Are the Futures of Empirical Legal Studies and "Moneyball" (Sabremetrics) Joined at the Hip?

Dave Hoffman (Temple) has an interesting post at Concurring Opinions that considers whether ELS and sabremetrics are destined to suffer from similar futures. Dave worries that: "sabermetricians are devoting oodles of time to ever-more-complex formulae which add only a small amount of predictive power, but which make the discipline more remote from lay understanding, and thus less practically useful.   Basically: the jargonification of a field." Although I hope Dave's worry is misplaced I understand his point. That said, perhaps awareness of a challenge ex ante can help reduce the probability of it presenting.