And now, some national random baseball stats for your enjoyment...

If you're like me, you don't just love the game of baseball.  You love all the statistics behind it, you want to know how your team is doing, not just on a conference (or division if MLB) level, but also nationally.  And so, in celebration of our nerdiness: I present to you Big West teams/players in national rankings.

Here's how it works, in a statistical category, I'll give players and teams who are nationally ranked (sounds simple enough, right?).  You can make your own judgements as to how good/bad that is.

So here we go:



NCAA Baseball RPI
15. CSU Fullerton (No. 12 by Collegiate Baseball, No. 14 NCBWA, No. 13 Baseball America, No. 15. Coaches Poll)
27. UCI (NR, recieving votes in Coaches Poll)
65. LBSU
101. Cal Poly
110. UCR
135. UCSB
210. Pacific
211. UCD
219. CSU Northridge
(future members: 160. SDSU, 68. Hawaii)

Important Team Stats (National, so if ranked in top 50, the teams are up there)
Batting Average
No. 38: UCSB - .307

Earned Run Average
No. 21 UCI - 2.73
No. 36 LBSU - 2.99
No. 48 CSU Fullerton - 3.18
(Note: No. 11 Hawaii - 2.39)

Individual Stats (if an individual player is ranked nationally)
Batting Average
No. 42 Brett Vertigan, UCSB - .425
No. 43 Bryce Tafelski, UCSB - .425 (less ABs than Vertigan)
(No. 27 Matt Munoz, SDSU, Fr. - .435)

Earned Run Average (minimum 20 IP)
No. 41 Kyle Hooper, UCI - 1.30
(No. 45 Jarrett Arakawa, Hawaii, So. - 1.34)

So why only show BA and ERA?  These two stats I firmly believe are vital to a teams success, basic Pitching and basic hitting.  Sure home runs are important, but they aren't going to help you win if you have one guy batting .150 and having 30 home runs.  Total batting average shows consistent successful hits, and ERA shows how many runs a person gives up per 9 innings of play.  A good combination of these two stats usually translates to success.  UCSB may bat .307 as a team, but as a team, their ERA is atrocious at 4.48 (that's 4.48 runs per game).  This is why they are 10-9 right now.  Look at the top three teams in the conference, and note that they all rank nationally in ERA.  This points to the trend, that in the Big West, pitching is more important than hitting.  Call it the territory, but look at the Major League teams in the Big West "region:" San Diego Padres, LA Dodgers, LA Angels, San Francisco Giants and Oakland Athletics.  In 2011, all 5 of those teams finished up in the top 10 statistically in ERA.  3 of those 5 teams finished with winning records.  Maybe that's all coincidental, but I would speculate that the colleges and the professional teams have very similar philosophies in this region.

What do you think?  Is pitching more important than hitting? Vice Versa? Are statistics just some made up crap to get nerds like me interested in sports? Leave your comments below!