Percentage Points
I've heard talk this summer of baseball "percentage points."
First, a couple months ago, when the Yankees and Red Sox were tied for wins but not losses, the media described the Yanks as being in first place "by percentage points." Last night, when Derek Jeter and Joe Mauer were tied for the league's best batting average, television announcers portrayed Jeter as being "percentage points" ahead of, then behind, Mauer.
Small margins are big in baseball. An inch is often the deciding factor between failure and success, and sometimes between a loss and a win. One slow step out of the batter's box; sliding to the left rather than right; stretching for a throw rather than stepping — all of these have decided plays, determined outs, altered games.
Even baseball's biggest statistical ladder — the batting average — is the comparison of numbers that are fractions of percentage points different. A .280 hitter and a .320 hitter will typically have vastly dissimilar paychecks. Yet their rate of hitting is only four percentage points apart. During an average 28 at-bat week, that's a difference of only one hit.
One hit per week: The difference between an all-star and a fill-in; between a Wheaties box cover and a jersey number the team store doesn't bother selling; between a Hall of Famer and the future answer to a trivia question.
By definition, percentage points are tiny numbers. But in baseball, they're titanic.
First, a couple months ago, when the Yankees and Red Sox were tied for wins but not losses, the media described the Yanks as being in first place "by percentage points." Last night, when Derek Jeter and Joe Mauer were tied for the league's best batting average, television announcers portrayed Jeter as being "percentage points" ahead of, then behind, Mauer.
Small margins are big in baseball. An inch is often the deciding factor between failure and success, and sometimes between a loss and a win. One slow step out of the batter's box; sliding to the left rather than right; stretching for a throw rather than stepping — all of these have decided plays, determined outs, altered games.
Even baseball's biggest statistical ladder — the batting average — is the comparison of numbers that are fractions of percentage points different. A .280 hitter and a .320 hitter will typically have vastly dissimilar paychecks. Yet their rate of hitting is only four percentage points apart. During an average 28 at-bat week, that's a difference of only one hit.
One hit per week: The difference between an all-star and a fill-in; between a Wheaties box cover and a jersey number the team store doesn't bother selling; between a Hall of Famer and the future answer to a trivia question.
By definition, percentage points are tiny numbers. But in baseball, they're titanic.
posted by Chris | 12:13 AM
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