Congrats to McLouth

Just a quick impromptu post here, a big congrats goes out to our favorite Bucco, Nate McLouth on picking up a Gold Glove today. It was certainly a surprise to us to see that, and probably a surprise to the Pirates and to Nate himself. It was certainly a surprise to the sabermetricians, many of whom are not a fan of this pick. Two of the originals, Rob Neyer and Bill James, both use their voodoo statistics to show us how bad McLouth was this season in center.

While I do agree that Nate was really nothing special this season, at least defensively, and his range does leave something to be desired, it angers me that they can pull out some crazy statistic that claims McLouth was the fielder who ranked worst among all outfielders among their positional average. Whatever the hell that means. And, as someone who has taken a few stats courses, I know enough about statistics to know not to rely too heavily on any one of them unless you have a complete grasp of it. And since no one can seem to agree on one fielding stat that really sums everything up, I think it's ludicrous to just pull out the certain stats that claim McLouth is not that great.

I know that all of these guys want nothing more than to narrow everything in baseball down to one tell-all statistic, but I just think that sometimes we need to realize that seeing things with your eyes for 162 games works a lot better than a spreadsheet, and in this case, I can guarantee you that while McLouth may not be a legit Gold Glover, there is no way he is the worst fielder in baseball.