Baseball has a stat for everything: WHIP (walks and hits per innings pitched), LIPS (late inning pressure situations), ERA and IRA (earned runs allowed and inherited runs allowed), plus dozens more. But as my math teacher was fond of saying, “Garbage in means garbage out.”
Baseball’s nagging problem is BUSTS (bad umpiring and scoring tarnishes stats).
Players and fans alike are losing patience with inconsistencies among umpires and scorers. What good is a pitcher’s K/BB (strikeout-to-walk ratio) if umps can’t agree on the strike zone? How important is a fielder’s FPCT (fielding percentage) if scorers differ widely in determining what is a hit and what is an error?
...In most cases, scoring seems to protect fielders while boosting offensive stats. Too windy? Hit. Bad bounce? Hit. Ball falls while two fielders stare at each other? Hit.
During the All-Star game, outfielder Bryce Harper stood with a confused expression as Mike Napoli’s routine fly dropped to the ground. Ruling: a hit. Come on.
The trend to favor fielders is unmistakable. The 11 highest fielding percentages of all time have come in the last 11 seasons, and overall errors are down by about 25 percent since 1970.
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1. I Am Not a Number Posted: July 14, 2012 at 07:56 AM (#4182322)I felt the same way reading this article.
At the scorekeepers panel at SABR this year one of the scorers (Stew Thornley I think) mentioned that several years ago MLB had issued an edict to scorers that if there was any doubt the benefit should go to the hitter.
Perhaps the author could look at things like range factor or zone rating if he's interested in balls that guys couldn't get to.
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