Counting Stats, Milestones, and MLB History

[RonCo]

I need to think about this a little, but it makes me ponder how I might do a translation of BBA back to MLB but include an additional adjustment for skew and kurtosis differences in the populations of the differing times.

[RonCo]

John's point on scouting is interesting to think about. In particular, I'm thinking about how much talent was in the "minor leagues" at the time ... the system was so different from what we would understand, that this is a factor I hadn't really thought about.

[aaronweiner]

Perhaps of some interest is this table, which shows the number of 400 and 500 HR hitters in the BBA have not quite doubled in careers starting in the last two decades

Years	400	500	600	700	All
1975-1984	10	1	2		13
1985-1994	7	4		1	12
1995-2004	9	1	2	1	13
2005-2014	7	2	1		10
2015-2024	12	5			17
2025-2034	15	5	1		21
	60	18	6	2	86

Overlay this with the HR/AB curve for the BBA.

The next interesting question, perhaps, is: Why don’t we have more 700 HR careers in modern day BBA? I would suggest the answer is related to that longevity thing. We will see, perhaps, if some of those mega-players from the late 2030 drafts will be able to hang around long enough to make it happen.

See, that's what I'm saying. I think understanding the talent curve the way it's constructed would go a long way towards understanding not just the nature of counting stats but also player development/deterioration.

[RonCo]

Another issue to bake in: the number of teams in MLB and BBA are quite different at times, with BBA having more--so raw counts will sway toward BBA a lot of the time--toward MLB others.

[Ted]

Another issue to bake in: the number of teams in MLB and BBA are quite different at times, with BBA having more--so raw counts will sway toward BBA a lot of the time--toward MLB others.

You know, I can't really believe I didn't consider this. Kind of dumb on my part.

As far as the longevity issue, it does get interesting. Historically in real life, players just seemed to have longer careers. OOTP in recent versions just seems skewed hard towards short careers as we've seen the same trend in MLB. As athletes have gotten better, the likelihood that someone past their athletic prime can hold on and remain competitive has diminished. In both real life and the BBA, it's really tough to find guys with 20 productive seasons. 15 isn't even that common anymore.

So now I finally kind of get where Aaron was going. Sorry it too me so long.

[indiansfan]

1st Cano hasn't gotten this much attention in a long time. Despite all the different mathematical looks at him, he still ranks as a pretty great player.

2nd It's Cochran, not Cochrane. His name gets messed up often for some reason.

3rd I really liked this article

Most Importantly - Can I just have Jimmy Foxx on my team?

[usnspecialist]

1st Cano hasn't gotten this much attention in a long time. Despite all the different mathematical looks at him, he still ranks as a pretty great player.

2nd It's Cochran, not Cochrane. His name gets messed up often for some reason.

3rd I really liked this article

Most Importantly - Can I just have Jimmy Foxx on my team?

Sure, but i get Jimmie Foxx on mine

[aaronweiner]

I'd just like Foxxy Cleopatra on mine.

[jleddy]

Sure, but i get Jimmie Foxx on mine

His name gets messed up often for some reason.

[CTBrewCrew]

Ill take Red Fox

[allenciox]

This is very, very interesting. I would argue that raw numbers do "mean something", though. Let's consider the deadball era, for example. A player hitting 8 HR versus another hitting 2 HR over the course of a season is going to have very little impact on total runs added by those home runs. On the other hand, a player hitting 50 home runs in a modern era is going to be adding a lot more runs from home runs than one hitting 25 home runs.

So the absolute number is going to have a lot to do with how important a home run is compared to, say, a hit.

[aaronweiner]

This is very, very interesting. I would argue that raw numbers do "mean something", though. Let's consider the deadball era, for example. A player hitting 8 HR versus another hitting 2 HR over the course of a season is going to have very little impact on total runs added by those home runs. On the other hand, a player hitting 50 home runs in a modern era is going to be adding a lot more runs from home runs than one hitting 25 home runs.

So the absolute number is going to have a lot to do with how important a home run is compared to, say, a hit.

I agree with this in spirit, but the idea is that if this hypothesis holds we'd have a lot of people hitting 8 HR instead of 2 HR, which would quickly offset the one player hitting 50 HR instead of 25.