HS Stats - "Don't Mean Anything"

I've point this out before but will do so again.  In my time as a HC and AC, the teams I've coached on have always been able to find an adult on the staff that enjoyed stats and of whom could and would do the book.  Several other teams, but not all, seem to have found similar people.  In fact, those people seemed to have gotten together at times to discuss what they did in games etc.  I was so blessed to have a gentleman there at my current HS to stepped in from day one and took the book.  He has a great reputation in our area for his accuracy.  Our one rule was that I was to never change the book nor question his call.  NOT A PROBLEM!  If there is any such thing as an accurate book, I believe ours was.  I have known Stats4Gnats a very long time as well.  I'd bet he about as accurate as they come.  For people like them, their integrity is utmost important to them and so, they don't waiver to appease the coach or public. 

 

The point made earlier about levels of competition, schedule, ... is also a valid point.  In college softball, I just saw one school pad their stats by playing an institution that was not NAIA, NCAA, ... but rather some odd affiliation.  That school's best player hit 4 home runs, went 6 for 6 and had 7 RBIs.  In doing so, that school's player moved ahead of another school's player statistically and won that conferences top honor.  Note, they didn't do conference stats this year because so many of the schools didn't play each other due to the snow etc.  

I wouldn't say that HS Stats don't mean anything based on my 2015's recruiting journey. It depends what the coaches are looking for and value. A tool that makes a player special on paper (homerun power hitter, strikeout pitcher with low walks) which puts a player on a different level than the others can lead that college coach to take a deeper look at a player, and want to see them play. In my son's case it was his speed and his ability to make contact. Supplement these stats with how the player does at Showcases and Camps (game situations) can give the recruiter even more of an idea. The questions parents ask is "what does my son need to show to get Coach X to see my son play". Need of a recruiting class is a factor as are grades in many cases. Competition tells a lot, as do skills sets and video, but stats can at least open the door, albeit maybe just a crack. 

Originally Posted by PGStaff:

…I would say the stats that mean the least are pitchers ERA and hitters batting average. …

 

I wouldn’t say they mean the least because there’s some really putrid stats out there, but there are definitely stats the people who spend a great deal of time studying them and trying to use them to make decisions about at the ML level find are much better. It’s really only the ignorant who use BA and ERA as their primary measuring metrics.

Originally Posted by Everyday Dad:

Although I would like to see a stat for line drives whether they are hit or outs 

 

Seek and ye shall find.

 

 

Originally Posted by Ripken Fan:

I wouldn't say that HS Stats don't mean anything based on my 2015's recruiting journey. …

 

And that’s a big reason statistics are so misunderstood. I agree they’re not very useful in prognosticating for higher levels. But what about for a team like ours that doesn’t have even one current player ready to play at the college level, unless it’s a school that has a very poor baseball program.

 

So no one in the program is at all thinking about anything other than trying to figger out where to best spend what little coaching time there is, and for that I’m told by the coaches the stats are meaningful indeed.

 

Not every kid playing baseball in HS is dreaming of or capable of playing at the next level.

"HS Statistics - Don't Mean Anything"

 

Stats are in the eye of the beholder.   They do mean something, but it just depends from who's perspective you are looking at this.

 

1) Uniformed Parent - Joe87 -  I had a similiar (recent) conversation with a parent.  I've learned to not say anything and just nod my head like a bobblehead when cornered by this type of parent.  Nothing you say or do is going to matter to this parent because little Johnny should be on the field or at the plate because he is God's gift to baseball.  They are venting about something they don't understand. Let them vent.  

 

2) Informed Parent - Understands stats don't mean much in the grand scheme of things.

 

3) High School Player - Understands stats don't mean much in the grand scheme of things.

 

4) High School Coach - Sees him practice everyday.  Doesn't use stats as much as a guideline as he does the weekly practices and how he performs in the games.

 

5) College Coach/Recruiter - understands HS stats don't mean much.  Wants to see how players perform against top level competition, how he does with the radar gun & stopwatch.  That matters much more.

 

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

Now that is a great quote! 

As someone wrote above,

We were told (& value) reports/recognition from Perfect Game, Prep Baseball Report, Area Code tryout/event invites, the MLB Bureau reports and Bureau/Team wokout invites are more prestigious & valuable than the "you vote for my guy, I vote for yours" & puffed stats of All-League, All-Conference, etc. 

 

In our experience, the independent assessments from the professionals at PG and PBR (who does their own All-State teams in many places now) are mentioned far more than the local stuff based on unreliable stats & handshakes and mean a lot more to colleges and MLB.

 

Heard this one Monday " yes it was a foul ball but the coach said it was hit hard and far so added it as a homerun online" (Player in question is a coach favorite and about everything the bat touches is a 'hit')

 

Originally Posted by Catcherdad:

…In our experience, the independent assessments from the professionals at PG and PBR (who does their own All-State teams in many places now) are mentioned far more than the local stuff based on unreliable stats & handshakes and mean a lot more to colleges and MLB.

 

What if someone wants to know what a kid’s numbers were who hadn’t attended any showcases or been scouted by “professionals”?

 

Heard this one Monday " yes it was a foul ball but the coach said it was hit hard and far so added it as a homerun online" (Player in question is a coach favorite and about everything the bat touches is a 'hit')

 

I’ve heard this and similar anecdotes, but when push comes to shove, I’ve never been able to prove anything like that has taken place. I’ve seen a coach give an RBI when it wasn’t deserved or a run counted as unearned when it wasn’t, but most of the time it’s because the coach didn’t know the scoring rules or was too lazy to reconstruct an inning.

 

Does flat out cheating go on to make players look better than they are? Of course! But is it as widespread as some would have us believe? I seriously doubt it.

HS stats are what we used to call "unevaluated intel" in the military.

 

There are tons of stats and tons of intelligence reports.

 

None of it becomes "actionable" until someone figures out if it's true, what it means, and what should be done about it--which is what PG Staff was describing above.

 

Hey Everyday Dad. You didn’t comment on the metric I posted and I wondered if it met your requirements for a line drive stat.

Stats are what they are.  Just one part of the decision making equation a HS coach may use.  The beauty of todays computerized scorebooks is that even a caveman can keep score and you can really see what is happening, like spray charts. 

I hate reading "______ don't mean anything" and in this case HS stats.  I know there's no ill intent in what the OP is saying and I understand what they are getting at but it just gets to me slightly.

 

If something you do truly means nothing then why do you do it?  HS stats are important because you use them for whatever you want to use them for - playing time, set up defense positioning, etc... - this will help you become successful.  Are they a cure all to help solve all the problems with baseball?  Heck no but that doesn't mean they aren't important if they help you win games or make kids successful.

Now in regards to the intent of the OP I completely agree in that HS stats cannot help a player move to the next level.  There are tons of reasons why stats do not help people move to the next level but doesn't mean they have no value in other areas. Figure out how you can use them to help your team / players and then make it happen.  If they can't help your team / players then just move on.

 

Now if someone is inflating stats to help kids look better that is not the stats fault.  That is lack of character on the person doing that.

 

I don't know - guess I'm feeling philosophical this morning.

Originally Posted by Golfman25:

Stats are what they are.  Just one part of the decision making equation a HS coach may use.  The beauty of todays computerized scorebooks is that even a caveman can keep score and you can really see what is happening, like spray charts. 

 

Well, I don’t know about a caveman because even with scoring on a phone, pad, or computer, in order to have valid stats the person scoring the game still has to understand the scoring rules. But I get your drift and I think you’re right.

 

Today there are people getting to see metrics that only 10 years ago were only available from some of the whackos like myself who were willing to spend untold amounts of time generating them. Now, unless something really whacky took place during a game that needed me to correct or change something, it literally takes me less than 15 minutes to do twice what it used to take me 2-3 hours to do.

Coach, first, I am the OP and sorry, I didn't mean it in the way you read it.  I happen to agree with you that stats can be useful if they are meaningful.  I used to keep score for our travel team up until last year (we switched teams).  Im not saying Im perfect but I was pretty unbiased when I kept score.  Yes I had a kid playing on the team but I had no reason to prove he was better then any other kid.  It was nice to be able to pull us stats we had gathered over the years on the other teams and tell if a kid had certain tendencies, etc.  In that respect I get what your saying.

 

On the other hand, if the stats are not kept properly then there is an issue.  In this instance the parent was using bad stats to prove a point.  The parent did not understand how the stats are developed or for the most part even what they meant.  About the only thing they knew was their sons BA was higher then most of the starters BA's so his kid should be playing.

As I mentioned the reality of the situation was the data he had was flawed.  In addition, mentioned a few posts later, was the fact that he was comparing his kid getting mop up time against the starters facing the better players.  He also was only looking at a very small sample as his kid had about 15 plate appearances vs. the starters 70+ appearances at this time.

 

 

 

I disagree with you slightly on this.  You need to know how to score a game before you start using the computerized apps.  If you don't understand what an Error is or what a SAC is, etc, then you are not going to be generating useful stats.  Yes, tapping a few buttons which allows you to generate data you need to sit and calculate out of a scorebook makes it easier but you still need to understand what buttons to hit.

Haven't had a chance to sink my teeth into. Will in a bit.

Here is another side of the stats argument that I have thought about a lot.... Take a very, very good High School team with good pitching and good hitters 1-9. Of that hitting lineup, 5 are good enough to move on to the college level and 4 are good high school hitters. Those 4 who are good will have inflated numbers due to seeing opposing bullpens earlier in the game and getting to a third or fourth pitcher during a blowout.

 

In fact, some average to below average teams will not throw their top starting pitcher against a very good team as I've described. Instead, they will save their best pitcher to use in a game that is more winnable. So, in many cases, the very good team will start out with an advantage of facing weaker pitching.

 

At the end of the season, the bottom of the order on the very, very good high school team could easily have better hitting stats that the top of the order of many above average teams.

 

I found the high school stats useful for comparing where my son stood in relationship to the rest of the team.  I never used them to compare him to other high school players outside his school.

So yesterday I'm following a friend's son's JV game (this kid has also been summer teammates with my son) on Gamechanger.  And I see that he hits a fielder's choice to right field.  It was a bloop hit that all kids get at some point.  Turns out that the runner on 1B misread the ball and got thrown out at 2B.  Later on I asked the dad, how did a that get put down as a fielder's choice?  He said, it was easy.  Back up bench player to his son was scoring the game and that's how he scored it.

 

Now we can debate the validity of how to score this (Stats would know best), but trust me, accuracy was not the scorer's intent.

 

       
       
By rule that is a fielders choice.  No options there for the scorer.  It is unfortunate when a kid loses a hit to a baserunning gaffe but thats the way it is.

       
       
kudos.  Some great points here.  I have done that myself.  Starting someone down your rotation vs. A powerhouse and trying to win another more winnable game that week.  Nice catch.

 

No issue with that.  But as I said, it was not the kid's intent.  I know him and his father well and the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.  He's done worse with the Gamechanger scoring in the past, so this was not the best example.

 

 

One local team in our area (HS football) will routinely have 4 players with double digit tackling numbers. 23, 22, 15, and 14 recorded for the top tacklers in that week's game. If you start looking at the number of plays from scrimmage for the opposing offense, it just doesn't add up. Apparently, if four players converge for a tackle, all four get credited with a tackle???

 

Imaginary conversation in the booth:

 

"Why'd you score that a hit? Players at this level should make that play every time."

 

"Probably so. But if I score it an error, the hitter's dad and the fielder's dad will both be mad at me. If I score it a hit, only the pitcher's dad gets upset, and I'm pretty sure I can handle him."

As a pitcher's dad, this clears up a lot of confusion from the past.

 

 

 

Ok Stats had a chance to look at.

I like this info.However I would like to see a little more detail on the GB's and FB's

Bring all the hard hit balls together whether they are hits or outs

I'm guessing some of the GB's were scorched and some of the FB's were hit to the fence or were right at guys

If you could get an average of all these hard hit balls per TAB's, that is what I would think could tell me a bit better who the good hitters were.

 

Of course your line drive Babip says something right there.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm guessing your best 2 hitters are Nichols and Vargas.

Even though Vargas's BA isn't very good.

Yet I would still like to see the above hard hit stat.

Thanks for the info!

 

btw- I think you need a hitting coach

 

 

Seen multiple times this year, yesterday as well, where the GC scorer records a hit during a fielders choice. 

He goes back and adds "runner A out at second", yet doesn't change the hit to "reached on fielders choice"

Happens all the time, not necessarily through intent, however the accuracy and judgments made are inconsistent to say the least.

 

That can happen but I see the opposite happen more often, in our neck of the woods anyway.  The very very good teams with the best players are usually in the top leagues with the best pitching.  So, many of the best hitters have BA's around .300 - .350 or so.  Those same hitters in any lesser leagues would be tearing it up at a .400+ clip.  The California federation does a pretty good job of league and team alignment to keep things on a reasonably level playing field.  It is the lower divisions/smaller schools where you see excessive numbers, due mostly to lesser pitching and sometimes in part to more loose or less knowledgeable scoring.

Stats mean something to parents. One year I kept score, maintained the stats and managed and updated the website. I also wrote the first draft of the recap of the game for the paper. The coach sent in the final draft. I had to get him the draft and the box score by 9pm.

 

After every game within an hour of posting the stats I had at least one call or email from a parent. At games i didn't have a protected space to keep the book. I did a Les Nessman and spray painted walls around me.

I probably didn't word things very well because I agree with everything you've said.  I even love your responses to the parent because it's the truth.  I guess I was talking more or less as an overall gesture.  Hope that makes sense.  

 

Been in a very frustrated mood here the past two weeks.  Got parent complaints going on two of our teams that is just ludicrous.  I've thought about making a post about it to vent a little but A) finding the time to do it and B) not sure if it's even relevant to anything on here.

 Stats are ok when they are actually right. We had a Freshman girl keeping my sons stats and it was ridiculous, she didn't know the difference between a RBI and a BLT.

Been in a very frustrated mood here the past two weeks.  Got parent complaints going on two of our teams that is just ludicrous.  I've thought about making a post about it to vent a little but A) finding the time to do it and B) not sure if it's even relevant to anything on here.

 

 

coach, agreed but on opposite side for much longer. Not gonna say much now but maybe later. I wish we had some of you as coaches but we are not that fortunate!

I am back at least for now.  In High School Ball Stats DO NOT MATTER.  From what I see Coaches pick their players for each team JV and V and that is the end of it.  If a players is doing bad a V they send them back to a JV game when V doesn't have a game to get them confidence.  But the reverse DOES NOT happen.  If you are a JV player tearing it up you will not get a chance a V unless you are hitting a .500 with 5 homeruns in 20 at bats and if that happens then chances are you should not have been at JV in the first place becasue it doesn't happen, most coaches don't miss that.  The players that get screwed are the consistent players who don't wow the coach but always seems to get it done when needed.  Going back to my post a month ago my kid is leading in every stat in JV and that includes the players that come down form V to play and led the JV in every stat last year but has yet to see any V time while other move up ahead of him.  SO like I said STATS don't matter at HS ball.  

You mention a situation where stats truly don't matter as far as advancement at the time though they may mean something later. The makeup of V/JV is a delicate balance for a coach. For example, let's say you've got a kid down in JV tearing it up. However, he's a slow lefty basically suited for first base and dh. If I bring him up, he may only be my third best F3, so he'll sit the bench and get nothing out of the experience. But don't assume I don't notice or I'm not getting updates from the jv coaches. I gotta think about next year, too. Further, it is often true that those guys coming down to jv from varsity for playing time are, indeed, not as good as many of the current jv kids. many coaches operate from the idea that he'd rather his younger studs get playing time on jv than sit the bench on varsity. My point is that there are usually two or thre kids on jv better than the end of the varsity bench and that's sometime by design.

We've been through this. Your kid is a below average player. Thanks for coming back.

Its funny how you say that and you don't even know him.  By the way, by your standards virtually all players in our area are below average.  I made that statement as an example not to bring up the past, because its not about the stats its about what the coach is looking for and if you don't fit in you can forget about playing time. 

That is a very true statement. Coaches are looking for players to help them win.

 

The coach is not looking for a junior on JV that his own dad thinks is 13th best in the

program. 

Now now boys.  I know nothing is a be all end all but this is why I like measurables that are apples to apples.  Velocities, pitch, positional,  exit.  60 times, pop times.  I believe what is coming next will be lateral jump measurements, and perhaps vertical.  Also average exit velocity to help those kids who may not be quite at the high end but square it up more consistently.  Forget the traditional stats, they are just about meaningless.  So irondad I would ask do you know your sons measurables?  If he has an exit velo of 90+ and positional velo in the 80's and 60 time somewhere around 7 then maybe you are correct in your assumption he is getting screwed.  But if he doesn't have the numbers perhaps he is a kid who is just good enough to succeed at jv but not varsity.