Big Data & Baseball: How Stats Drive Major League Success

BIG DATA & BASEBALL STATISTICS How Stats Drive Major League Success The SABR Defensive Index – 2013 a new “apples-to-apples" metric to determine the best defensive players – is created, accounting for 25% of the Gold Glove winner determination process, with votes from managers and coaches accounting for the other 75%?1 Sean Smith develops the Wins Above Replacement (WAR) statistic, which summarizes a player's total contribution to his team10.20 2010 The Boston Red Sox hire 2003 sabermatician founder Bill James, who helped form the 2004 and 2007 World Series Teams19 Using sabermetrics, and primarily on-base percentage, to determine players' value, Billy Beane, manages the 0akland Athletics to tie for the best 2002 record in the MLB at 103-59 6 1984 On Base Plus Slugging (OPS) is devised by Pete Palmer and John Thorn in the book "The Hidden Game of Baseball"17, 18 The Chicago White Sox lead the 1983 league in scoring and win the AL West title after moving home plate forward following the discovery they had more fly balls caught at the warning track than their opponents6 1969- The Baltimore Orioles win three straight American League pennants after manager Earl Weaver incorporates left-right splits and batter vs. pitcher stats into his decision-making5 1971 1950s The Brooklyn Dodgers’ Allan Roth and S general manager Branch Rickey devise the formula for on-base percentage“ 1947 Roth is hired by the Dodgers as the MLB's first full-time statistician, to evaluate player performance3 The Buffalo Bison are the first team to track 1879 RBIS. In 1920: RBI becomes an official record kept by the National and American leagues? 1874 The batting average statistic first appears in print" devry.edu DeVry V University 1 http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/business_technology/big data_the_next_frontier_for_innovation http://sabr.org/sabermetrics http://sabr.org/research/macmillian-baseball-encyclopedia-west-system-and-sweat-equity http://sabr.org/sabermetrics/statistics 5 http:/www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2011/4/14/2110082/why-dont-sabermetric-gms-have- sabermetric- managers-and-shouldnt-they http://www.rantsports.com/mlb/2012/06/08/americas-pastime-revolutionized- sabermetrics-analysis/ ?ZHVMzBjK6e8fBkoG.99 7 http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/official_info/baseball_basics/abbreviations.jsp http://www.baseballprospectus.com/glossary/index.php?search-VORP http://www.fangraphs.com/library/offense/ops/ http://www.fangraphs.com/library/misc/war/ 11 http://www.baseball-almanac.com/bstatmen.shtml 12 http://baseballrecordsdigest.com/tag/rbi/ 13 http://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/05/sports/alan-roth-74-dies-baseball-statistician.html 14 http://bleacherreport.com/articles/699788-branch-rickey-helped-mickey-mantle-become-better-than-willie-mays 15 http://content.usatoday.com/communities/dailypitch/post/2011/09/documentary-delves-into-the-importance- of-baseball-stats/14.Ux360_ldWSo 16 http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/The-312/January-2013/The-Cubs-and-White- Sox-at-the-Dawn- Learn more at devry.edu of-Sabermetrics/ 17 http://sabr.org/about/pete-palmer 18 http://sabr.org/node/607 19 http://www.forbes.com/sites/allenstjohn/2013/10/31/powered-by- bill-james-and-friends-the-red-sox-win- another-moneyball-world-series/ 20 http://www.baseball-reference.com/about/war_explained.shtml 21 http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1828102-gold-glove-award-voting-is-changing-for-the-better-but-still-needs-fixing Devry University is accredited by The Higher Learming Commission (HLC), www.ncahlc.org. In New York, DeVry University operates as DeVry College of Now York. DeVry is certified to operate by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. Devry University is authorized for operation by the THEC. www.state.tn.us/thec/. Nashville Campus - 3343 Perimeter Hill Dr., Nashville, TN 37211. Program availability varies by location. ©2014 Devry Educational Development Corp. All rights reserved. 4/14