from Amazon
Friday, August 01, 2008
Lazy assumptions or lazy research?
I know, sabermetric orthodoxy insists that lineup order doesn’t matter; I guess I keep forgetting to drink all of my Kool-Aid, especially when lineup-related research depends on so many lazy assumptions and/or involves redoing some of the same Markov Chain analysis that’s been done for decades, all of which ends up suggesting that… well, that Joe McCarthy or Earl Weaver or Casey Stengel or Bobby Cox are smarter than the models (or the modelers). Consider me a firm believer in the proposition that much of sabermetrics is about the documentation of already-observed phenomenon, and that the best-placed observers did not and do not need sabermetric re-educations, they need to be learned from to create historically-informed sabermetrics.
If Christina has read The Book, I am annoyed. If she hasn’t, then she is as lazy a reader as she claims the researchers are. And since most of The Book in fact documents empirical (i.e., real-life) data, satisfying her vision of sabermetrics, then Christina should be one of the biggest vocal supporters of The Book.
Hat tip: FifthOF