How Important Is Batting Average?

One of the big renaissances in baseball history is the updated view on what used to be viewed as the sport's most important stat, batting average. The classic three main stats used to be batting average, home runs, and RBIs, but because of analytics and the game becoming more advanced in its thinking, stats like those have become very devalued. Well, batting average and RBIs. Nowadays, a lot of the stats we look at are understanding there's a difference between a single and a double or a home run, and stats that show more context on just how much value a player brings to the table. It's pretty straightforward now, like the idea of, I don't know, an iPhone, but imagine trying to explain to a caveman the idea of an iPhone. Same concept with modern baseball stats. And as the game's gone on, batting average has really gotten less cared about and incentivized. Batting average league-wide has gone down over the years, etc. But thanks to some players recently, most notably Luis Araiz bringing some of that old school classic type of hitting back that values batting average most, more than anything, the conversation's been brought up about how valuable batting average is. How valuable a player like Luis Araiz is. Is it really even that great to have or valuable? And I've seen some talk get brought up on this subject, especially lately, and I found it interesting, so I decided to chime in because I can. God bless America. Really quick as always, if you're part of the 59% of viewers unsubscribed yet, go ahead and hit that button if you enjoy the videos, as some of the craziest baseball stats I've ever seen are the ones on Tony Gwynn. Like how he could've gone 0 for 1,199 at the end of his career and still retired as a .300 hitter, or how he was a lifetime .302 hitter with two strikes, or when you compare him to today's greats like Aaron Judge who will strike out more times in a season than Gwynn did overall in the 90s. And when I saw something like that several years ago, about how quick it took for Aaron Judge to strike out as many times as Tony Gwynn would in like 10 years, I used to think of it in a negative way toward Aaron Judge which is what facts like that are supposed to do, but when you think of it, sure Gwynn may have been a much much better contact hitter and avoided strikeouts like the plague, compared to a guy like Judge who avoids them like Bill Clinton avoided Epstein's Island, but what Judge does with his hits are more valuable than what Gwynn did with his. So even though Gwynn averaged a lot more hits per season, he didn't provide much power with those hits. 25% of Gwynn's career hits were more than singles. Almost 50% of Aaron Judge's career hits are more than singles, extra base hits. So Judge may strike out a lot more, but when he does make contact, he does more than a single almost half the time. They're both very valuable in their own ways, both kind of ways of hitting, but the stat wins above replacement aka war, a widely accepted stat to calculate a player's whole value with just one number, isn't very favorable to hitters like Tony Gwynn or at least not nearly as much, and it makes sense. I mean on the surface, the more homers and doubles you hit, the more value you bring even if you strike out at least 150 or 160 times a year, but to me it's also times like these I feel like war isn't a good stat to look at to fully see the value. To me it's a stat that sometimes accurately depicts how valuable a player really is and other times it doesn't, and in the case of today's version of the late Tony Gwynn and Luis Arias, I don't think war is a good way to judge his value. Now for some more context on war, so it basically estimates how many more wins a player contributes to their team than a replacement level player. Aaron Judge's war last year was 10.8, meaning according to the stat he was estimated to almost single-handedly add about 11 wins to the Yankees for how good he was. He had 180 hits on the season, 58 of them were home runs, and more than half of them were extra base hits in general. Luis Arias had 20 more hits on the year right at 200, which was the most in baseball, and you want to know what his war was? The amount of wins that he added? One. Uno. Um, um, that's that's how you say one in Portuguese. Anyway, now look, am I going to make an argument that Luis Arias was anywhere close to Aaron Judge in terms of value? Of course not, but I do find it weird to see his 200 hits being devalued so much like that. I understand walks matter too, and Judge walked a crap load of times last year while Arias did not, but I don't care if every single one of Arias' hits were singles, which over 80% of them are, there is some serious value to having a guy who just refuses to swing and miss, even if he doesn't walk. And forget just the fact that he gets hits and has beyond elite back control so he just doesn't miss, it goes beyond that. The fact that those 200 hits, even if mostly singles, are times he's simply on base for other guys to drive him home. But here's another interesting thing that shows a big reason why a lot of people look at what Arias does as being that special, is how teams use him. What Arias does so great is putting the bat on the ball all of the time, but what he doesn't do so great is making loud things happen when he does put the bat on the ball. So for the longest time, your prototypical leadoff hitter in baseball was what Luis Arias is. Not a powerful guy at all, but a guy who's at the top of baseball in hits and batting average every year. But nowadays you realize maybe having a guy like that at leadoff wouldn't be smart because yes, he makes all the contact in the world and gets hits left and right, but they're all singles basically. Meaning yeah, like I said earlier, he's on base for the guys behind him to drive in. But think about it, it would actually be smarter to put Arias lower in the lineup so he has a better shot at hitting with guys on base already. Because what would you rather have? Arias loft a leadoff single or have him hit with guys on base where you know there's such a good likelihood he at least puts the ball in play and makes something happen if not gets a hit. So now that lofted little leadoff single is driving someone home in a key situation or creating more on-base traffic. So I think as baseball develops, a lot of how you get the most out of a player is how you use him. And in the case of Arias, the modern day Tony Gwynn or any batting average centric hitter, put him in a spot where his hits matter more rather than a chance they go for nothing. It's the ninth inning, your team is down one and you have a runner in scoring position with two outs. I don't think it's a terrible argument to prefer Arias over anyone else in that scenario because you're almost guaranteed he makes contact there. Whereas Judge and Otani for example, yes they are better overall hitters by far, but are still way more likely to strike out than Arias. Arias has been used as a leadoff hitter for the last several years with the Twins, Marlins, and now Padres. So I think if anyone is devaluing Arias' game, it's the teams for how they use him. So I found that pretty interesting, but batting average is still an important stat overall. Is it the most important? No. But look at every Hall of Fame level player in baseball right now. Guys who are on track to have that good of a career. The best players in the game today. Aaron Judge, Shelly Otani, Bobby Witt Jr, Jordan Alvarez, Juan Soto. Yeah they may hit homers and do a lot of the sexy stuff too, but you know what they all have in common? Their 300 hitters are at the very least pretty damn close to it. Sure some guys may hit for lower batting averages and have strong seasons because of their power, but that's not sustainable. That's not something you can do for a career. But you know what is? Hitting for a good batting average. Of the top 10 best hitters in baseball in 2024, 6 of them hit at least 300. The lowest batting average in that top 10 was 285 from Bryce Harper. Is batting average the only stat to look at in evaluating how good a player is? Something that that's kind of how it was a long time ago? That was the only really stat that they looked at? Of course not. Of course that's not how it should be today and how it should be at all. There's a lot more context to look at how good a player is, but in the end the best of the best have a good batting average. And when you have a guy whose greatest and really only strength is to hit to a good batting average, I know he may not be the greatest player in baseball, but don't overlook that. Especially when it's the team's handling of him that undervalues how great his strength is. If that makes sense. Hit him lower in the lineup. Have him bat with guys on rather than getting these singles with nobody on. And I think people would look at his batting titles every year in a little bit of a different way if they didn't respect it enough already. And same with batting average as a stat as a whole. But overall it's still a stat that should be respected. Let me know your thoughts and thank you for watching.