Discussion of Yankee ownership’s use of analytics with Zack Britton on “Foul Territory” podcast, 2/6/24, You Tube

“If you like a guy, you can make that guy look really good in some areas. If you don’t like a guy, you can make him look really bad in some areas.“…Britton, @57:28

2/6/24, “Ex-Yankees pitcher doubles down on analytics criticism: ‘Disconnect’ exists,” nj.com, Bridget Hyland, nj advance media for nj.com

“After retiring in November, Zack Britton shared that he felt that while he was with the Yankees, there was a “disconnect” between the analytics and the players.

Speaking on “Foul Territory” on Tuesday [Feb. 6], the 2016 Mariano Rivera Reliever of the Year award winner doubled down on his assertion. [@55:57, Discussion of Yankee analytics begins. @57:15, “Disconnect” reference]

“So the Yankees had a lot [of analytics],” Britton said. “And I would I would say, yeah, the communication is just not a strength in the in the game today. I feel like there’s there [are] a lot of people in every single clubhouse kind of pulling in different directions, unfortunately. At the end of the day, it’s about getting results on the field. So you want your front office, you want your analytical department, your players or coaches to all be given the same message to players. And I don’t know every organization, but I know with New York and referencing what [Aaron] Judge said, there was just that disconnect there of good communication, on kind of filtering out the noise of analytics.

The truth is, it’s numbers and

you can manipulate them any way that you want.

If you like a guy, you can make that guy look really good in some areas.

If you don’t like a guy, you can make him look really bad in some areas.

So I think the issue is just more about communication, when it comes to it and I still think we’re struggling with that in the game.”

Britton was referencing comments Yankees slugger Aaron Judge made after the season.

“We get a lot of numbers, but I think we might be looking at the wrong ones and maybe should value some other ones that some people might see as having no value,” Judge told reporters in October. “But when you’re playing 162 games, you’ve got to grind, and you’ve got to play through things. I think there are certain things you can’t put a number on.”

Britton made similar comments in November while speaking on “The Show” with The New York Post’s Joel Sherman and Jon Heyman.

“I just know as a player there, a lot of times in the clubhouse I felt like there was this disconnect between some of the things that we were presented with and what we were seeing on the field as players. And sometimes that creates, you know, that rift which is not what you want. From a clubhouse culture standpoint, you want everything to mesh well together, whether it be the communication from the front office, to the play on the field, and I felt that sometimes the two just weren’t connecting well.

“What the players were saying, we were like, ‘Hey, we should be doing this, and this has been working well.’ Then sometimes the way that that was implemented through the data didn’t line up, and I don’t think I’m the only player that feels that way.”

The Orioles traded Britton to the Yankees in 2018. He missed most of final season with the Yankees in 2022 while recovering from Tommy John surgery and then announced his retirement from baseball in November 2023.”

 

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