Baseball's Most Overrated Stat

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Posted By: warshawlaw

Game winning RBI is the most useless stat they compile. if your team wins 5 to 4, they are all GWRBI's.

As far as K goes, I disagree. Keeping runners off base is critical to success. Strike them out and they never get a chance. How many flares, TX leaguers, cans of corn, etc. do we see fall in every season? There is no way to track it statistically because no one I know of can track the quality of a hit, but keeping the ball out of play makes sense. I saw a game a few weeks ago where Shaun Green hit a bouncer up the line for a double. Weak squibber but it got through and he later scored. Baseball folk know that having no baserunners is critical, which is why they pay power pitchers with lots of K so well. It isn't superfluous. Look at Gagne this year. When he comes into the game in LA, he usually K's 1 or 2 batters each inning and that is the reason for his success. It isn't any hot fielding by LA (not with Clank Beltre at 3rd and Tree Root Feet McGriff at 1st), it is lack of baserunners.

Ryan, BTW, was a great pitcher for sucky teams. He could have had much better W L records if he'd sold out and headed for a contender, but he chose to stay with crappy teams in his home state. Yes, he lost a lot of games; so did the guy with that award named after him. You know, Cy Young.

walter Johnson: greatest all time: I wouldn't argue with that; I also would not argue with Lefty Grove as the choice, either.