Sports and Numbers

In the world of sports statistics, there is often tension between those who consider themselves academicians and purely trying to advance the science versus those who also seek to commercialize their work.  In a capitalist society, there really should be no moral distinction there.  Regardless, the validity of statistical systems can always be called into question, as will be the case in a sports statistics conference this weekend.  David Berri's "Wages of Wins" system is based on a controversial system of assigning number of wins attributable to each player.  Dan Rosenbaum will be presenting work this weekend that attempts to debunk the WoW system.

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