Joba's Workouts

Not the first name that comes to mind when you think of ESPN The Magazine's "Body Issue" but they have a quick video of Mr. Chamberlain doing some running around the Oakland Coliseum as part of his training regiment. There's also a picture and a quick blurb of you go here and click on number 4.

I'm with Joba on this one. When I go running, I always try to mix up the terrain and scenery to keep it interesting. When I lived on the Upper West Side I would hit up The Ramble in Central Park while everyone else ran the prescribed loops that encircled it. Likewise, why run laps in the outfield when the stands in every park are unique? It gives you the freedom to alter the route as you go, the downside is that pretty much impossible to keep track of how far you've ran. But I think we can agree that any amount of running is an improvement over this Joba.

"The Secrets Of Dork Elvis Will Be Mine"

I'm hesitant to make a tradition out of this, because it's beyond trite and cliched for a blog called "Fack Youk" to FJM Bill Simmons. It's completely unoriginal in two distinct ways. (-2 x -2 = 4??)

But again this week, he hit the lowest common denominator, "stats are for nerds". Reading that kind of lazy, anti-intellectual bullshit from a crotchety old newspaper hack is one thing, but from fantasy sports devotee who constantly references the current season of the Real World?

The Sports Guy is a unique case, because he bridges the gap between the old school and new school of sports writing. He pumps out content like a blogger but has the the rigid weekly schedule of a newspaper columnist. He made his name on the internet, but loves intangibles and greatness and as you will see in this column, considers any sort of statistical analysis dorky. And just like two weeks ago, right after he is finished reinforcing that stigma, makes suggestions for new interesting stats.

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Never come between an NBA stat geek and the truth.

A few weeks ago, I spent a Saturday at MIT's Sloan Sports Analytics Conference, or as I dubbed it, Dorkapalooza 2009!

I'd save the "Dorkapalooza 2009!" tag for something like this. Or this. It's only March.

A slew of statistical rock stars showed up: Dean Oliver, Aaron Schatz, John Hollinger. Panels argued topics like "Where are basketball analytics headed?" and "What's more important, coming up with a cool formula or kissing a girl?"

Rick Reilly approves this message.

The hottest celeb? My friend Daryl Morey, the Rockets GM, who was hounded by MIT students as if he were Britney among the paparazzi. I dubbed him Dork Elvis. Even he admitted that was funny. Begrudgingly.

How I imagine that going down:

Simmons: [Breathlessly] Daryl, Daryl... I can't believe how everyone is following you around this place trying to talk to you...

Morey: That's probably because they all knew I was going to be here and read the article Michael Lewis wrote about me for the New York Times a of couple weeks ago.

Simmons: You are a rock star. Like the Nerdy John Lennon. Or the Geeky Bono. Or the Dweeby Dave Matthews. No, I've got it... You are DORK ELVIS. Can we all agree that Daryl Morey is DORK ELVIS??!!?

Morey: I mean, it doesn't have anything to do with basketball...

Simmons: DORK ELVIS!!! Is that NOT hilarious?!??!

Morey: Yes, Bill. I suppose it is somewhat funny.


That's the thing about stat geeks: They have a sense of humor about themselves.

They have a sense of humor because they "begrudgingly" admit Bill Simmons' jokes are funny. Why stat "geeks", exactly? These guys are creating cutting edge statistical techniques to break down and quantify a very fluid, fast-paced sport played by some of the sickest athletes on earth. That sounds pretty cool to me.

And yes, I count myself among them.

Why does he throw himself into the nerds/geeks/dorks category? You know he doesn't think of himself that way. Aren't those terms more relevant to some one's personality type and social disposition? There is noting inherently nerdy about systematically drilling down into a topic like sports, which by most people's standards is about as far from geekdom as one can get. It's not like these guys are trying to calculate the Expected Value for plays in Magic the Gathering.

I played entire Microleague baseball seasons on my 1984 Apple and kept handwritten stats.

Okay, that's pretty nerdy.

I've played fantasy baseball since 1982. I frequent the Prospectus sites and devour their books. I try to hide my inner geek, but believe me, it lurks.

Yes, try to hide that intellectual curiosity. It will do wonders for your analytical sports columns.

Remember, I'm the guy who figured out Hickory High's title-game box score.

How could we forget?

In my mind, basketball lends itself to the perfect blend of objectivity and subjectivity. Statistics help only so much; we still have to interpret what we see.

Which is totally different than say, baseball, where there is nothing to interpret or read between the lines.

I hear that some NBA teams factor "clock-saving attempts" into adjusted shooting percentages. But do they share that info? Of course not. And that's what's wrong with this revolution: We have access to only some of the data.

It's been said that a lot of baseball teams have their own sophisticated methods of defensive analysis that they keep secret from the public, and more importantly, other clubs. Because that would, you know, sacrifice their competitive advantage and defeat the entire purpose of creating the system.

There's one problem with that: Baseball isn't basketball. It's an individual sport; teammates don't matter unless they can help get PEDs. (Sorry, I had to.)

No, you didn't. You (presumably) typed this at a computer. You could have very easily applied the backspace or delete button and removed those six words (or the three unnecessary ones in parentheses).

Every conceivable diamond talent can be measured objectively.

Can you measure a pick-off move "objectively"? Bunting? A catcher's ability to call a game? A third baseman's arm? A reliever's ability to hold runners on?

There is a long way to go before defensive metrics can be considered objective. John Dewan's Fielding Bible is great, but the methodology is still subjective [emphasis mine]:

Video Scouts at BIS review video of every play of every major league game and record detailed information on each play, such as the location of each batted ball, the speed, the type of hit, etc.

It's still a scout's eye, just more methodically applied. UZR is objective but still somewhat crude in terms of measuring defense, especially in the infield where Baseball Info Solutions locations data are less accurate.

I thought Derek Jeter was a great shortstop until the defensive stats told me otherwise.

I thought he was when I still lived in Boston and couldn't watch him play every night. Eventually you notice that, aside from the step-throw maneuver, Jeter doesn't make that many impressive plays and a lot of balls seem to get by him.

Like every other forward-thinking GM, he considers numbers not a sacred evaluation tool but rather part of a bigger process: How can we calculate the best way to win?

This isn't a phenomenon contained to "forward-thinking" GMs. Steve fucking Phillips probably thought stats were "part of a bigger process". No one thinks numbers are a "sacred evaluation tool", whatever that means.

Does it not bother anyone else that certain teams meticulously keep track of and hoard those moments? It's valuable data that would give us all a better understanding of what we're watching.

No, it literally does not bother anyone else.

In fact, that's what made Dorkapalooza so much fun. But one thing we all agreed on was that the basketball revolution will be much rockier than baseball's.

Are you shitting me? Please show me one column by a basketball writer who thinks statistics are ruining the game? ONE. Now go to FJM and start from the begining. Baseball is fraught with traditionalist fans and writers who have fought and continue to fight the movement tooth and nail.

It's not as simple as embracing WHIP and OPS or creating watershed, easy-to-prove stats like VORP and PECOTA.

Rough estimate, but I'd say that that 75-80% of baseball fans don't embrace WHIP or OPS. You won't find too many of them in the blogoverse, but you will in the stands. I'm not sure what good "proving" VORP or PETCOA would be, but I know it wouldn't be "easy".

NBA teams need to stop acting like they're protecting nuclear info during the Cold War. Aren't we in this together?

No...? Every NBA team, by definition is in it for themselves. Why should they give a shit if a very select few die hard fans want to know their advanced statistics? They league has them by the balls anyway, they really don't need to appease them by disclosing proprietary information. Do other businesses disclose their secrets to their customers...

When I asked Daryl that before begging for a few secret stats, he laughed the way Frank might if you asked for his RedHot sauce recipe. In other words, not a chance.

Shocking. You mean he wouldn't disclose his competitive advantages to one of the most popular sports writers in America?

Next year I'm returning to Dorkapalooza, strapping a recorder to my chest and getting him drunk on tequila -- or laser-printer fumes.

The secrets of Dork Elvis will be mine.

What, your laser printer doesn't fume?

/Morey files restraining order

Has She Won 6 WNBA Championships?

"Their degree of greatness doesn't matter, just the greatness itself."

Maybe a pregnant Candace Parker being on the cover of the new ESPN The Magazine started me off on the wrong foot, but I couldn't help but FJM Bill Simmons' column.

I'm hoping The Sports Guy didn't write the headline...

You don't need stats to know greatness. Meryl taught me that.

...because his entire column seeks to undermine it.

Only 59 years old, Streep has been in 40 movies (stat) (not including voice-overs and cameos), taken home Oscars for Sophie's Choice (best actress) and Kramer vs. Kramer (best supporting actress) (stat) and drawn 13 other nominations (stat). She's been nominated for 23 Golden Globes (stat) and won six (stat). She has two Emmys (stat).

If we called age "Years Lived (YL)", that would be a stat too. Just like the people rail against "advanced" statistics in baseball, Simmons rips off a bunch of numbers that when strung together give you an idea of how good of an actress Meryl Streep is, but individually are fairly arbitrary and incomplete. If only someone could devise a better analytical technique...

Only Katharine Hepburn had a more decorated career -- four Oscars and 12 nominations in all -- but Streep has a lot of years left to pass her.

Hang on to that, because we are going to need it later.

Statistics allow us to compare players with one another, follow their peaks and valleys, determine which are most responsible for their team's success. Hollywood doesn't work like that.

Well, yeah it kind of does. This entire column is about actors' peaks and valleys. It's just that the "teams" come together temporarily and are disbanded when production of a movie is finished. You can't determine that the producer, director, and starring actors are mostly responsible for the success of a movie?

It's an industry of extremes -- this movie had the biggest opening weekend, this guy made the most money, this woman used to be terrific until she went crazy -- that hinges on what everyone believes, not on what can be proved.

I'm pretty sure which "movie had the biggest weekend" and which "guy made the most money" can be proved.

At some point in his career [Jack Nicholson] broke into the greatest actors club, the membership of which we have all subconsciously agreed upon. We know who the best actors are. We just do. It's why Hollywood has never built a Hall of Fame. We don't need it.

You know there is a Hollywood Walk of Fame, right?

Sports are objective (you win or you lose), whereas movies are almost entirely subjective.

All of the numbers you've cited for movies are "win or lose" (Oscars, Emmys, Golden Globes). And movies are so subjective that we can all "subconsciously agree upon" the membership of the "greatest actors club"?

If the Oscars were reliable, they would help us create a formula that enabled us to rank actors of all eras.

Well, Nate Silver created a formula to predict this year's Oscars using past results and they were fairly reliable. I wouldn't expect you to know anything about that though, because you don't read blogs.

Well, what if we tried anyway?

Then it would completely contradict the title of this column?

Let's make best actor/actress nods worth seven points and nominations worth three. Then let's make best supporting actor/actress nods worth three and nominations worth one(...)

Top 13 actors: Nicholson (38); Spencer Tracy (35); Laurence Olivier (32); Marlon Brando (30); Hoffman, Newman (29); Jack Lemmon (28); Peter O'Toole (24); Gary Cooper, Hanks, Penn (23); De Niro and Pacino (22).

>8

Are you happy with those rankings? Me too! I'm a genius! Yeah, Pacino and De Niro should be higher, but they were robbed in '74 and '76, so their stats make sense.

That, and like you said about Meryl Streep, their careers aren't over. But why would this part of the column agree with another? That would totally shatter the precedent you've established.

Other than that, I have no major qualms besides a failure to account for iconic performances like De Niro's in Raging Bull (should it be worth 10?)...

No major qualms with the system you just arbitrarily created? I mean, I'd like to think that you read this once or twice after you wrote it. You probably could have gone back and worked it in.

Now, if you feel like getting your supernerd on, you could figure out Simmons Points on a per-film basis by dividing SPs by movies made... a Hollinger-like AER (actor's efficiency rating) ... or even VODM (like baseball's value over replacement player, only it would be value over Dermot Mulroney).

Why does it have to be me getting my "supernerd on", Bill? You are the one who just named the fucking statistic you just created after yourself. Why do you have to deflect the "statistics are nerdy" stigma, dude? Because fantasy sports are so much cooler?

But that's not the point. We've had ample time to figure this all out, and we've never bothered.

Maybe the reason that we've never bothered is because acting is not quantifiable unless you want to start tallying things like "lines spoken" or "scenes appeared in".

The numbers that you've cited throughout this column (award nominations and victories) are just like measuring an athlete by the number of championships won. Award shows each happen once a year. Being nominated is sort of like making the playoffs. There are an incredible number of variables that go into making a movie aside from that person's performance, most of which are well beyond their control.

We never felt the need to validate Brando's brilliance by raving that he's the most consecutively nominated leading actor (four, from 1951 to '54), nor do we pimp Nicholson by pointing out that he's the only living actor with three Oscars.

Those are some really interesting stats you just used to indicate greatness. That's not what Meryl taught you.

Those guys are legends. Their degree of greatness doesn't matter, just the greatness itself.

Yes, once you surpass the Greatness Threshold (GT) it doesn't matter. Which of course is why you began this column proclaiming Meryl Streep as the "greatest living actor" and state your case with absolute certainty.

Maybe we overthink this stuff. The truth is, either you're great or you're not.

And I think that we can all subconsciously agree that Bill Simmons' is great.

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Here's what I don't understand: He makes up a pretty interesting system, finds some holes in it, and even goes as far as to create more insightful ways of looking at it. And right after he does that, he just shoots it down all in the name of "stats are for nerds". Then he wraps up by stating a fucking stupid truism: "either you're great or you're not"? Thanks for that, Bill.

Why couldn't he write the column and actually try to create some sort of a rubric for measuring actors against each other? It would have been interesting. The crux of it is already in there, just trapped inside a two inch coating of condescending bullshit.

Coughlin: Easy There Jerry

Again, from Ralph Vacchiano, Coughlin had this to say when confronted with Jerry Reese's quote that Plaxico could "absolutley" return to the Giants:

You know what? I'm not ready to say that. I'm not ready to say that because we need to sit down and think about it and talk about that and see what the circumstance might be. And I told everyone, I told the world, that Plaxico is a member of our team and I am concerned about him, for his well-being and that of his family. But the issues that I have to think about are that there are 52 other guys in that locker room as well."

Let's not forget that Plaxico goes to trial in March and by the time the season rolls around, this could be a non-issue because he's wearing a different uniform all together. He retained Benjamin Braffman, who got P. Diddy off of his 1999 gun & bribery charge stemming from an shooting in a Manhattan nightclub, but the three year mandatory sentence still looms.

I think if you are a Giants fan, you should be concerned for him. Only a few weeks before the incident, ESPN The Magazine had a cover story called Living Scared which talked about the increasing occurence of crimes against athletes including Sean Taylor's death, the Darrent Williams shooting and the robberies of Eddie Curry and Antoine Walker. Only a week before, teammate Steve Smith had been robbed at gunpoint outside of his house, which is something I'd imagine Burress was aware of.

This in no way excuses him for carrying a gun in Manhattan. Steve Smith's situation probably would have gotten a whole lot uglier if he was packing. As it was, he gave up a cell phone, some cash and a little jewlery. He's probably got insurance, and if not, that stuff is pretty expendable. If Plax was afraid, he should have gotten a bodyguard or pooled together with A.P. for a full security detail. He just siged a $35M contract, so I think he could have dropped a little scratch if he legitmatley feared for his life and still really felt the need to go out.

I don't think he brought the gun to play the role of Mr. Big Shot and be a tough guy in the club. I can sit here and call it ridiculous (which I pretty much did), but nobody knows how real the threat floating around in his mind seemed, except him. The guy has some issues. I'm guessing he's too proud to sit down with a therapist and make any headway, but he could probably use it.

He made a really dumb mistake and luckily no one else got hurt. I hope one awful decision doesn't ruin his whole life, but his time with the Giants has come and gone.