Comments on: Life of Boswell

By: Tom Boswell, in the ’80s, on Sabermetrics « Misc. Baseball

Tom Boswell, in the ’80s, on Sabermetrics « Misc. Baseball — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 07:23:41 +0000

[...] stats to simply stop putting out books on baseball. I bring this up in part because I came across a blog post coming after Boswell pretty hard for taking Ryan Howard over Albert Pujols as 2008 MVP. Published [...]

By: Arne

Arne — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 05:48:18 +0000

To make a very late contribution, I was rereading Boswell’s Heart of the Order today, and he wasn’t exactly friendly toward the sabermetricians back in the mid-’80s either. In ‘86 he called it “the new pseudo-science of baseball stats” and Boswell let the guns blare in ‘87: These days, lawyers run Rotissierie League teams and “sabermetricians” cross swords with 500-page tomes, debating the exegesis of comically obscure stats.

By: Life of Boswell | Scott Karl interview « hardball times

Life of Boswell | Scott Karl interview « hardball times — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 21:04:15 +0000

[...] by Dave Studeman One of my favorite sports writer/bloggers, Joe Posnanski, has written a biting, yet appropriate, critique of Thomas Boswell’s position that giving the MVP to Albert Pujols is “nuts.” This [...]

By: KHAZAD

KHAZAD — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 07:40:32 +0000

Even as a kid, I knew RBI was overrated. I used to read Tom when I was young too.

I loved total average as a teenager (before the explosion of more complicated and accurate stats) and it is still more viable than the current common lazy man’s stat OPS, which takes 2 numbers with much different spreads between being good and bad, as well as different denominators, because it is easy.

In recent years, I too have noticed that Tom was mailing it in, not making any sense and calling it common sense. I wonder how old he is?

Jose Guillen’s 97 RBI while being about the 8th best player on the team- but getting the most plate appearances and hitting 4th says everything about the uselessness of RBI as a stat to analyze.

It does not take any analysis to know that Pujols is clearly superior to Howard. You simply have to watch them play.
Pujols is the best RH hitter I have ever seen.

By: Chick Stahl

Chick Stahl — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 04:08:04 +0000

Mr. Redlegs wrote: “A writer widely known among his peers and co-workers as a shameless plagiarist who, if heâ€™d been anyone but Tom Boswell, would have been gloriously fired and career ruined and to whom La Russa once called â€œAbner Doubledayâ€ in mock of Boswellâ€™s self-importance and arrogance?

Thatâ€™s some hero you got. Fortunately, many of us know better”

I have never heard Boswell accused of plagiarism. And in the age of Google, a “shameless plagiarist” cannot stay in the closet very long.

Where is the evidence behind this accusation — which amounts to a libel against Boswell in the absence of evidence.

By: Johnny of Lenexa

Johnny of Lenexa — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 03:17:34 +0000

Well, now I have stopped laughing. This must be one of the most sublimely humorous things I have read this year.
Boz, in the article linked above writes: “In the case of the goofy gap between Pujols’ VORP of 96.8 and Howard’s 35.3, my reaction is ‘Time to revisit VORP. If it can be this wrong, it’s not as good as I tought it was.’”
Ok Sylvester, you did see “a puddy cat”.

By: JeffSol

JeffSol — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 22:57:30 +0000

I thought the Mattingly in 1985 comparison was beautiful, in that, like Howard, Mattingly wasn’t even the best player on his team — Rickey Henderson was. Even if I accept the widom of traditional stats, Mattingly’s accomplishment was less impressive than Rickey’s. Mattingly drove in 145 runs, which was a lot, the most since Foster in ‘77, most in the AL since Al Rosein in 1953. However, McCrae had 133 RBI in 1982, and Rice and Baylor had 139 in ‘78 and ‘79 respectively, so it wasn;t miles ahead of recent performances. Rickey scored 146 runs, the most in a season since….Ted Williams in 1950. And, in fact, since Willimas in 1950, only 2 people had scored within 10 of Rickey’s total.

Likewise, Howard wasn’t the best Phillie (Philly?) this year, with Utley, probably Hamels and Lidge all better than Howard this year. If sportswirters argues that Utley deserved MVP, I think the outrage would have been 0, but how can Howard be MVP when he isn;t close to being MVPhillie?

By: David

David — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 12:19:21 +0000

When you ignore most of the data, you could conceivably to go war stating there are WMD when there are none. I too am a great Bowell fan. He was prescient when he proved time begins on opening day. Yet, this article concerns me. Perhaps his situation is analogous to Paul McCartneyâ€™s. McCartney wrote great songs as a Beatle and a good bit of nonsense thereafter.

By: rcharbon

rcharbon — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 12:14:47 +0000

You can’t add up VORP to score a trade or compare groups of players. Think about this.

Remember, a replacement level player HAS value, value that does not show up in VORP. Using VORP, 1 schlub = 1 billion schlubs. Or more relevantly here, 2.73 Howards = 1 Pujols + 1 billion schlubs. But 1 Pujols also = 2.73 Howards + 1 billion schlubs.

The total value of Pujols (if VORP measures anything) is (96.8 + schlub) and Howard’s value is (35.3 + schlub). In order to know how many Howards = 1 Pujols, you need the value of a schlub. Then the relative value is something under 2.73, which I think we’d all agree is a better assessment.

Of course, if you add in the value of a schlub to Pujols’ VORP, you just get his runs created. So why bother with VORP at all in this situation?

By: David in Toledo

David in Toledo — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 02:52:54 +0000

Murray Chass, in the article referred to above, says, “[About the MVP], My own definition over the years has been to designate the player without whom his team could not have done what it did.”

It would seem that a simple “common sense” test would then be to ask, “If Ryan Howard had been replaced by Albert Pujols, would Philly have won more games?” You can’t answer “Certainly not!” with a straight face.

If Chase Utley had been replaced by Dan Uggla, would Philly have won more games?”

If Jimmy Rollins had been replaced by Hanley Ramirez, would . . .?”

If Cole Hamels had been replaced by Tim Lincecum, would. . .?”

That would at least get you to a better sense as to who was most important to Philadelphia. If you asked enough such questions, it would get you an understanding as to who was best at each position in the league.

To get the MVP, you have to do further analysis, but at least you wouldn’t make the dumbest of choices.