MLB Stat of the Week: Secondary Average

Everybody knows that a player's batting average is a ratio of hits to at bats. A player's batting average is the most talked about statistic, and the most likely to get you benched.

While simple batting average is the most commonly-known statistic today, there are flaws. Batting average doesn't account for walks, stolen bases, or extra-base hits. While batting average is a ratio of hits to at bats, secondary average is a ratio of bases gained to at bats.

Secondary average, as a general rule, is higher than batting average.

The formula is very simple and a calculator is barely needed!

(TB - H + BB + SB - CS) / AB

TB: total bases
 H:  hits
BB: bases on balls
SB: stolen bases
CS: times caught stealing
AB: at-bats

To give a general feel for secondary average, a score of .500 is outstanding, while a score of .200 is very poor.

Let's take some time to apply this to the batting leaders of 2008.

The current (as of May 20) MLB batting leader is Chipper Jones. He has a batting average of .411, which is considered outstanding. Let's take a look at his stats and see where he really stands.

(106 - 64 + 21 + 0 - 0) / 156

= .404

Now let's take a look at Lance Berkman, who is currently second in the MLB batting-average race with an average of .389.

(131 - 65 + 26 + 8 - 1) / 167

= .593

I'm just going to pick another name and look at Joe Mauer's secondary average. He is currently fourth in the AL batting-average race at .331, seventh in the MLB.

(56 - 45 + 19 + 0 - 1) / 141

= .206

Ouch.

Finally, I'm just going to take a name out of the air. Miguel Cabrera of the Detroit Tigers isn't leading the MLB in batting average, in fact, he is number 74 on the list. He is batting .282 as of May 20.

(74 - 43 + 22 + 1 - 0) /159

= .340

Secondary average is certainly revealing, isn't it? It is a great stat to mess around with, but there are flaws. Namely: too many walks.

The same Barry Bonds that is sitting by a phone somewhere in Florida right now drew an all-time record 232 walks in 2004. As a result, here is what his secondary average looked like:

(303 - 135 + 232 + 6 - 1) /373

= 1.086

Wow. How incredible was he in 2004? His nearest competitor, Jim Edmonds, only had a secondary average of .554. The difference between these two numbers, .532, would have been the third best secondary average from the year 2004.

Maybe that is why Bonds won the MVP award in 2004.

In the end, however, the basic goal of secondary average is to simply give you  more information. The more good information you have, the more likely you are to make good decisions.

And impress a few friends along the way.

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