Gross Production Average or GPA is a baseball statistic created in 2003 by Aaron Gleeman

Aaron Gleeman

Aaron Gleeman is the Senior Baseball Editor at Rotoworld and owner of a popular blog, aarongleeman.com. He also currently writes for Rotoworld and NBC Sports. He was the co-founder and main operator of the baseball statistics website, The Hardball Times before leaving to write for NBC Sports...

, as a refinement of On-Base Plus Slugging

On-base plus slugging

On-base plus slugging is a sabermetric baseball statistic calculated as the sum of a player's on-base percentage and slugging percentage. The ability of a player to both get on base and to hit for power, two important hitting skills, are represented. An OPS of .900 or higher in Major League...

 (OPS). GPA attempts to solve two frequently cited problems with OPS. First, OPS gives equal weight to its two components, On Base Percentage

On base percentage

In baseball statistics, on-base percentage is a measure of how often a batter reaches base for any reason other than a fielding error, fielder's choice, dropped/uncaught third strike, fielder's obstruction, or catcher's interference In baseball statistics, on-base percentage (OBP) (sometimes...

 (OBP) and Slugging Percentage (SLG). In fact, OBP contributes significantly more to scoring runs than SLG does. Sabermetricians have calculated that OBP is about 80% more valuable than SLG. A second problem with OPS is that it generates numbers on a scale unfamiliar to most baseball fans. For all the problems with a traditional stat like batting average

Batting average

Batting average is a statistic in both cricket and baseball that measures the performance of cricket batsmen and baseball hitters. The two statistics are related in that baseball averages are directly descended from the concept of cricket averages.- Cricket :...

 (AVG), baseball fans immediately know that a player batting .365 is significantly better than average, while a player batting .167 is significantly below average. But many fans don't immediately know how good a player with a 1.013 OPS is.

The basic formula for GPA is:

Unlike OPS, this formula both gives proper relative weight to its two component statistics and generates a number that falls on a scale similar to the familiar batting average scale.

See also

• On-base plus slugging
  On-base plus slugging
  On-base plus slugging is a sabermetric baseball statistic calculated as the sum of a player's on-base percentage and slugging percentage. The ability of a player to both get on base and to hit for power, two important hitting skills, are represented. An OPS of .900 or higher in Major League...
  
  
• On-base percentage
• Slugging percentage
• Batting average
  Batting average
  Batting average is a statistic in both cricket and baseball that measures the performance of cricket batsmen and baseball hitters. The two statistics are related in that baseball averages are directly descended from the concept of cricket averages.- Cricket :...
  
  
• Sabermetrics
  Sabermetrics
  Sabermetrics is the specialized analysis of baseball through objective, empirical evidence, specifically baseball statistics that measure in-game activity. The term is derived from the acronym SABR, which stands for the Society for American Baseball Research...
  
  
• Weighted on-base average
  WOBA
  In baseball, wOBA is a statistic, based on linear weights, designed to measure a player's overall offensive contributions per plate appearance. It is formed from taking the observed run values of various offensive events, dividing by a player's plate appearances, and scaling the result to be on...
  
  

External links

• New Baseball Statistic, With a Nod to an Old Standard NYT Article of February 25, 2007 explaining GPA.