quote:
Originally posted by ctandc:
I'm not talking about HS numbers for pitchers. HS stats are pretty much meaningless in and of themselves. Scouts and college coaches don't take a lot of notice from simply looking at HS numbers. I'm speaking about pitchers that get looks at showcases or tournaments.
I remember a kid getting attention from several D1's at a tournament several years ago. There were several scouts looking at a highly touted pitcher (for the other team)...they broke the guns out and did their thing. The starting pitcher for the other team gave up 1 hit in a complete game. Early in the game several scouts clocked the kid at something truly unimpressive...if I remember correctly it was close to mid 80's if that. So the guns went away.
In the last inning, one of the scouts was curious and gunned him again. His FB was a tad faster in the late innings as it was in the early innings.
Sometimes it's luck, getting noticed. Right place, right time.
But HS numbers are pretty much meaningless for several reasons...
Batting Average - Who's keeping the book? That's always a question mark for outside coaches looking in.
Other numbers such as HR, SB, ERA, K's etc etc they are ALL Dependent on the level of the competition the player is facing in HS.
Let me clarify my post.
A kid, being looked at by college coaches and scouts, will get more notice now of course, when the fisted balls hit off good pitches are now outs, instead of hits. That's common sense. Especially if the quality of the hitters they are pitching against is a known factor.
Just my 2 cents.
Well, I sure understand why you have such disdain for HS stats, but I can’t help wondering why in the Devil anyone even bothers to keep score, let alone mandate the keeping of stats if they really are so completely worthless. It would be ever so much easier to just count the innings and runs scored, then let the “experts” take care of the rest.
As for how players “show” at showcases and tournaments, while I’ll certainly agree that the overall quality of players skills are higher in those venues, there’s just no way all of the players at them are top quality! As long as someone can participate in an even by simply paying the entry fee, there’s no upper or lower limit on the skills.
But why not keep cumulative player stats for all of the venues, rather than each separately? That way, there’d be a mitigating effect that would give much more meaning to an “average”, and therefore much more meaning to the stats across the board. Or even better yet, come up with a “mitigating” factor that can be used to “normalize” all player stats? Lord knows I’ve tried to do that, but to tell the truth, as things currently stand, its literally impossible.
I completely agree that BA, and any other stat that depends on hits or errors, such as OPB, POS, SlgP, or anything that depended on the scorer’s judgment such as total bases, ERs or anything else, are worthless as a toll for comparing players from different teams. They are extremely valuable from a team perspective because all of the players are being measured with the same measuring stick. But for team to team comparisons, they literally stink on ice.
I believe your feelings about the other numbers though, are wrong because while there are some teams that play weak competition, usually over a season it balances out where there’s competition from good, bad, and in between teams, and that’s why there’s something called “averages”.
I’ve come up with some metrics I believe are objective because they don’t depend on the scorer or the competition. They just are.
http://www.infosports.com/scor...r/images/objnums.pdfWhat difference does it make what the level of competition is, if you have several thousand players on a lit like that. Its simply more information to assist the evaluator.
I truly don’t understand how you’ve come to believe “A kid, being looked at by college coaches and scouts, will get more notice now of course, when the fisted balls hit off good pitches are now outs, instead of hits.” How would any college coach or recruiter know how any hits or outs were generated unless he watched every single game, and that’s an impossibility.
Somewhere along the line, an evaluator has to look at numbers and use them in his evaluations, or he has to depend on someone else for their evaluation, like the player’s coach. Would you bet your life on a HS coach’s evaluation of one of his own players?
