12/21/24
January 17, 2005
Scouts and Statisticians, together at last : Since the publication of Moneyball, a baseball debate has raged between old-school scouts and Bill James-reading statheads. Here the two sides sit down and exchange ideas, information, and insults. People will be watching to see how this guy does in coming years, as the stat guys cite him as an example of someone the scouts let get away. More discussion here and here; a good Moneyball discussion here .
It may be a double, Matt, but the post is aces. Feel free to stick around and make more.
posted by Ufez Jones at 06:56 PM on January 17, 2005
Agreed. I didn't really sell that post well enough anyway. I'd rather see it get some discussion than have it not posted again because it's a double. Which is all to say: I keep the street cred for posting it first.
posted by yerfatma at 07:50 PM on January 17, 2005
Slightly off-topic, but inspired by the stuff in the links. Does anyone know of similar stat-driven changes in the way individual-sport athletes are evaluated? I have in mind tennis. I'm not sure how it would work, but maybe agents and coaches would find some value in careful analysis of a prospective client's performance. I imagine figures like "match wins after losing first set to opponents with winning records" would have some kind of predictive value. I'd like to see stats that separate truly good prospects from the talented head-cases that plague the sport.
posted by Uncle Toby at 09:01 AM on January 19, 2005
Interesting, but there's no real incentive to do that, at least in golf and tennis. Players in those sports work for themselves. I guess maybe pro caddies might be interested.
posted by yerfatma at 12:03 PM on January 19, 2005
Hey, more discussion here, too. Sorry about that, missed it on my searches before.