Charlie Pavitt: Open the Hall of Fame to sabermetric pioneers

This guest post is from occasional contributor Charlie Pavitt. Here's a link to some of Charlie's previous posts.

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Induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame (HOF) is of course the highest honor available to those associated with the game.  When one thinks of the HOF, one first thinks of the greatest players, such as the first five inductees in 1936 (Cobb, Johnson, Matthewson, Ruth, and Wagner). But other categories of contributors were added almost immediately; league presidents (Morgan Bulkeley, Ban Johnson) and managers (Mack, McGraw) plus George Wright in 1937, pioneers (Alexander Cartwright and Henry Chadwick) in 1938, owners (Charles Comiskey) in 1939, umpires (Bill Klem) and what would now be considered general managers (Ed Barrow) in 1953, and even union leaders (Marvin Miller, this year for induction next year). There is an additional type of honor associated with the HOF for contributions to the game; the J. G. Taylor Spink Award (given by the Baseball Writers Association of America) annually since 1962, the Ford C. Frick Award for broadcasters annually since 1978, and thus far five Buck O’Neill Lifetime Achievement Awards given every three years since 2008.  Even songs get honored ("Centerfield", 2010; "Talkin' Baseball", 2011).

But what about sabermetricians? Are they not having a major influence on the game?  Are there not some who are deserving of an honor of this magnitude?

I am proposing that an honor analogous to the Spink, Frick, and O’Neill awards be given to sabermetricians who have made significant and influential contributions to the analytic study of baseball. I would have called it the Henry Chadwick Award to pay tribute to the inventor of the box score, batting average, and earned run average, but SABR has already reserved that title for its award for research contributions, a few of which have gone to sabermetricians but most to other contributors. So instead I will call it the F. C. Lane award, not in reference to Frank C. Lane (general manager of several teams in the 1950s and 1960s) but rather Ferdinand C. Lane, editor of the Baseball Magazine between 1911 and 1937. Lane wrote two articles for the publication ("Why the System of Batting Should Be Reformed," January 1917, pages 52-60; "The Base on Balls," March 1917, pages 93-95) in which he proposed linear weight formulas for evaluating batting performance, the second of which is remarkably accurate.

I shall now list those whom I think have made "significant and influential contributions to the analytic study of baseball" (that phrase was purposely worded in order to delineate the intent of the award). The HOF began inductions with five players, so I will propose who I think should be the first five recipients:

George Lindsay

Between 1959 and 1963, based on data from a few hundred games either he or his father had scored, George Lindsay published three academic articles in which he examined issues such as the stability of the batting average, average run expectancies for each number of outs during an inning and for different innings, the length of extra-inning games, the distribution of total runs for each team in a game, the odds of winning games with various leads in each inning, and the value of intentional walks and base stealing. It was revolutionary work, and opened up areas of study that have been built upon by generations of sabermetricians since.

 

Bill James

Starting with his first-self-published Baseball Abstract back in 1977, James built up an audience that resulted in the Abstract becoming a conventionally-published best seller between 1982 and 1988.  During those years, he proposed numerous concepts – to name just three, Runs Created, the Pythagorean Equation, and the Defensive Spectrum – that have influenced sabermetric work ever since.  But at least if not more important were his other contributions.  He proposed and got off the ground Project Scoresheet, the first volunteer effort to compile pitch-by-pitch data for games to be made freely available to researchers; this was the forerunner and inspiration for Retrosheet. During the same years as the Abstract was conventionally published, he oversaw a sabermetric newsletter/journal, the Baseball Analyst, which provided a pre-Internet outlet for amateur sabermetricians (including myself) who had few if any other opportunities to get their work out to the public.  Perhaps most importantly, his work was the first serious sabermetric (a term he coined) analysis many of us saw, and served as an inspiration for us to try our hand at it too. I might add that calls for James to be inducted into the Hall itself can be found on a New York Times article from January 20, 2019 by Jamie Malinowski and the Last Word on Baseball website by its editor Evan Thompson.

Pete Palmer

George Lindsay’s work was not readily available. The Hidden Game of Baseball, written by Palmer and John Thorn, was, and included both a history of previous quantitative work and advancement on that work in the spirit of Lindsay’s. Palmer’s use of linear-weight equations to measure offensive performance and of run expectancies to evaluate strategy options were not entirely new, as Lane and Lindsay had respectively been first, but it was Palmer’s presentation that served to familiarize those that followed with these possibilities, and as with James these were inspirations to many of us to try our hands at baseball analytics ourselves.  Probably the most important of Palmer’s contributions has been On-base Plus Slugging (OPS), one of the few sabermetric concepts to have become commonplace on baseball broadcasts.

 

David Smith

I’ve already mentioned Project Scoresheet, which lasted as a volunteer organization from 1984 through 1989. I do not wish to go into its fiery ending, a product of a fight about conflict of interest and, in the end, money.  Out of its ashes like the proverbial phoenix rose Retrosheet, the go-to online source for data describing what occurred during all games dating back to 1973, most games back to 1920, and some from before then. Since its beginning, those involved with Retrosheet have known not to repeat the Project’s errors and have made data freely available to everyone even if the intended use for that data is personal financial profit. Dave Smith was the last director of Project Scoresheet, the motivator behind the beginning of Retrosheet, and the latter’s president ever since. Although it is primed to continue when Dave is gone, Retrosheet’s existence would be inconceivable without him.  Baseball Prospectus’s analyst Russell Carleton, whose work relies on Retrosheet, has made it clear in print that he thinks that Dave should be inducted into the Hall itself.

 

Sean Forman

It is true that Forman copied from other sources, but no matter; it took a lot of work to begin what is now the go-to online source for data on seasonal performance. Baseball Reference began as a one-man sideline for an academic, and has become home to information about all American major team sports plus world-wide info on “real” football. 

 

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Here are two others that I believe should eventually be recipients.

Sherri Nichols

Only two women have been bestowed with HOF-related awards; Claire Smith is a past winner of the Spink Award and Rachel Robinson is a recipient of the O’Neill Award.  Sherri Nichols would become the third. I became convinced that she deserved it after reading Ben Lindbergh’s tribute, and recommend it for all interested in learning about the "founding mother" of sabermetrics. I remember when the late Pete DeCoursey (I was scoring Project Scoresheet Phillies games and he was our team captain) proposed the concept of Defensive Average, for which (as Lindbergh’s article noted) Nichols did the computations. This was revolutionary work at that time, and laid the groundwork for all of the advanced fielding information we now have at our disposal.

 

Tom Tango

Tango has had significant influence on many areas of sabermetric work, two of which have joined Palmer’s OPS as commonplaces on baseball-related broadcasts. Wins Above Replacement (WAR) was actually Bill James’s idea, but James never tried to implement it. Tango has helped define it, and his offensive index wOBA is at the basis of the two most prominent instantiations, those from Baseball Reference (alternatively referred to as bWAR and rWAR) and FanGraphs (fWAR).  Leverage was an idea whose time had come, as our blogmaster Phil Birnbaum came up with the same concept at about the same time, but it was Tango’s usage that became definitive. His Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP) corrective to weaknesses in ERA is also well-known and often used. Tango currently oversees data collection for MLB Advanced Media, and has done definitive work on MLBAM’s measurement of fielding (click here for a magisterial discussion of that topic).

There are some historical figures that might be deserving; Craig Wright, Dick Cramer, and Allan Roth come to mind as possibilities. Maybe even Earnshaw Cook, as wrong as he was about just about everything, because of what he was attempting to do without the data he needed to do it right (see his Percentage Baseball book for a historically significant document). Perhaps the Award could also go to organizations as a whole, such as Baseball Prospectus and FanGraphs; if so, SABR should get it first.

Charlie Pavitt: Steroids and the Hall of Fame

This guest post is from occasional contributor Charlie Pavitt. Here's a link to some of Charlie's previous posts.

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I am writing today about a much-discussed topic, performance enhancing drugs and Baseball Hall of Fame enshrinement. My goal is not to defend a particular opinion about it, but rather to attempt to lay out five possible positions and some strengths and weaknesses each has. In fact, one reason why I will not defend a particular opinion is that, given these strengths and weaknesses, I am torn among several of the options.

But before I start, a few preliminaries. First, research of which I am aware provides strong evidence that steroid use significantly increases offensive performance, whereas there is little if any evidence that human growth hormone has any impact.

Second, none of this is new. Ancient Greek athletes took then-known stimulants before competitions, and nobody back then batted an eye.

                

Third, one must be careful throwing rocks when one’s own house could potentially, in a different context, be made of glass. When I was in graduate school, if someone had come to me and whispered, "Hey man, I have this pill you can take every day that will make you read, write, and think more quickly and efficiently," I would have been sorely tempted to partake.  In fact, one of my grad school cohort-mates imagined a situation in which you took a pill that provided you with the information you are supposed to learn from assigned reading, with lighter doses for undergraduate students and heavier doses for us grad students. Mighty tempting fantasy.

                

Fourth, and this is critical: Before throwing rocks, one needs to defend the claim that there is something wrong with taking performance enhancing drugs.  The fact that it may be illegal is, in my view, irrelevant, as many illegal items are not only harmless but helpful. For example, without getting into the marijuana debate, it is the case that any use of hemp has been illegal in some places, despite its many many positive applications. And taking something into the body to improve athletic performance is often a good thing. After all, a person can improve athletic performance by eating better, and perhaps taking supplements of necessary vitamins and minerals in moderation. So what’s the difference?  Here’s an argument for that difference; eating better and taking supplements in moderation promotes overall health whereas taking steroids (and overdosing on vitamins/minerals) does quite the opposite. The early deaths of many professional rasslers (I reserve the word "wrestlers" for the real sport), perhaps some football players (Lyle Alzado?), and two well-known baseball players (more on this later) has been linked with steroid use. 

One could then make the claim that it is the use of a substance that causes bodily harm that warrants rejection from the HOF. After all, the criteria for entry include "Integrity, sportsmanship, and character" along with "record, playing ability," and "contributions to the team(s) on which the player played."  

So, the argument continues, PED use is contrary to the former three criteria.  I think the best angle for this argument is that it sets the wrong example for others, particularly young people, whereas eating well and getting one’s vitamins/minerals sets the right example. Fair enough. But: Lots of HOF players were smokers or used chewing tobacco, and Babe Ruth certainly did not set a good dietary example by reportedly eating multiple hot dogs just before games.  And speaking of setting bad examples, if there is anybody enshrined who does not deserve it for absence of integrity etc., it is Adrian "Cap" Anson, who was proactive in the successful attempt to get Moses Fleetwood Walker, the first African-American major league baseball player, banned for the color of his skin.

So this argument leads to a slippery slope. But let us assume that we accept it.  Here are five possible responses, ordered from most lenient to most strict.

Position Number One: Let everyone in. The argument here is that great performers deserve entry no matter why they performed greatly. Buttressing this position is the seeming fact that until the public response to Jose Canseco’s confession among other events forced action, the powers-that-be in MLB’s establishment knew what was going on and intentionally turned a blind eye to it. After all, fans like offense, particularly home runs, and attendance was swelling, so all seemed right with the world. So if that was what baseball was in those days, goes the argument for this position, one must accept it and its great performers no matter what.  ne strength of this argument is that one must not make always-problematic non-performance-related judgments about players, as we will must for the other positions on this issue to be discussed in turn below.  The problem with this argument is that it is contrary to the "integrity, sportsmanship, and character" criteria, condones unhealthy behavior, and as such if anything encourages youthful copy cats.

                

Position Number Two: Let everyone in who deserves enshrinement independently of PED use. This implies that one likely accepts Alex Rodriguez, Roger Clemens, and Barry Bonds, because if one mentally subtracts the PED-fed "value-added" part of their performance, they are still HOF material. But one rejects those who would not have reached performance criteria otherwise: Mark McGwire and Rafael Palmeiro among others come to mind.  Perhaps this makes some sense, but one is still condoning bad behavior by allowing in known users while making questionable judgments about whose performance would have been "good enough" without PEDs.

                

Position Number Three: Ban known users. So Bonds, Clemens, McGwire, Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa, Manny Ramirez, and some others who reached supposed HOF performance levels are out. Also some who approached HOF levels and might otherwise deserve consideration (Miguel Tejada, Jason Giambi) get none. In so doing, we clear the deck of those guilty of poor integrity etc.  Also, it might allow us to consider those whose performance would have reached criteria in another era; think Fred McGriff, who hit as many homers as Lou Gehrig.  But what about those suspected of use? Take Jeff Bagwell for an example. Although there is no clear evidence of his use and he has steadfastly denied it, he did get a lot bigger fairly quickly, hit way more homers than anyone originally expected, and associated closely with the first known user alluded to earlier, Ken Caminiti, whose early death has been partly linked with use. If we lower our performance criteria to allow for McGriff, it also allows for Bagwell.  So now we’ve admitted someone who may have been as guilty as Bonds et al. but whose usage (if any) has not been publicly verified. Setting the in versus out boundary is a pretty questionable judgment call.

                

Position Number Four: Ban everyone either known or rumored to be users.  So Bagwell and Gary Sheffield and perhaps Juan Gonzalez if you think he reached HOF performance levels and maybe even David Ortiz are out, and Mike Piazza should not have been recently admitted. Now we know we’ve kept the HOF free of those with poor integrity etc. But at least in the U.S. court of law one is considered innocent until proven guilty. Take Jeff Bagwell.  Although he got a lot bigger fairly quickly, hit way more homers than anyone originally expected, and associated with a known user, there is no clear evidence of his use and he has steadfastly denied it. Again, setting the in versus out boundary is a pretty questionable judgment call.

                

Position Number Five: Not only ban everyone suspected, but kick out anyone currently in who is suspected. Now we are sure everyone in baseball had the proper integrity etc.  Out goes Mike Piazza. Further, and this is the second player I alluded to at the beginning of this essay, out goes Kirby Puckett.  Jose Canseco fingered him, plus the physical problems that ended his career along with those that ended his life along with his violent post-baseball behavior sure seem to be signals of steroid use. In addition, in a 2002 article, statistician Scott Berry calculated that Puckett’s jump from no home runs his rookie year (1985) to four his sophomore year to 31 his junior year was the most unlikely performance increase in the history of MLB, with an odds of one in 100 million, much greater than similar jumps made by other known or suspected users. But this is all indirect evidence, there are other explanations for all of it (maybe Kirby started taking his vitamins or radically changed his swing between the 1986 and 1987 seasons). And if we kick out Kirby, should we kick out Adrian Anson? (Actually, I think we should, but that’s a side issue here.)  How about Ty Cobb for his racism (to be expected, natural attitudes for a Georgian in his time)?  Babe Ruth for eating all those hot dogs? I do not believe I have heard anyone support this position, but I suppose someone could.

                

So – as I noted at the top, I am frankly torn among several of these options. If I had a vote, my heart would point me toward Position Three, but my head would tell me that it would be hard to rationally defend relative to some of the others (particularly Four). Anyway, I hope that I’ve laid out at least some of the arguments on either side well enough that readers can have an intelligent discussion about it and maybe even add some arguments to my list, and that those who are SURE that their position, whichever it is, is obviously correct think twice about its weaknesses along with its strengths.

-- Charlie Pavitt

Charlie Pavitt on "Redskins"

Here's occasional guest blogger Charlie Pavitt commenting on the use of the nickname "Redskins."  He invites intelligent responses, as always.

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Along with others who are troubled by the commercial use of the term "Redskins" in reference to the Washington area football team, I was surprised by the results of the survey indicating that about 75% of Native American respondents did not find the term insulting, and only about 10% did (I don’t remember the exact numbers). Now one thing I have learned over my years as a social scientist is to be suspicious of surprising survey results. I automatically think in terms of biased question writing, but I did have the opportunity to read the question, which was worded something like (again memory fails) the following:

Do you or do you not find the term “Redskin” insulting?

I don’t find that biased, so I can’t quibble with the reported results on that issue.

But I wish we could find out how that sample of Native Americans would have responded to two other questions. One was suggested by a statement in response made by an activist on this issue (third memory flaw – forgotten name):

Are you or are you not comfortable with the commercial use of the term “Redskin” by the Washington area football team?

Is that not the issue that is really at stake here?  The second comes from a remark by a sportswriter made on ESPN (fourth memory failure):

Would you or would you not be insulted if a Caucasian referred to you personally as a “redskin”?

My guess here is that a large proportion would find that insulting.  And if I am correct about that guess, then the term is insulting no matter the results of the question that was actually asked.

One more issue – I am perturbed by those who defend the use of the term because of its “tradition.” In a roughly parallel circumstance, more and more people have realized that the “tradition” of flying the Confederate States flag on state government grounds is insulting, because the reason why there was a Confederate States independent of the United States was to protect the institution of slavery. (And I don’t want to hear about “states’ rights”; the reason why the Confederate states wanted their “rights” was to protect the institution of slavery.) And there is a tradition in part of Africa to mutilate female genitalia.  I could go on and on with examples, but I’ll stop here; “tradition” is no reason for continuing a bad practice.

Anyway, I do think that some of the discussion of this issue is overblown; two hundred years of ill-treatment has left the Native American nations with far worse problems than a football team’s commercial trademark. And maybe I am wrong about the answers one would get from the two survey questions suggested above. But it doesn’t matter to me. I shall continue my practice of referring to the “Washington area football team” by that title rather than their commercial trademark.  And I invite all like-minded people to do the same.

-- Charlie Pavitt

Charlie Pavitt: On some implications of the Adam LaRoche situation

Charlie Pavitt occasionally guest posts here ... been a while, but he's back! Here's Charlie's thoughts on Adam Laroche and education.  

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Let me begin this essay by stating that if it is true that the White Sox promised Adam LaRoche full clubhouse access for his son Drake, then they are wrong to reverse themselves on that promise now; and if LaRoche only agreed to sign the contract because of the promise, he has good reason to feel betrayed.

But this essay is not about this specific issue. It is about something more general.  My understanding is that LaRoche made a public statement that included something like the following: School is not so important, you can learn more about life in the baseball clubhouse than in school. Even if I am wrong about what LaRoche did or did not say, the question deserves consideration, so I want to discuss my thinking about this general issue and not about this specific case.

You most certainly can learn something about life in the baseball clubhouse. Here are three important things that you can learn: First, that a group of men from drastically different backgrounds (different races/ethnicities/social classes/religions/etc.) can work together in harmony in pursuit of a shared goal. Second, that a group of men from drastically different backgrounds can forge close friendships. Third, that success in one’s pursuits requires what I call the three D’s: desire, dedication, discipline. These are all extremely valuable lessons, and I suppose there are some other things that you can learn in the baseball clubhouse that I cannot think of right now.

But there are many things that are also important in life that you cannot learn in the baseball clubhouse.

First, you cannot learn how to interact in a mature enough manner with women to work in harmony with them in pursuit of a shared goal and to forge close friendships. I have no idea about now, but certainly in the “old days” a baseball clubhouse was anything but a good training ground for learning how to treat women as potential co-workers or non-sexual friends.

Second, you cannot learn how to interact in a mature enough manner with people with a different sexual orientation than you to work in harmony with them in pursuit of a shared goal and to forge close friendships. In this case, it is pretty clear that instances of disparaging treatment are still occurring, although happily the response to these instances has been to demand that the perpetrators grow up and act like adults. I would like to add that it is likely that there are quite a few gay major league baseball players right now who do not feel comfortable enough with how their teammates would react to come out of the closet, given how few past players have felt comfortable enough to do so even after retirement.

Third, you cannot learn how to interact in a mature enough manner with people with disabilities, be they of sight or hearing or physical limitations or psychiatric problems or low “intelligence,” whatever that is, to work in harmony with them in pursuit of a shared goal and to forge close friendships. I will say that baseball players have as a group been sensitive to and supportive of people such as these and also to other players with analogous issues (e.g., alcoholism), which is laudable.  But the issue here is whether one can learn this sensitivity in a baseball clubhouse as well as you can in school.

Fourth, you cannot learn how to interact in a mature enough manner with straight men with no disabilities, but a different temperament than one usually finds among baseball players, to work in harmony with them in pursuit of a shared goal and to forge close friendships.  I am thinking of men who think like artists or musicians or writers (or academics like me), who are basically non-competitive and wish to collaborate with everyone and not only one’s teammates. I am also thinking of men who have made financial sacrifices to dedicate their lives to the betterment of others; those who work in non-profits for pitiful wages, school teachers spending part of their much-lower-than-deserved income on their classroom and students because their school is so badly underfunded. I would not expect active disparagement of such people in the clubhouse, in fact if anything baseball players probably respect the hard work and achievements of such people. But I doubt they learned that attitude in the baseball clubhouse, and in any case the issue is once again whether the ability to understand those mindsets well enough to work alongside and becoming truly friendly with such people is better learned in a baseball clubhouse than in a school.

Fifth, you can learn the sorts of things that can make you a responsible public citizen and contribute to your community and to your nation; for example, someone who votes based on well-thought-out values and relevant knowledge rather than emotion and hearsay.  I am not saying that baseball players as a group do not have adequate public citizen skills, just like the general citizenry my guess is that some do and some don’t, but that you can learn those skills in school far better than in a baseball clubhouse. 

These are the sorts of things that you can learn in a school that you cannot learn in a baseball clubhouse. And, I might add, you can also learn in school about the three important things I listed above that you can learn in a clubhouse; in fact, you can learn them better. You can learn to pursue a goal with or become friends with people from drastically different backgrounds, and you can learn about the importance of the three D’s, and you can learn them better in a school because you are actually participating and not just observing others, as would be generally the case in the clubhouse. Note that unlike the clubhouse, you are learning these skills while interacting with people your own age rather than 10/20 years older. Research has conclusively shown that, while basic language and communication skills are originally learned from intense interaction with one’s immediate family, they are practiced and perfected through intense interaction with one’s age peers.

Now let me add one other thing that you can learn in a school that you cannot learn in a baseball clubhouse. You can learn a marketable skill other than playing baseball.  Again, I want to consider the general issue and stay away from the specific LaRoche situation; my understanding is that Drake is being home-schooled and that Adam LaRoche does many things other than play baseball and I trust that Drake is participating and learning from them. If a player thinks that the baseball clubhouse is a more educational environment for a son than a school, the player is thinking as if there was no question that the son was also going to spend their lives in the baseball clubhouse.  ut what if the son’s interests and temperament are more in line with the examples I mentioned above: the musician/artist/writer/academic, the person who values other’s betterment over personal wealth?  Or even if the son has the desire and temperament to play baseball, but not the skill?  In particular, the latter type of son is woefully unprepared for work, not just for the nuts and bolts of the job but also for working in tandem with women, gay men, and those of different temperament. Or does the player think that, in that instance, it is fine for the son to live his life off the fortune the player is making?

Now, I understand that Drake LaRoche is being home-schooled, and for all I know he is learning about the things I am concerned about, and whether or not this is true in this instance is beside the general point. And I am not saying that boys should never spend any time in a baseball clubhouse, even if it means missing a little school. In conclusion, I am saying the following:

A baseball team that promises a player that the player’s son can totally share the baseball player life at the detriment of schooling is performing a great disservice to the son.

A baseball player who wants his son to totally share the baseball player life at the detriment of schooling is performing a great disservice to his son.

A baseball team that realizes the detriment to the son that the promise has caused and reverses itself on the promise certainly deserves censure for breaking a promise, but is performing a great service to the son.

And a baseball player in the latter situation who retires because of it and, in so doing, insures educational experiences for the son beyond the clubhouse is performing a great service to the son. 

-- Charlie Pavitt

Charlie Pavitt: what's the false positive rate for MLB steroids tests?

This guest post is by Charlie Pavitt. Take it away, Charlie ...

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I have a question about drug testing, which for the sake of this blog I will restrict to that for steroids by professional baseball leagues although it is just as relevant for all performance enhancing drugs (PEDs) by all sports organizations in general. I’ve had this question for awhile, but this is a good time to ask it, given that the Tour de France was recently completed (with the usual disqualifications for PEDs along the way) and the Olympics is about to begin (with, leading up to the Games, the same).

No drug test is perfect. All lead to some percentage of false negatives (users whom the test misses) and false positives (innocents whom the test implies are guilty). The latter is what specifically concerns me. In our court of law, one is supposedly innocent until proven guilty. But every few weeks I read of another minor leaguer suspended for a couple months for a positive test. Given that every player knows about the tests, I wonder how many are really still using. Yeah, I can see the possibility that some of the more pampered of them, who have never been punished for anything they’ve done in the past decade because their athletic skill has made them sacrosanct in their communities, probably imagine they can use and get away with it. But I’m not at all convinced that they are all guilty. And, given the publicity it generates, a reported false positive would result in a drug-free player pretty much permanently tarred-and-feathered (Rafael Palmeiro comes to mind; I’m not saying that he wasn’t a user, I have no idea either way, but talk about a positive image permanently crashing down to earth in an eyeblink…).

I just did a bit of web searching (googled “drug testing baseball false positive”) and didn’t find a ton of helpful information on it. One website mentions a study with a huge 14% false positive rate. I’m not the only one concerned (see here, among others).

So here’s my specific, two-part question: What is the false positive rate for the test (assuming there is only one) used in professional baseball? And what precautions are there against false positives (at the very least, there should be a blood sample divided in two, with the second tested in case the first comes up positive)? If anyone has these answers, it is not I’d like to know. More importantly, I’d like the general baseball-fan public to know also.

--Charlie Pavitt