SABR School Hangout, 3/19/14
Recently, our good friend Rob Neyer joined Fox Sports, and today, we’re going to join him, Jon Paul Morosi, and Ben Lindbergh for a Google Hangout discussion of sabermetrics and the role of statistical analysis. To watch live (or to view the archive when the hangout is over), you can simply click the embedded video below.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
Rob Neyer is past his prime if he ever had one. His writing on SBN was below replacement level.
Maybe that’s why he drew the attention of a dumbed-down larger network. Sabermetrics will never be accessible enough to enjoy mainstream support, and that’s fine. The people who want to learn will invest the time to gather the requisite knowledge and ability to extrapolate and predict.
I might have to disagree with this. While I tend to be fairly misanthropic, I think it’s possible (note the word choice) for anybody who can graduate high school to get this stuff. I’m not saying they can explain the 24 base-out states and run expectancy tables, but I don’t think concepts like a player being worth a certain number of wins, or defensive runs saved, or wOBA are totally out of the grasp of the average person, even if the actual calculations might be.
I think it’s up to us as the stat guys to learn how to communicate this information to a broader audience. I mean, I don’t have great knowledge of how exactly my car works, but I can still drive it, fill the tank and change the oil. People don’t have to be experts on something to wield it competently.