Often today's baseball fans think they have some new way of looking at the game that escapes "Old-Time Baseball Men" like Joe Morgan and Tim McCarver.
Little did I know, but the venerable Brooklyn Dodgers exec Branch Rickey was advocating the use of on base percentage and isolated power over 50 years ago. Check out the following excerpt from an article Rickey wrote in 1954 for Life Magazine titled "Goodbye to Some Old Baseball Ideas." Here's a sample, for the rest, just click the title.
Even batting average must be reexamined. There are people who pride themselves on their ability to quote what Johnny Whosit hit the year of the big flood.
Among fans it is the accepted standard of excellence at bat. Why? Principally because it is easy to figure. Even the professionals lean upon it.
But batting average is only a partial means of determining a man's effectiveness on offense. It neglects a major factor, the base on balls, which is reflected only negatively in the batting average (by not counting it as a time at bat).
Actually walks are extremely important. Ted Williams, a student of batting values, bragged more about the 162 gases on balls he got five years ago than about his .343 batting average or his 43 home runs.
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