Take your statistics and #$%@!

Might as well get grumpy right off the bat in 2020.

I mean, I’ll almost surely write some complimentary and feel-good columns later this year (Lord, I hope so…), so why not get some bitching done as soon as possible?

I’m not even going to rip any player, coach, team, school, or even a mascot, either.

Nope, today we’re going to talk about statistics.

I’m bringing up stats because some of the common numbers we use every day are so dumb that you look and say: “What? Why?”

For instance, in college football a quarterback can take a 12-yard sack on an obvious pass play — and that loss is docked against his rushing total.

Idiotic.

The result, of course, is that you scan two teams’ total yardage after a game and think: “Well, Hobby Horse State had no success running the ball at all.”

Wait!

Maybe the Hobby Horse fullback rumbled for 157 yards and kept his team in the game — but when the lads fell three TDs behind in the fourth quarter, they had to throw on every play.

So the quarterback gets sacked eight times for 107 yards, and there goes all but 50 of the fullback’s yards in the team rushing stats.

Looks like they never ran at all.

I SUPPOSE that’s an NCAA thing, since so more silliness comes sloshing out of the place than most places on Earth.

But let’s change sports…

Here’s a statistic that makes me want to smash something: basketball assists.

I’ve even got a timely example for you.

Last Monday night, as Gonzaga was racing past Detroit Mercy, Ryan Woolridge seemed to be everywhere.

Woolridge had 21 points, five rebounds and eight assists.

Just eight?

The guy had the ball in his hands most of the night, and continually was feeding various Zags for open shots or drives down the lane.

I was anxious to see the final box score, because I thought Woolridge had a lock double-double with something like 12 or 13 assists.

Nope.

Because…

On a play where Woolridge makes a nifty pass to Corey Kispert heading toward the hoop, there is NO assist if Kispert gets clobbered and can’t make the shot.

Please explain that to me.

If Kispert scores, assist for Woolridge, but...

If Kispert get whacked, and makes both free throws, then no assist for Woolridge.

How does that make any damn sense at all?

Woolridge’s part of the play, the piece where assists are doled out, was exactly the same.

Grrrr…

THERE ARE also situations where simple new statistics could be added to make individual numbers fairer.

Why, for instance, has baseball not added a “team error”?

Let’s say a pitcher is trying to get out of a jam, bases loaded and two out.

He throws a great fastball that rides in on the hitter, jamming him — with the result that the guy hits a feeble pop fly out behind second base.

Any one of three players could catch the ball in his pocket without more than a jog, but all of them just look at each other, and…

The thing drops harmlessly on the grass.

Current logic here is that you can’t give anyone an error, because all three players were at fault.

So the ball is scored as a double, all three runs that cross the plate are considered earned and immediately fatten the pitcher’s ERA.

The hitter doesn’t deserve three RBI, either.

It’s a complete miscarriage of historic scoring guidelines.

AND THE silliest part of it is that everything could be fixed with assessment of a “team error” — a number that counts against overall defensive statistics but not against any particular player.

For purposes of hitting and pitching, however, it would be the same as if the shortstop had simply dropped the ball.

I’m certainly not the first, and won’t be the last, to lobby for a “team error,” and I was scolded by some rulebook guardian one night.

He claimed you couldn’t change scoring guidelines now because it would create unfair comparisons with the past.

Oh?

You do realize this is a sport where MLB changed the game in 1973, so that the American League and National League could play by entirely different rules?

Ah, and in which they lowered the seams on the ball last year so 115-pound infielders could hit 34 home runs?

You’re seriously worried about comparing eras?

Please stop.

My head hurts.

Email: [email protected]

Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns for The Press appear on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. He also contributes the “Zags Tracker” package on Gonzaga basketball each Tuesday or Wednesday.

Steve’s various tales from several decades in sports — “Moments, Memories and Madness” — run on Sundays.