Sunday, September 07, 2014
Listen to MGL
?Regular readers of this blog, the old book blog, my original blog at Primer, and where it all started at Fanhome know of MGL's insight. And really, insight is selling him short, because the way he organizes his ideas is brilliant.
He was actually the first one to teach me (at Fanhome) about regression toward the mean, the single most important concept to understand and appreciate when analyzing observations. His chapter in The Book on Game Theory is a must-read. One thing that MGL has talked about alot is the idea of optimization and that once both sides play optimally, it doesn't matter what either side does (which I believe is the Nash equilibrium). But it doesn't really matter what you call it, as long as you understand its application.
I summarized this point in response to something Bill James had said, and wrote it as follows:
If the defense is playing optimally, then it doesn't matter if you bunt or not. But if the defensive alignment is suboptimal, then you exploit that, meaning you bunt if they give you the bunt, and you swing away if they play for the bunt too aggressively. Each hitter has his own optimal defensive alignment, and a smart ego-less hitter exploits that (and a smart defense will exploit the hitter's ego with extreme shifting).
This is why we should ignore announcers who say "the pitcher MUST throw a fastball low-and-away here", because a hitter will simply look for that pitch. It can't work that way. Maybe he should throw it there 80% of the time instead of 60% of the time in that particular situation, but obviously 20% of the time, he'll do something that looks weird, but is just part of that randomization plan.
Those words may technically be mine, but the entire concept of the idea is simply dripping with MGL-isms. Bill responded that this idea was "brilliant, just brilliant". I just want to make sure that everyone out there realizes that the person who started this movement we were on is calling someone else (MGL) a brilliant thinker. My role in this instance is akin to a translator or moderator.
And since I'm here, I'll leave you with another MGL-ism:
The sabermetrician's credo: "I'm not sure, this is why I'm not sure, and this is roughly how not sure I am."
I consider myself very lucky to have the opportunity to be able to intersect so much with those who influenced me (Bill and Pete Palmer), and those who continue to advance the saber-movement (MGL).
Those who can, do. Those who can't, learn. The rest, we ignore.
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