Analytics has drained baseball of emotion/stars

[Wanne]

On 10/14/2018 at 1:56 PM, Lip Man 1 said:

Just another one in a long, long series of stories over the past six months from various web sites and Sports Illustrated showing that analytics may be harming baseball more than helping, turning off fans and making the game boring to watch. Personally I agree with those reports.

I do too.  Is there a more worthless statistic on the planet than WAR?

[iWiN4PreP]

2 hours ago, Wanne said:

I do too.  Is there a more worthless statistic on the planet than WAR?

Kind of ironic since it's a statistic that is supposed to be the tell all when evaluating players. Would you prefer to talk only in terms of HR/RBI/R stats which are team dependent and luck-dependent?

[iWiN4PreP]

On 10/16/2018 at 7:55 AM, [email protected] said:

I like analytics but I don't like the bullpenning trend. Too many pitching changes per game. Could adress that with rules.

Perhaps it could be looked at via rules, but I'd have to hear some proposals before I get behind it. I don't mind the bullpen switches... every team has only 25 pieces and if they end up using "x" amount of them during a game due to bullpen switches, theoretically that'll hurt them in a later game OR it just shows how they are using all 25 pieces to win their games. Kudos to them, I say. 

[Wanne]

2 hours ago, iWiN4PreP said:

Kind of ironic since it's a statistic that is supposed to be the tell all when evaluating players. Would you prefer to talk only in terms of HR/RBI/R stats which are team dependent and luck-dependent?

It's based on a person that doesn't fucking exist lol!!!!  If you want to count on that...knock yourself out.  I think it's an idiotic measuring device...

[kitekrazy]

7 hours ago, Wanne said:

I do too.  Is there a more worthless statistic on the planet than WAR?

 QB rating.  Are other sports using WAR?   I think they do in hockey.  Agents usually like those worthless stats.

[Jack Parkman]

Disclaimer: I am a fan of analytics, and read fangraphs pretty religiously. 

However, Greg is right when he says that pitchers getting hurt is because of analytics. Pitchers aren't throwing harder because they're better athletes, they're throwing harder because if you can't miss enough bats, you can't make it to the big leagues anymore. Strikeouts are king for pitchers, and to chase strikeouts the pitching mechanics being used these days are pushing the human body to the limit. That is why you see more instances of thoracic outlet syndrome and a lot of Tommy John surgeries. They have found that altering the timing of the arm in the delivery makes a pitcher throw harder. It also puts a ton of stress on the arm, by breaking the kinetic chain.  Instead of chasing health and clean mechanics, pitchers now chase velocity, because you're more likely to strike guys out. The decline of the ground ball specialist and pitching to weak contact at lower velocities, is killing careers, and it is a rare pitcher that makes it to FA without losing velo or being completely healthy. There was a reason why it used to be freaky if  a pitcher threw mid-upper 90s, and 100 mph was special. It was even more rare that those guys didn't get hurt. Now they're all over the place. Why? Because emphasis has been put on max velocity vs. pitcher health. Pitchers use timing tricks to achieve high velocity, and more tricks to correct their timing. Eventually it breaks down, and the pitcher breaks, as we're seeing with Kershaw. Analytics are a huge part of that, as they have rendered the 130 K/220 IP contact specialist obsolete. Sabermetricians have said those pitchers aren't valuable. This is the market inefficiency that needs to be exploited. Baseball needs more pitchers like Mark Buehrle. 

This coming from a guy who absolutely loves watching the hard throwing ace, and 15 strikeout games. They are the best part about baseball, in my opinion. I love hard-throwing pitchers being dominant.   Verlander is one of those freaks of nature. Strasburg isn't. Verlander hasn't had an arm injury in his career, and is still throwing 97 mph at age 36. Enjoy him as a fan of the game, because he may be the last of a rare breed. 

Edited October 23, 2018 by Jack Parkman