The other night, the husband and I decide to have a little date night. Which, for us, typically consists of opening up a bottle of wine and watching the Jays game. On this particular night the Jays weren’t playing so instead we decided to pop in the movie “61*” that I had recently purchased. For those of you who are not familiar with this movie it is based on the 1961 season when Yankees Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris battled it out to surpass The Babe’s single-season home run record. While the movie itself was a little low-budget, it’s tough as a ball fan not to at least appreciate the story. Not to be a total spoiler, but Roger Maris went on to hit 61 home runs that year; but, because he did it in eight more games than The Babe did, his record went into the books with an asterisk next to it. Watching the debate over whether or not Maris’ record should hold up against Babe Ruth’s made me shake my head. Mainly because like most of you, I’ve now lived through the steroid era and have seen what sort of records actually deserve an asterisk next to them. While this blog is not meant to drudge up that old argument of did he or didn’t he beat The Babe, let me just say this before I move on: yes, Maris got eight more games in his season, but The Babe never had to play games out on the West coast or endure the rigors of night games. I guess we all know where I come down on this issue.[1]
What this movie really got me thinking about is how skewed many stats are in sports. For example, last night I watched the Jays make one of the best comeback wins I’ve ever witnessed against the Red Sox. As anticipated, Jonathan Papelbon came in to close out the game for Boston, and as he jogged onto the field a stat flashed onto the screen about how he has more saves from 2006-2010 than Yankees’ lockdown guy Mo Rivera. While Papelbon is a fantastic closer, looking at this stat I found holes glaring right through it. Sure Papelbon has more saves, but look how much younger he is than Mo. Because of his advantage in age he’s likely seen more innings and had more attempts at closing out a game in the past few seasons. Skewed?!?
Let’s take Phillies starter Jamie Moyer as another example. Poor Moyer is getting a bad rap as the pitcher to give up the most home runs in his career. Tell me you see the giant hole in this one! Moyer is 47 YEARS OLD!! Of course he’s given up the most home runs in his career - he’s also played longer than any other pitcher in major league baseball today.
I really don’t mean to pick on pitching statistics alone, but some of them are so blatantly skewed I can’t help it. Take the all-time wins leader for pitchers - Cy Young. Cy was a fantastic pitcher, and even has an award named after him. But as a sports fan, does it make you feel any different about this statistic to know that Cy Young is also the pitcher with the most losses? Which would lead you to think that maybe the reason he has the most wins under his belt is because he pitched more than any other pitcher. You would be correct. Young also holds the record for most innings pitched, as well as the most complete games in history. It’s pretty tough to lose that W when there’s no Jesse Carlson or Brandon League to come in to screw it up for you.
There are a ton of these small stats floating around sports that we blindly read and rarely question their validity. Unless you consider all of the mitigating factors, most of these statistics would be completely incomparable. One of the biggest milestones of this season was recently reached when Alex Rodriguez hit his 600th career home run. As many sportscasters have already pointed out, if you subtract the years he was admittedly juicing he’s really only at somewhere just over 400.
It’s amazing to me to think about the insane uproar back in that 1961 season when Roger Maris rightfully took the single-season home run record away from The Babe. Yet when we talk about who holds that same record today we answer Barry Bonds! There is no one more deserving of an asterisk next to his name than Bonds. Even before him was Mark McGwire, another name to tarnish the record. Well, if this baseball fan ever got asked who holds the single-season home run record today I would unfalteringly answer … Roger Maris.
[1] And yes I realize that there is no longer as asterisk next to Roger Maris’ home run record, although it is a little sad that the asterisk wasn’t removed until six years after Maris died … he never knew he held the record.
Source: http://kwagland.blogspot.com/2010/08/statistics.html
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