Stats vs. visual playing skill

[darkpower]

Sorrty if this debate has been posted before, but I thought this was a good debate.

You know the one. People always pay attention to an athlete's stats and numbers when picking particular players, like how many yards someone may get rushing in a football game in order to find out whether or not he would be a good running back, or how many turnovers, RBI's, steals, Ks, etc., a player may get in order to figure out his valubility.

But then there are those, like me, who don't like to pay attention to the stats that one player has. For one, they might be too confusing to remember who has what numbers, and where. And secondly, there is one stat that is the most important, and it's how many points the team that person belonged to had gotten. Is his stats helping his team out to win games, or is he being the star in vain while his team continues to suffer? Is he getting those numbers to just show off or getting them when he should?

And also, you can more or less, just by watching the guy play, if he is good enough to be a star or not. If he's striking out batters left and right, if he's moving his team down the field, those kinds of things. You don't need stats and numbers to find out if the guy is good or not. Just watch him actually do his job.

This has worked on a number of occasions. Not all people are stat people (like me, and FOX's Terry Bradshaw has also admitted that he doesn't pay attention to stats, and he's got a good eye).

Who pays attention to the stats, and who thinks stats are overrated?

[Stickman]

Stats are extremely overrated. Let's take a goalie in hockey for example. Lets say the goalie is a backup who only plays no more than 15 games and gets thrown in there when the team is sucking infront of him. Goalie gets no warm up when he gets put in and the team is playing like shit, of course he's going to give up a couple goals. His save percentage for the game could be like 75 percent but he only faced like 8 shots. I feel people who look at stats don't have a grasp of sports because they don't tell the whole story.

[Joey Slugs]

It's all about stats.

[RP]

I dont see how stats are overrated. If you have a guy that puts up amazing stats, it usually a reflection of how skilled a player is. Theirs not enough Ricky Davis's out there to say other wise. The better the stats are, the better the odds the player is very skilled. Pretty simple really.

Now stats vs being a winner is another story. Peyton Manning wont ever be considered the best QB in the league cause he dont have the ring. He's a winner, but he's not a " Winner " like Brady.

[ct2k]

Both

In some cases stats are enough to tell you what you need to know, ie look at Albert Pujols or Vlad Guerrero's stats and you can instantly tell they're both ridiculously special hitters. But at the same time, no amount of stats can prepare you for the fact that Vlad can basically hit any pitch thrown anywhere in or out of the strikezone for a home run.

[Gertner]

Both

In some cases stats are enough to tell you what you need to know, ie look at Albert Pujols or Vlad Guerrero's stats and you can instantly tell they're both ridiculously special hitters. But at the same time, no amount of stats can prepare you for the fact that Vlad can basically hit any pitch thrown anywhere in or out of the strikezone for a home run.

they have stats for everything

[Stickman]

Bad stats don't mean bad player. Not that he had bad stats but imagine if Sidney Crosby played on a good team.

[ct2k]

they have stats for everything

True, but with the exception of the Miz, normal people don't tend to delve into the obscure end of the stat spectrum.

I still think the whole debate is facile as nobody with any influence in a baseball team would make major roster shifts without seeing a player or at the least reading scouting reports.

[road doggy dogg]

Or just be like Barry Sanders and have the stats AND natural skill to be both.

[DrA]

You know why no one knows anything about offensive lines?

Because they don't many/any stats for it.

The fact of the matter is that people depend too much on their stats, which are usually pretty accurate as to a player's skill (actually more accurate to a team's skill). But when you begin watching stats instead of the actual game, then things can get deceiving.

[DrA]

Like a player who rushed for 80 yards on 10 carries. He could have just had one play where he rushed for 70 yards and just stuffed on those other nine.

If you just look at the 80 yards on 10 carries alone, you might think that this player has had consistency with the way he runs the ball, which is not the case in that certain situation.

Although there are guys who bet like crazy that are geniuses at looking at statistics, but I'm just looking at the average fan here.

[DrA]

Like a player who rushed for 80 yards on 10 carries. He could have just had one play where he rushed for 70 yards and just stuffed on those other nine.

If you just look at the 80 yards on 10 carries alone, you might think that this player has had consistency with the way he runs the ball, which is not the case in that certain situation.

Also, let's just say that this running back made that 70 yard run when his team was already behind 28-0 with 1:37 minutes left to play. His nine carries that got his teams 10 yards in the earlier parts of the game might have been a factor in the team giving up on the run, therefore passing more and becoming one-dimensional, which allowed for the defense to shut down the team. Unless you saw the game in person or isolate certain variables in the stats, it would look like this running back had a better game than he actually did.

[Jesus Shuttlesworth]

Yeah I think baseball is really the only game where you can see how good a player is purely off stats. There is pretty some type of stat for everything, except for like range in the field.

I don't think stats are overrated though, I just don't think they tell the entire story. (Pretty much how DrA said, break an 80 yard run or something and then continuely get stuffed all game you'll post a good average per carry)