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Right! Right! Right! Right! Right! The map is not the terrain, and the model is not the phenomenon, in baseball or in politics or in policy analysis.
But note that both the interviewer and James assume that there was some reason the Red Sox came back from three games down to win the pennant: that if it couldn't be explained analytical terms, then the cause must be some intangible.
The alternative view is that each game was an independent event, with the probability of either team winning somewhere near 50%, and that the Red Sox made up for eighty years of bad luck by having the coin come up "heads" four times running. That's going to happen one time in sixteen, just by chance.
And yet the impulse to find some fundamental cause, whether that cause is "leadership" or something else, is nearly irresistible.
Article comments
1 - Eric Olsen
very apt, Mark, at the beginning of a new season - have always loved Bill James, although haven't followed him as closely over the last decade or so. Thanks and welcome back!
2 - bhw
Maybe the Red Sox just played better than the Yankees did in the last four games.
3 - Pog
Good post, but I'm not sure I'd conclude that James or the interviewer assumed it can't be luck. They were talking specifically about intangibles, right? Does one have to say "Or it could all be luck" every time? Maybe it's just assumed to be understood that in the "it's random chance" worldview, analysis is pretty much beside the point.
4 - Eric Olsen
I think the key insight here is that each and every game is its own separate entity, and over time mathematical improbabilities are not unlikely to occur. But I also think momentum can be a very large psychological factor