Analytics Avenue: WAR
The Colossus of Clout and the King of WAR: Babe Ruth. (Photo: Call to the Pen)
How do you define greatness in baseball? Is it the most home runs? The most strikeouts? The most RBI’s? If you were to ask five die-hard baseball fans who the best player of all time is, you’d get five different answers - guarantee it.
Baseball greatness, especially over the last 30 years, has leaned on a set of “tools” that helps fans, scouts, and owners alike define greatness:
Hitting for Average
Hitting for Power (Slugging/Home Runs)
Defense
Speed
Throwing Arm
Those who are above average than most in these are probably playing professional baseball today - but there’s more to it.
If I am making the rules, I would add a sixth tool - Mental.
A baseball player’s mind can greatly affect them, and the ability to forget about a strikeout, or missing a ground ball that allowed the winning run to score, is huge. Most Major Leaguers are great at forgetting about their mishaps and it shows.
So if a player has all of these tools, then how do we define greatness?
Babe Ruth hit a lot of home runs, compiled a great lifetime batting average (.342), but his defense, and definitely his speed were lacking. Ty Cobb stole 897 bases and hit .366 for his career, but only hit 117 career home runs. Christy Mathewson won 373 games, struck out 2,507 batters, but also gave up 1,135 earned runs and allowed 4,209 hits during his career.
All of these players were great, are in the Hall of Fame, but what gives one the edge over the other when it comes to greatness?
In modern baseball, the statistic that is used to truly show one’s greatness is Wins Above Replacement (WAR). And you’re probably thinking - “What is it good for?” (I couldn’t write this with out throwing in the corny reference).
The easiest way to define WAR is: A measure of a player’s value in all facets of the game by determining how many more “wins” he is worth than a readily available replacement at the same position.
Major League Baseball’s All-Time Home Run King, Barry Bonds, is fourth all time in WAR (162.8). (Photo: Men’s Health)
WAR, which was developed in the 1980’s, uses two complex formulas:
Position Players: The number of runs above average a player is worth in his batting, base running, and fielding + adjustment for position + adjustment for league + the number of runs provided by a replacement-level player/Runs per Win.
Pitchers: Depending on who is doing the calculating, it’s either runs allowed per 9 innings pitched or Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP). Whatever number is used, its then adjusted for league and ballpark, then using league averages, it is determined how many wins a pitcher was worth based on those numbers and his innings pitched total.
Did you feel like Alan from The Hangover playing blackjack trying to figure out the formulas?
Still confused? Here’s one more “watered down” explanation:
If you took “Player A” from a replacement-level club, and replaced him with “Free Agent X,” and the team won 54 games instead of 48, Free Agent' X’s WAR would be 6, because the team improved by six games on the roster.
Plain and simple - WAR estimates a players true value by using a concept everyone can understand: Wins. So what’s a good WAR for a player?
MVP Material: 8 or higher
Superstar: 6-8
All-Star: 4-6
Solid Regular: 2-4
Role Player: 1-2
Bench Material: 0-1
Triple-A Material: 0 or below
WAR has become a driving force in many front office decisions when it comes to players, especially free agent signings.
“The main value, particularly on the position-player side, is to be able to capture all the contributions of the player and really do an apples-to-apples comparison,” San Francisco Giants president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi told MLB.com in 2019.
“So you’re not saying, ‘This guy is a plus hitter, but he’s below average on the bases and in the field.’ We can just say he’s a 2 Wins Above Replacement player, taking all that into account.”
MLB’s all-time WAR leaders are filled with players from both the “Dead-ball” and “Live-ball” eras. This list accumulates the entirety of their careers:
Babe Ruth: 182.6 (22 year career)
Walter Johnson: 165.1 (21 year career)
Cy Young: 163.6 (22 year career)
Barry Bonds: 162.8 (22 year career)
Willie Mays: 156.1 (23 year career)
Ty Cobb: 151.5 (24 year career)
Henry “Hank” Aaron: 143 (23 year career)
Roger Clemens: 139.2 (24 year career)
Tris Speaker: 134.9 (22 year career)
Honus Wagner: 131 (21 year career)
Roger Clemens is the best “live-ball” era pitcher in MLB history, with a WAR of 139.2. (Photo: Yardbarker)
When looking at WAR, it’s always best to compare batters to batters, and pitchers to pitchers. Some may say, “Willie Mays was better than Barry Bonds,” or “Cy Young was better than Walter Johnson.” To the naked eye, some may agree, but when looking at each’s individual career as a whole, I can agree with the WAR ranks.
For instance: Bonds for his career had 175 more stolen bases, 102 more home runs, 111 more OPS points, and defensively, he’s just a tad higher in Fielding % (.984 to .981) with 46 less errors. Some will use the 24 All-Star nominations for Mays, or his 12 Gold Gloves, compared to Bonds’ 14 All-Star’s and 8 Gold Gloves. But if you look at the stats as a whole, Bonds was better.
Between the pitchers listed for their careers: Johnson had 706 more strikeouts, a 2.17 Earned Run Average, compared to Young’s 2.63, a 1.061 WHIP compared to Young’s 1.130, and in further advanced pitching stats, Johnson had a career 2.38 FIP compared to Young’s 2.84.
Fans will lean on the fact that Young holds many MLB records, including Wins (511), Games Started (815), Complete Games (749), and Innings Pitched (7,356). A lot of those stats many would argue because of the help he got from his defense and/or quality of the other team. Young also played a majority of his career in the “dead-ball” era, which was favorable for pitchers.
Johnson, on the other hand, who played in both eras, showcased more individual stats that were better than Young’s, especially stats that are overlooked. Some of those include Shutouts (110 - MLB record, compared to Young’s 76), K/9 (5.3 to 3.4), and a .576 career OPS on batters, compared to Young’s .964.
Once again, very debatable, but if you look solely at the stats, they don’t lie.
Within the rest of MLB’s All-Time WAR leaders list, there are many more debates present when it comes to who is best. Many fans who don’t like WAR always tend to look at traditional stats to determine who is the best in any given season. There is no finer example of this than the 2012 American League MVP vote.
To many, this was WAR’s “coming out party” as the stat was put front and center between Mike Trout and Miguel Cabrera. Trout, who started the year in Triple-A, was called up April 28, and began to rise in the ranks among baseball’s best. Cabrera, the seasoned veteran, put together a season statistically that hasn’t been seen since.
From the time Trout was called up, he was a machine for the Angels. He was the complete package: He hit for power, average, stole bases, and played stellar defense. Trout succeeded in many other categories, such as:
On-Base Percentage: Trout: .399 // Cabrera: .393
Batting Average on Balls in Play: Trout: .383 // Cabrera: .331
Runs Created per Game: Trout: 9.3 // Cabrera: 8.3
Runs: Trout: 129 // Cabrera: 109
Stolen Bases: Trout: 49 // Cabrera: 4
Who had the better 2012 season? Traditionalists will say Miguel Cabrera. Everyone else: Mike Trout. (Photo: ESPN)
Statistically, Trout was the better player in 2012, but Cabrera hit the “holy grail” in baseball by leading the American League in Batting Average (.330), Home Runs (44), and RBI’s (139) - The Triple Crown. It was the first winner since 1967 (Carl Yastrzemski), and it guided Cabrera to 22 first-place votes, compared to Trout’s six. I also believe Cabrera won because he was on a better team that season. Detroit was a playoff team that won the pennant, while Los Angeles missed the playoffs.
Cabrera had a great season - don’t get me wrong, but he was not the complete player Trout was. For instance, he had a -7.5 BsR, which is an all encompassing base running stat, that turns stolen bases, caught stealings, and other base running plays, into runs above and below average. Trout’s BsR in 2012? 14.3
Miggy was also a liability in the field. That season, as Detroit’s third baseman, he had a -4 Defensive Runs Saved (DRS), which measures how many runs a defender saved. It takes into account errors, range, outfield arm, and double-play ability. The higher the number, the better, and in 2012 once again Trout was much better with 19 DRS.
The 2012 season saw Trout finish with a 10.5 WAR while Cabrera finished with a 7.1 WAR. Cabrera would win the award again in 2013 with a 7.5 WAR, and Trout would win his first in 2014 with a 7.7 WAR.
The 2012 AL MVP Vote is a prime example why voters should consider WAR more often, as it encompasses all facets of what a player brings to the game. Sure - it’s easier to calculate on the offensive side of the game, and while the “kinks” are still being worked out on the defensive side, it’s getting better. A home run saving catch in the outfield is just as good as a deep fly ball that gets caught right in front of the wall, according to WAR.
There will continue to be the traditionalists that measure baseball greatness from what they see on the surface in a player. But whether those old-timers like it or not, WAR is here to stay and its value is evident. I’d much rather rely on data that gives me the full picture, and shows me how much a player helps his team win games.
Now you know what it’s good for.
