Manuel throws SABR-heads under bus

[HoustonGM]

one problem
according to the quote posted.

manuel never said stats shouldnt be taken into account.

Read my full posts. The very first line is:

Manuel didn't use that strawman argument. It was brought up by someone else and I'm speaking about it in general terms, not specifically regarding the original Manuel quote.

[kenny1234]

3 consecutive horrific outings with loss of 10 mph ?
gee small sample size !
no dude is hurt
no small sample size !!

Just a comment regarding sample size. The importance of sample size depends on the variability of what you are measuring. When measuring hitting sample sizes need to be fairly large due to the inherent variability of hitting.
Your example is considering a metric that doesn't vary from start to start for most pitchers by more than a couple of miles an hour. If a guy that normally throws 90mph can't break 80mph - he shouldn't even get out of the bullpen. A 5-pitch (or less) sample size would be enough for a statistician to tell something is wrong with him.
But in general, I agree that a manager's job is to see small things that help predict the future performance of individual players before the sample size is sufficient to tell through statistical measures. And within the season I think this is reasonable - and is what makes some managers better than others.

For a manager to decide who pinchhits on a particular day because of some gut feeling - I'll believe the manager. For a manager to say that his team will be better next year if they learn to play better in the clutch - that is meaningless drivel.

[HoustonGM]

By the way, Jerry's at it again, spewing stuff that is even more nonsensical than the original quote in this thread, which I suppose can be construed into something approaching logic.

But, how about these gems?

Manuel said spring training will be a time of teaching, for him to give "clarity" to players on his methods. Execution in the clutch is his emphasis, and the Mets likely will bring in new offensive players, most likely in the corner outfield spots.

There ya have it. Manuel wants to teach players how to "execute in the clutch."

And then:

"You don't see a lot of guys that have statistical numbers play well in these championship series," Manuel said. "What you see is usually the little second baseman or somebody like that carries off the MVP trophy that nobody expected him to do. That's because he's comfortable in playing that form of baseball, so therefore when the stage comes, it's not a struggle for him."

FJM covered this, and I think that what they said with regards to these quotes was pretty dead-on accurate, and I couldn't have said it better myself.

[filihok]

We have to win because we have baseball players that know and can understand the game.

We have to put a value on say, moving a runner over. We have to put a value on getting a bases on balls. We have to put a value on infield back, [getting a] ground ball that's sufficient to score a run," he said. "Those types of things have to be accented in order for us, in my opinion, to kind of get to the next level

Yeah. Manuel is an absolute mad-man