Baseball Between the Numbers: Why Everything You Know About the Game Is Wrong

Additional Baseball Between the Numbers: Why Everything You Know About the Game Is Wrong Information

In the numbers-obsessed sport of baseball, statistics don't merely record what players, managers, and owners have done. Properly understood, they can tell us how the teams we root for could employ better strategies, put more effective players on the field, and win more games. The revolution in baseball statistics that began in the 1970s is a controversial subject that professionals and fans alike argue over without end. Despite this fundamental change in the way we watch and understand the sport, no one has written the book that reveals, across every area of strategy and management, how the best practitioners of statistical analysis in baseball-people like Bill James, Billy Beane, and Theo Epstein-think about numbers and the game.

Baseball Between the Numbers is that book. In separate chapters covering every aspect of the game, from hitting, pitching, and fielding to roster construction and the scouting and drafting of players, the experts at Baseball Prospectus examine the subtle, hidden aspects of the game, bring them out into the open, and show us how our favorite teams could win more games. This is a book that every fan, every follower of sports radio, every fantasy player, every coach, and every player, at every level, can learn from and enjoy.

What Customers Say About Baseball Between the Numbers: Why Everything You Know About the Game Is Wrong:

you'll learn a lot from it. if you're a fan of baseball you should read this book. great book. interesting stuff.

Good stuff. Whether Fantasy or reality, a real fan of the game will find much to love in this book. Statistics galore and a point of view that you may not have considered.

The novel is chocked with stats, so if you are into that sort of thing, you'll get the maximum out of it. How can some teams spend a ton of money for a cellar-dwelling result. you need to be only a baseball fan. However, you don't need to be a math genius to enjoy the book. How do other teams build a thrifty team and manage to thrive.Some of these answers appear in Baseball Between the Numbers, which contains a compilation of studies regarding different game facets. There are chapters devoted to relief pitchers ("Are Teams Letting Their Closers Go to Waste."), managers ("Is Joe Torre a Hall of Fame Manager."), situational hitting ("When Is One Run Worth More Than Two."), high school draft picks ("What Happened to Todd Van Poppel.") and many more.As a lifelong baseball enthusiast, I thought the book was a great look at some of the more intriguing items that happen inside and outside a game.

Still, this is solid reading for students of baseball and other thinking fans. All together, these 27 chapters are well-researched and thought-provoking, although not entirely flawless. The writing gets a bit stiff in places, the charts need full headings rather than abbreviations, and the comparison of Barry Bonds to Babe Ruth forgets that Bonds wasn't close until he began cheating with steroids. This important effort examines key questions about baseball strategy, player value, and finances. The authors examine whether teams should use a four-man or five-man rotation (they favor four, limiting pitch counts), why closers should be more effectively used in key middle innings (quite persuasive), and why RBI's are over-rated - which explains why Juan Gonzalez was twice named MVP over a far superior Alex Rodriguez. The authors are from Baseball Prospectus, and they devote a chapter each to 27 important questions. The authors also examine and largely debunk owner-promoted myths about ticket price increases being tied to player salaries, and publicly-financed ballparks improving city economies - what they improve is owner profits.

Excellent stuff to really make you think about baseball and commonly held misconceptions.I'm not a math/stat guy and this made my hair hurt it was so complicated.