You can study him at length and at leisure in the batter's box or on the mound. On defense, when the batted ball seeks him, so do our eyes. Baseball statistics open a world to us. Football statistics are virtually useless or, worse, misleading. For instance, the NFL quarterback ranking system is a joke.
Nobody understands it or can justify it.
Only in football would a runner with 1,100 yards on 300 carries be rated ahead of a back with 1,000 yards on 200 carries. If you use NFL statistics as a betting tool, you go broke. Only wins and losses, points and points against and turnovers are worth a damn. Baseball has one designated hitter. In football, everybody is a designated something.