Sabermetrics, Assumptions, And Morgan Ensberg

Morgan Ensberg has created quite a buzz among the sabermetric community with the most recent post at his blog entitled "You Can Throw Your Calculators Away". Now while the title would cause you to think that he's bashing on sabermetrics, that's actually not what it was about at all.

It's a long post, but he concludes it with this:

Sabermetrics verifies mathematically what it takes to win a baseball game. This analysis is correct. But baseball players have to help you identify nuances that can only be found by playing the game. Your genius will be perfected when you can show us the probability of bunting a ball in a location that baseball players know will move the runner 100% of the time. Your ability to prove if a batter should show a bunt early or late is the type of information we need.

While the story was great, Ensberg's post can really be summarized thusly: I want sabermetrics to be relevant to the players on the field, because it's pretty useless for that purpose right now. And he's right.

There were individuals who took the entire post the wrong way, as sort of an anti-sabermetric story, but it's actually quite the opposite, and it had the opposite intention. Ensberg is simply pointing out that sabermetrics is a good way to quantify value, but its use to players is limited. Heck, even Brian Akin agreed during the interview he gave to me. After all, knowing your WAR or wOBA is great and all, but that doesn't help the player become better on the field.

I realize guys like Brian Banister and Zack Greinke have said they use Pitch F/X and stuff, but that's not quite Ensberg's point anyway. Pitch F/X is actually a lot like charting pitches, except more badass, so I doubt anybody in the game would be opposed to the technology.

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For once, the assumption part of the conversation didn't fall on the athlete talking about sabermetrics, but rather the sabermetricians themselves. Granted, the post that announced he was going to tackle sabermetrics was called "Sabermetrics: Bill James and Tom Tango…Get in the Box! You’re Up!", so I guess that put people on the defensive, but if you read the comments in that post, so many were quick to judge what Ensberg was going to say. In the actual post he made later about sabermetrics, i've never seen so many sabermetricians backpedaling in my entire life. :o

I think it's a good lesson for all of us who are into the statistical side of the game. At least in the sense that just because a lot of athletes who address sabermetrics try to discredit and mock it, doesn't mean everybody feels that way, so there's no need to get overly defensive about it off the bat.

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On that note, if you haven't yet gotten the chance to read Ensberg's blog, you should. I have been reading it all morning, and I have to say that I really like it.

Ensberg's not really into sabermetrics, nor do I agree with him on all his views of statistics, but it's always interesting to read a fresh perspective that has logical thought behind it. Regardless of whether or not I may agree with his specific stances, I can see the though process behind his opinions, and it's much easier to respect them that way.
Besides, he actively interacts with fans on his site, and seems almost overly honest, which is refreshing.

Stuart

March 3, 2010 at 6:08 pm

Did you use PED’s and did you see others using them? A simple yes or no will not do… good luck in broadcasting yo. Oh ya, go Dodgers!

morganensberg

March 3, 2010 at 7:24 pm

Stuart I am pumped up that you asked me that! I didn’t use steroids or anything else that helped build muscle.

The only thing I saw in the clubhouse was “greenies” which I have done about 10 times. Greenies are basically “uppers” and they didn’t do anything to me. I am not sure if that is a good thing.

I drink a ton of coffee and would drink something like 2 redbulls before a game if I felt sluggish.

I always use this analogy. In Hermosa Beach, where I grew up, there were a bunch of kids who smoked weed. I was asked if I wanted to smoke, but I said no and that was the end of it.

I eventually smoked in college about 30 times and I liked it. But I noticed that it made me eat a lot and I didn’t need any help in that department.

Back to the point, I didn’t smoke so I wasn’t in “that club”. If you are not in the group then you have no idea what guys are doing it. The same thing happened in college with cocaine. I have never done cocaine, but some of my buddies did and I had no idea. I just thought that they were really hyper.

My opinion is this. I can’t fault anyone for doing steroids because they are trying to do everything they can to get to the big leagues. I played in the Dominican and Venezuela and nothing you say will change my opinion on a guy making a decision to feed his family. This isn’t apples and apples.

I don’t even think that those guys who did do steroids pushed me out of the game. I had the ability to play the game at the highest level and that is really cool to me.

Awesome.