An interesting article about a writer who was 100+  years ahead of his time on coming up with some sabermetrics. 
joeposnanski.si.com/2012/01/01/f-c-lane/

Great post - I love the part quoting ubercookie Cravath!

http://cyrilmorong.com/LaneBaseonBalls.htm an article written by F.C. Lane on Base on Balls

$1.28 not 12 coins

I love these articles. But what it really shows me is that good baseball men (or women) have understood the game well as long as it has been played.

Read about this on FanGraphs ... It's nice to see that there were smart men from the beginning. It's not so great to see that there were also less than bright men who didn't have the gumption or desire to change a system they knew was broken. The must have been the ancestors of Plaschke, Conlin, etc.

a great post, a good example of why I hang around WIS.  Thank you for posting.

Posted by soxdoc on 1/3/2012 12:12:00 PM (view original):
Read about this on FanGraphs ... It's nice to see that there were smart men from the beginning. It's not so great to see that there were also less than bright men who didn't have the gumption or desire to change a system they knew was broken. The must have been the ancestors of Plaschke, Conlin, etc.

I think it was moreso that there wasn't an infrastructure for mathamtically complex stats.  Remember that well into the 80s old-timer's stats were constantly being recalulated as researchers went back to source materials (box scores mostly).