Now, I love me some Moneyball, SABR, Bill James, Voros, Sheehan, etc. etc., but this is a dangerous line that really needs to be addressed, because it is irresponsible to say that BA means nothing.
It does mean something. It shouldn't carry as much weight as it had in the past, but to completely dismiss the BA stat is kinda dumb. There is no one number that defines a player, and the subsequent chase that a section of the Stats community (of which I consider myself a member) has embarked upon to find One number to define a player is pretty much dumbing down player analysis.
BA should still carry weight, it is indicative of how well a player makes contact in an arbitrarily selected amount of Plate Appearances. Juan Pierre does have some value because he can make contact. How much that means is lesser than how often a player gets on base, but it doesn't mean absolutely nothing. I mean shit, Ichiro has a lot of value and he is all BA and SPD.
To get to the Alex Rios vs. Adam Dunn stuff, it isn't crazy to say that Alex Rios has been better this year. Yes they are two very different players, one plays plus defense, the other one doesn't. Rios has 18 more XBH than Dunn (36 2B, 8 3B, 24 HR for Rios, 19 2B, 0 3B, 41 HR's for Dunn), which drives up his OPS which is also higher than Dunn's. Those last to factors, XBH and OPS, are driven up by Rios's BA, which of course has no value, except that it helps translate into some extra points of slugging.
Rios is inconsistent as hell, he is maddening and doesn't have near the track record that Dunn has, but there are red flags for Dunn even in this season. Dunn strikes out a lot, and that's fine, but his contact rate has continued to drop in the American League. He doesn't hit for average and that's fine too, but a .208 is still considered a red flag when you are evaluating where a player is in his career.
Perhaps this will become a sig line next year, but Adam Dunn to me looks like a guy that is at the end of his career. If you want to roll dice with that, I get the rationale. But it is stupid to completely disregard Alex Rios just because and ignore the year he's had thus far.
Both have had tremendous bounce back years, both do merit consideration for staying on this team long term. I would just rather do it with Rios.
