What is Sabermetrics?
For those who love the sport of baseball there is just something about walking in to the ball park that makes you feel so exhilarated and happy. Hearing the vendors and crack of the bat as the team takes batting practice. Smelling the combinations of ballpark foods, as you watch the multiple fans pile into the stadium. And, perhaps the best part of it all, seeing your favorite players partake in America’s pastime.
I absolutely love the sport of baseball and the experience of walking into a ball park. It doesn’t matter who is playing, just watching some of todays best players, play the sport I love is enough for me. Recently, I went down to Fort Myers, Florida and watched a few spring training baseball games.
While in Fort Myers I thought about how one man totally changed the way a team is operated. The introduction of new numbers has shaped the game of baseball into what we see today.
While watching the game, numbers are constantly being filtered through your head.
The number of outs.
The number of innings.
The number of homeruns this guy at the plate has hit.
The number of walks this pitcher has given up.
And the list can go on and on. Ever since the creation of the game, baseball has been linked to numerical data. Back in 1859, exactly 20 years after Abner Doubleday invented the game in Cooperstown, New York, an American sportswriter by the name of Henry Chadwick published the first box score and began keeping track of hits and home runs. This would eventually lead to batting average and other offensive statistics. From that time on, statistics has been shaping the way we play and evaluate the game. In 1947, the Dodgers General Manager at the time, Branch Rickey, hired the first baseball statistician, after which the use of statistical analysis grew.
But, it wasn’t until the year of 1977, when a new, fancy word began to get thrown around, and the practice of statistical analysis took a giant leap forward.
Sabermetrics.
Introduced by Bill James, sabermetrics was this ever-expanding line of numerical analysis. In past years, scouts and General Managers were evaluating prospects by their physical appearances. They would look at a guy, watch his swing, and tag him with all-star status or hopeless big league dreamer. Sabermetrics gave scouts the numerous amount of objective data it takes to find real value in a player.
For decades’ people have looked at sabermetrics and thought that this is just a vast array of new numbers and statistical categories that can cross the line from being very useful to replacing common sense. Recently, however, the concept of sabermetrics has not only proved to be useful, but has really paid off for some organizations. So take a journey and discover how America’s National Pastime has been shaped into a whole new ballgame.
