Bowling Philosophy-December 2011

""Plus/Minus"
Evaluating actual consistency in bowlers and a few thoughts on the Winter Meetings and Ron Santo

By Thomas Scherrer

Before the final BP post of the calender year, there are two baseball related issues I feel I need to address:

1) Jo'se' it ain't so!  I have literally and figuratively watch Jose Reyes grow up from a 19-year-old can't miss prospect to a 27-year-old NL batting champion, whose skill set and offensive and defensive talents are undeniable and exhilarating to watch.  I have often referred to Reyes as "the most electrifying man in baseball".  Forget exciting, just electric.  Every movement, every at bat, every megawatt smile was electric to not just Met fans but baseball fans.  At both Shea Stadium and at Citi Field, Reyes' every step was worth watching.  He would lead off in the bottom of the first, reggeatron blaring in the background, crowd cheering for hopes that this man, this leadoff hitter who flies around the basepaths like a point guard running the break in basketball and had thunder in his bat-thunder that could drive a rope into the vast Citi Field gaps and give fans an early reason to cheer: a triple with a customary head-first dive into third, a clap of both dusty hands, then mugging to his teammates with the "spotlight" gimmick, which showed off his flashiness (and in some cases, his on-field arrogance that turned off the opposition).  It was magical...when it happened.  Now, Miami Marlin fans will get to see Reyes' talents on South Beach as he signed a 6-year, $100+ million contract.  The Reyes Era has ended and with many a Met fan outraged.  Not at Reyes, but at the organization for not going to whatever lengths needed to retain Reyes.  
Sensing this, I immediately put on my logic cap and applaud Met GM Sandy Alderson for standing his ground on a player who:
A) Averaged 98 games a season the past 3 years.
B) Has had half a dozen DL stints in his career, mostly to his legs.  You know, only the lifeblood of his offensive game.
C) Despite being considered and elite leadoff hitter, has never walked more than 80 times in a season, and his career best  in 2007 (77) included 13 intentional walks and...
D) In that infamous '07, was benched twice by Willie Randolph in games for not running out a ground ball, and in the penultimate game of the season/collapse (the Maine 14K, 1-hitter masterpiece), got into a near-brawl with said Marlins that only pissed a 90-loss team off, only to turn around the next day and pummel Tom Glavine to put an exclamation point on the '07 Fold Job.


All that being said, Met fans are sore at Alderson and the Wilpons (dubbed, the "Coupons" by locals) for not keeping Reyes at all costs.  Met fans feel like they were screwed, but someone else got screwed just as much if not more.  His name is David Wright.


Wright, in the final year of his deal with the club, has been a lifelong fan of the Mets, grew up watching the Norfolk Tides, was drafted by the Mets, has been a constant fixture, the babyface of the organization to all their younger fans.  Older fans see Wright as a good but not great ballplayer, not very clutch, a defensive liability, and pretty much a player that has been traumatized/scared/underperforming by the far-reaching pastures of Citi Field toward his production numbers.  Given the Mets current state of affairs, it seemed logical that only one of the duo would be a Met and Wright for the moment is the lone survivor.  His future as well, might be open for a new address possibly by the end of the Winter Meetings, signifying the darkest week in the organization's now 50 year history.  And that is saying something.


However, as a Met fan, I see the anger and hatred but this team was not likely to be winning for a few more years.  Why start giving gobs of money when you don't know which direction your ballclub is heading?  Plus, there is a option year for Wright in 2013 as well.  By then, things might very well have changed for the Mets from a financial and performance standpoint.  Plus, a baseball team is 25 players, not just one player.  The Cardinals and Rangers showed us how valuable all 25 players were en route to a World Series.  Yes, both teams had their superstars but you win baseball games as a team, despite it being a mask of individual performance.  The Mets drew a line in the sand, Reyes got a better offer, and has moved to a team with a borderline franchise player/borderline clubhouse cancer in Hanley Ramierez.  It might be something Met fans might actually be thankful for in years to come.


2) What in the Hall took so long???  If you woke up this morning as a Cubs fan, you finally get to see Ron Santo as a baseball Hall of Famer.  If you are Ron Santo, sadly, you are still dead at the present time.  Mr. Santo died last December and one year later, will be inducted into Cooperstown among the immortals.  The Veterans'  Committee voted Santo in this year, where in years past, his resume wasn't good enough for enshrinement.  The only thing that has changed on his resume is that he is dead.  If you care even a little bit about baseball today, you should feel sick about all this.  Yes, I know the Veterans' Committee has been revamped this past year to help solve some injustices, but I am utterly disgusted that Ron Santo is now a Hall of Famer after his death.  For the record, I'm a very hard grader on HOF players.  I've stated before that Trevor Hoffman should not be one, yet he will be.  I do believe that Curt Schilling, John Smoltz, and Josh Beckett, based solely off their postseason performances are and will be at some point.  Bill Mazerowski, the man who hit the Game 7 1960 WS game winning homer, is a Hall of Famer and probably should not be.  Roger Maris for his historical 1961 season, which with each dirty needle gets better over time, keeps warranting Hall of Fame merit, is still not a Hall of Famer and I don't think should be.  Yes, Pete Rose bet on baseball but he is a Hall of Famer and they should just give him and Joe Jackson their plaques and move on.


Look, I'm not a ninny on Hall players but I want it to fully represent the best of what baseball has to offer and that includes how they get in as well.  Santo's Hall nomination is great for the family and for Cub fans to remember a very, very, very good player.  A great player, in fact.  But not a Hall of Famer.  The only reason I say no is that for many years, his body of work was not good enough for Cooperstown, so now that he is gone, it is suddenly good enough?  I'm highly dubious about all of this.  There are far greater injustices that the Veterans' Committee could have looked at.  Hell, certain Hall of Fame caliber players have been dead for many more years, and yet, they weren't elected in this past weekend.  Let's just move on before I throw my Kindle at something.  At least Bill Simmons' Pyramid for basketball greatness makes sense.  This does not.  Again, happy for the Santo family...sad that Ron Santo won't be around to see it.






With that, let's get to something you would use in hockey: plus/minus bowling.  Often, only good players are talked about in such tones: I like Bowler X; he's consistent...Bowler Y is a real solid player-averages 220, grinds out good games all the time, never gets shut out...bowler Z has got a lot of skills, can play anywhere and shoot a good score no matter what's out there.

All fine comments, and stuff you have surely heard or said or was even told about you.  And once again, that little elephant in the room creeps up.  A player's average.  Look, this is solely for the use of team bowling because that is where most of bowl and how most of us actually make some type of money while bowling.  Individual bowling is more based off how can you, the sole person, bowl against the field or against the conditions.  Team bowling is a totally different animal: instead of bowling against 3 people on a pair, you are bowling with 3 people on a team, and against 4 other people.  There is more lane traffic, with more shots, variable styles of play, some styles which make lane play, even on house shots, a challenge if not broken down correctly.  Plus, there is the notion of what you average as a player.  Take for instance we take two players, both with the same average or close to it and we chart their game score and do a running average after each game, as opposed to doing it by series (sidenote: why a league hasn't tried this formula as an average is perplexing...I know it takes some math but, seriously...how many times has a good player gotten beat by a lower average bowler because the latter has a higher handicap and pulls a 240 out of him?  Shouldn't we calculate his or her average after that game to reflect a true average, and in turn lower their handicap?  This would ultimately help out the better player, you know, as long as they weren't dumping or tanking themselves.).  


For example...


Let's say Bowler 1 bowls the first game of their season and they shoot 227 and Bowler 2 shoots 246.  After one game, their averages are 227 and 246 of course.  Now Bowler 1 shoots 279 in game 2 and Bowler 2 shoots 235.  After two games, Bowler 1 has a 253 average and Bowler 2 has a 240.5 average.  On the surface, Bowler 1 has the better average but wasn't as consistent as Bowler 2 in their first two games.  So, how do you use plus/minus in relation to all this?  This is how we get there: Bowler 1's game 2 score of 279 made his average go up by 26 pins to 252, which if we do simple math (279, the game score-253, the player's average after that game), his plus/minus is +26.  As for Bowler 2, his average after two games was 240.5, but game 2 was only 235, making his plus/minus -4.5.  Again, on the surface Bowler 1 looks to have an advantage in this too.  Or do they???


Why should having a wild influx of scores be considered a good thing?  Wouldn't it make more sense to have a player who is closer to zero than it would be to have a plus/minus of 100?  If you think about it, it means that yes, the player can be more explosive than maybe the other players, but is also a little bit more erratic and is prone to major drops as well?  Look no further than my social experiment known as the Thursday Knights league.  I looked at the 6 players that averaged over 235 and took one bowler that averaged 200-210 to see if I was either A) wrong or B) genius or C) drinking while I typed this.  After 12 weeks of bowling the top averages went like this:


1) Charlie Pezanko (238.63)
2) Jim Lovewell (237.90)
3) Chris "Goof" Gauvin (237.24)
4) Steven "Wheels" Dale (236.19)
5) Myself (236)
6) Chris Monroy (235)


Now, we get to each bowler's plus/minus (starting from the highest plus to the minus):
1) Gauvin (+166.37)
2) Lovewell (+160.05)
3) Dale (+55.26)
4) Me (-5.48)
5) Monroy (-85.29)
6) Pezanko (-181.58)


So, lemme get this straight:  Pezanko has the highest average, yet he is the most apt to swings in his game, according to plus/minus.  Going back to the premise that the closer a player is to zero, the more consistent they are game to game, you are going to think this was a biased blog post by me:


1) Me (-5.48)
2) Dale (+55.26)
3) Monroy (-85.29)
4) Lovewell (+160.05)
5) Gauvin (+166.37)
6) Pezanko (-181.58)


Again, I have to state I started with my own numbers, saw the plus/minus and went through everyone else's numbers, thinking someone would be closer to zero than me or amazingly hit zero.  Didn't happen.  But what about the 200-210 bowler and where they stand in all this?  I took just one bowler, thinking that their plus/minus would be at least in the 150 range.  This is what I got:


Average: 206.11
Plus/minus (as of week 12): -102.02
Peak plus/minus (game 20): +165.79
Bowler: "Beamer" Stacy Beamanderfer


What does all this mean?  I'm not totally sure.  In a foxhole, would I rather have Lovewell on my team...wait, he already is, so that's easy.  Of course I would.  But what about Goof or Pezanko over Beamer?  If I am looking at the more tangible numbers (average), of course.  But if I needed a reliable bowler who I could trust with more consistent scoring...?  It's open for debate at least.  But there is one more thing to bring up: a bowler's peak plus/minus.  I said Beamer's peak was +165.79 came after game 20, but that means over the last 12 games, she has a minus over 260, which is quite a drop off.  So, let's look at that peak plus/minus and what game it came in (from lowest to highest):


1) Me (-79.57 after game 13)
2) Monroy (-85.20 after game 24)
3) Dale (+159.85 after game 14)
4) Pezanko (-181.58 after game 36)
5) Lovewell (+228.21 after game 21)
6) Gauvin (+246.35 after game 28)


OK, again shoot me.  I have no idea what that means other than I am still trying to make sense of who is actually a consistent player.  If, in fact my plus/minus is now -5.48, that means I am riding a wave where I am bowling better than I was earlier in the year, while Monroy's peak came the last game he bowled which means, for his great talent, is slumping a bit.  Maybe consistency is truly unattainable, but perhaps knowing when you are peaking or slumping as a player could perhaps help players and teams match up against players of a similar pattern, which could make team bowling even more competitive than it ever was before.  Hopefully, I didn't fry out your brain cells doing this.  As always, consult your physician before reading my blog and Happy Holidays!!!






For those with a love and knowledge for the sport of bowling, this IS Bowling Philosophy.  Namaste.