Data resistance is like language barrier

Continued from B1

Even using an advanced metric like Total QBR, it’s a wash: 83.4 for Ryan to 83.1 for Brady. There are arguments to be had about the two, such as whether Brady’s four missed games are too much for an MVP, or whether Ryan is too much the product of an explosive offence that allows him to pile up numbers with relative ease.

Was Brady the beneficiary of a butter-soft schedule? (Yes). Would Ryan have been so good if he played on, say, Green Bay? (No). But none of this is about the modern use of analytics that gets so many so angry. How else is one to determine an end-ofseason award like the MVP without considering the accomplishments of the candidates on the field? Should Brady and Ryan be measured on the basis of their haircuts and chin dimples?

Wilbon’s blast, though, is of a piece with a lot of sentiment in sports analysis: if you disagree with an argument, it must be because the argument is based on those fancy-pants analytics with their silly acronyms that no one understands. It’s like “analytics” has come to mean “any position with which I do not agree.”

Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman told a story last week of a conversation he had with an NHL general manager about PDO, a stat with, yes, a funny acronym that explains a team’s shooting luck. This team, Friedman explained, had a low PDO, which suggested that over time, their fortunes would improve because shooting luck tends to balance out, but the GM became increasingly more leery as he pondered how he would explain statistical regression to his bosses: “What the (expletive) am I supposed to do with that?”

PDO has also come in for some serious eye-rolling as Columbus rolled through its recent 16-game win streak. The Blue Jackets have an excessively high PDO — second in the NHL — but there was no lack of analysis in recent weeks that suggested it was unfair to ascribe too much of the Columbus streak to luck.

Teams make their own luck, and all that. But there is nothing new about the concept of good shooting fortune, even if a statistic to describe it is relatively novel. Coaches have been saying things like “we deserved a better result than we got tonight” since the days when they wore jaunty fedoras behind the bench. But bring up PDO, and you risk a wave-ofthe-hand-dismissal as it being a silly new stat not worth considering.

Kyle Dubas, an assistant GM for the Maple Leafs, once talked about trying to explain some analytics concepts to his bosses’ bosses at MLSE. He knew that the term “PDO” — originally named for a hockey blogger — might not get buy-in, so he said it stood for “percentagedriven outcome,” which is meaningless but probably Statistically, there isn’t much separating Tom Brady, above, and Atlanta’s Matt Ryan, the top MVP candidates. sounds like familiar business jargon to someone who sits on a corporate board.

That story has always struck me as telling because it explains how the resistance to analytics — to numbers, that is — is often like a language barrier.

“The Blue Jackets are unstoppable.”

“Well, a little lucky, too. Their PDO is—”

“I don’t speak Russian. Don’t waste your time.”

But new statistics aren’t inherently at odds with old statistics. They are just more of the same thing. More data, more information, with which to evaluate teams and players. In some cases, new research has proven certain statistics to be better indicators of future success than traditionally believed, but that’s not a revolutionary point. Or at least, it shouldn’t be. If you are trying to consider how an athlete has performed, having more numbers is more useful than having fewer numbers. It is weird that this is still a thing.

In 1974, the NFL MVP was Ken Stabler, who led the league in touchdown passes. In 1975, it was Fran Tarkenton, who was tied for the league in TD passes and led it in completion percentage. In 1976, the MVP was Bert Jones, who led the league in passing yardage and had more than twice as many touchdown passes as interceptions.

Why, it’s as though the voters back then paid attention to the numbers.