Barry Bonds, Todd Helton, and Mickey Mantle are the top three batters in baseball … well, according to a new study that used network science to rank players by analyzing the outcome of every at-bat from 1954 to 2008. The study, which a Wired article called “the baseball version of ‘Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon,’” had the advantage of comparing players from different eras, which means we can see how Albert Pujols might have fared against Sandy Koufax. Some factors, of course, get lost in time translation — steroids, e.g. [%comments]
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TAGS: Baseball, data analysis
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Based on the inclusion of Todd Helton, I’m betting they failed to account for ballpark effects.
As an Orioles fan, it took me two seconds to determine that the study must have some major flaws. the Wired Magazine article shows Armando Benitez and B.J. Ryan on the list of top relief pitchers. Ahead of Lee Smith? Ahead of Greg Olson? Benitez wasn’t even better than Tippy Martinez. And I love my Orioles, but any list that puts Greg Maddox below Mike Mussina has to go back and questions its assumptions.
Steriods doesn’t change anything…
What about Babe Ruth. It does not go back that far? He hit .342 over his career in addition to the crazy HR and RBI numbers. Not to mention his 2.92 career ERA as a pitcher.
J -
I think it’s going by single seasons on the wired list – which would make sense since Benitez’s 2004 season was pretty amazing. But if it ranks careers, then it is completely flawed as Benitez is horrible.
Mitch -
You are correct. I read an article on this story yesterday that mentioned the study isn’t complete yet; they still haven’t accounted for things like ballpark effects which is part of the reason they haven’t released the whole list yet.
Personally I wish more people dedicated this amount of brainpower and time to managing their personal finances.
I’ve worked with people who could recite an entire teams lineup of baseball players and the players statistics but had no clue about what risks were present in retirement plan options… if they even knew what retirement plans were at all.
That said, what about smoking cigarettes in the dugout as a factor in ratings as the players of old used to do?
And was Babe Ruth really really good or the pitchers of yore just worse than todays crop???
This study is pure junk. Anybody with the even cursory knowledge of sabrmetrics can demonstrate that Albert Pujols is a superior player than Todd Helton. Both Bill James and the people at Baseball Prospectus have studied these issues for years, and their work is vastly superior to this study. You should cite to their work rather than this.