To ignore any stats is ignorant. If you want to tell me looking at stats is not the best way to evaluate talent, then I’d love to hear how you plan on watching over 2,000 baseball games to come up with a non-statistical evaluation.

OBP is a very important stat. The best hitters in the game get on base either through skills of their own or fear of those skills.

What is being missed is the important of SLG %.

For example, in 2010 Joe Mauer was on base .402 and Shin-Soo Choo was on base .401

Very, very great OBP’s. However, if you have a guy in your 3-4-5 hole, and those 2 guys are your options or you could have Paul Konerko or Adrian Gonzalez… you’re taking Konerko or AGone even though they have lower OBP’s, their SLG % is much higher.

If you’re asking me who fits best in the #2 slot or #1, I want the guy with the high OBP.

I think you just have to be careful and use the stats that best fit your system, not just a generic paintbrush or OBP or bust. Regardless, I’ll take a guy with .350+ OBP over a guy with .300-.349 OBP any day.

It’s defining the differences between those .350+ guys that you need to figure out where they fit and how they fit into the lineup.

OBP tells you the so-called, chance a runner has at scoring runs.

If my OBP is .400, then I have a 40% chance of scoring a run do I not?

So coming up with a statistical formula to predict runs is not a bad idea BUT you can’t ignore the amount of times a player is on base.

PA/RUNS just tells you how OFTEN they scored, not the CHANCE he puts his team in a scoring situation.

So I guess you could say,

Francoeur has a .300 OBP (only using him because its even 30%)

He scored 52 runs so you’d have to figure out of all times Francoeur got ON BASE how many times did THAT lead to a run scored. You can’t just jump to counting R per PA because its not a valid predictor

So Francoeur was on base 30% of the time
Of those times on base he scored a run 39% of the time

All PA:R tells you is that he DID score 52 runs (every 8.5 times per plate appearance) It doesn’t tell you the CHANCES he had

“If you have a 6.7 PAtoRS Ratio then you are going to score on average 4 runs per every 27 PA.”

Tell me, how do you calculate PAtoRS Ratio? Yep, you need to know the PA and RS a team scored. LOL then what good is that ratio if you already know how many runs the team scored? Please stop embarrassing yourself.

It’s especially helpful if someone gets stuck in the first car and needs to be picked up.
The first car got you somewhere but not where you wanted to go. The second car was way more important in getting to your destination.

the OB is the first car that got stuck halfway to the destination. Useless unless you have that car behind him to pick him up and get him home.

it’s nice to have the OB instead of the out but it can’t get the job done without the help. And there is no reason to say the broken down car was more important to the result than the car that came and got that runner home!

But Boggs would not be worth having if I had no RBI guy batting behind him.
The OBP would mean nothing if no one drove him in.

And no matter what stat you look at they are only a good indicator if the team you are bringing him to will offer the same opportunities he had when he compiled those numbers.

Francouer had those high RBI years at Atlanta where everyone had high RBI and were good hitters. That meant that they were forced to throw strikes to Francouer so his free swinging could connect on some.

It is a good example of what I originally said, Get a lineup of good hitters and the whole will make the parts perform better than they would of their own accord. Higher OBP, Higher RS and RBI.

All because the hitters around him forced the pitcher to pick their poison.

he got better pitches to free swing at and since they were in the strikezone he actually drove those runs in.

All stats are affected in that way.

No you most certainly did not make that suggestion, X did. You have made no such out front and audacious statements! Thats why your a good guy here! lol

My examples are least likely in regards to erasing the PA, but the chances of those happening are just as likely to happen as a guy who gets on base scoring. Only in the case of getting picked off does the runner really have an active part in determining what happens, all the other possibilities are not under the OB runners control.

And if every guy walked who would be more responsible, the Hitters or the Pitcher in that absurd scenario?

OBP may tell you how many good outcomes the batter was involved in but it doesn’t say jack if the goodness was a result of his skill or someone else’s failure! And while he may get on base there is no guarantee he will stay on base long enough to increase PA or score. an OB HAS to result in a score (either as an RS or an RBI) before it can ensure increased PA for that game.

OBP also includes HBP, Was that a product of the batter’s skill or the Pitcher’s bad location? It includes walks which may or may not be due to the skill of the batter or lack of it by the pitcher.

As far as decisions go RBI and OBP are secondary indicators, not primary as Xtreem would have OBP be. Neither are the first thing you should look at when selecting players. OBP and RBI are indicators to look at when you have two players who fit the main criteria (BA, Power(or Speed), and W:K ratio), Then once you have two players who fit those indicators it is fine to then look at RBI and OBP to determine which of the two are better (and you could even call it Luckier!) Scouting trumps it all though.

BA is always primary as the BA is an ACTIVE trait. It shows how much the batter accomplished on his own. Sure a pitcher can make a mistake pitch but the batter still has to hit it where they are not!

Power or Speed is important depending on what role you are looking for. Leadoff or Big Bat. You can use OBP or SLG here if you like. I prefer RBIP which tells me what percentage of RBI ops actually resulted in an RBI which tells me something about the hitter in a pressure situation.

W:K Ratio is important. When coupled with BA it tells you a ton about the batter’s plate dicipline.

Now that is not to say that those are the only important stats or the only way to pick players.

But it’s a damn site better than just looking at OBP and expecting that conga line of walking that the logic of the theory is totally based off of. Since OBP doesn’t tell you how much is walk, HBP or an actual hit it does not tell you enough by itself to be an IMPORTANT PRIMARY indicator of anything other than how often a player got on. And it doesn’t tell you how often that resulted in an RS at all!

Yes getting on base is good. Yes Walking is good. But neither in and of themselves cause a run to score. they may contribute but the effort in and of itself is inadequate. In most cases it requires something else to happen that is not under the OB’s control.

Personally I look for players who will fight in an at bat and batters who have a high BA with 2 K on them. Those are the guys who will get on base AND drive in a run while doing so.
OBP could indicate high walks which usually do not drive in runs except when the bases are loaded.
And OBP becomes MORE important for role players like leadoff hitters and the 2 Hole, but after that the OBP is not as important as the BA and the RBIP (SLG if you prefer) because you want someone who actively drives in the run, not just walks and moves a runner over and hopes someone else will get the job done.

I think that is my greatest problem with OBP.
X treats it as the most important trait, yet it is a passive stat in regards to driving in runs. It MAY drive in a run if it is a hit (Which shows in BA) OBP IMO is a stat that obscures what the other stats are telling you because it ignores everything but how often you got on base. It especially doesn’t tell you anything about scoring!

getting on base is important but not as important as HOW you got on base. A walk is NOT as good as a hit in my book, better than an out yes but a consolation prize for not getting yourself out.

Give me guys who can drive the runs it that’s why I want to see batting average first.
Giving me the OBP first doesn’t amount to a hill of beans if in the game the guy can’t hit.

Give me the hitters first, the guys who drive the runs in. You can live with the guy on base but you can’t live without a run. You win the game by runs not how many men on base. It’s R H E, not O H E on the scoreboard.

Clearly if every hitter in your lineup walked every single time up they would score an infinite number of runs. It would never end.

If every hitter got a base hit every single time up eventually someone would be thrown out at 3B, forced out at 2B and even thrown out at 1B on a hit to RF.

Eventually that inning would end. The continuous walk inning never would, it would go on forever (unless Ryan Church failed to touch 3B)

The most valuable offensive player is the one who not only drives in his teammates but also PROVIDES the opportunity to his teammates to drive HIM in.

If the decision is between a guy who cannot get OB at a reasonable percentage or the guy who can not drive in runners at a reasonable percentage my solution would be to get rid of them both and find someone who can drive in runs AND provide OPPORTUNITIES to the guys behind him to drive HIM in.

For your two out scenario…

Guy gets on with two outs, gets picked off.

Does the guy who came up after him get to hit in that inning?

If he does then you are correct, if he doesn’t then the guy who got on didn’t extend anything but the pitch count. Nice contribution but you want to applaud a guy who got picked off as a contributor? Any contribution made woulod be offset by the error!

As for the counting stat argument the SaberRattlers always bring up, I would remind them that their own metrics are based on those counting stats And their Metrics would not be possible and actually mean nothing without them!

A guy has an OBP of .750, Great number right? If you go just by that would you get a good player? Not when you see he got walked 3 times in 4 PA.

RBI is at least an indicator of does the guy get hits that drive in runs. Not just singles and walks. You don’t take the count as gospel and if you did look you would metric it with the number of opportunities he had compared to league average.

But OBP doesn’t tell you how many runs will score.

They are lessons that work quite well in most thing in life and I keep hoping we will hire a GM who thinks as strategically and as thouroughly as that.

My opinion on this issue is really explainable like this.

You want to drive a nail into wood, You need a Nail you need some wood and you need a hammer.
Is that enough to drive the nail in the wood? can the hammer all by itself drive the nail in?

Or does someone have to swing the hammer?

Did the wood make the nail go in? No It was the hammer.
Did the nail make the hammer drive it into the wood?
Did the hammer make me swing it so the nail could be driven in?

NO!

If the nail is in the wood I don’t give anymore importance to the wood the nail or the hammer as the other.

If it gets done it is because the guy who wielded the hammer did his job and forced the hammer onto the nail that went into the wood!
If I hit my thumb I don’t blame the hammer or the wood I blame myself.
If I do it successfully then I caused the nail to go in the wood not the nail, not the hammer nor the wood!

OBP is the Nail! Home Plate is the wood! the Batter is the Hammer and when it isn’t the Error or the defensive decision is the hammer in that case!

The OBP is incidental, So is the RBI, what did it was either a good PA or a bad defensive error or decision.

and what I think you are overlooking in all your scenarios (such as the DP), is that if the first guy does not get on, that next guy may not even get up (if there are 2 outs) so he will never have his chance to do anything.

go back and read the birthday analogy again. It fits.

No one can deny that Jim Rice had many more opportunities because he hit behind Wade Boggs.

Which is more important? depends on the player. Jeff Francouer once had 100 RBI’s but the guys that hit behind HIM didn’t have too many opportunities. Why? because he only got OB 29.3% of the time. (league avg was about .330) So the guys behind HIM had less opportunities than he had to get RBI’s.

McCann .388 and 93 RBI and Chipper .409 and 86 RBI would have to be considered more productive in the Brave offense than Francouer .293 OB and 103 RBI because not only did they drive in 85% to 92% of the runs Francouer did, they PROVIDED the opportunity for their teammates to drive in about 170 more chances than Francouer provided the guys that followed him. In addition those 170 outs that combined Chipper and Brian did not make PROVIDED about 150 more AB’s for the guys that followed THEM then Francouer provided to the guys that followed HIM.