Sons of Steve Garvey

From "Some strange new letters in baseball's numbers game" by Bill Shaikin at the L.A. Times:

Baseball statistics can resemble alphabet soup these days. In books, websites and research papers, analysts present such acronyms as VORP and BABIP.

Major league teams generally conduct their statistical research through consultants or in-house analysts, sometimes covering similar ground with proprietary labels, but even baseball executives can have a hard time keeping up with the expanding universe of statistics. So we asked four general managers if they could identify VORP and BABIP, two statistics developed several years ago.

Ned Colletti, Dodgers
VORP: "I can't remember what the exact definition is."
BABIP: "What's that?"

Bill Stoneman, Angels
VORP: "No."
BABIP: "No."

Kevin Towers, Padres
VORP: "Yes."
BABIP: "You'd have to ask the number crunchers on that one. I couldn't tell you."

Billy Beane, Athletics
VORP: "Value over replacement player."
BABIP: "Which one is that? I don't even know what that one is."

Is it further proof of the deification of Billy Beane that I believe the other GMs, yet I think Beane was being disingenuous by saying he doesn't know BABIP?

I'll admit that I feel like a neophyte with baseball statistics. I believe in them, and I enjoy learning about them, but I'm still a little ways away from injecting acronyms like BABIP, EqA, and VORP into common conversation.

Murray Chass of the NY Times, however, will have none of that. In his latest column of "topics which should be off-limits this season," he writes:

[Off-limit topic:] Statistics mongers promoting VORP and other new-age baseball statistics.

I receive a daily e-mail message from Baseball Prospectus, an electronic publication filled with articles and information about statistics, mostly statistics that only stats mongers can love.

To me, VORP epitomized the new-age nonsense. For the longest time, I had no idea what VORP meant and didn’t care enough to go to any great lengths to find out. I asked some colleagues whose work I respect, and they didn’t know what it meant either.

Finally, not long ago, I came across VORP spelled out. It stands for value over replacement player. How thrilling. How absurd. Value over replacement player. Don’t ask what it means. I don’t know.

I suppose that if stats mongers want to sit at their computers and play with these things all day long, that’s their prerogative. But their attempt to introduce these new-age statistics into the game threatens to undermine most fans’ enjoyment of baseball and the human factor therein.

People play baseball. Numbers don’t.

And guns don't kill people, people do! But I digress. Anyway, as Jon pointed out on Dodger Thoughts, Nate Silver of Baseball Prospectus wrote a very classy response to Chass' piece. I agree with Silver, whether you like statistics or not, we are all baseball fans. Let's enjoy the national pastime in whatever language we want to use.

I should note, though, that Chass has shown a penchant for citing statistics like Marginal Utility of Righthanded Relievers Against Youngsters, as well as Contributing Hits As ShortStop. But again, I digress.

A good article for the statistically challenged around here, i.e., me:

Rob Neyer, ESPN.com: "The world according to VORP"