THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

I’m white, and it seems reasonable to me.  Too bad retrosheet doesn’t go back 10 more years.  That would be perfect, having PBP data for all of modern baseball history.

Actually, there are really three eras.  Totally segregated through 1946. Integration in progress 1947 through, say, 1968.  Fully integrated 1969 through today.  Pre-1947 and post-1968 are so different in terms of talent pools that I agree it would make sense to have different records kept for both.

I agree that you always have overlaps, so it takes time for full integration.  I don’t know why you would say full integration is as late as 1969.  What black player in 1960 was not in MLB that deserved to be there?

Willie Mays was MVP in 1954.  Campanella in 1951.  Satchel Paige made his MLB debut in 1948 as a 41yr old.  The last year of the Negro Leagues was 1948.  High quality black players were integrated very fast it would seem.

The black-bias that you could point to is that they wouldn’t sign a bench black player (much like the NHL wouldn’t sign a bench European player).

Tango,

It’s true that many, perhaps most, African-American stars were playing (mostly in the National League) by the ‘50s.  So perhaps simple records such as most HRs or highest batting average can be counted earlier than 1969.  However, sophisticated ratings based on value over average or replacement level are overstated before 1969 or so because many African-Americans of below-star quality were kept out, thus reducing baseline performance.  There was an outstanding presentation at SABR 37 showing basically this.

I’m not sure I agree.

First, is this a moral argument or an empirical one?  If it’s a moral one, I have more sympathy with it.  If it’s an empirical one, arguing that the quality of the league wasn’t very good, I would again argue (as I have before) that what matters is the size of the population, not whether any people in particular were barred.  Early 20th century MLB was worse than today’s, although it’s “more worse” than it would have been if it had let black players in.  I’m not sure it has empirical significance any different from the fact that many people CHOSE not to pursue a baseball career because of low wages, or other such era-specific circumstances.  (Again, that’s empirically.  Morally, there’s a huge difference.)

Suppose, for the sake of argument, that someone finds a tribe in Antarctica, of 300 million people, who have been playing baseball (in the cold) for 100 years.  Does that mean that all of today’s records are footnotes because the antarticans weren’t in MLB? 

The population of the world will probably keep growing, and the caliber of baseball players in MLB will get better and better.  By Tango’s logic, EVERY era is a “footnote” compared to every future era.

Mike/4: I agree that your issue would be one of a different baseline, but that we agree that the top end are not affected.

Phil/5: Your issue is more like what hockey experiences.  The WHA in the 1970s introduced the Europeans to hockey in North America.  And the Russians were finally allowed to play in the NHL, to some degree in the late 80s.  And after a wave of defections in the early 90s, were here for good for 10-15 years now.  Even so, many Europeans/Russians still chose not to play in the NHL, even now.

The Russians went toe-to-toe with the Canadians all through the 1970s and 1980s.  The Canadians had arguably the two best players of all time (Gretzky, Lemieux), plus others of super high caliber (Bourque, Messier, Fuhr among others).  For the Russians to go toe-to-toe with such caliber, they themselves must have been enormous (Markov, Larionov, Krutov, Fetisov, Kasatonov, while remembered fondly don’t hold the same esteem as the Canadian players).

So, you could put some footnote.  And I would.  The NHL of the 1980s was essentially Russian-free.  And in the 1970s was essentially European-free.  Peter Stastny, one of the best players ever, only played in the NHL because he defected Czechslovakia through an elaborate plan.

The difference though is that baseball fans hold counting numbers in such high regard for some reason.  Hockey doesn’t really have this issue to anywhere the same degree.

Tango/6: agreed.  My point is only that everyone becomes a “footnote” as the quality of play improves.  I see no reason to single out the white players in the time of the Negro Leagues, except morally.

And, of course (as maybe you were implying), the situation with the Russian players is also a moral one—the USSR’s human rights record is arguably similar in some ways to MLB’s treatment of black players.

I think that the initial point is a very good one, and I completely support it.  Not that you needed my affirmation, just wanted to say that. -j

Tango:

I want to ask how is your opinion about baseball played in other country (Cuba, Japan, etc) ?  They’re highly organized for a long time, too, and we can’t deny that some (maybe many) players there are as good as (if not better) MLB’s top players. Shouldn’t we take it into consideration in this issue? (Not to mention the situation of Cuba is much like USSR in NHL)

That is a good point.

I suppose, just like we would for the NHL until the mid 70s or so, we’d have to establish the NHL records as “North American”.  And until Markov et al showed up, establish the NHL as “Russian free”.

So, it would be foolish to call MLB players the “best baseball players ever” when compiling your lists.  You should be saying the “best North American baseball players ever” for whatever period of time applies.

Real life example: My (actual) research deals mostly with the ways in which stressful events affect the development of things like depression in low-income, mostly minority youth.  Why do this?  Because until recently, most of the research looked only at White kids in the suburbs and assumed that what was found there could generalize to everyone.  Sure enough, when we look, the theories on what causes what change a bit.  Does it make the research that came before it invalid?  No, just incomplete.

I’d also like to second Ty/9’s point.  If our standard is full integration, then we certainly haven’t fully integrated players from Japan and Cuba into MLB.  Plus, there are surely some kids in Europe who grow up playing soccer instead of baseball (but would actually prefer to play baseball) who would make the talent pool that much better.  So, once MLB conquers the world (which would make Bud Selig world dictator… yikes!) we can start the modern era.

I suppose to fully qualify it: “of those White people who have chosen to play baseball professionally in North America, Babe Ruth was the greatest player ever”.

I think all the ‘eras’ need to be understood in their context, properly footnoted, and records held in appropriate focus.  The current first PED era, for instance, is drawing to a close---I think it is wrong to ignore its records, but remember the context.

I’ve noted some sabremetric-inclined wags stating that the main work is over.  Besides my personal belief that we are a long way from understanding defense and its relation to pitching numbers, I also think the supernaturally strong desire of baseball fans to compare players and their numbers will mean alot of work still needs to be done on how to translate across eras, whether pre-’47 or first PED or deadball or whatever.

The exclusion of blacks and dark-skinned Hispanics pre-’47, however, is of another character, because of its moral dimension (as opposed, say, to the lack of Asian players that is more, though probably not completely, due to geographic and other non-racial based issues).  I have made the personal decision to reduce my study of pre-’47 players’ accomplishments because of it.

tango, who would you consider the “best” player ever?

I’m not really crazy about lists type questions.  You can be guaranteed that if someone doesn’t know what to write, he’ll write a “list” column, and this will also guarantee maximum response.  The final “answer” is far less interesting than the process in getting there.

If the question isn’t about skin color as much as it is talent pool, then we may be on the cusp of another era--the international era.