About WOBAR
One number. Every player. The whole game.
Baseball has no universal standard for measuring player performance. WOBAR was created on the basis that every player deserves to be evaluated accurately, by providing a dynamic rating based on results, competition, and context.
The game has never been short on numbers. Batting average, OPS, ERA, WAR, each measures a sliver of it, and each lives on its own scale. You can't set a hitter next to a pitcher. You can't read one at a glance without a footnote.
WOBAR is a single number. It rates every hitter and every pitcher on the same scale, and it earns that number the only honest way, by reading what actually happened on the field.
start here
Everyone begins at 100
Every player starts each season at exactly 100.000.
100 is the starting line, not a grade. From the first pitch, the number moves. Do more than your starting self and it climbs. Do less and it falls.
So you never have to ask whether a rating is “good.” You only have to ask how far it sits from 100, and who else is up there. A 139 means a player has pulled 39 points clear of where everyone began the year. A 94 means the season has cost them ground.
- Above average performance
- Average performance
- Below average performance
Everyone opened the season on the same line, the distance from 100 is what each has earned since.
what makes it different
It reacts. It doesn't tally.
Most stats count. WOBAR reacts.
Every plate appearance is a contest between one hitter and one pitcher, and the result moves both ratings at once. A home run lifts the hitter and dings the pitcher. A strikeout does the reverse. The two numbers are always pulling each other toward the truth.
That's why context isn't a footnote here, it's built into every play. Beating a top-rated pitcher is worth more than the same hit off a weak one. A bases-loaded swing in a tie game late counts for more than a solo shot in a blowout. And a full season steadies the number, so a hot week never tells the whole story.
How it works
Pure statistics, every play
Traditional rankings lean on opinion. WOBAR reads the actual events of the game and lets the data set the standing. Four things shape how far a rating moves on any given play.
Every play counts
A rating moves on each plate appearance for both the hitter and the pitcher. A home run, a strikeout, a walk: each shifts the number in its own direction and magnitude.
Opponent strength
Beating a top-rated pitcher earns more than the same hit off a weak one and costs that pitcher more. Ratings pull each other toward the truth.
Game situation
Leverage matters. A bases loaded swing in a tie game late counts for far more than a solo shot in a blowout. The moment amplifies the change.
Park & body of work
Environment is accounted for park factor, altitude, home or away. And a full season of games steadies the rating, so a hot week never tells the whole story.
why it matters
One scale, top to bottom
WOBAR runs across MLB, Triple-A, Double-A, and High-A. A hitter and a pitcher can be compared directly. So can two players who never shared a field.
Ratings are kept honest by level: a player called up from Triple-A starts fresh at 100 in the majors, and his Triple-A rating waits for him if he heads back down. We don't pretend a Double-A number and a big-league number carry the same weight, they live on their own ladders, each starting from the same line.
the story
Why WOBAR exists
WOBAR started from a simple frustration: the numbers we use to argue about baseball were never built to be compared. A .340 batting average looks like greatness. But the box score never asks who was standing on the mound. Pad it against tired bullpens and back-end starters and .340 says one thing, face the best arms in the game and that same hitter might be sitting at .145. Two different players, one identical number. The stat can't tell them apart, so it tells you nothing about the moments that actually decide games. WOBAR was built to close that gap.
No opinions. Just the game.