Yes, that seems to be one of his points...because he's edited in the past and it's a headache, so expecting other sites to have some semblance of competent editing is asking to much from a free site. Just ask them to run it through word spell check at least before submitting the article.

Yeah, I think he took the editing process really personally, when you really shouldn't do that. Editing is about making the final product as good as it can possibly be. It's not anything about the writer. It's about improving the copy, and it's certainly not nit-picky to use better style.

as bbref has begun to, how to say, fully monetize the eyeballs. There is some info fangraphs has that is nowhere else - I use it for that.

Between the damn videos that run constantly and the pop up adds IN THE MIDDLE OF THE PAGE....bb-ref is becoming something that I sometimes regret having to visit... I mean I have headphones on, listening to music on the computer and happen to scroll past something or leave one of my 3-8 open bb-ref page and you get a trumpet blaring or some Talking head chatting up about something that happened in the red sox/yankee game last night that I just don't care about. BB-Ref is an essential site, so you have to live with the annoyances that make it exist, but it's still frustrating.


As to why people might not like Fangraphs. I've mentioned it before, they have a superior smug attitude when it comes to their stats and in their articles they act like their stats were handed from the almighty themselves..... For the record, You guys use WPA as an actual stat.... you have nothing to feel superior about, I haven't figured out which is a more useless stat, WPA or Productive outs. The fact that Fangraph writers think it should be listed in nearly every article is reason enough not to visit....And that is before the silliness of Fip being used as a tool to write articles in support of a candidate for a season award.

(reads the second link from 46)
I like Tango and have some sympathy for his position but...

using FG is not being invited to a party, it's using a website - and not the only game in town. If someone doesn't use their stats because they don't like the articles there (be it for the subject matters, quality and professionalism of writing, whatever), that's a little weird to me - but not a case of holding one site to a higher standard than the other, it's reacting to something that turns them off. Which is totally legit - you should vote with your eyeballs online, it's why I rarely click on links that I think will annoy me or for entities that I realy don't want to get my business.

There's nothing wrong with not liking something. (cue Smitty)

For the record, You guys use WPA as an actual stat.... you have nothing to feel superior about, I haven't figured out which is a more useless stat, WPA or Productive outs.

WPA is not a stat that should be used to measure the value of players, but it perfectly encapsulates what it's supposed to be. It's useful to tell the story of how the game went.

WPA is not a stat that should be used to measure the value of players, but it perfectly encapsulates what it's supposed to be. It's useful to tell the story of how the game went.

Correct and productive outs tells what it is supposed to also, it doesn't make it useful. WPA is a story telling tool that tells you the high and low emotional impact of a fan on a particular game. Beyond that it has no value, and pretending that player A is more valuable than player B because he has a higher wpa should be grounds for a shunning by all thinking baseball fans.

I think WPA is neat.

productive outs tells what it is supposed to also

Only literally. It's supposed to be a measure of what contributes to run production and it certainly is not that.

I like cfb's stance on K/27, but I also like WPA. Sure, like any bit of information it can be misused. It definitely isn't a leading indicator.

Fangraphs today put up an article about why a 27-year old Christian Garcia is the next K-Rod (circa 2002). I guess he's an hispanic reliever with a good 6-innings, but that's still a gargantuan stretch.

To cardsfanboy. If you don't like the ads on BBREF, I'm not sure why you don't just use FanGraphs. Their stat pages are top notch - at least as good as BBREF's. It's seems like your just playing favoritism, which is fine I guess, but you're shooting yourself in the foot and I'm not sure why anyone should listen to you. I agree that the articles are mostly poor and can be downright terrible at times, but that's irrelevent to the stats portion of the site.

Secondly, WPA certainly can be used as a measurement of value. It's essentially just linear weights adjusted for leverage. If you want to included clutch performance in your definition of value, using WPA in place of WRAA (batting runs above average) in the WAR calculation is perfectly defensible. The problem with WPA on it's own is that it's baselined to league average instead of replacement level (meaning it doesn't properly account for playing time) and obviously your leverage is dependent on the guys in front of you. On the other hand, you have no problem using ERA instead of FIP even though ERA is heavily dependent on your teammates as well. So #### it, I'm not sure what your general philosophy is.

So #### it, I'm not sure what your general philosophy is.

Say what you want about the tenets of cardsfanboyism, but at least it is an ethos.

tshpman (#51) brings up a very interesting point. There are three things that an editor is supposed to do when confronting a submission: proofreading, copy editing, and editing. Proofreading is just checking for obvious typos and basic adherence to style. Copy editing includes proofreading and also involves things like full adherence to style sheets and checking for virtually duplicate passages and such. Editing, however, involves questioning the content, especially if the content seems ambiguous or just plain hard to understand. It also involves fact checking. Writers do take editing personally, especially when the editor questions whether your content could pass a good stiff fact check. The other two - copy editing and proofreading - are things that no writer should ever object to. Essentially, they amount to just applying a second set of eyes. It's easy for a writer to skip over a typo; in fact, every writer I've ever seen, including me, has a few specific typos that they always seem to miss. If you're a writer complaining about "editing", you need to make clear whether you're complaining about full editing or copy editing.

And before anyone brings up the books that I edited back in the 1990s, they are TERRIBLY copy edited. In fact, except for the 1991 book, they are, essentially, not even proofread. The issue was time. I was trying to do too much in too few months, and copy editing and proofreading were what went by the wayside, except in 1991, when I had a little more time than usual. The irony is that, in between technical writing assignments, I proofread, freelance, for a living. So it's not as if I can't do it, or am slow. I just ran out of time. That happens, and a writer has every right to complain if it does. A writer should expect at least a proofreading pass. I failed at that and I feel guilty about it all the time, even two decades later. But my point remains: A writer not only should not complain about copy editing, he should insist on it. Full editing is a different beast. - Brock Hanke

To cardsfanboy. If you don't like the ads on BBREF, I'm not sure why you don't just use FanGraphs. Their stat pages are top notch - at least as good as BBREF's. It's seems like your just playing favoritism, which is fine I guess, but you're shooting yourself in the foot and I'm not sure why anyone should listen to you. I agree that the articles are mostly poor and can be downright terrible at times, but that's irrelevent to the stats portion of the site.

Bb-ref still loads faster, is easier to read, is easier to sort, is easier to use, is easier to convert to txt documents, better and easier to use seasonal data. (Spent the last minute+ trying to figure out where runs scored per game for the team is and still haven't found it nor have I found runs allowed per game...these are basic stats that I look at on a somewhat daily basis) Doesn't have save situation or save opps as a stat which is another stat I use semi-infrequently. (Any time some idiot tv announcer tries to disparage a non-closer in the closer role by pulling out save situation, you need to have holds, saves, blown saves and save situation to accurately calculate true save percentage) Etc....Fangraphs isn't remotely on the same level as bb-ref.

Secondly, WPA certainly can be used as a measurement of value. It's essentially just linear weights adjusted for leverage. If you want to included clutch performance in your definition of value, using WPA in place of WRAA (batting runs above average) in the WAR calculation is perfectly defensible. The problem with WPA on it's own is that it's baselined to league average instead of replacement level (meaning it doesn't properly account for playing time) and obviously your leverage is dependent on the guys in front of you. On the other hand, you have no problem using ERA instead of FIP even though ERA is heavily dependent on your teammates as well. So #### it, I'm not sure what your general philosophy is.

It is linear weights ran through a stupid machine.... again, if you hit a solo homerun in a 1-0 game, it has the EXACT SAME VALUE no matter what inning it happens in. WPA on the other hand says "no it doesn't, because I'm a legal retard stat and if you hit that homerun in the top of the 9th inning, it's worth a whole hell of a lot more than it is in the first inning."

ERA is dependent on teamates, but it's at least based upon something that happened, instead of some theory of what should have happened.

Comparing era to wpa is ridiculous. A run allowed in the first inning of a 9 inning performance is the same as one allowed in the 9th inning of the same performance. Theory should never be substituted for reality.

It is linear weights ran through a stupid machine.... again, if you hit a solo homerun in a 1-0 game, it has the EXACT SAME VALUE no matter what inning it happens in. WPA on the other hand says "no it doesn't, because I'm a legal retard stat and if you hit that homerun in the top of the 9th inning, it's worth a whole hell of a lot more than it is in the first inning."

Actually, if it's a 2 run homer, it IS a lot more valuable in the bottom of the 9th, because it ENDS THE GAME. If it happens earlier in the game, there are still outs left for the other team to use up before they don't have a chance to tie or go ahead. The timing of events has no predictive value of future events, but it most certainly DOES have a different value looking backwards. It's the essence of competition with outcomes that result in a win or a loss.

Um, what the hell are you talking about? WPA says a two run homerun is worth more than a solo home run. It's literally the exact same idea as ERA, which gives more value to certain events based on their timing. You're getting hung up on the real vs. constructed idea and I can only assume that's because you have zero imagination. If you're trying to accurately value a player you're going to have to go with models, otherwise you're going to have a bunch of #### that doesn't measure what you're trying to measure.

Also, ERA totally is theoretical because it reconstructs the innings based on errors. If you want a stat that's pure results, look at RA/9.

Also, ERA totally is theoretical because it reconstructs the innings based on errors. If you want a stat that's pure results, look at RA/9.

I would prefer for ERA to not include errors and would prefer ra and many times I do the math to include that. But era+ is well within the norm that it's more than good enough. Again, I would prefer to go by a component era that looks at singles, doubles, triples, homeruns and walks and go by runs created and go with that.

Actually, if it's a 2 run homer it IS a lot more valuable in the bottom of the 9th, because it ENDS THE GAME.

I never said anything about a 2 run homerun, but no, a 2 run homerun is worth exactly the same value no matter when it happens. That is the silliness of WPA.

You're getting hung up on the real vs. constructed idea and I can only assume that's because you have zero imagination. If you're trying to accurately value a player you're going to have to go with models, otherwise you're going to have a bunch of #### that doesn't measure what you're trying to measure.

When looking at MVP/Cy Young real is what matters, you can argue luck based upon the order of the events, but you can't just turn a double allowed into nothing because your theory says that double wouldn't have happened in a universe populated with average defensive players.

If I want to evaluate a pitcher who is moving from one team to another team, then FIP is a good tool. If I want to predict a players performance next year even, fip is better than era. But for evaluating past performance, it's not a good tool.

Right, but it's also equally unfair to give the pitcher full credit for stuff his defense does. That's why I say go somewhere in between FIP and RA. I actually agree with you about WPA for pitchers. I don't think it matters if the pitcher gives up his runs in the 1st or the 8th. But for hitters WPA totally is meaningful as a measure of value because it accounts for base/out states in a way that wOBA does not.

I use B-ref mostly out of habit I suppose, but Fangraphs definitely has lots of great stuff; I love the projections data, the Pitch F/X stuff, and the charts, just to start. Being able to sort pitchers by fastball velocity is a very cool feature. They post articles?

But for hitters WPA totally is meaningful as a measure of value because it accounts for base/out states in a way that wOBA does not.

Use L1 for that, not WPA.

but no, a 2 run homerun is worth exactly the same value no matter when it happens

This is false.

Again, if you are measuring talent, or trying to project future performance, of course the sequence of events does not matter. As I have tried to explain, in REAL LIFE, the order in which things actually happen does indeed create different values to the people who actually have a vested interest in the outcome. Some people think the value of the story is different from the value of the event, but the story IS the value.

I actually agree with cardsfanboy that the sequencing of events is irrelevant. Think about it, if a team wins 3-2, it doesn't matter whether they score 3 runs in the first or 3 runs in the ninth, the only thing that changes is the perception of the teams chances. That makes WPA a good storytelling stat. It's also good if you believe clutch exists because the leverage is the thing that would make a hitter quaver more in the clutch. So if you like giving a player credit for the intensity of the situation, WPA is good.

If clutch situations didn't exist, then the Red Sox and Orioles would have the same amount of wins this year.

Instead, the Orioles have 16 more wins this year than the Red Sox.