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Wednesday, March 02, 2011
Almost time to stop the ESPN hate?
ESPN has been swimming against the tide of vitriol with a clear attempt at the saber-age. Mostly, it’s been on the periphery, with articles by many in the sabersphere, and even hiring full-time guys with a saber-slant.
But Dean Oliver has a chance to really shape things over there:
While a bit secretive about what’s in his laboratory Petri dishes, Oliver suggests some common stats will become largely extinct. Like baseball batting averages, which he says should be replaced by a combination of on-base and slugging percentages.
...
But he concedes it’s easier to find flaws in stats than invent ones: “RBI, in 10 years, will have gone away. What’s more of a battle is what it’s replaced with.”
...
Oliver would also seem to have potential to help TV networks present their own TV ratings — “as an environment engineer, part of my job was to see how people lie with numbers and I know how to do it” — but now he’s devoted to “telling the truth with numbers” because they get around more than any expert: “The numbers see all the games.”
RBI will remain, if for no other reason that it’s a factual representation of a key part of the game: who was involved when a run scored.
Batting average, however, will end up in the dustbin, a minor player, to be used as often, if not less, than BABIP. Batting average has no inherent reason to exist.
Baseball is about wins(*), which is about runs(**), which is about bases and outs(***).
(*) So, pitcher wins, in some form, has to exist.
(**) Runs scored, runs batted in, runs participated in has to exist in some form.
(***) OBP has to exist. Something akin to SLG has to exist (if not SLG, then say Total Average, or wOBA).
Batting average would be a subset of that last one. It has no real reason that it must exist. OBP is inherent in the game and so will exist. OBP will outlive Batting average.
In a logical and rational world anyway.
Anyway, kudos to ESPN for plunging ahead. Hopefully, the end of the gasbags will also be upon us.
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