Who said this: "OPS is, to be blunt, stupid."

Go ahead and try to guess. Recently published quote. I will check back in a little while to see if anyone got it right.

 

It's in the new Baseball Prospectus book, "Extra Innings," in the introductory chapter on advanced statistics. Who'd have thought?

 

Hawk Harrelson

 

No, I mean it's actually the BP staff saying it. They aren't just quoting someone and making fun of it. This is the BP staff opinion on OPS. I had always wondered why it wasn't listed in the annual, other than that you could just add it up yourself.

It looks like a really interesting book. It's not just a stat orgy, but there are also chapters on how a front office puts together a bullpen and how it scouts in the Dominican, etc., etc.

The opening is about Ken Rosenthal's assertion last year that the MVP is a subjective award, by definition, so he doesn't have to defend his vote against sabermetricians.

We had an all-time kerfuffle here last fall over a writer's vote for Michael Young as the MVP of the American League. I said it wasn't a vote to be taken seriously, because every argument that the writer raised in defense of Young, there was an answer in which Miguel Cabrera was better. This was BP's point: You can have a subjective criteria for the MVP, but you should still have to defend it on those terms.

 

Not that shocking, really. Most stat people will tell you the same thing. Common knowledge that you aren't supposed to add percentages together.

 

I posted essentially that years ago, ETN. I believe I said OPS was like "taking apples and oranges and getting watermelons"

 

It's a quick and dirty metric that gets you a lot closer to offensive truth than Triple Crown stats, but still leaves a pretty big gap between itself and reality.

BP has taken a sort of weird turn in recent years. Much less analysis, much more emphasis on writing and features.

 

What the hell, pray tell, is "offensive truth"? Do you have to go to the Himalayas or an ashram to find it?

 

It's truth you don't want to hear because it offends your sensibilities or ideals.

For example, I find Theo Epstein's free agent track record to be offensive truth.

 

I really like the Baserunning Runs (BRR) stat that they introduce in the opening chapter. Essentially, going through data of what taking an extra base, stealing a base, getting thrown out stealing, etc., etc., etc., leads to, in terms of added run expectancy, BP has a number for how many runs added a player adds on the base paths each year. They estimate that 10 added runs equals a team win (same way WAR is formulated).

By this measure, only Maury Wills, who has 21.6 BRR one season, has ever eclipsed 17.0 in a single season.

They also have a fielding metric that tries to eliminate the subjectivity of having observers chart results and instead compare results to what typically happens in a particular situation. Since 1950, I believe, they have Derek Jeter as having five of the worst 50 fielding seasons on record.

 

I see what you did there, stain

 

OPS was invented elsewhere, so is perhaps a more likely target for BP critique.