here's what's in store for ichiro...

[Mark McGwire]

Yeah, I gotta agree with JC. It doesn't matter if he's leading off for the 1927 Yankees, pitchers are gonna throw Ichiro breaking junk, cause he swings at breaking junk off the plate.

 

[LongTimeListener]

OPS, K/BB ratio and such stats are a fine new way to look at the game.

VORP and its brethren are complete bullshirt, manipulated according to the "stat" creator's view of the one and only way to play baseball.

I used to feel this way too, but I'm coming around on WAR and VORP. [More so on VORP.] I don't know that it's that hard to say "X is what we can expect a minimum cost resplacement player to produce based on the league average" and "Y is the statistical value of the player in question" and then calculate the difference between the two.

I think where non-seamheads (and I think I'm still one) err is is their belief that every sabernerd looks at something like VORP as an absolute. It's just another way to quantify something speculative. Really, it's not that much different than saying "How much better is he than an average player at his position?"

DD, I can get behind your first paragraph. The second paragraph, though, I just don't believe that's true. FJM used to be a daily repository of how stupid everyone was for not looking at VORP and WAR and realizing how aweseome Adam Dunn is. Last year the Votto-Pujols MVP debate brought its own special brand of absolutism, and here I return to the fond memory, in a previous thread, of Mark McGwire's take:

How did anyone get where they were going before there were cars? They didn't go places. No one is suggesting baseball can't exist without advanced metrics. Just that you're silly to dismiss them because you only need RBI to tell the difference between Rafael Furcal and Albert Pujols. Of course anyone can tell that difference. Better data allows us to answer more specific questions, like the one I posed above: Who was the more valuable player in 2010, Albert Pujols or Joey Votto? And the answer is Votto, despite the fact that Pujols had the edge in two of the three traditional triple crown statistics. Again, if you choose not to understand that, that's your right. But it's silly to degrade people who actually are interested in the answer to that question. And, yeah, since folks here cover sports for a living, I kind of expect them to be the type of people who ARE interested in the answers to such questions. And the strain of anti-intellectualism that infects the anti-statistics people is a pernicious American problem that can be measured all around us. Also in politics, deck. Also in politics.

So there you go. Last year there weren't merely opinions on Pujols-Votto, there was an absolute right and wrong answer. Same as Ichiro-Jeter.

 

[Mark McGwire]

Are you arguing that Pujols had the better year?

 

[LongTimeListener]

Are you arguing that Pujols had the better year?

No, I'm arguing that it was unbelievably close and there really wasn't a definitive answer. One guy had an OPS of 1.024 and one guy had an OPS of 1.011 and you seem to think that's reason enough to declare one the absolute most valuable player in the National League, just as by their differing OPS and OPS+ numbers you want to say Jeter is absolutely better than Ichiro.

 

[Mark McGwire]

So you just want to preserve the "No right answer" option? That's it?

Well, no. Someone had to be the MVP. They don't get a too-close-to-call bubble on the MVP ballot. And Votto was more valuable. And he won. You're right their seasons were close. Pujols had a monster year. But Votto had a slightly better year. And that was reflected, I might add, in the voting.

Joey Votto got 31 of 32 first-place votes. So you look sort of silly proclaiming "No right answer." Close, yes. But there was a right answer. Just because something is close doesn't mean there isn't a right answer.

Which was the point of my original post, I might add.

 

[LongTimeListener]

So you just want to preserve the "No right answer" option? That's it?

Well, no. Someone had to be the MVP. They don't get a too-close-to-call bubble on the MVP ballot. And Votto was more valuable. And he won. You're right their seasons were close. Pujols had a monster year. But Votto had a slightly better year. And that was reflected, I might add, in the voting.

Joey Votto got 31 of 32 first-place votes. So you look sort of silly proclaiming "No right answer." Close, yes. But there was a right answer. Just because something is close doesn't mean there isn't a right answer.

Which was the point of my original post, I might add.

I don't disagree with Votto winning, but the pure declaration is the absolutism that DD says doesn't happen and that I believe does happen with the stathead croud. It really clouds the debate, because we both know it was too close to call at least based on these stats.

And we also both know, and you were probably pulling your hair out when you realized, the real reason Votto got 31 of 32 first-place votes: His team beat Pujols' team for a playoff spot. Had the Cardinals made it, I'd bet anything Pujols would have won the award and you wouldn't have your "right answer."

 

[Double Down]

OPS, K/BB ratio and such stats are a fine new way to look at the game.

VORP and its brethren are complete bullshirt, manipulated according to the "stat" creator's view of the one and only way to play baseball.

I used to feel this way too, but I'm coming around on WAR and VORP. [More so on VORP.] I don't know that it's that hard to say "X is what we can expect a minimum cost resplacement player to produce based on the league average" and "Y is the statistical value of the player in question" and then calculate the difference between the two.

I think where non-seamheads (and I think I'm still one) err is is their belief that every sabernerd looks at something like VORP as an absolute. It's just another way to quantify something speculative. Really, it's not that much different than saying "How much better is he than an average player at his position?"

DD, I can get behind your first paragraph. The second paragraph, though, I just don't believe that's true. FJM used to be a daily repository of how stupid everyone was for not looking at VORP and WAR and realizing how aweseome Adam Dunn is. Last year the Votto-Pujols MVP debate brought its own special brand of absolutism, and here I return to the fond memory, in a previous thread, of Mark McGwire's take:

How did anyone get where they were going before there were cars? They didn't go places. No one is suggesting baseball can't exist without advanced metrics. Just that you're silly to dismiss them because you only need RBI to tell the difference between Rafael Furcal and Albert Pujols. Of course anyone can tell that difference. Better data allows us to answer more specific questions, like the one I posed above: Who was the more valuable player in 2010, Albert Pujols or Joey Votto? And the answer is Votto, despite the fact that Pujols had the edge in two of the three traditional triple crown statistics. Again, if you choose not to understand that, that's your right. But it's silly to degrade people who actually are interested in the answer to that question. And, yeah, since folks here cover sports for a living, I kind of expect them to be the type of people who ARE interested in the answers to such questions. And the strain of anti-intellectualism that infects the anti-statistics people is a pernicious American problem that can be measured all around us. Also in politics, deck. Also in politics.

So there you go. Last year there weren't merely opinions on Pujols-Votto, there was an absolute right and wrong answer. Same as Ichiro-Jeter.

I would say that, first and foremost, FJM was always about comedy. If you listen to Schur when he's on Joe Posnanski's podcast (or, Poscast) you understand pretty quickly that he's someone who loves every aspect of baseball and doesn't consider his own way of thinking to be absolutist, just that the people who have been making historical comparisons based on "their gut" and anecdotal memories tend not to be very reliable or accurate. I'm not sure I remember nearly as much pro-Adam Dunn support as you do [this is where we need statistics!] but Dunn seems a fairly convenient whipping boy right now seeing as he's having the worst season of his major league career. I doubt anyone was arguing that Adam Dunn was a Hall of Fame performer. But you can certainly make a case that Adam Dunn hitting .240 and striking out 170 times is more valuable than Juan Pierre [definitely a favorite FJM target] hitting .298.

I'm not going to speak for every sabermatrician, especially since I'm not one. But I will say that I think your brain is amplifying the loudest voices to the point where you can't hear anything else, and then just making a blanket declaration for all statheads. Buckweaver is a baseball stat guy, probably the best we have here at SportsJournalists.com, and I don't know that you'd feel comfortable slamming him as an absolutist. There is an onus on the listener too to not put too much emphasis on the people who shout the most. I think King Kaufman is kind of a deck for attacking Dave Kindred a few years ago for not being interested in VORP, and said as much on a thread about it here but I don't let Kaufman's dickish way of arguing detract from my enjoyment of stuff by Keith Law or Jonah Keri.

Even Mark, who I know fairly well, is not a sabermatrician, yet he's being used here to represent all stat guys. Well, he's someone who believes as much in the poetry of the game as anyone I know. So while your argument may be true for some of the statheads, I think it's a bit of a reach to claim they all demand we view the game like a beautiful math problem, or we're flat out wrong in our enjoyment of it.

 

[Mark McGwire]

It wasn't too close to call. It was close. Votto was better. Votto won the slash stat triple crown.

And Felix Hernandez won the Cy Young despite going 13-12 for a terrible team. So, no, I don't grant your hypothetical.

You want to take your hesitancy to embrace VORP and transfer it to something like OPS? Is that it?

I don't consider on-base or on-base plus slugging to be even up for debate, really. If you're talking about VORP, that's one thing. But if you're trying to say it's too close to call when one player was clearly -- slightly, but clearly -- better at getting on base and hitting for power than another, then you're just not making sense.

 

[LongTimeListener]

It wasn't too close to call. It was close. Votto was better. Votto won the slash stat triple crown.

And Felix Hernandez won the Cy Young despite going 13-12 for a terrible team. So, no, I don't grant your hypothetical.

You want to take your hesitancy to embrace VORP and transfer it to something like OPS? Is that it?

I don't consider on-base or on-base plus slugging to be even up for debate, really. If you're talking about VORP, that's one thing. But if you're trying to say it's too close to call when one player was clearly -- slightly, but clearly -- better at getting on base and hitting for power than another, then you're just not making sense.

The player you favor plays in a way more hitter-friendly park than the other guy, and bats in the middle of a lineup that scored 54 more runs for the season. Interestingly enough, Pujols beat him in OPS+. And yet there's a declarative and definitive answer and anybody who dares to think otherwise is silly.

Absolutism at its finest.

 

[Mark McGwire]

So let me get this straight.

You're down on VORP, and advanced metrics in general, but you're gonna use OPS+? You think Pujols might have been more valuable, and you're going to use the Reds scoring more runs as proof of that?

And so I am clear, any expression that there is, in fact, a correct answer to a question is absolutism?

Then, yes, I am guilty of absolutism. So is any other functioning human with an intact cerebral cortex, but I am guilty.

If that's how you define absolutism, and absolutism is what offends you about people looking to measure things, might I suggest that the problem lies with you and your definition of absolutism. There can be no answering any questions if we are to abide by the rules you propose by inference. The MVP award is a zero-sum proposition. Someone wins. There can be multiple arguments for multiple players. But people are not bound to treat those arguments with equal weight. I could argue that Pablo Sandoval was the most valuable, because he had a cool nickname. What I cannot do is demand you weigh that equally with an argument for Votto, or even an argument for Pujols.

I humbly submit the following:

Votto won the slash stat triple crown. Albert Pujols was a close second, but he WAS second, in BA/OBP/SLG. Controlling for both of them playing the same position, above average, and neither having any particular speed, etc, I think it's the only reasonable conclusion that Votto was the National league's most valuable player last season.
He got 31 of 32 votes. And won the award.
Since you will not argue that this was not the correct answer, I think I was right in asserting that it was the correct answer. And consider the matter closed.
Now, if you would like to make a case that I am wrong, the voters were wrong, or that the stat folks are wrong, I'd be interested in reading it.

In other words, stop letting your fee-fee get hurt by the WAY people make their case, and make a different case, if you genuinely think there's a case to be made. People argue their opinions because they believe them to be correct, and there are few things so tiresome as someone who never ventures an opinion but whines that other people are too "absolutist".

 

[dooley_womack1]

A corollary to Bill James' Ruth-Lemke argument: Any system that posits that Ichiro as a Hall of Famer is not a sure proposition has some 'splaining to do. I know that's not your argument, Mac, but it sure seems to be that of "JonnyD".

And I'm not sure it's a corollary or not if a 130-120 pitcher makes the Hall of Fame. And building a team, I would take Pujols over Votto in a second, regardless of who won the MVP. I'm not questioning your arguments, Mac (and I do wish they would call it Player of the Year and not Most Valuable Player). I do think part of the vote was many people saying it was someone else's turn to win. I doubt most voters used the stat you mentioned as their determiner.

 

[JC]

A corollary to Bill James' Ruth-Lemke argument: Any system that posits that Ichiro as a Hall of Famer is not a sure proposition has some 'splaining to do. I know that's not your argument, Mac, but it sure seems to be that of "JonnyD".

And I'm not sure it's a corollary or not if a 130-120 pitcher makes the Hall of Fame. And building a team, I would take Pujols over Votto in a second, regardless of who won the MVP. I'm not questioning your arguments, Mac (and I do wish they would call it Player of the Year and not Most Valuable Player). I do think part of the vote was many people saying it was someone else's turn to win. I doubt most voters used the stat you mentioned as their determiner.

The voters are changing Dooley and I would bet you they did use those stats.