I guess OPS is really a short-hand (which Steve is getting it with his /3 concept), as it doesn't make much sense mathematically. It's
Slugging = Total bases/at-bats +
OBP = Times on base/plate appearances
(more or less; this excludes sacrifices, HBP, and other one-offs). So if someone never walked, OPS would simply be (hits + total bases)/at-bats, which would double-count (overweight) singles: a single would worth be 2 in the numerator, a double 3, a triple 4, and HR 5. Someone who has three singles in ten at-bats has a BA of .300 and an OPS of .600. Someone who has three doubles in ten at-bats has a BA of .300 and an OPS of .900. But isn't this batter twice as productive as the one who has three singles? Yet his OPS is only 1.5 times as high. Someone who singles every time at bat would have an OPS of 2.000; what does this signify? I don't see the logic of OPS.
Why not just create a "Slugging+" that adds walks into Slugging -- total bases (including walks)/plate appearances? That would be a better measure of "expected number of bases achieved per time at the plate." Or, nearly equivalently, remove singles from the numerator and denominator of slugging and then add the result to OBP.
You're right that OPS doesn't make sense if you do basic dimension analysis.
When you see rule-of-thumb sports metrics like that, you should interpret them as if the precise linear combination was determined by linear regression (OPS probably wasn't determined that way, but it still helps with interpretation). The dimensionful regression coefficients in front of each of the terms in the model (On-base percentage and slugging) just so happen to equal one in the units that we conventionally measure each stat.
Interpreting advanced stats like OPS as linear regression models also makes you less tempted to try and make sense of their values at the extreme. Though my impression is that sports stats tend to have asymmetric bias; popular stats tend to be quite good at ranking all-time players, but useless if you want to distinguish between replacement-level players. I suspect that's simply because of selection effects: the advanced stats that remain popular are those that accord with people's intuitions, and we spend more time debating great players than lousy players, so advanced stats will tend to be selected for their high-end performance.
Good point -- looking only at extreme cases (as I did in all of my examples) makes it look sillier than it is. Fair point about linear regression. The old NFL QB rating comes to mind: I think it's a linear combination of four statistics, with capricious-looking coefficients for each.
"Someone who has three doubles in ten at-bats has a BA of .300 and an OPS of .900. But isn't this batter twice as productive as the one who has three singles?"
No, because neither the doubles hitter nor the singles hitter made an out, which is good for the team's chance of winning. OPS values Not Making Outs. So a single is not 1/4th the value of a home run, as in Slugging Average, or 1/1th the value of homer as in Batting Average or On Base Percentage, but 2/5th value of a homer because besides getting to first base, the batter didn't make an out.
There is one; it's called runs created. It is calculated by multiplying OBP by SLG by AB. For 2024 Judge had 179 runs created while Ohtani had 160. This stat isn't perfect as it doesn't include the impact of stolen bases, but on a team-wide and league-wide basis, the total runs created comes very close to the actual runs scored. There are other more intricate versions of the formula available for those so inclined, but the basic version I gave above works well enough.
I always find it enjoyable when you get to "geek out" on baseball. Much preferred to the slow burn comic tragedy that our national culture and politics have become.
Thought I'd look up who has the highest all-time and single season OPS in the World Series. I admire the greats from all eras who consistently perform at a high level over many seasons, but I also like the guys who rise to the occasion and perform best when it counts the most (a championship title on the line). You can check out the OPS stats here:
36 plate appearances or 14 BB + H required for career leaders of rate statistics.
18 plate appearances or 7 BB + H required for yearly leaders of rate statistics.
Barry Bonds comes out on top for "career" in a losing effort in 2002 vs the Anaheim Angels with an OPS of 1.994 (~.665 BA); only one series appearance but it went 7 games so he was able to rack up 13 walks vs Anaheim pitchers along with 17 plate appearances. Still, he had 8 hits including 4 homers and 6 RBIs. But, again, this is likely Bonds at peak PEDs.
Lou Gehrig has the top single season OPS at an eye-popping 2.433 (~.811 BA) in the 1928 series in which the Yankees swept the St. Louis Cardinals. Gehrig had 6 walks, 6 hits (including 4 dingers) and 9 RBIs. Ruth had a monster series as well, batting .625 (10 for 16, with 3 HRs), but Gehrig out-homered him and racked up more RBIs (9 vs Ruth's 4). Interestingly, Ruth's '28 Series performance is 4th on the single season list at 2.022 (~.674).
My first World Series was in 1968 when Detroit defeated St. Louis in seven games. Mickey Lolich was heroic with three starts and wins. Jim Northrup was unsung but hit two home runs, including a grand slam, and knocked in eight runs. Incidentally, Northrup, the Tigers' fourth outfielder, led the Tigers with 90 RBIs for the year as he replaced injured Al Kaline for sixty games. That led to the audacious decision of Manager Mayo Smith to bench shortstop Ray Oyler, owner of something like a .136 batting average, move centerfielder Mickey Stanley to shortstop, a position he last played in high school, and starting Northrup in centerfield. Stanley did commit two errors in the World Series but neither led to Cardinals runs.
The logic of OPS is that it values walks. That is a major feature of Billy Bean’s Moneyball approach. Walks represent three things: outs avoided, higher pitch counts (enabling teams getting into opponents’ bull pens sooner) and men on base (potential runs). Walks, home runs, and strikeouts constitute what sabermatricians refer to as the three pure outcomes, since fielding is not an issue (except for leaping outfielders who rob batters of home runs, inside the park homers and dropped third strikes).
Even in the 1950s and 60s when I was playing youth baseball this was recognized by coaches, who were constantly telling batters that “a walk is as good as a hit.” This was appreciated by a late developing, smaller guy like me, who in four years had one extra-base hit, a triple in a game in which I pitched a complete game shutout, a day I still remember 64 years later. The only other really vivid memory I have of playing baseball during that time is watching a grand slam go over the center field fence from the mound the next year.
Was going to made the same point you did. As the parent of a young baseball player it is definitely something coaches pay attention to now - we use an app called Game Changer and as long as you have someone electronically keeping the book it generates all sorts of stats for the kids for hitting, fielding, and pitching which I greedily monitor on behalf of my son.
I believe there is a 70 percent rule. However, I wonder whether a base-stealer's distraction can be quantified. Scot Podsednik was often around the 70 percent line but his base-stealing rattled pitchers.
The distraction/worry a base stealer poses to a team is often out of proportion to the base once stolen. Yes, the running is now in scoring position, but if he was good enough to steal straight he probably turns a lot of singles into doubles and the pitchers should just chalk it up to him rather than worry themselves into a hole trying to keep him at one base. It causes the pitcher to make bad pitches to other batters and thus make his situation worse.
Probably the best strategy against a good base stealer is to cede him the base rather than constantly hold him on and have the catcher try to throw him out if his arm isn't strong. But most pitchers and catchers spend far to much time on the stealer and blow innings that way.
Not to be picky but it was Jesus Alou, a mediocrity who played mostly for the Astros. Felipe was the best of the Alou brothers, a very good hitter who hit a lot of doubles. He was not quite a Hall of Famer but was very good.
What I find striking about Aaron Judge is how well he has aged. In modern baseball, tall sluggers with large strike zones tend to decline at about the age of 30. Chris Davis and Ryan Howard are recent sluggers who declined steadily once they entered their early thirties. Judge defies age because he is an excellent athlete and has a compact swing.
I hope Judge does well in this World Series because he'll be 33 next year and could start turning into Giancarlo Stanton at any time. Ohtani will be 31. It's pretty amazing they had their offensive peaks at ages 32 and 30 considering how high their previous peaks had already been. How do you top hitting 62 homers?
Also, as a Dodger fan, I feel guilty that Judge lost a large chunk of last season because of the negligent way Dodger Stadium was constructed with a 3 inch high concrete lip around the outfield. Judge made a heroic catch in rightfield against the Dodgers, crashing through the bullpen gate, but busted his toe on this stupid concrete curb and missed about a third of the season. Otherwise, he'd have had three straight 50 homer seasons.
It's not like Dodger Stadium doesn't generate enough revenue to have fixed this design flaw over the last 60 years.
Hank Aaron was very good until the year he caught Babe Ruth. I believe he was forty. But that's such a different era. Almost every pitcher today can throw 92 MPH at the minimum. You can't say that about the pitching in the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s.
In one of the Mantle biographies, he's quoted as saying the reason he retired is that he'd hit a lot of his homers off pudgy guys who didn't throw very hard, and that more Radatz types were showing up.
Back in the day before every game was televised and available coast to coast a lot of teams would end worthless games when the light was fading by a wink-wink agreement where the pitcher would throw easy fastballs down the middle and the hitters would all agree to swing at the first pitch but not for homers. It was a way to end a game early and let everyone go have a drink.
Then TV came in, and then nationally televised games, and gamblers wanted to make sure their teams weren't throwing it, so the batting practice endings stopped for the most part. Then free agency came in and players realized every at bat meant more or less money on their next contract and so everyone started bearing down even in bad games, so relievers ("firemen") started becoming a thing. Finally, Tony LaRussa made the one-and-done reliever, bullpen-as-key a thing with the White Sox and more famously with the A's.
Between that problem in Dodger Stadium and the hill/flagpole in centerfield in Houston---that was *deliberately* built there -- I truly wonder if the Players Union has any power or pull except when it comes to holding out/contracts.
Getting these obvious player hazards removed/never made should have been a basic safety priority. The purpose of labor unions initially was not just to raise salaries, but to protect workers from dangerous conditions. Apparently, the 'roided-up players have forgotten the latter.
> baseball statistics analysts like Bill James pointed out that simply adding together two other statistics — On-base Percentage and Slugging average — concocted a statistic called OPS that correlated much better than BA with winning baseball games
Strictly speaking multiplying the two figures together does an even better job of correlating with runs scored, which then leads to winning baseball games. The reason why OPS took off was that it is MUCH easier to add two three-digit numbers together than it is to multiply then. Also, it gives you an answer that is generally three digits, while a multiplication gives you 6.
FOX is having a Los Angeles sports doubleheader Friday night, with the Dodgers/Yankees World Series Game 1 airing at 5, followed by the USC/Rutgers BigTen football matchup at 8. It turns out the events are only 5 miles apart, and adding to the regional rivalry, Rutgers is the only Power 4 team in the NYC metro, with the school and Yankee Stadium being an easy Amtrak ride away from each other, as well as 35 miles as the crow flies.
"With the World Series starting today, I have a lot to say about baseball.
For those readers to whom all sports are “sportsball,” I can usually justify writing about current sports as being relevant to the election or to race or whatever."
Steve, Steve. No need to justify your cheering your hometown team to a championship. And perhaps its also payback for 77 and 78. This WS is the tiebreaker for NY vs LA. The WS that MLB fans have wanted for quite some time now.
"Ted always wanted that batting crown."--Johnny Pesky, regarding Ted Williams on hitting, and giving lessons, advice to hitters from rival teams.
BA still remains an important MLB stat, Steve.
Also, if you want to diss PIT's Matty Alou, keep in mind that CIN Pete Rose won the '73 MVP and he won the Batting Title that year with .338. Rose had a similar year to Alou's five seasons, and yet he won the MVP, due in no small part to the fact that CIN won their division and was in the playoffs, while PIT didn't make the playoffs until 1970, Alou's final year with PIT. Also, unlike Clemente, Alou wasn't the first Pirate that sportswriters thought of. Could also make a case that Matty wasn't the first Alou brother that sportswriters thought of (Felipe was on SF, which got more headlines than PIT during most of the '60's).
And of course Pete Rose's personality always got the attention on him no matter where he played.
Batting Average is a good stat for comparing one player's own seasons to each other. E.g., Judge's .322 batting average this year was his career high, and, sure enough, many of the newer stats say it was his best season as a batter, even better than his 62 homer season two years ago.
Similarly, a lot of advanced stats point to previously often overlooked 1923 when Babe Ruth hit only 41 homers, but batted a career high .393 as Ruth's single best as a hitter.
Ted Williams' two best seasons in the modern stats: his two highest batting average seasons: .406 in 1941 and .388 in 1957.
So, while batting average has obvious massive weaknesses for comparing, say, Luis Arraez to Aaron Judge, it's quite good at comparing the various seasons of one player to his other seasons.
Good idea. Divide by 3. A good way to understand it for anyone who came of age before OBP was known to the general public. Boomers, Gen Xers, Millenials.
Dub them The Guys Who Learned Stats from Baseball Cards and Newspapers.
Very helpful! Been a baseball fan (ok, a Mets fan, but hey, it still counts!) for over 40 years, and all the new stats (wOBA? WRC+?) just annoy and baffle me. Give me batting average and RBIs and I’ll easily be able to determine an offensive player’s value. Simple, elegant, effective, and easy to grasp.
I guess OPS is really a short-hand (which Steve is getting it with his /3 concept), as it doesn't make much sense mathematically. It's
Slugging = Total bases/at-bats +
OBP = Times on base/plate appearances
(more or less; this excludes sacrifices, HBP, and other one-offs). So if someone never walked, OPS would simply be (hits + total bases)/at-bats, which would double-count (overweight) singles: a single would worth be 2 in the numerator, a double 3, a triple 4, and HR 5. Someone who has three singles in ten at-bats has a BA of .300 and an OPS of .600. Someone who has three doubles in ten at-bats has a BA of .300 and an OPS of .900. But isn't this batter twice as productive as the one who has three singles? Yet his OPS is only 1.5 times as high. Someone who singles every time at bat would have an OPS of 2.000; what does this signify? I don't see the logic of OPS.
Why not just create a "Slugging+" that adds walks into Slugging -- total bases (including walks)/plate appearances? That would be a better measure of "expected number of bases achieved per time at the plate." Or, nearly equivalently, remove singles from the numerator and denominator of slugging and then add the result to OBP.
You're right that OPS doesn't make sense if you do basic dimension analysis.
When you see rule-of-thumb sports metrics like that, you should interpret them as if the precise linear combination was determined by linear regression (OPS probably wasn't determined that way, but it still helps with interpretation). The dimensionful regression coefficients in front of each of the terms in the model (On-base percentage and slugging) just so happen to equal one in the units that we conventionally measure each stat.
Interpreting advanced stats like OPS as linear regression models also makes you less tempted to try and make sense of their values at the extreme. Though my impression is that sports stats tend to have asymmetric bias; popular stats tend to be quite good at ranking all-time players, but useless if you want to distinguish between replacement-level players. I suspect that's simply because of selection effects: the advanced stats that remain popular are those that accord with people's intuitions, and we spend more time debating great players than lousy players, so advanced stats will tend to be selected for their high-end performance.
Good point -- looking only at extreme cases (as I did in all of my examples) makes it look sillier than it is. Fair point about linear regression. The old NFL QB rating comes to mind: I think it's a linear combination of four statistics, with capricious-looking coefficients for each.
"Someone who has three doubles in ten at-bats has a BA of .300 and an OPS of .900. But isn't this batter twice as productive as the one who has three singles?"
No, because neither the doubles hitter nor the singles hitter made an out, which is good for the team's chance of winning. OPS values Not Making Outs. So a single is not 1/4th the value of a home run, as in Slugging Average, or 1/1th the value of homer as in Batting Average or On Base Percentage, but 2/5th value of a homer because besides getting to first base, the batter didn't make an out.
We need a stat that is based totally on contribution to runs.
Runs scored or RBIs or runners advanced. Is there one?
There is one; it's called runs created. It is calculated by multiplying OBP by SLG by AB. For 2024 Judge had 179 runs created while Ohtani had 160. This stat isn't perfect as it doesn't include the impact of stolen bases, but on a team-wide and league-wide basis, the total runs created comes very close to the actual runs scored. There are other more intricate versions of the formula available for those so inclined, but the basic version I gave above works well enough.
I always find it enjoyable when you get to "geek out" on baseball. Much preferred to the slow burn comic tragedy that our national culture and politics have become.
Thought I'd look up who has the highest all-time and single season OPS in the World Series. I admire the greats from all eras who consistently perform at a high level over many seasons, but I also like the guys who rise to the occasion and perform best when it counts the most (a championship title on the line). You can check out the OPS stats here:
https://www.baseball-reference.com/postseason/WS_batting.shtml
36 plate appearances or 14 BB + H required for career leaders of rate statistics.
18 plate appearances or 7 BB + H required for yearly leaders of rate statistics.
Barry Bonds comes out on top for "career" in a losing effort in 2002 vs the Anaheim Angels with an OPS of 1.994 (~.665 BA); only one series appearance but it went 7 games so he was able to rack up 13 walks vs Anaheim pitchers along with 17 plate appearances. Still, he had 8 hits including 4 homers and 6 RBIs. But, again, this is likely Bonds at peak PEDs.
Lou Gehrig has the top single season OPS at an eye-popping 2.433 (~.811 BA) in the 1928 series in which the Yankees swept the St. Louis Cardinals. Gehrig had 6 walks, 6 hits (including 4 dingers) and 9 RBIs. Ruth had a monster series as well, batting .625 (10 for 16, with 3 HRs), but Gehrig out-homered him and racked up more RBIs (9 vs Ruth's 4). Interestingly, Ruth's '28 Series performance is 4th on the single season list at 2.022 (~.674).
My first World Series was in 1968 when Detroit defeated St. Louis in seven games. Mickey Lolich was heroic with three starts and wins. Jim Northrup was unsung but hit two home runs, including a grand slam, and knocked in eight runs. Incidentally, Northrup, the Tigers' fourth outfielder, led the Tigers with 90 RBIs for the year as he replaced injured Al Kaline for sixty games. That led to the audacious decision of Manager Mayo Smith to bench shortstop Ray Oyler, owner of something like a .136 batting average, move centerfielder Mickey Stanley to shortstop, a position he last played in high school, and starting Northrup in centerfield. Stanley did commit two errors in the World Series but neither led to Cardinals runs.
The logic of OPS is that it values walks. That is a major feature of Billy Bean’s Moneyball approach. Walks represent three things: outs avoided, higher pitch counts (enabling teams getting into opponents’ bull pens sooner) and men on base (potential runs). Walks, home runs, and strikeouts constitute what sabermatricians refer to as the three pure outcomes, since fielding is not an issue (except for leaping outfielders who rob batters of home runs, inside the park homers and dropped third strikes).
Even in the 1950s and 60s when I was playing youth baseball this was recognized by coaches, who were constantly telling batters that “a walk is as good as a hit.” This was appreciated by a late developing, smaller guy like me, who in four years had one extra-base hit, a triple in a game in which I pitched a complete game shutout, a day I still remember 64 years later. The only other really vivid memory I have of playing baseball during that time is watching a grand slam go over the center field fence from the mound the next year.
Was going to made the same point you did. As the parent of a young baseball player it is definitely something coaches pay attention to now - we use an app called Game Changer and as long as you have someone electronically keeping the book it generates all sorts of stats for the kids for hitting, fielding, and pitching which I greedily monitor on behalf of my son.
Modern analytics would come down hard on Matty Alou's base stealing. He was caught stealing often.
In his career Matty had 156 SB and 80 CS; by modern metrics this would be considered a net negative. Now don't get me started on his brother Boog
I believe there is a 70 percent rule. However, I wonder whether a base-stealer's distraction can be quantified. Scot Podsednik was often around the 70 percent line but his base-stealing rattled pitchers.
The distraction/worry a base stealer poses to a team is often out of proportion to the base once stolen. Yes, the running is now in scoring position, but if he was good enough to steal straight he probably turns a lot of singles into doubles and the pitchers should just chalk it up to him rather than worry themselves into a hole trying to keep him at one base. It causes the pitcher to make bad pitches to other batters and thus make his situation worse.
Probably the best strategy against a good base stealer is to cede him the base rather than constantly hold him on and have the catcher try to throw him out if his arm isn't strong. But most pitchers and catchers spend far to much time on the stealer and blow innings that way.
A good base stealer creates havoc.
Well presented argument. I think what you write is valid but probably will be argued to the Lord's Second Coming.
Jose Alou was really bad by modern statistics. Felipe Alou was quite good.
Not to be picky but it was Jesus Alou, a mediocrity who played mostly for the Astros. Felipe was the best of the Alou brothers, a very good hitter who hit a lot of doubles. He was not quite a Hall of Famer but was very good.
What I find striking about Aaron Judge is how well he has aged. In modern baseball, tall sluggers with large strike zones tend to decline at about the age of 30. Chris Davis and Ryan Howard are recent sluggers who declined steadily once they entered their early thirties. Judge defies age because he is an excellent athlete and has a compact swing.
I hope Judge does well in this World Series because he'll be 33 next year and could start turning into Giancarlo Stanton at any time. Ohtani will be 31. It's pretty amazing they had their offensive peaks at ages 32 and 30 considering how high their previous peaks had already been. How do you top hitting 62 homers?
Also, as a Dodger fan, I feel guilty that Judge lost a large chunk of last season because of the negligent way Dodger Stadium was constructed with a 3 inch high concrete lip around the outfield. Judge made a heroic catch in rightfield against the Dodgers, crashing through the bullpen gate, but busted his toe on this stupid concrete curb and missed about a third of the season. Otherwise, he'd have had three straight 50 homer seasons.
It's not like Dodger Stadium doesn't generate enough revenue to have fixed this design flaw over the last 60 years.
Hank Aaron was very good until the year he caught Babe Ruth. I believe he was forty. But that's such a different era. Almost every pitcher today can throw 92 MPH at the minimum. You can't say that about the pitching in the 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s.
In one of the Mantle biographies, he's quoted as saying the reason he retired is that he'd hit a lot of his homers off pudgy guys who didn't throw very hard, and that more Radatz types were showing up.
Back in the day before every game was televised and available coast to coast a lot of teams would end worthless games when the light was fading by a wink-wink agreement where the pitcher would throw easy fastballs down the middle and the hitters would all agree to swing at the first pitch but not for homers. It was a way to end a game early and let everyone go have a drink.
Then TV came in, and then nationally televised games, and gamblers wanted to make sure their teams weren't throwing it, so the batting practice endings stopped for the most part. Then free agency came in and players realized every at bat meant more or less money on their next contract and so everyone started bearing down even in bad games, so relievers ("firemen") started becoming a thing. Finally, Tony LaRussa made the one-and-done reliever, bullpen-as-key a thing with the White Sox and more famously with the A's.
Between that problem in Dodger Stadium and the hill/flagpole in centerfield in Houston---that was *deliberately* built there -- I truly wonder if the Players Union has any power or pull except when it comes to holding out/contracts.
Getting these obvious player hazards removed/never made should have been a basic safety priority. The purpose of labor unions initially was not just to raise salaries, but to protect workers from dangerous conditions. Apparently, the 'roided-up players have forgotten the latter.
> baseball statistics analysts like Bill James pointed out that simply adding together two other statistics — On-base Percentage and Slugging average — concocted a statistic called OPS that correlated much better than BA with winning baseball games
Strictly speaking multiplying the two figures together does an even better job of correlating with runs scored, which then leads to winning baseball games. The reason why OPS took off was that it is MUCH easier to add two three-digit numbers together than it is to multiply then. Also, it gives you an answer that is generally three digits, while a multiplication gives you 6.
O/T
FOX is having a Los Angeles sports doubleheader Friday night, with the Dodgers/Yankees World Series Game 1 airing at 5, followed by the USC/Rutgers BigTen football matchup at 8. It turns out the events are only 5 miles apart, and adding to the regional rivalry, Rutgers is the only Power 4 team in the NYC metro, with the school and Yankee Stadium being an easy Amtrak ride away from each other, as well as 35 miles as the crow flies.
But what about the Sports Media orgasm over the two biggest markets in the WS?
What Would Steve Say?
The two biggest markets are in the World series due to "fascist" design, according to Vice-President Kamala Harris.
"With the World Series starting today, I have a lot to say about baseball.
For those readers to whom all sports are “sportsball,” I can usually justify writing about current sports as being relevant to the election or to race or whatever."
Steve, Steve. No need to justify your cheering your hometown team to a championship. And perhaps its also payback for 77 and 78. This WS is the tiebreaker for NY vs LA. The WS that MLB fans have wanted for quite some time now.
"Ted always wanted that batting crown."--Johnny Pesky, regarding Ted Williams on hitting, and giving lessons, advice to hitters from rival teams.
BA still remains an important MLB stat, Steve.
Also, if you want to diss PIT's Matty Alou, keep in mind that CIN Pete Rose won the '73 MVP and he won the Batting Title that year with .338. Rose had a similar year to Alou's five seasons, and yet he won the MVP, due in no small part to the fact that CIN won their division and was in the playoffs, while PIT didn't make the playoffs until 1970, Alou's final year with PIT. Also, unlike Clemente, Alou wasn't the first Pirate that sportswriters thought of. Could also make a case that Matty wasn't the first Alou brother that sportswriters thought of (Felipe was on SF, which got more headlines than PIT during most of the '60's).
And of course Pete Rose's personality always got the attention on him no matter where he played.
Batting Average is a good stat for comparing one player's own seasons to each other. E.g., Judge's .322 batting average this year was his career high, and, sure enough, many of the newer stats say it was his best season as a batter, even better than his 62 homer season two years ago.
Similarly, a lot of advanced stats point to previously often overlooked 1923 when Babe Ruth hit only 41 homers, but batted a career high .393 as Ruth's single best as a hitter.
Ted Williams' two best seasons in the modern stats: his two highest batting average seasons: .406 in 1941 and .388 in 1957.
So, while batting average has obvious massive weaknesses for comparing, say, Luis Arraez to Aaron Judge, it's quite good at comparing the various seasons of one player to his other seasons.
On the whole I agree, with the caveat that BA remains the one stat that accurately tracks if a hitter is safely hitting the ball for a base hit.
Babe also won the AL MVP in 1923. (pre '31, when the modern MVP was established as chosen by MLB sportswriters)
How confident are you on LA's chances of winning the WS vs NY? Could be an interesting match. Would be awesome if it goes the full 7 games.
Good idea. Divide by 3. A good way to understand it for anyone who came of age before OBP was known to the general public. Boomers, Gen Xers, Millenials.
Dub them The Guys Who Learned Stats from Baseball Cards and Newspapers.
Thanks, Steve.
Very helpful! Been a baseball fan (ok, a Mets fan, but hey, it still counts!) for over 40 years, and all the new stats (wOBA? WRC+?) just annoy and baffle me. Give me batting average and RBIs and I’ll easily be able to determine an offensive player’s value. Simple, elegant, effective, and easy to grasp.