Posted by Jtpsops on 7/18/2017 5:18:00 PM (view original):
It is broken. And instead of looking at that example, applying common sense and saying "Ya, I can see where there might be a few holes in it", you defended it like a moron and claimed the two seasons were equally valuable.
WAR is not a stat. Imagine if I said "Guys, it's time to come up with a new method to determine who the best home run hitter was. We'll call it HRAR. Since all hitters play in different eras and different sized parks, only homeruns over 420 feet will count. Therefore, Babe Ruth is the new home run king, followed by Mickey Mantle and Harmon Killebrew". You'd think I was retarded.
And then imagine if someone else came along and said "Hmm, I like your idea for HRAR, but there were some huge parks back in the day. I'm going to use HRAR, but I'm going to calculate it using only 440+ foot homers. In my books, Mark McGwire and Reggie Jackson are the all-time home run kings."
Would you take "HRAR" seriously at all? I'll give you a hint: the answer is no.
It is broken. And instead of looking at that example, applying common sense and saying "Ya, I can see where there might be a few holes in it", you defended it like a moron and claimed the two seasons were equally valuable.
There's nothing broken. It was
significantly more difficult to prevent runs in Radke's situation than it was in Scherzer's. So much so that an average pitcher in Radke's situation would have allowed around 6 runs per 9 IP compared to around 4 for Scherzer. If you want to argue that those calculations are wrong, I'm willing to listen. But a blanket declaration the stat is broken because you don't like what it says doesn't work.
WAR is not a stat. Imagine if I said "Guys, it's time to come up with a new method to determine who the best home run hitter was. We'll call it HRAR. Since all hitters play in different eras and different sized parks, only homeruns over 420 feet will count. Therefore, Babe Ruth is the new home run king, followed by Mickey Mantle and Harmon Killebrew". You'd think I was retarded.
WAR is a stat. Just like the unemployment rate is a stat. There are differing opinions on how to calculate unemployment and what it should measure, but it's still a stat. If you came up with a good stat to measure HR power to while accounting for differing ballpark size, that would be cool.
And then imagine if someone else came along and said "Hmm, I like your idea for HRAR, but there were some huge parks back in the day. I'm going to use HRAR, but I'm going to calculate it using only 440+ foot homers. In my books, Mark McGwire and Reggie Jackson are the all-time home run kings."
If HRAR was a stat that was widely accepted and used and everyone knew that it was calculated one of two different ways depending on the site, that wouldn't be a problem. Just like it isn't a problem with WAR.