WAR: What Is It Good For?
If you watch baseball, play fantasy baseball, or if you're like me and just like to look at baseball statistics, then you have heard or read about WAR. No, WAR is not the Edwin Starr song. If you haven't heard that song, I recommend it. Another song I blame my dad for getting into my head as a little boy. But let's get back to this version of WAR. WAR stands for Wins Above Replacement.
WAR isn't specifically a certain statistic, but rather a conglomerate put together to give you how a player is performing right now. Here is the catch about WAR though, you can use whatever stats that you find valuable, and put them into a specific player. This makes WAR interesting to me. As an amateur level coach, I find that WAR can be used to evaluate players on the team.
The next question would be, what kinds of WAR are there? There is position player WAR and pitcher WAR. To calculate position player WAR this is the equation: WAR = (Batting Runs + Base Running Runs +Fielding Runs + Positional Adjustment + League Adjustment +Replacement Runs) / (Runs Per Win) (FanGraphs). Where I can find that position player WAR can be used in amateur baseball, I have not found a way to make pitcher WAR accessible on the amateur level.
I am in hopes that one day, pitcher WAR can be accessible to the amateur level. With StatCast taking over Major League and Minor League games, I feel that within the next 20-30 years that sabermetrics will be accessible to all levels of college and high school baseball. Reason being, is that these stats are necessary for a player to be the best that he or she can be on the diamond. Here watch this video of Alex Bregman discussing how the Houston Astros's analytics team has helped their performance on the field. http://www.espn.com/video/clip?id=24561088
So let's dive into what Batting Runs, Base Running Runs, and Fielding Runs are in the equation of WAR. These three are three crucial elements in the understanding of WAR for the amateur level. Batting Runs is simply how many runners that the batter hit in. Base Running Runs is how many extra bases, stolen bases and times being thrown out that the player has accomplished. Fielding Runs is simply how many runs have been saved by outs and errors made by the player. All of this combined gives us a snapshot of how reliable the player has been for his team. But it is also important to know that you do not have to calculate WAR this way. You can use the stats that you as a team find valuable to calculate a player's WAR.
A disclaimer on this is that WAR can be difficult to be calculated by keeping score on a score card. Programs like Game Changer can give you some advanced stats that will come in handy to calculating WAR. With this all being taken into account, this is not a set in stone approach, but advanced statistics are making there way into amateur level baseball. This has happened with teams bringing in statisticians and coaches that are good at math. Like I stated earlier, I believe that sabermetrics are making there way into amateur baseball, and this will only make the game better overall.
I am in hopes that one day, pitcher WAR can be accessible to the amateur level. With StatCast taking over Major League and Minor League games, I feel that within the next 20-30 years that sabermetrics will be accessible to all levels of college and high school baseball. Reason being, is that these stats are necessary for a player to be the best that he or she can be on the diamond. Here watch this video of Alex Bregman discussing how the Houston Astros's analytics team has helped their performance on the field. http://www.espn.com/video/clip?id=24561088
So let's dive into what Batting Runs, Base Running Runs, and Fielding Runs are in the equation of WAR. These three are three crucial elements in the understanding of WAR for the amateur level. Batting Runs is simply how many runners that the batter hit in. Base Running Runs is how many extra bases, stolen bases and times being thrown out that the player has accomplished. Fielding Runs is simply how many runs have been saved by outs and errors made by the player. All of this combined gives us a snapshot of how reliable the player has been for his team. But it is also important to know that you do not have to calculate WAR this way. You can use the stats that you as a team find valuable to calculate a player's WAR.
A disclaimer on this is that WAR can be difficult to be calculated by keeping score on a score card. Programs like Game Changer can give you some advanced stats that will come in handy to calculating WAR. With this all being taken into account, this is not a set in stone approach, but advanced statistics are making there way into amateur level baseball. This has happened with teams bringing in statisticians and coaches that are good at math. Like I stated earlier, I believe that sabermetrics are making there way into amateur baseball, and this will only make the game better overall.
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