The Nemesis
Semper Tyrannus
with respect, your analogy doesn't make sense. baserunning has to do with investing in the home, and something about kitchen and bathroom renovations and people that do nothing not adding value. I'm really not sure what direction you're trying to take it. A more apt homebuyer/baseball player analogy would be something like different improvement/value boosting aspects for renovations represent different skills each contributing to the overall value of the home, and you could say that something like garage renos are baserunning/stealing because they're not something everyone looks for, but they can add a lot of value to someone for whom that part of the house is valuable (a person who works on cars a lot) similarly steals aren't something that every team values high in their acquisitions compared to contact, power, defence, etc, but they're highly valuable to someone that wants to add speed. But even then it's still a clumsy analogy. I don't even like making this "you could use the analogy like this:" statement because it's so clunky.
It's not like baserunning ability is ignored in stats, it's just not featured in SLG/OPS because those stats aren't meant for baserunning. What you're saying is akin to saying that strikeouts should be factored into WHIP because a high ability to strike guys out makes the guys that get on base less of a concern since strikeouts don't give them a chance to advance like outs in the field to. But like this stealing/SLG suggestion, it ignores that the stat (WHIP in this case, SLG/OPS in the other) was created specifically for another purpose not tied to the element that's proposed to effect it (strikeouts or steals).
If you want to judge someone's ability to impact the game with steals, look at their baserunning stats and look at their on base stats and use both. There's a point where continuing to streamline stats doesn't serve any useful purpose.
What? Billy Beane didn't make WAR nor do I imagine he has his own framework for WAR. And I imagine that they have a wide net in terms of the stats they use to analyze players that includes steals and baserunning. I like WAR, but it's a conversation piece first and foremost. If you're going to start pulling out a mass of stats (as would be smart for something as important as actual baseball decision making), WAR becomes less valuable since you're going to be including many of WAR's components and WAR essentially starts doubling up on analysis.
and FWIW, steals have traditionally been a low-priority target for the A's and Beane because it's something that is valued so highly around the rest of baseball. Teams around the league tend to pay a premium for fast players that rack up steals, so it makes no sense for hte A's to spend money there when they can more efficiently use that money to purchase other undervalued skillsets and get more mileage out of their dollar. Maybe eventually speed on the basepaths will become a cheaper option the way defence has to some degree, but it hasn't really happened yet.
