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sion. The most famous retired number is 42. That was worn by Jackie Robinson, who in 1947 became the first African-American play- er in the Majors in the 20 th century. In 1997, on the 50 th anniversary of his appearance, Major League Baseball retired number 42 for all teams for all time, showing clearly how a number can become a symbol. Stats, of Course P layers wear numbers on their backs , but they make numbers on the field. Statistics are the lifeblood of most sports. Statis- tics is actually a complete branch of higher mathematics, studied in upper high school and college. The techniques used in those studies have migrated into sports in new and amazing ways. We’ll look at some of them in each chapter, as stats have different applica- tions for each part of the sports world. For athletes, stats are a way to measure their success. They track how they’re doing just as fans and team owners and managers are doing. But for players, those stats are more personal. They don’t need to get involved in the higher math of calculating obscure new stats (see page 25). They focus on the stats that drive their success: points, speed, time, distance, etc. Track-and-field athletes aim for PRs: per- sonal records. They can see how much they

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