them. We'll never make most of them see the light. I prefer to spend my energy and time talking advanced stats with other people who are into them, and for those that aren't ... well, it's best to smugly ignore their rants and just move on.
Ive always been a guy that likes a good example to illustrate a point and there are many good points being tossed about in this forum. Keeping it nice and simple, I will guineapig our old pal Jose Guillen. In 2008, after arriving at camp late, and soft as a biscuit, he slumped horribly for the first several weeks, got incredibly hot for a month, then basically repeated this cycle to a less dramatic degree for the remainder of the season while somehow staying surprisingly healthy. The Old School stats, .264, 42 dbls, 20 hrs, 97 rbi, clearly show that he had a solid yet unremarkable season. Unless that is, you were to take another, closer look using the more modern,'Professor Frink' stats. Here we notice that in 633 PA's Guillen was only able to score 66 runs due to his horrible so/bb ratio of 20/106 creating an ever so subpar OBP of .300. Suspicion leads to validation when further Stats reveal a .738 OPS, 95 OPS+ and 0.1 WAR. In conclusion, what becomes clear thru more advanced study is that he did absolutely nothing to help his team win all year. Certainly not solid and extremely unremarkable for a 12 mil COF...oh, and he grounded into 23 double plays. I will be merciful and not mention his -def stats. Sorry you all had to relive that.
ReplyDeleteI think the traditional baseball stats were how nearly all of us learned to love the game. We were told that in baseball you can fail 7 out of 10 times and still be a success. That Cy Young had 511 wins and Hack Wilson once drove in 191 runs in a season! There's romanticism to those statistics that many people want to hold onto - and I think these traditionalists feel threatened that they're no longer allowed to enjoy the game in the way they feel comfortable.
ReplyDeleteThey want to feel like the game won't change - that like in James Earl Jones' quote in "Field of Dreams", "The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It's been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game, is a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good, and it could be again."
With the statistics revolution, they see that baseball really isn't a constant - that it's ever-changing. And because they love the game for this romanticism and the history, they rebel at numbers that would've meant nothing to them when they were learning to love the game.