Baseball Stats Glossary

I just want to give an explanation on how I calculate these stats so that you can understand what you are looking at and what the terms mean. Hope this helps!

Glossary

Contact

Gap Power

HR Power (Home Run Power)

Walk

Strikeout

HIT (Hitting Ability)

RUN (Running Ability)

OVR (Overall Ability)

OPS+ (Adjusted On-Base Percentage Plus Slugging)

KEO (Self-Created Stat)

MVP (Self-Created Predictor for MVP) 

Math Behind The Numbers

Contact

• For the Contact rating, I use a self-made statistic and it is called BIP/PA.   
• BIP stands for Balls in Play
• BIP/PA stands for Balls in Play per Plate Appearance
• BIP/PA = (Plate Appearances - Hit By Pitches - Walks - Strikeouts) ÷ Plate Appearances
• Contact = 100 * (Player's BIP/PA ÷ Average BIP/PA for that Year)

Gap Power

• For the Gap Power rating, I use another self-made statistic and it is called Non-HR XBH%
• Non-HR stands for not a Home Run
• XBH stands for Extra Base Hits (2B, 3B, & HR)
• Non-HR XBH% is the amount of At-Bats that are 2Bs and 3Bs
• Non-HR XBH % = (Doubles + Triples) ÷ At-Bats
• Gap Power = 100 * (Player's Non-HR XBH% ÷ Average Non-HR XBH% for that Year)

HR Power

• For the HR Power rating, I use a commonly used sabermetric stat called ISO
• ISO stands for Isolated Power
• ISO = Slugging Percentage - Batting Average
• HR Power = 100 * (Player's ISO ÷ Average ISO for that Year)

Walk

• For the Walk rating, I just use BB%
• BB stands for Walk
• BB% = Walks ÷ Plate Appearances
• Walk Formula = 100 * (Player's BB% ÷ Average BB% for that Year)

Strikeout

• For the Strikeout rating, I just use K%
• K stands for Strikeout
• K% = Strikeouts ÷ Plate Appearances
• Strikeout Formula: 100 * (Average K% for that Year ÷ Player's K%)

• I reverse the order of the numerator and denominator because we want players who strikeout less than League Average, whereas all of the other stats want players who get higher rates than League Average.

HIT

For the HIT rating, I do something that is similar to a z-score.

For a little bit of background, I previously used the percent rank function in Google Sheets which put every stat on a scale of 0 to 100. Since everything was on the same scale, I could add all of the stats (Contact, Gap Power, HR Power, Walk, & Strikeout) and divide that score by 5 and it would scale every stat equally. If I try that with the current formula, every stat is on a different scale and it would favor the stats that differed more. My entire goal of the HIT statistic is to find the most well-rounded hitters and dividing the sum by 5 would be futile.

Here is how I combated that issue:

   1) I calculated the standard deviation of the statistic (Contact, Gap Power, etc.)

   2) I took the player's statistic (Contact, Gap Power, etc.) and divided it by the stat's respective standard deviation.

   3) Add every statistic to get an accumulative stat (I call it the Raw Hit Score).

   4) Take the player's Raw Hit Score and divide it by the League Average Raw Hit Score for that Year

RUN

For the RUN score, I actually use 5 of the 6 factors of Bill James' Speed Score for most leaderboards. I  have all 6 factors for the Minor Leagues.

5 Speed Factors I Use for All Leaderboards

•     Stolen Base Percentage
•     Stolen Base Attempts
•     Triples
•     Runs Scored
•     GIDP
•     (6th is Defensive Range)

Each formula can be found here (Wikipedia's Speed Score page).

I do the same thing with the HIT rating in terms of dividing by the League Average as well as taking the standard deviation to get a Raw Run Score.

Once again, take the Raw Run Score and divide it by League Raw Run Score for that Year

OVR

If there are no specific positions available for everyone, then I will use 90% of HIT plus 10% of RUN.

Otherwise, I adjust the OVR score depending on what position the player is.

Catchers / First Baseman / Third Baseman

•     (.95 * HIT) + (.05 * RUN)

Second Baseman / Shortstop / Centerfield

•     (.85 * HIT) + (.15 * RUN)

Leftfield / Rightfield / Designated Hitter

•    (.90 * HIT) + (.10 * RUN)

OPS+

MiLB:

• Player's OPS divided by Minor League Average OPS

• Adjust for Age & Park Factor

D1 & D3:

• Player's OPS divided by League Average OPS

• Adjust for Strength of Schedule & Park Factor

KEO

MLB, MiLB, & D1:

• Catchers / First Baseman / Third Baseman / Designated Hitter
• (.45 * OVR) + (.55 * OPS+)

• Second Baseman / Shortstop / Centerfield
• (.55 * OVR) + (.45 * OPS+)

• Leftfield / Rightfield
• (.5 * OVR) + (.5 * OPS+)

D3:

• (.5 * OVR) + (.5 * OPS+) for Everyone

MVP (MLB Only)

• Formula = (Average + HR Power) / 2
• Average = 100 * (Player's Batting Average / Average Batting Average for Year)
• HR Power formula is mentioned above