Michael Schell
Comprehensive Cancer Center
University of North Carolina
Identifying Baseball's Best Hitters For Average
Baseball is a sport filled with numbers ... and arguments. Many of the
arguments revolve around who is the best at some aspect of the game. In
recent years, statistical methods have played a critical role in these
arguments. To receive widespread attention, the arguments must account for
changes in the game over time, while at the same time retaining as much
statistical simplicity as possible. In my book, Baseball's All-Time Best
Hitters, I apply four adjustments to the raw batting average. I adjust for
the league batting average, the talent pool of the league, the ballparks
that the player plays in and for late career declines. Having thus "leveled
the playing field," Tony Gwynn, a current player for the San Diego Padres,
not Ty Cobb, who last played in 1928, emerges as baseball's all-time best
hitter for average. Arguments are welcome!
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