While bemoaning the fact that former Detroit Tigers superstar Jack Morris got passed over again for Baseball Hall of Fame, Fox MLB reporter Ken Rosenthal took a shot at both the sabermetrics community and the Tea Party.

But first, for those of you who have no idea what sabermetrics is, here’s a succinct definition: It’s the “organized study of baseball statistics to give objective, empirical evidence in measurement of in-game activity.”

In short, sabermetrics ignores such things as size and build and instead focuses entirely on players’ statistics. In the early 2000’s, for example, the Oakland Athletics made a name for themselves by discarding the old way of recruiting players (i.e. looking at strength, speed, etc.) and instead recruited players based on ​actual ​performance (specifically their on-base percentages). In fact, it was the focus of the movie “Moneyball.”

Ken Rosenthal Unfavorably Compares The Sabermetrics Community to the Tea Party“Moneyball” by Michael Lewis is all about Oakland’s experiment
with sabermetrics. It was later made it into a movie.

The Athletics won games. Lots of them.

Anyway, that’s what the sabermetrics community does. They crunch data and, apparently, they’re not too keen on Morris.

“The level of discourse against [Morris] by certain segments of the sabermetric community right now is over the top,” said Rosenthal. “It’s almost a crusade and it’s ridiculous.”

“At times, not among many of us, but some of us, is the almost polarized view of the world now that has come to pass. It’s as if the Tea Party is taking over one part of baseball discussion and that’s not right.”

Final Thought: While you try to figure out how a community based on statistics and spreadsheets has become “polarized,” enjoy this “Moneyball” trailer. If you haven’t seen it already, you really should:

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(H/T: Dead Spin). Front page photo courtesy Getty Images