From: zuhars@madrone.eecs.ucdavis.edu (Gary Didi Seven Huckabay)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.baseball
Subject: Arrogance, Statheads, and Life.
Date: 2 Oct 92 23:21:20 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: Lance Blankenship Appreciation Society (BB Division)

I want to address a question that many people have brought up on many
occasions here, and one that, in all likelihood, will not die.

Why do many of the people here consider the 'statheads' or, 'SDCNs'
arrogant?

I'm really serious.  I've heard people talk about being attacked from
all fronts, by Sherri, David, Harold, Roger, myself, and a plethora of
other charges, but I don't really understand why anyone would think
these people arrogant.

On the contrary, to me, it is those who hang on to their own
observations, however limited and subjective they might be, in the
face of hard evidence, who would best be described as arrogant.

There are implications to statements that go BEYOND the mere statement
itself.  If someone here says "I don't care what the studies or
statistics say, I KNOW that Ruben Sierra is a better outfielder than
Jose Canseco, because I've seen them both", this implies to me that
this person values their own observations over the recorded,
systematic observations that have been made about the defense of these
two over time.  To me, that's somewhat arrogant, very closed minded,
and simply foolish.

(I use this example because recently, someone said exactly this to me
in email.)

If you judge ballplayers based solely on your observations and
impressions, you are purposely limiting yourself in terms of the
information available to you.  Statistics are nothing more than
systematically recorded observations, made over time.  Observations
that are, in general, far more free from subjective filtering than
personal observation.

Furthermore, all statistics are NOT created equal.  Many of them, in
and of themselves, and basically worthless, because they don't offer
you any context.  If someone has 233 hits, is that good?  If it's in
570 AB, you bet it is.  But what if it takes someone 1382 AB to get
there?  What if they're all singles?

Context is ESSENTIAL when trying to interpret statistics.  People who
do serious research into player value can REALLY mess up if they don't
have proper information.  We all know the general stathead opinion 
about RBI - that they be taken with a large grain of salt, and that
they don't, in general, tell you much about an individual player's
performance.  Why?  Because if a player hits a single, it gets
recorded in his statistics, and we give him credit for it.  Why should
we give someone who hits a single ADDITIONAL credit for that single
because a teammate in front of him happened to hit a triple?

In short, I don't feel as if anyone HERE has the right to call me, or
any other SDCN here 'arrogant' about baseball.  On the contrary, I
feel the burden of arrogance is upon those who refuse to open their
minds, certain that THEIR method of analysis is superior to that of
others.  

I have not seen one SDCN here who is unwilling to listen and respond
to a well reasoned argument, provided there's some evidence to be had
there.


-- 
*      Gary Huckabay      * Coming Soon: Charles Grodin, Robert DeNiro  *
*************************** and Amit Likhyani in: 'Midnight Run II -    *
* Let's Stop at HoJo's.'  In Frostbitevision.  A Galvanek/Smizik/Elvis  *
* Production.  Soundtrack available on Dangling 'Cross The Turf Records.*