| Shake That Brain!® Solutions
Volume 2, Issue 11 |
| Shake
That Brain! Volume 2, Issue 11 IN THIS ISSUE: 1. BASEBALL
PLAYERS ON THE CHEAP ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ THEORETICAL: You're the general manager of a baseball team with very little money. QUESTION: How do you purchase really good players without a lot of money? ANSWER: Question assumptions. (Allow me to explain ...) In my days playing Little League, our coach was forever telling us, “A walk’s as good as a hit.” Because I was not a good hitter – and because most of the pitchers we faced threw more balls more than strikes – I took his advice to heart and wound up getting on base a lot. (Not many hits, mind you, but I was convinced my coach was right: a walk WAS as good as a hit!) Back home, though, watching professional baseball games on TV, what I never understood was why big league statistics only gave a player credit for getting on base as the result of a hit, not for a walk. To me – a veteran walker at the age of ten – it just didn’t seem fair. (Or very smart.) It still doesn’t. Consider two players, A and B. Player A, for every three trips to the plate, gets one hit and strikes out twice. He's said to have a “batting average” of .333. (In fact, a very good average.) In contrast, Player B strikes out once and draws two walks. His average is .000 (ZERO!) Clearly, player A has the better average – even though player B gets on base TWICE as often. (To make up for this statistical oversight, or "error," I’d mentally recalculate each player’s average, awarding, in this case, player B a getting-on-base “average” of .666. Major League Baseball just didn’t get it.) Meanwhile, a player’s batting average had always been used to determine the “value” of a player's hitting ability – and, consequently, became a measure of what a team would be willing to pay for his services. The “value” of a walk – contrary to logic, but fully in line with conventional wisdom – was Zero. As Michael Lewis explains in Moneyball, the concept of walks not being credited to the batter was a holdover from the earliest days of baseball, when Henry Chadwick, an Englishman, set about "counting the events that occurred on a ball field." This included, Chadwick's decision "that walks were caused entirely by the pitcher – that the hitter had nothing to do with them. ... 'There is but one true criterion of skill at the bat,' he wrote, 'and that is the number of times bases are made on clean hits.'" Chadwick, however, was dead bang wrong, as proven by amateur statisticians Bill James and Voros McCracken. The world of baseball, they discovered, "placed too much value on batting average" and "didn't place enough value on walks." Look at it this way: Each time a pitcher throws a ball the batter has a choice — either let it go and wait for a better pitch, or try to hit the ball. And that choice exists whether the pitcher throws a strike, or throws a "ball." So it's not just the pitcher who determines whether a pitch is a "ball," it's also the batter's "eye" – his ability to judge, within a fraction of a second, whether he should swing at a particular pitch, or let it go – that contributes to whether the umpire calls it a "ball." (There's also the individual umpire's "eye" that plays a factor, but that's a discussion for another time.) Bottom line? The batter plays an important role in whether or not he earns a base on balls. In lieu of "batting average" (the percentage of times a batter earns a hit) James and McCracken suggested a far more appropriate measure of a batter's worth – his "on base average," including those times he gets on base as the result of a walk. The “value” of a walk, they argued – contrary to conventional wisdom, but fully in line with logic – could not possibly be Zero. A walk, in fact, deserved to be valued the same as a hit. Whether a batter gets to base from a "hit" or a "walk," the result is the same – bringing his team that much closer to scoring a run – hence their conviction that "batting average" should be replaced with "on base average," a clearly superior measure of a batter's worth.. "The fetish made of 'runs batted in'," writes Lewis, "was another good example of the general madness. RBI had come to be treated by baseball people as an individual achievement – free agents were paid for their reputation as RBI machines when clearly they were not. ... Why did they get so much credit for this? To knock runners in, runners needed to be on base when you came to bat. There was a huge element of luck in even having the opportunity, and what wasn't luck was, partly, the achievement of others. 'The problem,' wrote James, 'is that baseball statistics are not pure accomplishments of men against other men, which is what we are in the habit of seeing them as. They are accomplishments of men in combination with their circumstances.'" What it took to put these theories in practice was Oakland A’s general
manager, Billy Beane, who quickly realized that James and McCracken were as right
as Chadwick had been wrong – that certain time-honored baseball values did not
hold up under scrutiny and that it was well past time to apply a new math to the
valuation of players. Moreover, Beane was in desperate need for help. During the
late 1990's, while player salaries were sky-rocketing, Beane had meager resources
– "working with either the lowest or the second lowest payroll in the game"
(only one third as much as the New York Yankees, the richest team). 1. They questioned assumptions. REPRINT INFORMATION: Permission is hereby granted to reprint this article. Adapted from Joel Saltzman's book, "SHAKE THAT BRAIN! – How To Create Winning Solutions and Have FUN While You're At It!," to be published by Wiley 12/05. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ This newsletter has been brought to you by Joel Saltzman. Joel is a speaker,
facilitator, consultant, and creator of the "Shake http://shakethatbrain.com/wow Joel is also the publisher and founder of Shake It! Books: http://www.shakeitbooks.com/ TO
SUBSCRIBE: If this newsletter has been forwarded to you and you'd This list
(and your participation in it) will never be sold, rented, or TO UNSUBSCRIBE: If you'd like to unsubscribe to our newsletter,
simply TO
BE HEARD: Send all comments, criticisms or suggestions to: This
email newsletter is intended for the use of subscribers only and Shake That Brain!« is a Registered
Trademark. JOEL
SALTZMAN Shake
It! Books http://shakeitbooks.com/ REPRINT INFORMATION: Permission is hereby granted to reprint this article. Adapted from Joel Saltzman's book, "SHAKE THAT BRAIN! – How To Create Winning Solutions and Have FUN While You're At It!," to be published by Wiley 12/05. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ This newsletter has been brought to you by Joel Saltzman. Joel is a speaker,
facilitator, consultant, and creator of the "Shake http://shakethatbrain.com/wow Joel is also the publisher and founder of Shake It! Books: http://www.shakeitbooks.com/ TO
SUBSCRIBE: If this newsletter has been forwarded to you and you'd This list
(and your participation in it) will never be sold, rented, or TO UNSUBSCRIBE: If you'd like to unsubscribe to our newsletter,
simply TO
BE HEARD: Send all comments, criticisms or suggestions to: This
email newsletter is intended for the use of subscribers only and Shake That Brain!« is a Registered
Trademark. JOEL
SALTZMAN Shake
It! Books http://shakeitbooks.com/ |
| |