Beer vs. Sabermetrics (Not a Fair Fight at All)
Published by Andrew Johnson February 5th, 2008 in Booze, Sabermetrics
Well it took like 47,000 days for someone to take the whole Jim Rice HoF argument somewhere else, but Catfish Stew finally did. It doesn’t really add a lot to the meat of the debate, but it is an interesting bit of baseball/(fan?) theory. In short, he claims Buster Olney lost his debate with Rich Lederer (start here) because he let stat geek Lederer dictate the debate. Here’s the thrust of his argument:
The first and most important lesson when fighting against a Sabermetrician is this: remember the beer. No, I’m not saying you should get your opponent drunk, although I suppose that wouldn’t hurt your cause any. The point is this: sabermetricians almost always argue from the point of view of a General Manager. They focus entirely on how to win instead of why we watch. …
Take, for example, the argument regarding the Hall of Fame merits of Jim Rice. If you’re a GM picking an all-time team, maybe the stats say you’d be stupid to pick Jim Rice for your team instead of Tim Raines. But who says you’re a GM? Remember the beer. You’re a fan, not a GM.
I’ve made this point before, but I’ll make it again: awards are celebrations, not measurements. If Jim Rice struck fear into my heart when my team faced him, why is that emotion not a valid reason to celebrate him?
It’s a pretty well-formulated argument and I almost started to feel bad for being a humorless stat dork. Then I remembered, I’m not humorless. I love beer. I love baseball just as much as someone who doesn’t give a shit about VORP. That’s my main issue with Arneson’s argument. It falls into the classic stereotype of sabermetricians as people who don’t watch or enjoy games and only care about unwholesome things like “winning” and “objectivity.”
Sorry, not buying it. And here’s why.
When I was six, my favorite player was Jose Canseco. He was awesome. Steals. Long homers. Giant muscles. Neon. In addition to being pretty good at baseball (even an MVP), Canseco got arrested, did steroids, and of course, blew the lid off of the PED scandal in Major League Baseball. Canseco the man is worth celebrating in a way. Of course, he doesn’t belong in the Hall of Fame, and not just because of his steroid use. Arneson is using a better-written, douchebag-free, more logical version of Colin Cowherd’s radio argument almost two years ago.
I’m not saying emotion can’t play a part, I just don’t think it should be a very big one because it’s ENTIRELY subjective and can almost literally be based in an alternate reality. Perception shouldn’t outweigh reality when it comes to baseball’s ultimate lifetime achievement award.
2 Responses to “Beer vs. Sabermetrics (Not a Fair Fight at All)”
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I think we’re actually agreeing with each other, not disagreeing. I specifically said in my article that I think you should weigh objective/subjective about 80/20 or 90/10 towards the objective.
And even if you didn’t, at some point, the wisdom of the crowds takes over. You may have one voter living in an alternate reality, but you’re not going to have 400 people doing so.
Yea Ken, I don’t think we’re that far apart.
In the case of Rice, though, perception is far outweighing reality, and he will almost certainly make the Hall of Fame next season. All you have to do is look at it through the prism of Dwight Evans, who was a far superior player to Rice for the vast majority of his career and yet received virtually no support for Cooperstown. 20 years after the fact, late-1970s, early-1980s baseball in Boston is an alternate reality to the one that existed, at least on this count.
If you’re saying that we shouldn’t get so worked up about the Hall of Fame, I can appreciate that perspective — there’s certainly a lot of merit to taking a museum less seriously.
On the other hand, if you’re saying the saber community should cut the electorate a break, then I have to disagree. Take it from a sportswriter, they’re as humorless a bunch as there is, and they take this whole Hall of Fame thing seriously, particularly in the steroid era.
What really rubbed me the wrong way, I guess, was the insinuation (intentional or not, I’m guessing not) that sabermetricians don’t love beer (translation: we don’t appreciate baseball like a real fan can).
I’d argue that most of the people actually electing players to Cooperstown enjoy the game far less than your average stat geek. To wit, I give you Dan Shaughnessy. (And if the Hall of Fame is a celebration of being a fan, then why should we trust sportswriters to be the arbiters of our celebration anyway?)
Anyway, this was a great read, and congratulations for doing something I didn’t thought could be done: making the Jim Rice argument interesting again. And I’m sorry for comparing you to Colin Cowherd. That was really uncalled for.