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Davey Johnson: Statistical Pioneer?

Ben Goessling wrote an interesting piece for MASNsports.com about Nationals manager Davey Johnson's statistical background and how it affects his approach to baseball. It's a very fascinating article that makes one think that Johnson does not get the credit he deserves for his role in the sport's recent statistical revolution.

Here's an excerpt: ↵
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Long before Baseball Prospectus or SABR were around, he was putting key-punch cards into enormous IBM 360 mainframe computers, using now-archaic programming languages like Fortran and COBOL to calculate the optimal batting order based on on-base percentage. You know Billy Beane, the Oakland Athletics GM who's the protagonist of the book "Moneyball" and will be played in an upcoming movie by Brad Pitt? Johnson managed him as a player.

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