Which baseball league has had the best hitters? Many of us have heard of baseball greats like Stan Musial, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, and Pete Rose of the National League and Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Rod Carew, and Wade Boggs of the American League. But have you ever heard of Willie Keeler, who batted .432 for the Baltimore Orioles, or Nap Lajoie, who batted .422 for the Philadelphia A's? The batting averages for the batting champions of the National and American Leagues are given on the Course Mate Web site. The batting averages for the National League begin in 1876 with Roscoe Barnes, whose batting average was .403 when he played with the Chicago Cubs. The last entry for the National League is for the year 2010, when Carlos Gonzalez of the Colorado Rockies averaged .336. The American League records begin in 1901 with Nap Lajoie of the Philadelphia A's, who batted .422, and end in 2010 with Josh Hamilton of the Texas Rangers, who batted .359. How can we summarize the information in this data set?
1. Use MS Excel, MINITAB, or another statistical software package to describe the batting averages for the American and National League batting champions. Generate any graphics that may help you in interpreting these data sets.
2. Does one league appear to have a higher percentage of hits than the other? Do the batting averages of one league appear to be more variable than the other?
3. Are there any outliers in either league?
4. Summarize your comparison of the two baseball leagues.