From: dtate@unix.cis.pitt.edu (David M Tate)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.baseball
Subject: Re: Rickey Henderson v Nolan Ryan -- Stat-head call to arms!
Date: 14 Apr 92 22:32:25 GMT
Organization: University of Pittsburgh

In article <167C9CAF8.CAVGEOE@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu> CAVGEOE@YaleVM.YCC.Yale.Edu writes:
> 
>     Everyone who's responded on the net has been against me -- where are
>the stat-heads to come to my defense?  You can read the numbers in Total
>Baseball, or do you have some reason for believing Rickey is *not* hands
>down superior to Nolan Ryan?  

Sheesh, can you at least wait until I get home from work?

Jeff is basing his claim on the _Total_Baseball_ "total player rating"
method, which is a good idea badly executed.  So, we have to be a little 
bit careful in how we do this.

For example, _TB2_ fielding ratings, while much better than _TB1_ (see Lynn
Jones thread), are still atrociously poorly conceived.  So, in the spirit of
being conservative, for purposes of this debate we will consider Rickey to
be "average or above", defensively.

Now, when it comes to batting and pitching, _TB2_ is on much better footing.
Again, allowing some margin for error (say 10%), we can conservatively 
estimate that Nolan Ryan has been worth no more than 1.5 additional wins per
season, on average, above what a normal pitcher would have been worth.  In
his best year, 1977, he may have been worth as many as 4 extra wins; in his
worst, 1985, he may have cost his team as many as 2 wins that a league-average
pitcher would have had.

(The 1.5 is extremely conservative; the true average is probably below 1.0).

(Again, note that I'm using "wins" here in terms of final team W/L record,
not the silly "W" stat that gets used for pitchers.)

We'll call Nolan's batting a wash, even though he's a below-average hitting
pitcher.

Thus, over Ryan's career, he's been worth no more than 36 extra wins, tops.

Now, Rickey Henderson, without even considering defense, has been worth 
anywhere from 20 to 60 extra runs per season above league average, which
tranlates into somewhere between 2 and 6 extra wins for his teams.  It
averages out to about 4.5 wins per year, over 18 years.  Let's be conservative
(again) and call it 50 wins in 18 years (I don't have 1991 numbers handy, but
he was still well above average).  Even being as generous as I can be, and
ignoring Rickey's defense, I get half-again as valuable (career) and four
times as good per season, Rickey over Ryan.  Throw in half a game per year
for defense, and you're up to twice as valuable (career) and more than 4 times
as valuable per season.

Does this mean Rickey's really a nice guy?  Of course not; he's a total jerk.
But he's an exceptionally talented and valuable total jerk: one of the 20 most
valuable players of all time, almost certainly.

I'd rather have dinner with Nolan Ryan; I'd rather *watch* Nolan Ryan.  I'd
rather have owned the rights to Rickey.



-- 
          David M. Tate            |"The man who hath no music in himself
     dtate@unix.cis.pitt.edu       | Nor is not moved by concord of sweet sound
  A poem should be dumb, / As old  | Is fit for treason, stratagems, and spoils
 medallions to the thumb.-MacLeish | 	Shakespeare, "Merchant of Venice", A.V