Baseball and the use of Closers...

[Hammer755]

Originally Posted by SackAttack

http://www.csgnetwork.com/quarterbackratecalc.html

Boom. If I didn't know how to calculate that stat before, it would have taken me two seconds to figure out what goes into it.

Now, quick. Show me a place, in the next 60 seconds, where I can get the VORP formula.

I understand what you're saying Sack, but tell me this doesn't look arbitrary

1. Complete passes divided by pass attempts. Subtract 0.3 and divide by 0.2
To gain a 2.375 in completion percentage, a passer would have to complete 77.5 percent of his passes.
2. Passing yards divided by pass attempts. Subtract 3 and divide by 4.
To earn a 2.375 in percentage of yards per attempt, a passer would have to achieve an average of 12.5 yards.
3. Touchdown passes divided by pass attempts and divide by .05.
To earn a 2.375 in percentage of touchdowns, a passer would have to achieve a percentage of 11.9.
4. Start with .095 and subtract interceptions divided by pass attempts. Divide that product by .04.
To gain 2.375 in percentage of interceptions, a passer would have to go the entire season without an interception.
Add the sum of 1-4, multiply by 100 and divide by 6.

[Tyrith]

I just don't understand the use of the term "secret" to describe it. It's not that people are trying to hide it, it's just complicated. And further, are these stat heads really trying to push these stats on the mainstream? It seemed to me they had a pretty good idea of the people that would try to use them -- people like us, people who spend way much time reading about baseball. The reason the stats are coming into use is because people find them useful or interesting, not because they're shoving them down our throats -- BP writes a book because people are interested in one, not because they're trying to overthrow the Cult of Joe Morgan.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Atocep

QB rating is a stat that is regurgitated by just about every NFL fan and I'm willing to bet maybe 1-2% of the fans know exactly what makes it up.

Wouldn't doubt it. But it's out there for them if any of them want to understand it.

VORP, on the other hand, if I'm not mistaken, doesn't part of the formula take into account production at the player's position? So right there, you have a difference in the way the same formula treats two different players. It'll track who is more valuable at a given position, but it really isn't an objective measure of two players' pure offensive abilities.

And even if it were, how can I find out?

Both QB rating and VORP are regurgitated numbers, but QBr is consistent among the people it's supposed to track, and it's quantifiable if I want to know how it was reached.

VORP isn't. It's subjective in a mathematical sense, and as a result, you can have two guys with otherwise similar numbers who have different VORP ratings because of where they play, not what they do with the bat.

This is my issue. It's not with how the stat is calculated, it's with being able to see how it works so I can understand why the 1B has a VORP of 77 while the CF has a VORP of 86.

I can break QBr down to see where Manning and Brady differ. I can't so easily deconstruct VORP to see where Pujols and Bonds are differing.

[jbergey22]

Originally Posted by Tyrith

I just don't see this secrecy thing you're talking about. There has been a lot of information made available that shows how all these statistics were derived. Whether or not we can understand it is a different matter, but I just don't see this intentional veil of secrecy shrouded over the sabermetrics of the game.

It shouldnt be hard to find this formula then right?

It's not so much that I think its wrong its the fact that it is easy to rip apart RBI's, BA, ERA, Wins because we know how they work. How are people suppose to break down and analyze what could be wrong with these formulas if we dont know the formula. I think this is what Sack is getting as well. Bill James used to reveal his secret formula's, why dont I get to see BP's equation. Hell I even created a database with all these formulas so I could put all the stats to figure out my HS baseball team. I cant break down a formula that at this point is fiction to me cause I cant see it.

[SackAttack]

Originally Posted by Hammer755

I understand what you're saying Sack, but tell me this doesn't look arbitrary

True enough. I'm not holding that up as the perfect stat. But as amalgamations go, it's accessible.

I don't understand why those specific modifiers are what they are, but I can still do the math - which is important if that's how you connect with the game as a kid.

I doubt very much if I would have understood what SLG meant as a kid...but I sure could have computed it.

[SFL Cat]

Originally Posted by Atocep

QB rating is a stat that is regurgitated by just about every NFL fan and I'm willing to bet maybe 1-2% of the fans know exactly what makes it up.

I also believe the QB Rating unfairly rewards a high percentage West Coast short passer and penalizes a lower percentage long-ball thrower.

[Atocep]

I've never seen EQA, VORP, WARP, ect pushed in a way where they would replace traditional stats. They are primarily player evaluation tools, which is what started this debate.

Traditional stats have their place, but if you truely want to evaluate a player's value are you going to go with RBIs and Batting Average or EQA and WARP?

[jbergey22]

I know that VORP does not give credit to certain pitchers that have better movement(Maddux, Halladay). The theory states that once a ball leaves a pitchers hand the pitchers dont have much control once the ball hits the bat. This theory I totally disagree with that is why I want to see these formulas that everyone talks about in these debates.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by jbergey22

I know that VORP does not give credit to certain pitchers that have better movement(Maddux, Halladay). The theory states that once a ball leaves a pitchers hand the pitchers dont have much control once the ball hits the bat. This theory I totally disagree with that is why I want to see these formulas that everyone talks about in these debates.

Thats DIPS, which Maddux is actually a perfect example of how it works.

[jbergey22]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Thats DIPS, which Maddux is actually a perfect example of how it works.

How so? If a pitcher loses control once the ball hits the bat, than why is he consistently among the DIPS leaders in average once the ball hits the bat. Seems contradicting to me.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by jbergey22

How so? If a pitcher loses control once the ball hits the bat, than why is he consistently among the DIPS leaders in average once the ball hits the bat. Seems contradicting to me.

I see Maddux used as an example of how DIPS doesn't really work quite a bit, but his peripheral ERA, which takes the DIPS stats and calculates what his expected ERA should be, has consistently been fairly close to what his actual ERA has been.

One player that has consistently outperformed his PERA is Tom Glavine. I think Nolan Ryan was another. There are guys out there, but they are generally the exception, not the rule.

DIPS hasn't really been revised, but there has been a lot of work done on the stat that shows that there's more to it than the basic principle. Hardball times has a wonderful stat called linedrive percentage which is interesting when applied to DIPS.

I don't think DIPS is perfect, but it does give a good baseline in how to evaluate pitchers. Thats what sabermetrics are about, finding better ways to evaluate players. Unlike the traditional stats, people are always looking for ways to make these stats better so that they become better tools for player evaluation.

[ISiddiqui]

Originally Posted by SackAttack

No it's not, honestly. It's one thing to outright question the validity of a measure because you don't see all the components. But you know what? At the end of the day, GDP and CPI are still how the game is played.

It's another to completely throw away other, possibly inferior measures, and accept somebody else's word that This One Is Better because You Wouldn't Understand.

Well that happens with laymen in the economic realm all the time . Different theories or valuations are advanced and used without most people really knowing what is going on behind the scenes on the calculators (so to speak).

Oh, and GDP wasn't always how the game was played. It used to be GNP.

Saying "Hey, ignore BA, ERA, etc and use THESE measures instead, but we're really not going to let you see the inner workings" isn't a great way to get your stat accepted as mainstream. If you want the average fan to look at EqA, VORP, WARP, etc as measures of a player's superiority or inferiority, it needs to be open. Not everybody will understand it, but they'll probably be more willing to accept something they CAN fool with, if they choose to, than a Trust Us stat.

Put the formula out there. Let people wrestle with it and come to terms with it in their own way instead of assuming that your Ivy League degree means that nobody who isn't willing to buy your book is likely to understand your work. It's the only way it'll ever become mainstream.

Well, for example, you can, if you wanted to take the time and effort parse through Win Shares. Bill James has an entire book dedicated to calculating out his formula and explaining what he does. I mean it is 'out there'. After all you don't have just one person calculating the stats. Many different sites/publications calculate these stats. They don't just take it from one site and roll with it.

Wikipedia gives you nice overview of, say, VORP, with some formulas and how something like 'replacement player value' is calculated.

[dawgfan]

Measures like VORP, EqA, Win Shares, xFIP, etc. are never going to be statistics that can be simply calculated, but that's not necessary nor what they are for. I'm pretty sure the formulas for the vast majority of those advanced metrics are public, and there are a number of sites that have glossaries giving a good summary of what those measures are calculating.

If you have a basic understanding of what those measures are doing, it doesn't take a lot of work to quickly estimate in your head from more traditional counting stats and rate stats how good or bad a player is. Simply looking at OBP, SLG and OPS and having a fair understanding of typical offensive production at the various positions will quickly give you a good clue as to how much better than average a particular player might be.

Advanced pitching metrics are a bit harder to gauge from traditional stat lines since you really need to see a measurement of BABIP and HR/F along with K rate, BB rate and groundball ratio to really understand how well a guy is pitching and how much of his results are due to good or bad luck. Fortunately we have sites like The Hardball Times that provide these stats. But even if you just look at a pitcher's K rate, BB rate and groundball ratio you get a pretty good idea of what kind of pitcher he is and how good he really is.

[dawgfan]

Speaking of advanced metrics, here's an updated list of UZR results so far this season: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?k...jbhlRcEb9PBbfw

Link to an article explaining UZR: http://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/..._2003-03-14_0/