Smart Baseball

For the past fifteen years, many baseball fans, writers, and commentators have remained mired in the muck of old statistics—baseball card numbers such as batting average, saves recorded, and a pitcher’s won-lost record—while newer, smarter, and at times counterintuitive baseball stats known as sabermetrics have become commonplace throughout Major League Baseball. Yet, despite their popularity, confusion persists about these new stats, with much of the baseball world still following the “old” way—a combination of those outdated numbers and gut instinct—to evaluate players’ contributions and careers. Baseball, they argue, should be run by people, not by numbers.

ESPN senior baseball writer Keith Law disagrees. In this provocative book, the outspoken Law takes on the established view of baseball stats, undermining over a century’s worth of baseball dogma. With many of these numbers dating back to the beginning of the game, he examines how allegiance to these old stats is firmly rooted not in the modern game as it’s played, but in baseball’s irrational adherence to tradition. Law also offers a clear-eyed discussion of the new stats that are helping teams win, changing how players are valued, and altering how we talk about the game. Simplifying the math that has gotten in the way for many curious fans, he provides understandable explanations of what these numbers measure and why they work better. The end result is the essential baseball book for the modern baseball era, revealing what the rise of Big Data really means for the sport.