The Sultan of Stats

Allan Roth did not invent baseball statistics. Henry Chadwick introduced those in the late 1800s, mostly for the benefit of the fans.

What Roth did — first for the Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers and later for network television broadcasts — was show how they could be used proactively, rather than as an afterthought published by newspapers for their readers’ consideration.

Now these statistics have spawned a major industry all of their own, with billions (with a “B”) spent annually on fantasy sports and a new class of fans called, variously, “statheads,” “sabermetricians,” and a few other things I can’t print here. The Los Angeles chapter of the Society for American Baseball Research is named, appropriately, in Roth’s honor.

In recognition for his contributions to the game, Roth — who was born in Montreal in 1917 — will be inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame on Saturday.

In his excellent (and highly recommended) book, The Numbers Game: Baseball’s Lifelong Fascination with Statistics, Alan Schwarz offers major props:

The first full-time statistician ever hired by a major league club, Roth spent his days churning out figures that no one had ever seen before: runners advanced and bunting success rates; batting averages in every ball-strike count; and performance against lefty and righty hitters or pitchers. He kept diagrams of where each hitter’s hits went, what we know call “spray charts.” Every one of the 40,000 pitches in Brooklyn’s season called for up to a dozen notations onto Roth’s yellow legal pad, which he then collated for hours after every game, all so he could discover any little edge the Dodgers could exploit.

It’s worth noting that in the 18 years Roth was with the team, the Dodgers finished in first or second place 13 times. “Allan Roth was as vital to Branch Rickey as Robin was to Batman,” said Schwarz, a writer for The New York Times.

(Burton and Bonita Boxerman also devote a chapter to Roth in their book, Jews and Baseball, Vol. 2: The Post-Greenberg Years, 1949-2008.)

The Brooklyn Dodgers’ top minor league team was based in Montreal, which Roth followed as a kid, already keeping track of all sorts of numbers. At the age of 27, he finally made his move, seeking out general manager, Branch Rickey, one of the most progressive thinkers in the game.

Schwarz writes:

Roth “showed up at spring training in Bear Mountain, New York, and cornered [Rickey] at his restaurant table. Roth showed Rickey his data on RBI percentage. He flashed the Dodgers batters’ records against lefty and right pitchers, numbers the Brooklyn boss had never seen. As soon as Roth got his visa, which took two years, Rickey hired him.”

An interesting sidebar: Roth’s arrival to the big leagues came on the heels of Jackie Robinson, another Rickey “innovation.”

Like a lot of new ideas, Roth’s groundbreaking work wasn’t immediately embraced or accepted. “Old school” managers and executives didn’t take kindly to this bespectacled little Jewish bookworm — who wasn’t even an American, dammit! They knew the game and didn’t need facts getting in the way. Roth would deliver page upon page of numbers to manager Charlie Dressen, who “would say thank you, wait until the door closed behind Roth, and shove the papers in the trash,” Schwarz reports. And remember, this was in the days before computers and spreadsheets.

After Rickey left the Dodgers in 1950, Roth fell out of favor and instead of delivering his work to the front office, it was suggested he distribute his work to the press corps, who were most appreciative. After all, what’s a game without a healthy smattering of stats to fill in the dead spots?

Roth resigned from the Dodgers in 1964 and became the head stats man for NBC’s Game of the Week, a job he held until the early ’80s when he moved over to ABC.

Roth died in 1992 at the age of 74.

“Long before there was Mary Poppins, there was Allan Roth,” said the legendary Vin Scully. “If you had some question that came to you in the middle of a game, he would reach down into his bag and the next thing you knew, you’d have your answer. It was marvelous!”

Roth was featured in a 10-page story in Life Magazine in 1954, and was editor of Who’s Who in Baseball from 1955-71.