Hitter Value and Pitcher Value in Colorado

It has been a while since I played this broken record, and I think it's time for another listen.  The subject of this post is the value of the current Rockies roster offensively and defensively (or, more specifically, pitch-fensively).  The outcome you can probably guess if you've read my posts on the subject before: the Rockies are one of the best pitching teams in baseball (if not the best), but have a mediocre to poor offense, and that's what is stopping them from going from good team to great.

I'm just going to take for granted that you know about Wins Above Replacement, or WAR, because it's just such a mind-bogglingly useful statistic that writing this post would take probably five times as long without it.  That said, WAR is no be-all-end-all, but it's a useful shorthand for getting a close approximation of who is better than who and for what reason (for example, Albert Pujols is better than Edgar Renteria because he's an ungodly hitter, while Renteria is an aging punch-and-judy middle infielder; you don't need WAR to tell you that, of course, but it still does).

Of course, Rockies fans are generally of the opinion that the team has a deep, potent lineup capable of producing lots and lots of runs, while the pitching staff has become solid, but is unspectacular (certainly not as good as the Dodgers or Giants, our divisional foes).  Rockies fans - and the mainstream baseball media, which holds the same opinions - would be very wrong if they agreed with this position.  Consider the National League of 2010.  You may not be surprised to learn that the Brewers and Reds had the top lineups, producing 74.6 and 67.9 Runs Above Replacement respectively.  Those two teams were far and away the best in the NL.

Only three other teams produced positive value from their lineups.  Now, you have to remember that "offensive WAR" is a combination of batting Runs Above Replacement, fielding Runs Above Replacement, A more-or-less fixed "Replacement" value that denotes playing time, and a positional adjustment (which comes out very close to zero for a whole team over the season).  So it's ok that only five NL teams had positive batting RAR; none had negative WAR overall (though the Pirates were close).

Those other three teams were the Braves, the Phillies, and the Cardinals, checking in with 35.5, 24.2, and 17.6 RAR respectively.  The Rockies finished sixth in the NL - respectable, but not excellent, with -7.4 Runs Above Replacement.  It is worth noting that almost all of the Rockies positive offensive value came from two players: Carlos Gonzalez and Troy Tulowitzki.  A handful of others produced small positive contributions with the bat (Ryan Spilborghs, Melvin Mora, and Seth Smith for example), but many, many more were offensive detriments.  Consider the following unimpressive contributions:

1) Clint Barmes, -17.1 RAR
2) Eric Young Jr, -7.9 RAR
3) Chris Iannetta, -3.5 RAR
4) Todd Helton, -2.1 RAR
5) Miguel Olivo, -2.0 RAR
6) Chris Nelson, -1.1 RAR

I'm leaving out the pitchers, who also produce significant negative offensive value, and are the main reason why the AL romps over the NL in Runs Above Replacement (8 of the 14 AL teams were ahead of the Rockies in this category).  Even so, this is an unimpressive list, notable in particular for including three of the primary holders of the Second Base position throughout 2010.  More importantly, though, this list includes starters at three positions.  Considering that the Rockies got minimal value from third base, center field, and left field already, it hurts a lot to get negative value from second base, first base, and catcher.  Tulo and Cargo are good players, but they couldn't carry the lineup themselves.

At least, you say, the Rockies have a good defense.  But you'd be wrong.  Last season the Rockies finished 12th out of the 16 NL teams in defensive Runs Above Replacement, at a woeful -19.4.  How is that possible, you wonder, given how much the Rockies broadcast team lurves the Rockies fielders?

The main culprit was Ryan Spilborghs, who is a butcher in the outfield, and who is sometimes even asked to play center, poorly.  He alone racked up -16.7 RAR on defense, more than compensating for his 5.0 offensive RAR.  Melvin Mora was the other major problem, amassing -9.8 RAR playing mostly first base, second base, and third base.  In Mora's defense, he's not a second or first baseman, and being played out-of-position is a sure way to look like a bad fielder.  Nevertheless, it matter little whether the Rockies used Mora incorrectly, or if he's simply bad on defense, because the result is the same.  What's more, the acquisition of Ty Wigginton for the next two or three seasons indicates that we're liable to see more of the same: a "utility infielder" who can't field.

You won't be surprised to hear that Troy Tulowitzki and Miguel Olivo were both excellent defensively, and - if you read this blog - you also will be pleased to know that Seth Smith was solid on defense as well.  It comes as a surprise, however, if you're a Rockies fan, that Carlos Gonzalez produced negative value on defense.  Now, Fangraphs WAR - which I'm using - gets its defensive value from UZR, a statistic that not everyone agrees about.  Cargo, however, scores poorly on just about every defensive metric.  Some people argue that Coors Field has not been adequately adjusted in those defensive statistics for how hard it is to play the cavernous outfield, but even so, the point remains that Cargo's value comes almost entirely from his bat, and not his glove.  Even the production of a great fielder like Tulo is 3/4 hitter and 1/4 fielder

The result of the Rockies mediocre defense and mediocre offense is a grand total of 18.8 Wins Above Replacement.  That places the Rockies firmly in 9th in the National League, smack dab in the middle.  The Rockies do not have a bad lineup - principally because Cargo and Tulo are good hitters - but they are far from excellent.  Consider the Cincinnati Reds (a playoff team), who amassed 33.3 WAR, or the World Series Champion Giants, who's meager lineup was offset by excellent fielding, to the tune of a total 25.1 WAR.  The other two playoff teams - the Phillies and Braves - both scored higher than the Rockies here as well, with 23.6 and 22.0 WAR respectively.  Which is not to say that position players win divisions and/or championships.  But they're really important.

Ah, but the Rockies had a saving grace in the form of the best pitching staff in the National League.  By far.  As in, by three full wins.

But, the Giants!  Tim Lincecum!  Matt Cain!  Jonathan Sanchez!  Brian Wilson!  They're all so good!

Yes, they are, and the Giants were second in the NL with 21.5 WAR from their pitchers (combined with 25.1 WAR from their position players, that's a pretty solid team, though hardly an all-time great; 48 Wins is considered "replacement," so 48 + 46ish results in 94, very close to the 92 wins the Giants actually ended up with).  The Rockies, however, put up 24.5 WAR.  Buzah?  How did they do that with such "crappy" pitchers and castaways like Jason Hammel and Jorge De La Rosa?  Well, here's a comparison of the Rockies top-ten WAR pitchers with the Giants.

Rockies Pitchers 

1) Ubaldo Jimenez, 6.3
2) Jason Hammel, 3.7
3) Jhoulys Chacin, 3.0
4) Matt Belisle, 2.2
5) Jeff Francis, 1.9
6) Rafael Betancourt, 1.9
7) Jorge De La Rosa, 1.7
8) Aaron Cook, 1.5
9) Esmil Rogers, 1.4
10) Huston Street, 0.9

Giants Pitchers

1) Tim Lincecum, 5.1
2) Matt Cain, 4.0
3) Brian Wilson, 2.7
4) Jonathan Sanchez, 2.6
5) Barry Zito, 2.1
6) Madison Bumgarner, 2.0
7) Sergio Romo, 1.2
8) Santiago Casilla, 0.9
9) Javier Lopez, 0.6
10) Dan Runzler, 0.4

Again, the Giants have an awesome pitching staff.  Lincecum and Cain are as good a 1-2 punch as you'll find in baseball, and Brian Wilson is an excellent closer.  It's just, Lincecum and Cain were worth 9.1 WAR, and Ubaldo and Hammel were worth 11.0.  If you paid attention to the late season rambling about how good the Phillies, Giants, Rays, and Yankees (among others) rotations were, you might have missed out on the best rotation in baseball: Colorado's.

Indeed, consider the WAR of the top three starters from each of the 8 playoff teams, compared to Colorado.  Remember, Jimenez, Hammel, and Chacin combined produced 14 WAR last season.

1) Philadelphia Phillies - Halladay, Hamels, Oswalt - 12.4 (note: with only a few starts from Oswalt)
2) Texas Rangers - Wilson, Lewis, Lee - 11.9 WAR (note: with only a half season of Cliff Lee)
3) San Francisco Giants - Lincecum, Cain, Sanchez - 11.8 WAR
4) Minnesota Twins - Liriano, Pavano, Baker - 11.7 WAR
5) Atlanta Braves - Hanson, Lowe, Hudson - 9.7 WAR
6) New York Yankees - Sabathia, Pettitte, Hughes - 9.6 WAR
7) Tampa Bay Rays - Price, Shields, Garza - 8.3 WAR
8) Cincinnati Reds - Cueto, Wood, Bailey - 6.9 WAR

Not once did I hear the Rockies rotation mentioned as good, let alone one of the best in the NL.  And yet, there it was, it's top three every bit as good as the top three from anywhere else.  Throw in De La Rosa - who's 1.7 WAR is largely due to missing about half the year - and consider that Chacin didn't start regularly until a couple months into the season, and you've got a staff that has four 3+ win pitchers, including a guy at the top good for 6 or 7.  That's as good as it gets.  Indeed, if any team in the NL can compete with Philadelphia's four aces next year in the pitching department, it's Colorado.  The Rockies may not have the names or the pedigree - in part because of how Coors Field inflates ERAs - but they have the skill to be just as good as the hideously named Phab Phour.  Also, since rotations go five deep, it's worth noting that I'll take Aaron Cook and/or Esmil Rogers over Joe Blanton any day.

The lesson here is that the mainstream media doesn't know about park effects, or else they'd realize what a good pitching team Colorado has (National League leaders in pitching WAR two years running).  Colorado can pitch.  The problem is, that NL leading 24.5 WAR (Chicago - the White Sox - led the Majors with 24.9; another team from a hitter's park) still isn't enough to win a division without, say, at least 20 or so Wins from the position players.  Can Jose Lopez and Ty Wigginton make up that difference?  We'll see.  Regardless, the Rockies will be a fun team to watch pitch, and Coors Field will remain a fun place to watch even bad hitters mash the ball.

Reading the Birth Chart

My birth chart, generated with OpenAstro.org

Above is my natal chart.  It is substantively the same as the chart at the end of my last post, but obviously it's a bit more colorful and, I think, easier to read than the alabe.com version.  If you have no background in astrology, however, you're just going to see a big mess of lines and bizarre, arcane symbols.  That's fine, because this post is going to be a brief introduction to how to make sense out of this mess.

The most important thing to remember, when you read a chart, is that the process is equal parts analysis and synthesis.  That is, you can't simply look at each individual planet and sign (and degree) and drill into it and explain it in isolation with the expectation that you'll thus develop a coherent narrative.  The process of reading a chart is much more like looking at a picture than reading a book.  That is, you have to pay attention to the whole, and while you can take in the details, they are meaningless without their relationships.

For example, my Sun is in Cancer, in my fourth house.  While certainly that says a lot about me, it would be foolish to ignore that my Sun is also opposed to my Neptune, or trine my Moon and Ascendant, or conjunct my Mars.  All of those things - regardless of their meaning - influence the essential core of "Sun in Cancer, 4th house."  Indeed, they influence it so much that two people with the same planet in the same sign and same house might have completely different manifestations of that aspect based upon the other planets in the chart.

Before we get into individual planets and signs, then, the first thing I do when reading a chart is look at overall shape.  Are the planets clustered or spread apart?  Are they mostly on the top, or on the bottom?  Are there any planets sitting out by themselves, or are there groups of several in the same place?

As you can see, my chart is dominated by a set of planets on the bottom - in the 2nd through 5th houses - and another set on the top, in the 8th through 10th.  Jupiter - indicated by the symbol that looks like a 4 - is alone in my 12th house, the only planet not clustered around either of those areas.

What does this shape mean?  Well, I don't show a strong East-West (Left-Right; opposite from a map, because we're looking at the sky) bias, or a strong North-South (Bottom-Top) tendency.  Usually, someone who's strong on the Eastern part of the chart is self-defined and self-directed, more likely to try to change a situation to match his or her needs, whereas someone strong in the Western part of the chart is more likely to "go with the flow" and adapt him or herself to whatever circumstances arise.  The presence of my Jupiter in the 12th suggests at least some Eastern influence in my chart, but, really, I'm not pulled strongly either way.  Indeed, that I have almost no planets in either direction means the question of self-defined versus circumstances-defined is something that I don't really even process.  I'm more liable to say that I am both, and/or neither, that the dichotomy there is only a seeming one, which in reality isn't a dichotomy at all.  Sounds like me, no?

As for the top and bottom of the chart, I likewise don't have a particular tendency here, but rather than having no planets to the North (bottom) or South (top), all of my planets go one way or the other.  I would say that, were the East-West question is almost a non-issue to me, the question of whether I am an internal, introverted person or an external, social person is a profoundly difficult one for me to answer.  That is, while I have undeniably strong introverted tendencies - my Sun is bellow the horizon, along with my Mars, my Mercury, and my Venus - I am also more than capable of talking to people and, sometimes, talking their ears off.  I can be a public speaker, and am more than happy to show off many of my eccentricities to the world (signified, particularly, by my Uranus - the one that looks like a capital H with a line through it - on my "midheaven").

Here, again, I might say that the seeming dichotomy between the two isn't really a dichotomy at all, but for a completely different reason.  Where I don't feel as though either self-definition or circumstantial-definition really applies to me, I feel all-too-much that both introversion and extroversion do apply to me, just in different ways at different times.

Having considered the shape of the chart, the next step I usually take - especially when using OpenAstro, which calculates it for me - is to look at elemental influences.  The chart is composed, fundamentally, of only seven different types of energies.  That is, there are 4 elements and 3 modalities that basically explain every sign, planet, and house.  "Huh?" you ask? "There are 12 houses, 12 signs, and 10 planets (or 12, if you count Chairon and the node, which I leave in).  What are you talking about?"  Let me explain.

There are four elements in astrology, the classical elements of the ancient Greeks: fire, water, air, and earth.  There are also three modalities: cardinal, fixed, and mutable.  Now, four elements times three modalities equals twelve signs.  Or, in other words, each sign has an element (you've probably heard that Leo is a fire sign, for example), and each element has three signs, one for each modality.  So, for example, Leo, Sagittarius, and Aries are the three fire signs.  Aries is cardinal, Leo is fixed, and Sagittarius is mutable.

Usually, when you're learning astrology, whatever book you're looking at will ask you to memorize the dates and qualities of each sign, as if they are all unique.  That's a fair thing to do, but it misses the mythological and elemental core of the practice.  If you learn, instead, the meanings of the elements, and the meanings of the modalities, you can synthesize them to figure out what any given sign means.  For example, Leo is a fixed sign, and a fire sign.  That means it has fixed energy: it is focus, determined, sometimes stubborn and lazy, devoted, and other stationary type adjectives.  It is also a fire sign, meaning it is passionate, intense, loud, and generally fiery.  Compare that to a Sagittarius, who is just as passionate and intense, but is mutable, and therefore has flighty, changeable, wandering energy instead of stubborn or lazy energy.  Voila, without memorizing the qualities of Leo or Sagittarius, you've generated explanations of both signs out of their elements.

My bias, then, is always to push towards elements and modalities.  There are dozens of influences in the chart, some extremely subtle, and for exactly that reason - because the thing is so freaking complicated - it's vital to try to break it down into fundamental building blocks that can be put together to form a coherent narrative.

In my chart, as OpenAstro tells you at the upper left (calculating based upon which signs my planets are in, giving more weight to more important planets), there's a lot of water energy, and not so much air or fire.  There's also a fair amount of earth.  What this means, in broad strokes, is that I am an emotional person.  I feel things strongly, and am naturally empathetic (to the point of sometimes over-estimating the emotions of others).  This much water does not mean that I am innately sensitive - though at times I can be very sensitive - because it can also indicate that I am emotionally very strong as well.  In short, I have a deep emotional well, which can manifest itself as strength or weakness depending upon the situation.

Water is not merely emotion and empathy, however.  It also indicates spirituality and mysticism, and is linked with artistic practice (if not always inspiration, which is more of a fire-sign tendency).  I would submit that my interest in astrology and my particular way of reading charts - which tries to break down people's personalities to their emotional, psychological, and spiritual essences - is emblematic of a person strong in water.

Air is the sign of intellect, and while I consider myself an intellectual and an academic, it is not strong in my chart.  That, however, does not mean that I am not intelligent; rather, it means that my thinking is not as rigorous or calculated as a pure air-sign native's would be.  I can be focused and calculating - my earth influences do help me stick to tasks, including intellectual ones - but my intellectual decisions are largely decided based upon emotional, psychological, or spiritual concerns, and not purely academic ones.

Having taken in hemispheres and elements, I might also take a look at modalities.  My own modalities are balanced between cardinal, mutable, and fixed, but some people show a preponderance or absence of one.  A pure mutable person, for example, is usually an extreme perfectionist and procrastinator, unwilling to ever be finished with something, and yet, at the same time, very easy going and not worried about getting things done.  A cardinal person will jump from idea to idea, never finishing anything, but always inspiring either him or herself or others to take on some new project.  A fixed person may be difficult to get moving sometimes, but will often fear change, and will establish routines, and will finish and start things on time.

Obviously, all three modalities are useful in different circumstances, and potentially dangerous in others.  Sometimes the initiator needs to finish things, sometimes the perfectionist needs to meet deadlines, and sometimes the diligent, trusty worker needs to shake up the routine to stay sane.  That's why it's so important to remember that charts do not only contain within them myriad interactions between planets and signs, but also that the world itself and the other people in it effect our charts in profound ways.  If I am "missing" a planet that might give me a favorable aspect, and I meet someone who has that planet, it might just let me accomplish things I couldn't accomplish on my own.

Believe it or not, my first time sitting down with a chart, this is all I look at.  Oh, I'll glance at where the Sun, Moon, and Ascendant are, and I might notice particularly prevalent aspects (I have a grand trine and a t-cross in my chart, for example).  But the fundamental first steps to reading a chart are much like the fundamental first steps to engaging with a painting, or a musical piece.  First you step back, take it all in, and look or listen for basic things like style and structure.  Analyzing harmonies, deciding which aspect influences career success, (or which light source is casting that shadow, or which subdominant substitution is used when) comes later.

I suppose I'm trying to form a question, in these last two posts: what is astrology?  Is it an art, or is it a science, or is it a craft (a techne, in Greek)?  I think it is all of those things.  Then again, I also think that music is all of those things, and, what's more, listening to music is all of those things.  What is so brilliant about astrology, however, is that the thousands of ways of interpreting a chart - the thousands of different processes, as well as outcomes, that make up the art/science/craft - are all contained within the practice itself.  Astrology is meant to be different for different people, it's meant to be an exploration of interactions not just between elements or planets in a chart, but between people.

If you ever do work with an astrologer, I recommend this, that you see the experience as a dialogue.  Astrologers are not mere mystics and entertainers trying to divine your past or future.  They are like counselors, or close friends, who are also students of human nature and the universe, asking questions and seeking answers in a way that may seem unscientific, but is in fact purely and especially human.  Engage in that dialogue, seek that wisdom, and see how your energies play off against someone who is an expert in engaging in that kind of conversation.  After all, astrology is fundamentally about finding one's place in the universe, a task we can all agree is worthwhile.

Astronomy, Astrology, and the Natal Chart

Astrology is an interest I picked up as a Sophomore at St. John's College.  There was something about reading Ptolemy's Almagest, tracing his mathematical and mythological argument for how the planets move around the Earth according to circular paths that was alluring.  Of course, Ptolemy is wrong about the construction of the solar system - indeed, he would never even call it a solar system - but he was not really that off on the appearances.  That is, the conceptual framework for his system may have been incorrect, but the math more or less wasn't.

More important than the question of right or wrong, to me, was the project itself.  As my roommate and I would sit on our balcony and gaze at the stars during one of his smoke breaks (my second-hand smoke breaks, I guess), we would ruminate on college-y things like how mind-bogglingly vast the universe is.  But, at least as Sophomores, we'd also think and talk about Ptolemy, about how much dedication and effort it must have taken to build his model.

The thing is, Ptolemy worked well before even telescopes had been invented.  His evidence that Mercury even existed was scant, and his complex formulae describing the motions of the other planets like Mars and Venus were built upon the kind of inexact measurements that mere eyesight and some fingers held up to the horizon provide.  In short, his was a Herculean task, impossibly detailed, completely lacking the equipment to do it, and without even a solid theoretical backdrop (for example, a theory of gravity) to do it from.

The mythos not only of the planets and their namesakes, but also the man who first described with a degree of accuracy the paths of those planets is a powerful one.  My own interest in astrology may surprise - does surprise - people who know me as a scientific kind of thinker.  I would argue, however, that while I do not know how or why the planets seem to be so relevant to my life and my understanding of the world, I do know that mythology is a much more powerful force than we like to give it credit for.  Human energy poured into any project - especially one as ancient and alternately revered and persecuted as astrology is liable to produce results we simply do not yet have the capacity to understand.

As a person interested in mythos, there is no question that astrology is fascinating to me.  Each planet, each sign, each aspect and house has its own story, its own anthropological and anthropomorphic being.  Whether those elements of astrological calculation are causes for us or we for them is irrelevant; they tell a story, they are an organized and orderly system in a chaotic world, a lens through which we can filter the nonsensical noise of life and end up with a meaning.  And what, after all, is a myth?  Is it not a story, a moral or ethical parable that provides way of divining meaning from chaos?  And what, after all, is science?  Isn't it the same thing?

The other key piece of Ptolemy's story is what happened to his work afterwards.  Sure, his model of the universe was co-opted by the Catholic church and turned into a dogma used to persecute scientists - the first astronomers in particular.  But the church had little use for astrology either, seeing its practitioners as just as dangerous as their more scientific brethren.  Indeed, in many cases those people were one in the same.  Astrology and astronomy may be worlds apart in our modern age, just as alchemy and chemistry are, but there was a time when those words meant essentially the same thing.

Think about the Greek roots for a minute.  Astronomy means, simple "laws of the stars," while Astrology means either "study of the stars," "logic of the stars," or, as I prefer, "story of the stars."  The difference is minimal, really.  Astronomy is, in some ways, a mere subset of astrology, a piece of the bigger picture.  Astronomy delineates the rules - hence Ptolemy as astronomer - but astrology tells the story.

All of which leads me to the actual practice of astrology.  My interest was piqued by Ptolemy, reinforced by gazing at the night sky, informed by my grandmother - who was a professional astrologer - and refined as I studied more and more, eventually taking an online course (which I heartily recommend) from the Astrology Career Institute and Samuel Reynolds.  I have learned a lot of specific skills along the way, but because I'm a meta-learner, too, I've also thought a lot about how different people both do and teach astrology differently.  My grandma, for example, has a number of opinions about how retrogrades work that differ from Sam's.  Some of the books I've read characterize certain aspects as bad and good, while others see them as "hard" and "soft."  In short - and this is no surprise - in this mythological, anthropological, psycho-social, linguistic field there's no shortage of debate and disagreement about everything from meaning to process to the nuts and bolts of which method of calculating houses is best.

All of which, I think, speaks in astrology's favor.  It's a robust world, an ancient study that has more to do with interactions and relationships than it does with solitary absolutes.  There is no greater misunderstanding of astrology than the notion that you are your sun sign, leading to the off-hand, "But I'm nothing like what the paper says a Virgo is like!"  Of course you aren't, I say, because astrology is about the way that Virgo sun you have interacts with your other planets.  But more than that, it's also about how the astrologer you're with right now reads your chart, and how that reading differs from the one a different astrologer would give.  The point is, both of those astrologers, though they might interpret every single piece of your chart differently, might both be right nonetheless.  The point is, astrology isn't about reducing your life or your person into a single sentence or a single word ("Leo!"), but rather it's about expanding it and complicating your picture of yourself.  It's about providing you a lens to discover your heart and soul and grow in ways you never previously imagined.

For those of you who don't know anything about astrology, then (and I'm impressed that you're still reading), I want to show you what a chart looks like.  I usually use openastro.org to run my charts, but since I'm too lazy to boot to Linux and create one right now, I'm just plopping my own birth info into alabe.com, a free chart service online.  Take a look and see what you think about it.  As a teacher who prefers inquiry-based learning, I'm going to let the thing stew for a couple days before I write another post getting into more of the details here, explaining how I read a chart.

My Natal Chart

On Facebook

I don't have a Facebook account.

I know, that's impossible, right?  I'm a technology-savvy, blog-friendly, twenty-something in 2010 (almost 2011) who doesn't use the biggest social networking site in the world?  And not just that, Facebook is the second most visited site on the entire Internet, behind only Google.  How is it possible that yours truly doesn't even have an account?

In some ways my refusal to join Facebook is merely stubbornness.  I didn't get one before, and I haven't had one yet, and I don't see any need to create one now.  In other words, it's just an irrational computation of habit, a perception that the barriers to entry - while undeniably low - are still too high to be worth the investment.  That is, I don't want to spend the half-hour or whatever to set the thing up.

That, however, is not the real reason.  Stubbornness is sufficient to prevent me from even raising the question most of the time, but it is not enough to really keep me away.  No, the real reason I don't have a Facebook account is because I don't believe that I would benefit from Facebook.  Far from it, I feel as though Facebook lowers, rather than raises, quality of life.  Now don't get me wrong.  I don't mean to insinuate the same is true for you or your 1,000 Facebook friends.  I mean that I, personally, would benefit very little from having a Facebook account.

It is true that I have few close friends, and that I don't tend to make many vague, Christmas Card acquaintances either.  I'm a natural introvert, and while I don't dislike people by any stretch, I don't have this burning need to stay in touch with everyone I meet.  Facebook, I believe, is designed to satisfy that very burning need, to excuse you for forgetting and ignoring people - which you would do anyway - simply because you are their "friend," and therefore you have "stayed in touch."  For my part - and I don't think I'm alone here - I don't see any benefit from having a network of 1,000 emigos (as Joe Posnanski calls them) that I am reminded of constantly, without any meaningful change in my actual relationships with those people.  It just sounds like extra work and stress.

Of course, there's more to Facebook than accumulating lists of friends.  There's the whole status update and wall posting.  That part is so successful that Twitter abstracted it, made it into its own service, and is now the 11th most visited site on the Internet.

This communication-focused part of Facebook I find more entertaining, but ultimately empty.  While there are many witty tweets, Facebook statuses, comments on pictures, and so on in the Facebook world, there are also plenty of the same in real conversations.  I don't feel as though I'm missing out on a vast trove of humor or wisdom by not following people on Twitter, or being linked in to their Facebook pages.  And, what's more, by the nature of the services, most Twitter users or Facebook users are intensely personal without even a hint of trying to bridge the paradox that makes good writing worth reading: being personal while still being impersonal and, perhaps, universal.

Is that too much to ask from a Tweet or from a Facebook wall post?  That it be a piece of good writing?  I think so.  It is probably impossible, in 140 characters (or, in the case of Facebook, in a few sentences of indeterminate length), to say much of anything really worth saying.  Oh, sure, you can be witty, and you can maybe even be profound, but what makes the great quotations of, for example, Ralph Waldo Emerson so great is not the quotations themselves, but the process of getting to them, the explanations and context that go with them.

Writing that does not explain itself leaves so much up to the reader that it encourages a kind of bland myopia.  Either we get it, and agree, or don't, and disagree and disregard.  Conversations die when there's no nuance in the exchange, no subtlety, no persuasion or explanation.  Facebook lets us retreat away from people we don't like so we can surround ourselves with groups of similar-thinking compatriots.  It lets us speak in sound bytes, in malformed or unformed thoughts that are reinforced by the agreement of the vast networks of friends we collect.

The result is conversation without purpose, without direction, without empathy.  Over the Internet, the kind of networking Facebook does may be practical, but it is not, it seems to me, human.  There is no substitute for sitting with your interlocutor and having a real conversation, because you have to acknowledge, when you speak in person, the other speaker's humanity.  You have to take them seriously, because they aren't just a vague collection of images and statuses.  You have to strive to understand, to agree.  Or, at least, you should do all of those things.  One of the problems with the cheapening of conversation that the Internet allows is that it might also cheapen our real-life interactions.

Don't get me wrong, though.  I love the Internet.  I believe that modern technology can improve quality of life immensely.  I just don't think that Facebook and Twitter really unlock the potential of a networked world.  Rather, they are just the same kind of stuff we've always engaged in as a society - backbiting, refusing to think critically, paying lip service to our "friends," general myopia - streamlined and made more efficient and widespread.  I believe, however, that there are also things the Internet can do that actually do connect people, that allow for real conversations where there never have been real conversations before, that encourage critical thinking and information sharing and so on.

It might very well be that Facebook and Twitter and social networks in general can be a gateway to that kind of thinking.  It might be that Joe South gets exposed to Mike Northwest via Facebook and they hash our their cultural differences.  But I don't think that happens very often.  Nevertheless, the model is not impossible, the question is how can the Internet really connect people, instead of just superficially connecting people?  I suspect the answer has something to do with understanding technology as an aide and not as life itself.

Which is why, above all, I don't use Facebook.  I've seen too many people let Facebook friendship stand in for real friendship, let a digital world replace a real world.  That's not what makes technology great, that's what makes it dangerous, and few people can resist the allure.  I don't use Facebook not because of the flaws in Facebook, but because of my own flaws, because I believe that I would lose touch with reality.  I only wish more people made the same decision.

Context Indepedent Statistics

It is my belief that the single biggest reason for the reach and speed of baseball's statistical revolution is the existence of context independent statistics with sufficient sample size.  That is not to say that context does not matter in baseball; far from it.  A pitcher at Coors Field will appear, based on everyday statistics, to struggle where a pitcher at Petco is an All-Star, even though the Coors Field pitcher might be better.  Likewise - and an even simpler example - a pitcher for a terrible team may accumulate a crappy W-L record despite pitching well, while a mediocre pitcher on a World Series winner will put up 20 wins.  Context absolutely, positively, without a doubt, matters.

Which is why sample size is so important.  Any one event on a baseball field - or even a week of events, or even a month, or, in some cases, even a season - is too small to really tell us much about actual player abilities.  There are enough events, however, over the time and space of a season, or multiple seasons, that we can start to determine things like park factors, home field advantages, player aging curves, and expected batting averages on balls in play.  What all of those statistics let us do is normalize, meaning that the .263 your favorite player hit this year may not be an indication of his actual ability as a player, but that, combined with linedrive rate, on base percentage, and a variety of other real numbers can be normalized to provide a context independent statistic that may not tell us exactly how good a player is, but will get us pretty close.

Now a lot of people don't trust that process, and rightfully so.  It's complicated, it's mathematical, and it is not always predictive.  No advanced statistic predicted Andres Torres of the San Francisco Giants to succeed as well as he did this year, for example.  But that misses the point.  Individual outliers are a part of any statistical sample; a little good luck, and anyone can end up in that third standard deviation away from the normal curve.  Even in a full season - even in a full career - no player will play exactly to his ability, and some will, simply by chance, vastly overperform or underperform expectations.

The point here, however, is not to argue in favor of baseball statistics, or to explain how and why they work.  There are dozens of great websites and articles out there that can do that for you.  No, I'm writing to make a simple observation about baseball statistics relative to statistics in other sports.  In short, I want to argue that the ability to come up with context independent statistics, I believe, means that baseball will always be far ahead of every other major sport in its ability to quantify player performance.

Of course other sports can normalize their numbers to some degree, based on factors like home field advantage, weather (in the case of outdoor sports), or other external factors.  What makes basketball, football, and soccer so hard to quantify, however, is the interdependence of the success of one player on the success of others.  The context independent statistics in baseball depend on the ability to limit or remove external influences on data, but they also benefit from the non-interference of internal influences.  That is, Albert Pujols may drive in more runs with a good leadoff hitter in front of him than with a bad one (which is part of why RBI is a useless statistic), but it will have a negligible effect on his ability to get on base or to hit home runs.  His actual ability is unchanged by his teammates.

Consider, in turn, each of the other three major sports.*  This year's Miami Heat - though the sample is still small - are demonstrating that three players with tremendous individual skill do not necessarily result in greater success.  Certainly, and this likely goes without saying, that individual skill is not additive in the way it is in baseball.  What I mean is, if Pujols is worth 9 wins and the Cardinals added, say, Alex Rodriguez at 6 wins, the addition of Rodriguez would not make Pujols any worse, and the Cardinals would be expected to win 6 more games with A-Rod than without.  In basketball, on the other hand, you can't just add a 6 Win Shares player to a 4 Win Shares player and get 10 wins.  Why? Because there aren't any context independent statistics at play, and there can't be.  What LeBron does cannot be separated from what Wade does, and there's no two ways about it.  If LeBron takes a shot on a given possession, that's a shot that Wade doesn't take, and vice versa.

* Yes, I'm elevating soccer over hockey, and not just because of international appeal.  It seems to me that the MLS is very close to catching the NHL in national popularity.  Maybe I'm wrong about that.  After all, the Stanley Cup still has larger viewership than the MLS Cup.  However, comma, the Seattle Sounders averaged over 30,000 fans a game this season, and the league is expanding, and I think it's only a matter of time.  Then again, I'm biased, because I don't particularly like hockey.

Anyway, regardless of the status of hockey and soccer in America, it's no contest in the rest of the world (except for Russia and Canada).  Soccer wins, hands down.

One could argue that baseball is effected by this to a degree.  If Pujols is surrounded by an amazing lineup, he'll naturally get more chances to hit over the course of the season because the Cardinals will bat around more.  But that's a poor proxy, because the effect is minimal, and what counts most is still Albert's rate stats, not his counting stats.  Rate stats matter in basketball too, of course, but even the rate stats (shooting percentage, points per 48 minutes, even player efficiency) depend heavily on the rest of the roster.  Last year LeBron, Wade, and Bosh were 1,2, and 4 in player efficiency.  It's safe to say they're all great players.  So far this year, however, they're number 9, 18, and 34 respectively.  Still plenty good, but - ironically - it's hard to be as efficient a scorer with other teammates who are also efficient scorers.

In the NFL the case is even more stark.  Almost every NFL fan can tell you who's a good quarterback and who isn't, and we keep a strange and esoteric statistic called "Quarterback Rating."  Quaterback rating, however, is anything but context independent.  Indeed, in a sport as specialized as football, there's really nothing that is context independent.  Whereas an MLB player can get traded from the AL East to the NL West and still hit cleanup the next day, even a quarterback as gifted as Peyton Manning would struggle if he suddenly had to lead the Seattle Seahawks next week, and not just because the Seahawks are inferior to the Colts.  The systems are completely different; Seattle doesn't run the same - or even a similar - offense, the offensive lines block differently, the receivers run different routes.  The context is entirely different, and even Peyton Manning would have to learn the new system.

So how can we measure the true skill of a quarterback, when systems differ, when some offensive lines block better than others, when teams don't play balanced schedules, when the season is too short to really tell?  We can't.  We can use scouting - and, in fact, this is what teams do - and we can try to maximize the success of a player by adapting gameplans to the player's skillset.  But that just goes to show that there's no single objective measure for quarterback skill.  And if not at quarterback (the position that touches the ball most), at what position could we possibly generate a context independent statistic of real meaning?

Soccer is in the same boat.  While the soccer world has done fascinating work on player aging curves (by position, no less), and some teams have learned how to identify and pursue (or sell) under or overvalued players, it remains difficult to calculate some underlying ability.  I don't think it's impossible, because there is a wealth of information available and, while context does matter, soccer is has less variability in roster construction and approach than football or, I would argue, even basketball.  In other words, context is controlled more naturally.

Nevertheless, it's a difficult sport to quantify, because it has one of the same problems as baseball defense: player spacing and positioning is probably as important, if not more important, than player skill levels, and a lot of that has to do with coaching.  Moreover, there are so many different kinds of skills and players that a singular scale may not work to assess player values.  Some teams, for example, are built on speed and strength, neglecting skill or technique, while others are filled with wily veterans who cannot outrun their opposition, but rely on being in the right place at the right time.  Successful soccer - and soccer is undoubtedly a sport where success and failure walk a razor's edge - depends upon coherent roster construction as much, if not more, than skillful players.  Much like the Heat, a soccer team filled with great players (like England's World Cup roster) may crash and burn while inferior players who work well together (like Uruguay or Holland) may succeed.

All of this is not to say that other sports should not be asking questions about how to quantify - or at least understand - player ability and contribution to team success.  Rather, it is to say that baseball will always have a leg up here, because the unit of action is so easy to measure by comparison.  Maybe it comes down to that, above all: baseball is a turn-based game, while soccer, football, and basketball are all real time.  Or at least closer to real-time.  Football in particular strikes me as a turn-based game with real-time tactical battles.

Anyway, the point remains: baseball actually has units of action that generally revolve around two players: the batter and the pitcher, with ancillary support from the catcher and whatever fielder the ball is hit to.  Even the smallest unit of action in basketball, football, or soccer involves the entire team, by necessity, because there's so much inextricable context.