jim wrote:Ah, but they are coin tosses. Because he is using a purely statistical approach, based on purely statistical data and not observational data. Those are his words, I've heard them repeated enough to believe that there are times where he really is going simply off the data.
It is exceptionally rare for a player to have enough AB's to make an informed decision based simply on the results. A player with 1,500 random AB's you are going to have to exceed 60 to get to any sort of statistical meaning. More random AB's, add more.
You say the notecards are better than nothing, even if it's not accurate it essentially shuffles the deck and results in a positive outcome - that being players get their playing time in which has benefits. So here we are, people claiming that Tony (or other managers) don't need to resort to fancy math because of their infinite baseball wisdom - and yet it's the math nerds calling for the manager to just go old school and use his baseball instincts.
Basically, it seems to me that if you criticize a manager for using statistics incorrectly or you criticize a manager for not using data available to him - all the same. In the former case, there is some reason (excuse really) to justify it, and the latter you get the ol' mysticism of baseball explanation that only a very few and chosen have been able to figure out.
His notecards are a bad idea, he should throw them away and use his baseball judgement as if player X will be successful against player Y.
From today's paper:
La Russa stayed with Springer because he'd struck Berkman out in Berkman's only two previous at-bats against him. Berkman ripped an 0-2 fastball deep to right field, but it veered foul enough that no video was required. He then drove the next pitch the opposite way for the winner.
I used to be a really big TLR fan. Through it ALL, my two peeves were always his slavish devotion to the notecards and his slavish devotion to platoon splits (which largely were two sides of the same coin).
The thing about the notecards is they're usually only used in coin flip types of situations. Bringing in Springer vs. Franklin. Pinch hitting or starting Miles vs. Kennedy. Its not like he's pulling Pujols or even Glaus to pinch hit with Felipe Lopez because of a handful of AB's.
So while the notecards are close to useless, I don't think they do much harm either.
Well, its threads like this that make me wish I could get on this board as often as I used to.
I think any person who is dismissive of scouting, and knowledge gained by seeing a player with his eyes, is an idiot. I think anyone who is dismissive of stats/SABR is an idiot.
An example: boyer14, due to his talent (which enabled him to play more games in his life than most people), knowledge of the game, and age (ancient), has seen more baseball games (function of talent and age and staying in the game after playing days as a scout) than anyone on this board. So there you have it...a staement that supports one's knowledge of the game using both EYES and a NUMBER to support the premise.
This won't be a long post...eyes tell us something that stats cannot. Stats tell us something that eyes cannot.
Personally--even without his vast resources--I think Theo Epstein is one of the top GM's in baseball. I have not met every GM in baseball, but I have meant many. Theo is a stats-oriented GM--yet hes has 2 scouts scouts looking at the opposing teams during the season, and has one person scouting the Red Sox looking for tendencies. This shows me that he realizes stats cannot show him everything he needs--he wants the information that only your eyes can tell you, too.
You can't get by with just one--both are necessary. We can argue which stats are more revealing than others, just as we can argue which scouts are better than other scouts. But we need both.
I'm not trying to be arrogant...substitute anyone's name in the premise. It's just that after over 50 years in the game, I am an "old timer" who you might think would be anti-stat. I'm not, and I don't think anyone can understand the game without both things.
a little bit of middle ground is beneficial in all aspects of life and baseball...
think smoking is bad for you, there are people in their 90's who have smoked most of their lives...probably just in moderation...
same for drinking and whatever else you can think of...and the same goes for baseball...
