STATE OF PLAY

Over the last few years the Sabermetric and Analytical (S&A) craze has infiltrated MLB front offices, dugouts, and news. S&A has certainly made contributions to better the game of baseball, but not to the extent that people seem to think it has. New terms, phrases, and unrealistic statistics like launch angle, spin rate, and pitch framing have been thrown at us and are being used as punchlines with little real meaning when it comes to how the game is actually played.

Former 12-year major league veteran and current MLB Network analyst Bill Ripken argues that new analytical terms are being introduced to the baseball lexicon before they've become completely validated ideas. He believes these new terms require qualifiers to make it clear to confused baseball fans that these new statistics and analytics aren't necessarily relevant to the fundamental truths of the sport. These new ways of thinking, Ripken argues, are actually damaging to the way people experience and understand the game.
STATE OF PLAY looks at these so-called new and improved statistics and methods and points out what makes sense and what doesn't in a larger, historical context. Baseball common sense is the main focus. Ripken reconciles the old with the new, arriving at a modern baseball philosophy that accounts for both.

Bill Ripken is a 12-year major league veteran and current studio analyst appearing across MLB's Network's programming, including the Emmy Award-winning flagship studio show MLB Tonight. A three-time sports Emmy nominee, he captured the award for Outstanding Studio Analyst in 2016. Ripken is also a bestselling author.