A Realistic View at 2018: Part II

[moonslav59]

Have to say that I don't give a flying f*** about what anyone wants to believe in when it comes to baseball. I'm a fan who does feel that I have some education with respect to the game. I'm not interested in trying to discredit anyone or their particular opinion about the game although I will say that I enjoy reading and actually learning from the people who I believe have not only an extensive knowledge about the use of statistics as well as having some practical experience with the game itself. The beauty of it is i guess that I get to choose who these people are based upon what I read here. I have for me some pretty firm opinions and beliefs but I would never try to shove them down anyone's throat. What I see here are a few people who are so goddam sure that they are right about everything that they absolutely refuse to see more than just their own side of any arguement. I offer quite a few opinions here that I do not support with what some call quantifiable evidence because I don't think that they can be. This normally causes someone to claim that either my eyes and knowledge of the game is just f***ed up. That is when I react as do a few others here who share similar views. I don't have any need to be right at all but I do feel somewhat of a need to react when someone tries to paint me as an uneducated old dope with respect to my understanding of athletics in general. They might even be right but I don't need to constantly be reminded of it. Seems like we should be able to get along if we have the large goal - to support the team we love.

 

Some great posts here, recently!

[Slasher9]

Have to say that I don't give a flying f*** about what anyone wants to believe in when it comes to baseball. I'm a fan who does feel that I have some education with respect to the game. I'm not interested in trying to discredit anyone or their particular opinion about the game although I will say that I enjoy reading and actually learning from the people who I believe have not only an extensive knowledge about the use of statistics as well as having some practical experience with the game itself. The beauty of it is i guess that I get to choose who these people are based upon what I read here. I have for me some pretty firm opinions and beliefs but I would never try to shove them down anyone's throat. What I see here are a few people who are so goddam sure that they are right about everything that they absolutely refuse to see more than just their own side of any arguement. I offer quite a few opinions here that I do not support with what some call quantifiable evidence because I don't think that they can be. This normally causes someone to claim that either my eyes and knowledge of the game is just f***ed up. That is when I react as do a few others here who share similar views. I don't have any need to be right at all but I do feel somewhat of a need to react when someone tries to paint me as an uneducated old dope with respect to my understanding of athletics in general. They might even be right but I don't need to constantly be reminded of it. Seems like we should be able to get along if we have the large goal - to support the team we love.

 

this would have won "post of the day" but you failed to supply any data to support your statements.....

[cp176]

this would have won "post of the day" but you failed to supply any data to support your statements.....

 

You're killing me here. I was even going to say that I would be ok if the Sox voided the Espinoza for Pomeranz deal!

[Hitch]

UN is a bright individual and it was a good post - one worth reading. it is also a post that if you change some of the wording, could be used to defend the points of view of the people who tend to have opinions that lean in the opposite direction. i don't necessarily buy into everything he said here but I still think that it is a good post. How about you Hitch - Do you feel the same way about some of the posts you read here that don't support you and your points of view? I hope that you do.

 

I don't particularly have a dog in the stats V's eye debate.

 

I happen to use both sides myself. I think there are some stats that are excellent and essential to forming an accurate view. And other stats, I think, are not only useless, they can create false information. And don't compete with the eye.

 

There are some analytics I agree with and others I don't.

 

For example I don't agree that hot streaks or line up protection are not a thing.

 

 

That said, on almost every page, of every thread, there seems to be a barb aimed at people who have used statistical analysis to arrive at a point.

 

Kimmi in particular seems to get rounded on despite her being one of the best posters here, whom almost always backs up her points with reasoned analysis and/or background.

 

I read this forum long before I joined it. And even back then, it was the same old s***.

 

It's embarrassing watching the same people falling over themselves to try and belittle the arguments of things they either don't agree with, or on times, just flat out don't understand.

 

As you say, it would be lovely if we could all focus on supporting the team, but lines have been drawn in the sand and some people would rather be wrong than give up their previously held position.

 

For what it's worth I find your posts very interesting, too. And you have the added and rare gift of being willing to have your mind changed.

[moonslav59]

I agree, but....

 

Arguing and debating is what most forums are about. If we all just sat here and agreed with each other on everything and sang Kumiyah together about how great our beloved team is, eventually, we might not have any posters left.

[Hitch]

Debate is great. I wish there was more of it.

[cp176]

I agree, but....

 

Arguing and debating is what most forums are about. If we all just sat here and agreed with each other on everything and sang Kumiyah together about how great our beloved team is, eventually, we might not have any posters left.

 

true

[cp176]

Debate is great. I wish there was more of it.

 

 

true

[mvp 78]

How about this to end the argument.

 

That's not how things work around here!

[Emp9]

How about this to end the argument.

 

I love baseball. I watch it, I follow it in all formats, but why is it necessary for some fans to s*** on a part of the game that enhances the enjoyment of the sport for other fans? I pay money I shouldn't pay in order to watch the Red Sox online because I live in another country. Watch all the games, would go to a bunch of them if I lived over there, but I don't.

 

However, I like stats, I like crunching numbers and enjoy what I consider to be a more objective measurement of the sport I enjoy. If you don't like it, that's fine, but why the interest in discrediting it if you won't take five minutes to understand what stat A or B is trying to measure or how? It's annoying as f*** and very pedantic.

 

I probably know more about scouting kids at 32 than most of you know in your 50's and 60's, since I live in an area where baseball is everything, and have helped (and sometimes still do) guys who prepare ballplayers for a living prepare reports and paperwork for kids and young adults, and I do it for fun. I can tell a slider from a curve and a splitter just by release and spin. None of you know as much as you think you do. A bunch of guys who scout for a living here compile stats on ipads, and are installing BIS data collection units in team's facilities for summer league. But you know more than the people who do this for a living, and if they compile stats or follow stats they're idiots. Great.

 

Part of the reason I barely come here anymore is that I don't understand why it's so goddamn hard to live and let die. Stats are more objective than the human eye, because the human is almost always biased towards or against things. This is a demonstrable fact. If you don't like statistics that's fine, don't use them, but don't discount them because you think you're so smart due to what you watch on tv. At least take ten minutes to try and understand what they're trying to tell you before spouting a bunch of nonsense that contradicts what the data is trying to tell you.

 

For the common folk like us, they're just another tool to further enhance our enjoyment of the game. Not an enemy trying to spoil our fun. Like the Yankees and their fans. That's who you should point your anger at.

 

/endrant.

 

Wait a minute. Hold on my man. You work with people who work with BIS. Baseball Info Solutions—a baseball data provider that relies on human input from video scouts (humans) and ballpark-based stringers (Interns that have taken an 8 week training course, more to the point, other humans). And you seem to have a problem with longtime baseball fans, more to the point, other humans’ input, because they haven’t marked it down on an iPad?

 

Take Statcast. Look, I’m all for Statcast. I’ve been pretty excited about it for years, before 2015 even (when it was fully implemented in EVERY MLB ballpark, not just a handful). But it’s still relatively new and not without flaws. Human flaws coupled with technology flaws and It’s only been 3 full years in every ballpark. It’s a baby. This technology WILL get increasingly better over time, but I do not believe it’s perfect in it’s present form. If it was perfect, why bother with BIS, or Inside Edge, or Trackman, or STATS, or PITCHf/X, or FIELDf/x on top of Statcast at all then? Why do some teams buy redundant data to find differences between them? Why question it all? Is the human brain the most flawed out of all of them? Yes. However, we wouldn’t have any of them without it, so maybe we shouldn’t totally dismiss an opinion outright.

 

My biggest issue with your post is the first line about ending the argument. Why the hell would I want to do that?

[harmony]

I am bracing for Day 5 of an intensive week-long analytics training in a narrow subfield of my work. My profession is not the target audience but I suspect I was invited to address constitutional issues of data collection.

 

I'm looking forward to getting away -- literally and figuratively -- for the weekend.

[jad]

Wait a minute. Hold on my man. You work with people who work with BIS. Baseball Info Solutions—a baseball data provider that relies on human input from video scouts (humans) and ballpark-based stringers (Interns that have taken an 8 week training course, more to the point, other humans). And you seem to have a problem with longtime baseball fans, more to the point, other humans’ input, because they haven’t marked it down on an iPad?

 

Take Statcast. Look, I’m all for Statcast. I’ve been pretty excited about it for years, before 2015 even (when it was fully implemented in EVERY MLB ballpark, not just a handful). But it’s still relatively new and not without flaws. Human flaws coupled with technology flaws and It’s only been 3 full years in every ballpark. It’s a baby. This technology WILL get increasingly better over time, but I do not believe it’s perfect in it’s present form. If it was perfect, why bother with BIS, or Inside Edge, or Trackman, or STATS, or PITCHf/X, or FIELDf/x on top of Statcast at all then? Why do some teams buy redundant data to find differences between them? Why question it all? Is the human brain the most flawed out of all of them? Yes. However, we wouldn’t have any of them without it, so maybe we shouldn’t totally dismiss an opinion outright.

 

My biggest issue with your post is the first line about ending the argument. Why the hell would I want to do that?

 

Yup. It's that pesky human input that so inconveniences claims of objectivity. I think our opinions on the value of stats are all very similar and can be summarized as follows:

(1) anyone who does not rely on stats as much as we ourselves do is a Luddite of some sort and out of touch w/ the modern game.

(2) anyone who values stats MORE than we do is a computer geek who doesn't know the first thing about baseball.

 

It's pretty much the same way we view, say, ethics.

[User Name]

Wait a minute. Hold on my man. You work with people who work with BIS. Baseball Info Solutions—a baseball data provider that relies on human input from video scouts (humans) and ballpark-based stringers (Interns that have taken an 8 week training course, more to the point, other humans). And you seem to have a problem with longtime baseball fans, more to the point, other humans’ input, because they haven’t marked it down on an iPad?

 

Take Statcast. Look, I’m all for Statcast. I’ve been pretty excited about it for years, before 2015 even (when it was fully implemented in EVERY MLB ballpark, not just a handful). But it’s still relatively new and not without flaws. Human flaws coupled with technology flaws and It’s only been 3 full years in every ballpark. It’s a baby. This technology WILL get increasingly better over time, but I do not believe it’s perfect in it’s present form. If it was perfect, why bother with BIS, or Inside Edge, or Trackman, or STATS, or PITCHf/X, or FIELDf/x on top of Statcast at all then? Why do some teams buy redundant data to find differences between them? Why question it all? Is the human brain the most flawed out of all of them? Yes. However, we wouldn’t have any of them without it, so maybe we shouldn’t totally dismiss an opinion outright.

 

My biggest issue with your post is the first line about ending the argument. Why the hell would I want to do that?

 

I don't work with them. Dude, I wish I did. I usually just help handle paperwork for "trainers" (the guys who sponsor the kids from when they're in LL to when they sign, kinda like buscones but without the shady s***, because MLB is cracking down on that HARD). That's allowed me to visit some of the facilities for MLB summer leagues here in DR, (some of those are exceedingly nice, some are shitholes) but the one thing they all have in common is how much they've integrated statistical analysis to their handling of games/kids.

 

One thing a700hitter was absolutely correct about is that these tools excel at looking at multiple players, and player-to-player comparisons. If they were the optimal tool for evaluating prospects of ballplayers individually, scouts wouldn't exist anymore.

 

As I said before, for us common folk they're just a tool to further enhance the enjoyment of the game. Statcast won't tell you when a kid has "deer-in-headlights" eyes, or when a guy is stubborn about trying to uppercut everything, that's what scouts are for. However, that doesn't make them any less useful.

[User Name]

Yup. It's that pesky human input that so inconveniences claims of objectivity. I think our opinions on the value of stats are all very similar and can be summarized as follows:

(1) anyone who does not rely on stats as much as we ourselves do is a Luddite of some sort and out of touch w/ the modern game.

(2) anyone who values stats MORE than we do is a computer geek who doesn't know the first thing about baseball.

 

It's pretty much the same way we view, say, ethics.

 

I like you.

[User Name]

UN, when did you move away?

 

Bruh, 2013.

[Bellhorn04]

As I said before, for us common folk they're just a tool to further enhance the enjoyment of the game. Statcast won't tell you when a kid has "deer-in-headlights" eyes, or when a guy is stubborn about trying to uppercut everything, that's what scouts are for. However, that doesn't make them any less useful.

 

I can agree that they're meant to enhance. I will say, though, that there can be a fine line between enhancement and overkill. Sometimes when you're watching a game now you feel you're being bombarded with numerical minutiae that is more distracting and annoying than useful. Obviously that has a lot to do with who is delivering the game and the information.

[User Name]

Also, scouts have hilarious stories about players. I remember a guy telling me a couple years ago that he'd been friends with Bartolo Colon since before he got signed. He told me Bartolo would sometimes call home and tell his wife to have his workers roast two pigs because he had some "visitors coming", but he just wanted to eat the pigs himself. Obvious hyperbole, but considering some of Colon's eating exploits, having them roast one is not something I'd put past him.

 

Adrian Beltre is another one I've heard a lot of stories about binge drinking in his younger days. But the funniest stuff is about Nate Mclouth (Remember him?) for when he came to play in the DWL.

[mvp 78]

I am bracing for Day 5 of an intensive week-long analytics training in a narrow subfield of my work. My profession is not the target audience but I suspect I was invited to address constitutional issues of data collection.

 

I'm looking forward to getting away -- literally and figuratively -- for the weekend.

 

I can't even get away from analytics on the weekend now. Last Sunday, I was setting the lineup for my son's tee-ball team and told them "look, you will all bat in numerical order in the first inning and then in reverse order the second inning because batting order doesn't really matter." One of the kids got upset because she thought she'd be hitting 3rd every inning. She picked up a bat and started wailing against the dugout shouting "I wanted to hit third because that's where the best hitter is supposed to hit! This team needs me to get on base and drive in runs!" I just told her that it doesn't work that way anymore and that the person who hits third doesn't have to be very good anymore. It really shattered her world view.

[mvp 78]

I can agree that they're meant to enhance. I will say, though, that there can be a fine line between enhancement and overkill. Sometimes when you're watching a game now you feel you're being bombarded with numerical minutiae that is more distracting and annoying than useful. Obviously that has a lot to do with who is delivering the game and the information.

 

I would love for NESN to provide a feed that doesn't include the k zone. That feature just makes me frustrated and generally more likely to be annoyed by the human umpires.

[Slasher9]

i would love for nesn to provide a feed that doesn't include the k zone. That feature just makes me frustrated and generally more likely to be annoyed by the human umpires.

 

robot umps now!

[mvp 78]

robot umps now!

 

Now and forever!

[moonslav59]

robot umps now!

 

Last year was the right time.

[Sox75]

Can I put in a good word for those who really mix it up over stats, no stats, my stats, your stats, whatever . . .

 

I love it!

 

The more insulting, dismissive, condescending, arrogant, argumentative, and angry, THE BETTER.

 

I tend to er on the side of simple metrics, combined with what I see, but what the hell do I know?!

 

Either way, I like watching you guys mix it up!

 

 

Keep up the good work! You're all a bunch of hosers anyway. But you're our hosers.

[moonslav59]

Can I put in a good word for those who really mix it up over stats, no stats, my stats, your stats, whatever . . .

 

I love it!

 

The more insulting, dismissive, condescending, arrogant, argumentative, and angry, THE BETTER.

 

I tend to er on the side of simple metrics, combined with what I see, but what the hell do I know?!

 

Either way, I like watching you guys mix it up!

 

 

Keep up the good work! You're all a bunch of hosers anyway. But you're our hosers.

 

As long as we're not Hosmers.

[mvp 78]

Hosers > Hosmers > Hoosiers

[moonslav59]

Hosers > Hosmers > Hoosiers

>Hosed

[moonslav59]

I'm hoping Cora starts thinking about moving Bogey to the 1 or 2 slot.

 

He gets on base. He's not a great runner, but he's better than Beni on the basepaths.

 

I'd like to see Betts up 2nd, but either way is fine with me. I'm not complaining or being critical of Cora, but I'd never put Moreland 4th, either.

 

I'd like this...

 

1) Bogey

2) Betts

3) HRam

4) JMart

5) Devers

6) Beni

7) Nunez

8) JBJ

9) Vaz

 

 

[Jasonbay44]

I'm hoping Cora starts thinking about moving Bogey to the 1 or 2 slot.

 

He gets on base. He's not a great runner, but he's better than Beni on the basepaths.

 

I'd like to see Betts up 2nd, but either way is fine with me. I'm not complaining or being critical of Cora, but I'd never put Moreland 4th, either.

 

I'd like this...

 

1) Bogey

2) Betts

3) HRam

4) JMart

5) Devers

6) Beni

7) Nunez

8) JBJ

9) Vaz

 

 

 

I like this lineup, I think I'd prefer Mookie lead off still, but would love Xander 2nd, he seems like a perfect 2nd place hitter.

[moonslav59]

I like this lineup, I think I'd prefer Mookie lead off still, but would love Xander 2nd, he seems like a perfect 2nd place hitter.

 

There are advantages having some power up in the one slot, especially late in games when the bottom of the order is up.

 

I've heard the 2 slot is supposed to be where your best hitter goes, so I'm fine either way.

 

Just move Bogey up.

 

Maybe Beni can thrive in the 5 or 6 slot (maybe 7th vs LHPs)

[kenmeister]

I'm hoping Cora starts thinking about moving Bogey to the 1 or 2 slot.

 

He gets on base. He's not a great runner, but he's better than Beni on the basepaths.

 

I'd like to see Betts up 2nd, but either way is fine with me. I'm not complaining or being critical of Cora, but I'd never put Moreland 4th, either.

 

I'd like this...

 

1) Bogey

2) Betts

3) HRam

4) JMart

5) Devers

6) Beni

7) Nunez

8) JBJ

9) Vaz

 

 

 

Good lineup. How do you shuffle it when Pedroia comes back ... assuming he resumes hitting well.