The New Ballgame: Understanding Baseball Statistics for the Casual Fan (21 page)

Yes, it takes a computer to calculate PECOTA. And the system is proprietary at Baseball Prospectus, so you can't monkey around with it. But if
you are a simulation-game or fantasy-league general manager, it might be
comforting for you to know that the real GMs take PECOTA seriously.

Runs Created, Win Shares and VORP have something in common besides being more complex than box scores. They are the most credible explorations so far in what might be called the search for the Holy Grail of baseball
statistics: The single number that will express a player's full value.

All three of these measures-PECOTA, too-are products of modern
"sabermetrics," the term derived from SABR, the acronym for the Society for
American Baseball Research. SABR members explore many research topics,
including biographies and off-the-field material, but the national non-profit
organization is best known for its sabermetricians, who are devoted to statistical analysis.

Someday, one of them is going to come up with the GRAIL (General
Rating and Impact Level) stat. GRAIL will be universally accepted as the
measure that so reliably compares players of any era to each other and accurately weighs their impact on winning that it will be used to balance trades,
determine salaries, set gambling odds, and settle all sports-bar debates.

A player's GRAIL will be better known than his jersey number. Hall of
Fame voting will be a formality. Talk shows will stick to football.

Of course, even if a GRAIL stat were possible, who would want to give
up all the debate, study, intrigue and excitement statistics bring to the new
ballgame?

ou could look it up," Hall of
Fame Manager Casey Stengel
rnce observed.

I looked up a lot as I wrote this book. My constant companions included
these mainstays of statistical information.

In the interest of full disclosure, some of the books listed here
were published by ACTA Sports, which also published this
book. What can I say? This is a book about statistics, and
they're a statistics publisher. You don't go to a podiatrist when
you need brain surgery.

This annual is the handiest reference for finding the performance of every
current player, both last year and for his big-league career. It includes league
and team-by-team stats, and league leaders. If all you want is that basic information, this is your book. But there is so much more in the Handbook that is
difficult or impossible to find elsewhere: data on each manager's tactics, the
influence of each ballpark, detailed fielding data, and unique leader boards
such as "tough saves." It also contains such Bill James specialties as Runs
Created, Win Shares, hitter projections and career assessments. Oh, and then
there's the baserunning analysis, and the Fielding Bible Awards, and...

Every baseball library needs an up-to-date encyclopedia. This particular one
is updated the most often. Nearly 1,300 of its 1,700-plus pages are devoted
to the year-by-year and career statistics (traditional and Sabermetric) of every player in major league history. This is the best source for looking up
former players or for comparing current players to past. The book has many
other virtues, such as detailed breakdowns on historic performances (e.g. Joe
DiMaggio's day-by-day 56-game hitting streak) and single-season and career leaders in a remarkable number of categories, including pre-1900 performances. There's never been so much information in one place at such an affordable price. There's never been so much information in one place, period.

Updated annually, this is the most comprehensive collection of baseball history presented one season at a time. The detail on every season from 1901 to
2005, including complete rosters for each team, is unmatched by any other
printed source. If you want to check out, say, the 1941 season (or any other
single season), this is the first place to go. This volume's 800-plus pages make
it a bit handier for speed-checking of single-season, career leaders and award
winners, especially if you don't want them infiltrated by pre-1900 performances.

The Baseball Almanac online has a rich supply of contemporary and historic
information-statistics, lists (e.g. all no-hitters or four-home-run games), accounts of how the game has evolved (e.g. rules, uniforms), notable quotations
and much more.

Baseball Reference online is organized more like an encyclopedia, combining the player-by-player comprehensiveness of the printed ESPN Encylopedia and the team-by-team comprehensiveness of The Sports Encyclopedia.
It's a reference for much more, including unique features such as finding any
player's most statistically comparable players in history.

The ".org" extension is significant: The generous work by David Smith and
his band of volunteers is the foundation for many other baseball research
projects, from books to websites to game ratings. Retrosheet's mission is
to collect and collate play-by-play data on every major league game ever
played. After a generation of creativity and diligence, it is getting close to its
goal. That yields a rich supply of basic information (you can even look up
the box score of almost any game) and a database that allows advanced users
to answer such questions as: How did Ted Williams do against left-handed
pitching for his career (or, say, against Whitey Ford)?

There are countless options, online and in print, but these are staples.

This non-profit organization is devoted to baseball research (statistics, biographies, players/non-players, all eras, you name it). Its active online listserve
(SABR-L) is the hangout for many of the most knowledgeable baseball fans.
Newspaper writers, TV producers, book authors, and more go there for answers.
Original research appears here all the time, and then comes out of the mouths
of baseball announcers. Your nominal paid membership to SABR also gets you
several annual print publications and online access to historical newspapers.
It's a treasure trove of baseball information. Some of it is fun and easy (a list of
all catchers who have caught more than one no-hitter). Some is more advanced
(the earned-run averages of the pitchers who are caught by certain catchers).
Some of it is for people who have fun with exponents and square roots.

Two annuals with vast amounts of data. The Guide is a review of the past
season, plus historic data on pennant winners, award winners, and more. The
Register is the career-long, year-by-year statistics of every current player,
including minor league performances.

www.mlb.com, www.espn.com, www.foxsports.com, www.si.com, www.
sportingnews.com, www.usatoday.com.

These sites, among others, for Major League Baseball, ESPN, Fox
Sports, Sports Illustrated, The Sporting News and USA Today are ideal for
tracking the current season beyond the home team-with news, scores, stats
and more. Your choice depends on your preference for how the data is presented, how far back it is archived, how interested you are in fantasy baseball,
and how annoyed you are by how espn.com obliterates its superior information with incessant pop-up ads.

Published in 2000, this compilation of 2,000 compact biographies remains a
vital reference for anyone writing about historically significant players.

Published in 2006, this book lives up to its billing as "breakthrough analysis
of Major League Baseball defense-by team and player." Never has defense
been so thoroughly considered and documented. This is uniquely valuable because defensive skill is the one major area of baseball that has mostly eluded
credible statistical analysis. Until now, that is.