Did you happen to catch Brandon Phillips’ comments about on-base percentage? If you didn’t catch the thought-provoking and forward-thinking musings of the current Red and former Tribe second baseman, he had a lot to say to USA TODAY. He took a Louisville Slugger to the advanced analytic establishment, and rightfully so, I might add!
“I don’t do that MLB Network on-base percentage (stuff),” Phillips told USA TODAY Sports. “I think that’s messing up baseball. I think people now are just worried about getting paid and worrying about on-base percentage instead of just winning the game.
“That’s the new thing now. I feel like all of these stats and all of these geeks upstairs, they’re messing up baseball, they’re just changing the game. It’s all about on-base percentage. If you don’t get on base, then you suck. That’s basically what they’re saying. People don’t care about RBI or scoring runs, it’s all about getting on base.
“Why we changing the game after all of this time? If we all just took our walks, nobody would be scoring runs. Nobody would be driving anybody in or getting anybody over. How you going to play the game like that? People don’t look at doing the things the right way and doing things to help your team win.
“I remember back in the day you hit .230, you suck. Nowadays, you hit .230 with a .400 on-base percentage, you’re one of the best players in the game. That’s amazing. I’ve never seen (stuff) like that. Times have changed. It’s totally different now.”
Subtle Carlos Santana dig aside, we here at WFNY have long prided ourselves on being at the forefront of advanced statistics. From Jon Steiner to Jacob Rosen (formerly referred to as #JakeyStats, more like #JokeyStats now, amirite?), we have a long history of digging deep in sabermetrics and analytics. Well, those days are over. It’s all too much to analyze.
For baseball, with our new team of talented writers, we’ve decided to keep it simple. We’re going with the 4×4 fantasy baseball statistics, and that’s it. For hitters, we’ll talk about batting average, home runs (chicks dig the long ball!), RBI, and stolen bases. For pitchers, it’s wins (perhaps the greatest and most telling stat ever created), saves, ERA, and WHIP. All of those poindexter stats like OPS, wRC+, FIP, UZR, K/9, jWAR, xFIP, and BABiP can take a hike. If you ain’t hitting dingers, you ain’t slugging. So you got on base… what do you want, a freaking medal? Want to look at a pitcher’s BABiP? We’ll catch the batting average on the flip side, bro.
We’re also blocking FanGraphs, Baseball Reference, hell, just about anything that has the word “reference”, from all WFNY-issued laptops. We’re also setting the homepage to either the Team Stream app, CharlesBarkley.com, or an embedded video of the most recent Sportscenter Top 10 (Because fans dig the long ball, the slam dunk, the touchdown, and nothing else) – dealer’s choice. In the coming weeks, we’ll be making similar changes to our hardwood (PER or Plus/Minus? There can only be one!) and gridiron (touchdowns and then field goals count as half a touchdown maybe?) coverage as well. Stay tuned.