162 > 3: In Defense Of Ron Gardenhire

Postseason baseball can be a thrilling month-long adventure, or it could be a terrible trip that lasts less than a week. A six month season will be judged on what happens to a team against top-tier competition under pressure-packed conditions in what can be as few as three games. Some players who have a terrible year can totally redeem themselves with a few big hits in a postseason series while others who have done yeoman's work since April can turn into a goat because of a split-second reaction in the outfield, one pitch left over the plate or a feeble at-bat with runners in scoring position.

The same goes for managers. A skipper can be viewed as a genius or a dummy after the fact, based on how he aligned his rotation, filled out his lineup card or inserted his relievers into a game. Or in this case, just the end results of three games against a superior team.

Take it away, David Pinto:

FIRE RON GARDENHIRE

Ron Gardenhire has now lost 12 straight playoff games. He’s been swept by the Yankees two years in a row. If he were the Yankees manager, he would have been fired last season. I really don’t care how well the team has done under him.

I believe what Pinto is trying to get at here is that he doesn't care how they've done during the regular season under Gardenhire, which of course is incredibly stupid. Regardless of how much you think a manager can influence a baseball game, 162 of them tells you a whole lot more about someone's abilities as a manager than three nights in October do.

Managers just don't have the ability to affect games over the short term, unless they want to pick a pitcher from High-A ball to start Game 1 of the series, pencil players into the wrong defensive positions and order them to bat from the opposite side of the plate they are accustomed to. Good managers are skilled at steering the ship over a interminable season and making good decisions that will work out well in the long run, but simply can't exert much pressure in the span of three games without trying to throw the series.

I'm sure losing 12 straight playoff games absolutely sucks for the Twins' organization and their fanbase, but what does the 2004 ALDS have to do with the series that concluded last night? Do you know how many players started games for the Twins in both series? Two. Michael Cuddyer, and Jason Kubel, and they might actually be the same person.

Pinto's not done yet:

The Twins team is good, but they need to be sent a message that getting swept every year is unacceptable. Firing Gardenhire will send that message.

I'm pretty sure that the Twins are aware that getting swept every year in unacceptable. Does this look like a bunch of dudes who are thrilled to be starting their offseason already?

What exactly has Gardenhire done to deserve being fired? What thing that was under his control did he screw up? Did he start someone that deserved to be benched? Was it the way he set up the starting rotation? A boneheaded bullpen move?

It's not any of those, of course. Pinto is just judging Gardy in black and white terms, which is something that a casual fan or George Steinbrenner at his most impulsive would do, not someone who goes by the Twitter handle @StatsGuru.

It's not like Gardenhire has some "Marty Ball" scheme and manages differently in the playoffs. It's not as if he has a pregame ritual wherein he runs around the clubhouse wearing only an unbuttoned Harmon Killebrew jersey screaming at the top of his lungs, which renders his pitching staff incapable of holding a lead.

The Twins, however, need someone ruthless in the playoffs who can find a way to win not only a game, but a series.

What "ruthless" mystery manager is going to be able to lead the Twins to postseason glory and by what means? Should we exhume John McGraw so he can get into a fistfight with an umpire? Perhaps an undead Gus Schmeltz would be willing to whip every fielder who makes an error with a riding crop and force the team to take batting practice using a lead pipe and jagged rocks.

Because THAT would send a message, goddammit. And that message would read, "The Minnesota Twins don't understand the concept of small sample sizes or the role that luck can play in a short playoff series, so they fired one of the best managers in baseball in favor of a sadistic zombie. Muthaphuckkkazzz1!!!!!"

10 (Bad) Reasons Spring Training Is "Better" Than The Regular Season

I've never been to Spring Training. I wanted to make the trip this year, but couldn't really find anyone to go with and didn't have the gumption or disposable income to go down by myself as a strictly blog-related solo adventure. But I'm sure it would be a lot of fun.

Whether you are in Florida or Arizona this time of year, you are treated to a unique kind of baseball experience. As a fan you're much closer to the action and you get to see a lot of the team's prospects who will be distributed throughout the farm system when the season rolls around. You're there for the batting practice and long toss and all the other stuff that you don't usually get to see from April - October, especially from your couch. The weather is obviously much nicer than it is here in the Northeast which a considerable benefit after being subjected to three months of temperatures around or below freezing. Blog friends Kevin Kaduk and Craig Calcaterra both made the most out of their time hopping around the Grapefruit and Cactus Leagues and produced some great material when they were down there.

So Spring Training is cool. It's different. But no one would actually say that it's better than the regular season. Would they?

Ladies and gentlemen, Ron Chimelis of MassLive.com would:

Once these teams head north, the air will be deflated out of my baseball balloon. In July, when others are setting their watches to the trade deadline, I will long for the carefree days of March, when the sport was at its most special and most pure.

Special? Yes, it's different than the regular season. Pure? Sure, if you're referring to the fact that it's not clouded by things like "competition", "excitement" and "anyone actually giving a shit". Being 8 years old was "carefree" and "special" and "pure", but it also sucked because you had no money, couldn't drive a car, your parents told you when you had to go to bed and no one really listened to what you had to say.

1. The ballparks. Not only are they cozy, they are named for people who have evidently done something worthwhile in their communities... It's much better than visiting stadiums named for multi-national corporations that were in the news when the nation's economy started going down the port-a-potty.

You get to see Major League players in what is typically a minor league setting, that's cool. But I assume you are referring to Citi Field? Well, the Mets just renamed their Spring Training facility "Digital Domain Park". I'm sure Mr. Domain has done some fantastic work in the Port St. Lucie area.

2. When a slugger hits a 440-foot homer, we can say it's because the pitcher was a 19-year-old kid who was buying a tux for his prom last year, not because the hitter was juiced.

Is that what you say when a person hits a massive home run, Ron? That they are "juiced"? I usually say something like "Wow, that was a bomb". Instead of trying to divine whether or not a player is taking performance enhancing drugs based on the distance of their home runs, I would recommend just trying to enjoy the game all year round.

3. The fans are universally nice. Most patrons, including those who line up at 8 a.m. to see what tickets are available, are either living on retirement money or on vacation.

Well... good for them? I don't attend baseball games to interact with courteous people. I go to see baseball players play baseball. And I definitely don't care how nice the people at the park are if I'm watching at home.

4. Lineups where the lowest uniform number is 67. I'd love the scorecard concession for these games.

If I wanted to watch a bunch of minor leaguers play, I'd watch a minor league game.

5. Parking for $5.

It's Florida and Arizona, parking should be free. In New York, thanks to the subway and the Metro North you don't even have to drive. You can even park your bike at Yankee Stadium now! What about the cheaper tickets and concessions? Sorry folks, Ron's in the press box so he doesn't care about what might matter to you the reader/fan. THIS IS RON'S LIST, SUCKERS!

6. Common sense. The umpires called a Red Sox-Astros game in the eighth inning Sunday after a 16-minute rain delay.

Common sense? Well in the regular season, it's sort of important that everyone plays the same amount of games, you know, for the playoffs and stuff. If it rains, they aren't just going to call it quits because the beat writers want to go home.

7. Fans who gloat about the Florida weather. This really annoyed me at first, but now I find it rather entertaining.

Nothing could be more relevant to a game of baseball than the fans talking about the weather. And everyone loves repetitive gloating about something they are not in any way responsible for!

8. Parking for $5. So good, I'm listing it twice.

It's much more likely that you couldn't think of another flimsy point to support your weak premise and instead of billing the piece as "9 things...", you copped out and repeated yourself.

9. The delightful contradiction over how much performance matters.

This is actually the worst part, by far, about Spring Training.

10. Interleague games that don't offend purists' sensibilities, split-squad games, games against Northeastern University and Boston College. You don't get this variety once the real games start.

There are plenty of good reasons that you don't get split-squad games against college teams when the regular season starts. No one wants that kind of "variety". If you want to see Bahston Cawledge and Nawtheastahn, then go down to fackin' Chestnut Hill.

I get what Ron is trying to get at here. He had a good time down in Florida and doesn't mind mailing in a hacky column proving just that. The problem is that most of his readers likely didn't go down to Florida and don't give a shit about the $5 parking, the nice weather, friendly people, or the ballpark names. They just want the season to start and the games to matter.

11 days.

Mondays With Curtis

Mitch Albom is very good at writing about "life". Life in quotation marks is inspiring and fits neatly into books which sell lots of copies and get turned into TV movies. "Life" teaches you important lessons about compassion and morality and kindness and faith and - most prominently in Albom's books - death. Unfortunately, baseball has little to do with "life" and everything to do with reality, so Mitch isn't very good at writing about it.

In his column in the Detroit Free Press yesterday, Albom tries to talk those Tiger fans who are distraught about the loss of Curtis Granderson down from the ledge. It's an admirable goal since Detroit lost the de facto face of their franchise and a guy who is by all accounts a very likable person. Except Mitch chooses to pretend that Granderson was never good in order to do so.

What did we know about Curtis Granderson? He had a great smile. He had a foundation. He made a few highlight plays in centerfield and had a good first half and a not-so-good second half in 2009.

That's what someone who is a casual fan of say, the Marlins knows about Curtis Granderson. We (as the supposed audience of this column - Detroit Tigers' fans) actually know a lot more about him than that. We know that in 2007 he hit 23 triples, 23 home runs and stole 26 bases while being caught only once which is pretty fucking amazing. We know that he's hit 94 home runs over the past 4 years which is great for a center fielder. We know that he is a pretty awesome player who doesn't cost that much money, neither of which are things that Dontrelle Wills, Jeremy Bonderman or Nate Robertson can say.

He'll also be 29 years old. Been an All-Star once.

Well he is 28 years old, so like anyone else who is under the age of 29, if he doesn't die tragically he'll be 29 years old eventually. And guess what year he made that All-Star team? This year of course, which was by far the worst of his previous three.

Only once has he hit 30 home runs or batted .300.

Another way of saying that would be "He has both hit 30 home runs and batted .300 before, although in separate seasons" which doesn't sound like the degradation that Albom tries to make it out to be.

He hit .095 in his lone World Series.

My favorite part of this sentence is the fact that Albom uses the word "lone" as if the fact that he made it to a World Series in his four full seasons as a pro was a knock against him. All the while, Albom is seemingly oblivious to the fact that 21 at bats over six games probably isn't a sufficient sample size to draw an actual conclusion from, especially when Granderson hit .313/.378/.719 in the ALDS and ALCS that same year.

Last year, he was benched occasionally against left-handers.

Could you be a little more vague here, Mitch? You know that they track statistics based on what hand a pitcher throws with, right? You could cite something called a "platoon split" if you wanted to make the case that he couldn't hit lefties.

Granderson was as close to a star in this town as the franchise had, mostly because Justin Verlander is too low key (and plays once every five games), and guys with flashier numbers -- like Miguel Cabrera or the 2007 Magglio Ordoñez -- seem eminently distant. They bolt town the minute the season is over. They seem... rented.

That is impossible to fathom. You mean to tell me that two players from the beautiful tropical nation of Venezuela return to that country to spend time with their families instead of staying in Detroit in the fucking dead of winter?

But baseball-wise, he was no Derek Jeter, a guy justifiably adored in New York for achievement and personality. He was no Albert Pujols in St. Louis. He was more like the closest thing we had to those guys, which says something about the Tigers.

Yes, it says that they have not been lucky enough to develop and retain an incredibly gifted franchise cornerstone player who has pretty much already punched his ticket to the Hall of Fame. Look around the league right now, who else fits this mold? Um, no one? Choke on that one Curtis Granderson... You may be an above average baseball player and an overall class act, but like everyone else in the MLB, you are not Derek Jeter or Albert Puljos!

"It's sad, but most likely you're not gonna see players in the same uniform for 10, 12, 15 years anymore," manager Jim Leyland told me last week. Leyland understood fans' frustration. He said Granderson was everything good about baseball. But he fell short of saying "we're losing a great talent" or "the heart of our team."

I know it would probably be futile to try to explain this to someone who cited a player's batting average in six games as a crucial stat, but the Amount of Praise Lavished Upon a Player By Their Manager After They Have Been Traded (APLUPBTMATHBT for short) is not a very good measure of their value.

What's surprising is how thin the "beloved superstar" tag has become for the Tigers over the past decade. Pudge Rodriguez? How connected was he to Detroit, really? Todd Jones? Bobby Higginson? Hardly superstars. We liked their longevity.

Considering the team lost 83, 96, 106, and 119 games in each of the first four years of the decade, it's really not that surprising at all. And just for fun, Bobby Higginson only hit 30 home runs and batted over .300 once and he played left field during the steroid era.

Granderson became someone to embrace, at least a bit, the way we once embraced Gibby or Tram, even if he wasn't that caliber player here, nor did he win the things they won. Good talent. Great guy. But I wonder if we don't lament the idea of him leaving as much as the departure itself.

But don't worry guys, Curtis Granderson the sixth person you'll meet in heaven.

Too Bad I'm Not A Parent...

Or else I could teach my children the virtues of hating the Yankees (h/t Joe P):

My mom, Michele, is one of the nicest people in the world (I'm admittedly a bit biased, but this is true). She finds the good in everyone. Well, just about everyone. She cannot stand the New York Yankees! This does not make my mom unique. Throughout the Major League Baseball playoffs, I have encountered only one person who wants the Yankees to win the World Series.

With an tiny niche fanbase like the one the Yankees have, I find this statement to be totally believable.

The Yankees have the highest payroll every year. This year their payroll is nearly 50% higher than the 2nd highest payroll (the New York Mets)! They play in a stadium built two years ago [sic] for more than one billion dollars. During the offseason, the Yankees signed C.C. Sabbathia [sic], A.J. Burnett, and Marx [sic] Teixeira for nearly half a billion dollars in long-term contracts. It's clear that rooting for the Yankees is roughly the same as cheering for the bully down the street to bloody another nose.

Except that bully hasn't won a fight in 9 years. It's clear that picking on a pop psychology piece for baseball inaccuracies is like picking on a baseball piece for trying to use pop psychology. But that doesn't make it any less enjoyable.

But how should we tell our children to hate the Yankees?

"I hate the Yankees" does little to teach our children lessons about hope, persistence, and teamwork. We ought to focus on the positive characteristics of the underdog, rather than the negative qualities about the evil Yankees. Below are five suggestions for what parents can say to kids about the Yankees while staying away from negativity:

Get your notepads ready:

1) "The Twins never quit, even though they don't have the same amount of money to spend on players as the Yankees." (a message about doing the best with what one has)

Or about making excuses.

3) "Even though the Yankees make a lot of money, watch their players. They hustle, encourage each other, and play great baseball. To win, a team must hit, field, and pitch better than their opponent." (a message that money doesn't get hits, and that substance wins over style)

Except the players on the Yankees make a lot of money because they play great baseball, not despite the fact.

4) "Notice how focused all of the players in the World Series are on each play." (a message about concentration, and how all players can work on this skill)

"But not the Yankees who are only calculating how much money they are making with each passing out".

5) If all else fails, remind your kids that the Phillies won the World Series in 2008 and that the Yankees have not won a championship since 2000.

An important lesson in sportsmanship: It's not whether you win or lose... it's whether you win or lose.

Please, folks, educate your children about the virtues of hating the Yankees. Their fragile little brains can't handle the realities of "free agency", the "size of the market they play in", or " the desire to win being more important than making profit on a sports franchise".

Lessons In Advanced Hindsight, With Mike Lupica

Good morning, Fackers. I think most rational people understand that one of the fundamental concepts of decision making is that you have to make your choice based on the information which was available at the time. Of course, Mike Lupica doesn't fall under the umbrella of "most rational people".

You surely know Lupica from his columns in the Daily News, his Matt Christopher-esque children's sports books, or as the wildly-gesturing smarmy douche on The Sports Reporters who sits on the edge of his seat partially because he feels that he's far too important to be seated in a semi-circle and partially because if he leaned back, his feet wouldn't touch the ground.

Anyway, in today's Daily News, Mike conveniently smothers Joe Girardi's decision to use only his three best starters in the World Series in a thick coating of hindsight, two days after any other course of action could have been chosen:

Joe Girardi knows the deal as well as he knows his way out to the mound. He's right about using only three starters in the postseason if the Yankees win, tonight or tomorrow night.

I love how Lupica sets up the scenario by saying "Girardi knows the deal". Yeah, he knows that if the Yankees lose, he's going to get second guessed by assholes like Lupica who were so convinced that the Yankees should throw Chad Gaudin in Philly that they... didn't write a word about it despite having a column in a newspaper dedicated to writing about sports.

He's right if Andy Pettitte does the job in Game 6 on three days' rest that A.J. Burnett didn't do Monday night. Or he's right if this thing plays all the way out and CC Sabathia carries everybody across the finish line. Girardi just better be right about three days' rest for these guys after being up three games to one.

So was Charlie Manuel right for holding Cliff Lee back to give him his normal rest even though he gave up 5 earned runs because the Phillies won Game 5? Of course! What did you want to judge the outcome based on his "performance" or "availability in a possible Game 7"? Fools.

Because if the Yankees blow this Series, if the Phillies come all the way back, then Yankee fans are going to wonder how the Yankees could spend $206 million on baseball players and not have enough left under the bed to buy a reliable fourth starter.

No, Mike, they're not. That's what they'd be wondering if the Yankees missed the playoffs. Like they did last year. When they spent $209M.

The Yankees have had a payroll over $184M since 2004 and that year none of the 4 guys who started more than 20 games for them had an ERA under 4. In 2005, their 4th starter was either Jaret Wright or Kevin Brown who both had ERAs over 6 and they needed Aaron Small and Shawn Chacon to patch together their rotation. The following year it was Cory Lidle. In 2007, it was Roger Clemens and we all remember how well that worked out in the playoffs!

You have to be a special kind of stupid to wait until the team is one win away from their first World Series in 9 years to start complaining about their lack of a #4 starter.

Oh by the way, the reason they don't have a #4 starter isn't because they "didn't have enough money left under the bed". It's because Chien Ming Wang, who had been their best pitcher over the previous three years, suddenly decided to suck. And Joba Chamberlain, who everyone wanted to go back to the bullpen (including Lupica, obviously), is back in the bullpen.

They will wonder at the same time about how much they think they could get for a copy of "The Joba Rules" on eBay about now.

How much are your books selling for on eBay, Mike? Let me check. One dollar.

There are still a lot of smart, passionate, grudge-holding Yankee fans who want to talk about all the pitching mistakes that Joe Torre made when the Red Sox started to come back on the Yankees in 2004. But when Torre came home in that American League Championship Series, the way Girardi's Yankees come home now, here were Torre's starters:

Jon Lieber, Game 6.

Kevin Brown, Game 7.

Right, so why are you complaining about the rotation this year?

Josh Beckett went on three days' rest in Game 6 of the 2003 Series, Marlins against the Yankees. Everybody screamed that Jack McKeon was making a huge mistake, that he should wait and pitch Beckett on full rest in Game 7 if it came to that. The Marlins manager went all in with Beckett and he pitched one of the most dominating close-out games in the history of the World Series.

He made McKeon right because he won.

Mike Lupica's decision making rubric: Win = Right, Lose = Wrong.

So Mike Lupica's son is dribbling down the court in a CYO game two minutes into the game and decides to fire up a short from half court. It goes in. From the stands, Mike yells "GREAT DECISION, BUDDY!"

Mike Lupica is playing in a poker tournament. Someone raises in front of him. He looks down at the 2 of hearts & the 4 of clubs and pushes all in. His opponent calls with pocket aces but the board reads 3-5-6-K-8. Mike sees that he made a straight and screams "I OUTPLAYED YOU!"

The best decisions are the ones that are most likely to succeed if the scenario is played out over and over again. And guess what. Feeding Chad Gaudin - who lefties have hit .293/.389/.433 off in his career - to the Phillies in Citizens Bank Park isn't one of those decisions.

You Know You've Made It In Sports Blogging When...

...Someone takes the time to FJM one of your posts.

Click over and see the hopeless homers at Halos Heaven (of SB Nation, of the Internets) misinterpret what Matt was trying to say, make a misguided attempt at mocking the title of this site, and use "words" like "fallicy" to defend their hitting coach right fielder, Bobby Abreu.

Behold this brilliant analogy comparing Abreu's influence on the Angels to a math teacher:

Once agan it comes down to LUCK. Sure. If your kid comes home from school with better math grades and tells you it's because his teacher showed him a better way to solve the equation, are you going to tell him, "No, you've just had better luck".

This would make perfect sense if A) there were varying degrees to which you could solve an equation, B) the greatest mathematician who ever lived solved equations at a 50% clip, C) the person creating the equations was doing so with the intention of making them impossible to solve and D) the teacher was somehow also the child's classmate. But other than that, it's flawless. Bobby Abreu is Mr. Dewey. Got it.

They also put together an wildly unoriginal list of reasons they hate the Yankees which we would counter if Yankees fans cared enough about the Angels to hate them. Well okay, here's one:

1. CHONE Figgins - I've never pronounced it "Shawn" and never will. Ch-ch-ch-ch-choke on that one, Figgins!

Just because the Red Sox aren't in the ALCS doesn't mean there can't be some animosity involved. Fuck the Angels... Wooohohohohohoo!!!

Run For Cover, This Is Not 11 Years Ago!!1!!!1!

You may recall the name Allen Barra from FJM Day over at Deadspin last week. He was the one saying that Derek Jeter should win the MVP because Paul Newman won an Oscar for The Color Of Money, for his "inspiration and professionalism", and because Jeter had been snubbed in the past.

Well yesterday, Mr. Barra busted out some similarly stupid logic for the Village Voice in regards to the Yankees' playoff chances:

Be afraid, Yankee fans -- be very afraid.

A couple of weeks ago everything seemed all sewn up -- the Yankees had vanquished the Red Sox, and all everyone wanted to know was if this year's editions was as good as the 1998 team. A couple of more games like yesterday's, and they're going to be wondering if this team is as good as the 2008 Yankees.

/shakes in shoes

I should be afraid because this year's team isn't one of the greatest teams ever? This actually makes perfect sense because if you were stupid and shortsighted enough to equate the '09 Yankees to the '98 version "a couple of weeks ago", then you are probably dumb enough to compare them to last year's team after they've lost 6 of 10 games.

A year ago [Joba] looked like the greatest young phenom in baseball; now he's a weight dragging down the rest of the pitching staff.

That's right folks, Joba is pitching so poorly that he hurt Andy Pettitte's shoulder. He's the reason A.J. Burnett has only won 1 of his last 10 starts and I'll be damned if he didn't make Mo blow that save in Seattle. Just wait 'til he starts getting into CC Sabathia's head. Then we'll really be fucked.

Sunday's outing against the punchless Seattle mariners -- dead last in the American League in both batting average and runs scored -- was an out and out disgrace that would have earned any other pitcher a demotion to Double-A.

Could the last declaration be any more factually incorrect? He's made 29 starts for the Yankees this year. Please give me even one example of the last time a pitcher was demoted, not to AAA but to AA, because of one outing late in the season, let alone "any other pitcher". Allen Barra makes George Steinbrenner in his heyday look calm and measured by comparison.

Is there a team in baseball with a worse record of developing young pitchers than the Yankees?

I'm not sure, but instead of trying to figure it out, you should probably just pose it as a rhetorical question, imply that it's true and move on.

Was there any more illogical way to bring Joba along than to put him in games where he was expected to only go three or four innings? If whoever is calling the shots in the front office had conferred with Joe Girardi and pitching coach Dave "No Man Is An" Eiland and at least agreed to put Job aback[sic] in the bullpen to be worked in front of Phil Hughes, they might at least have something to show for all the absurd coddling and pampering of Joba.

Is there a more illogical way to handle a pitcher than limiting him to pitching three or four innings a game? They should have only allowed him to pitch one or two innings a game! How absurd that they would want to protect a young pitchers arm by not transitioning him back and forth between the bullpen and the rotation, which ended with him being injured last year! IDIOTS! (And minus 10 for the non-sequitur Bermanism.)

What's the big difference between the 1998 and 2009 Yankees? Try this: In 1998, the Yanks weren't going into the last nine[sic] games of the season wondering if they were the best team in the league.

First of all, this was written yesterday, so the Yankees were actually heading into their last 12 games of the season. Mr. Barra apparently does not have access to the internet where he could look up the Yanks' schedule.

And the "big difference" is that after 150 games in 1998, the Yankees were FIFTY-EIGHT GAMES OVER .500. They were arguably the best baseball team ever. No shit this year's team isn't as good as they were, even though they still have the best record in baseball. Which would typically mean that they are, you know, the best team.

It's funny that Barra mentions the 1998 squad because although they were historically awesome and finished 114-48, they seemingly ran out of gas towards the end of the season. After 126 games the Yankees were 94-32. From that point forward, though, the Yankees had just the 12th best record in baseball at 20-16, which was significantly buoyed by finishing the regular season on a 7 game winning streak. Then, lo and behold, they went 11-2 in the playoffs en route to a World Series Victory.

So be afraid! The Yankees have the best record in baseball but are not comparable to the best team ever!

[Update 11:50: Although Barra was suggesting that Jeter is the AL MVP for the Wall Street Journal in the piece that got FJM'd, he wrote for the Village Voice that Cap'n Jetes is no better than the 5th most valuable Yankee this year. Allen Barra: Logician.]

Could Derek Jeter Get In The HoF Unanimously?

Jeff Pearlman thinks he could.

It's been a while, but I don't think there is any other way to approach this than FJM-style. Maybe I was inspired by yesterday at Deadspin. Or maybe there is so much wrong in this post that I tried to react to it using blockquotes but it was impossible without it seeming like I was quoting him out of context.

(Before you tell me in the comments, I have no delusions that I am as brilliant or funny as the FJM fellas, but when you disagree with just about everything in a piece, there aren't too many ways of responding to it other than bolding what they say and reacting in regular font.)

Is Derek Jeter an all-time, all-time, all-time great, a la Mantle, Ruth, Rickey Henderson, Bob Gibson, Sandy Koufax, etc? No.

But he is an all-time great—the shortstop with the most hits, a four-time World Series champ, an undisputed leader and grinder.

Luis Aparicio had the record for hits as a shortstop before Jeter and he received just 84.6% of the vote and it wasn't even his first ballot.

Phil Rizzuto was the Yankee shortstop for 7 World Series titles but had to be elected by the Veterans Committee 38 years after he retired, and unlike Jeter, he won an MVP.

Lots of people disputed Jeter's leadership when he didn't stand up for A-Rod. Others have said that Jorge Posada was the real, fiery leader in the Yankee clubhouse.

And "grinder" is a nebulous, bullshit term that has been used to describe the least talented player on every high school team ever assembled.

That’s why, I truly believe, Jeter may way become the first unanimous Hall of Same selection.

I really do.

All of those things in combination are pretty impressive, but none of those guys who you named as being better than Jeter were elected unanimously.

I know… I know—some moron voter will make a stand by voting NO; his chance to say, “If Ruth wasn’t unanimous, Jeter shouldn’t be.”

You really don't think he'll get in unanimously, then. So what was the point of this article again?

But Jeter, well, Jeter is perfect. First, look at his lifetime statistics. Second, look at the three Gold Gloves (yes, his defense isn’t what it once was. But, in 2009, it’s been very good). Third, look at the four titles. Fifth, look at the captaincy. Sixth, look at the clutch situations—especially The Flip against Oakland. Seventh, look at the dignified way he carries himself.

Okay, since you brought them up, let's actually look at these things instead of just listing them offhandedly, shall we Jeff:

First, look at his lifetime statistics.

Yes his statistics are very good, particularly his batting average and OBP, especially when you consider that he plays shortstop. I'm with you.

Second, look at the three Gold Gloves (yes, his defense isn’t what it once was. But, in 2009, it’s been very good)

It's not that his defense wasn't what it once was, it's that there are very smart people who contend that it was never very good to begin with. Derek Jeter isn't going to the HoF for his defense.

Third, look at the four titles.

Those four championships came in his first 5 years and he hasn't won one since then despite playing on the team with the highest payroll in the league every year during that time even though Jeter has been great all along. Which kind of goes to show that championships are a pretty terrible way of measuring individual performance.

[Fourth...] - Apparently because you used "four titles" in your 3rd point, you didn't include a #4. Clever.

Fifth, look at the captaincy.

Mmmkay, I'm looking. And I see Jason Varitek, who is the captain of the Red Sox, and the only way he's getting into Cooperstown is by driving down Interstate 88 and ponying up the $16.50 entry fee. I also see Thurman Munson who, despite winning a Rookie of the Year (like Jeter), and MVP (unlike Jeter) was not inducted because his career was tragically cut short. It's about the numbers not the "captaincy".

Sixth, look at the clutch situations—especially The Flip against Oakland.

Let's disregard the flip play that you mentioned because he has done something like that exactly one fucking time in his career on which Jeremy Giambi might have been safe anyway. If we are basing Hall of Fame voting on fluke plays in the playoffs, let's add Mookie Wilson and Aaron Boone while we're at it. But let's focus on the larger point; his performance in clutch situations in general.

If you had actually looked at his career numbers on B-R like you told everyone else to in point #1, you would know that Jeter's OPS in the regular season is .846. How about in late and close situations during the regular season? .811.

His OPS in the postseason is exactly the same as the regular season right now, .846. He's been great in the ALDS at .957. In the ALCS, though? .743, pretty close to leage average. In the World Series, the clutchiest of all baseball gaming situations? .809. There's something to be said for staying close to his great career norms under intense pressure, which is more than most can claim. But let's not pretend that Jeter has delivered transcendent "clutch" performances throughout his career whenever the pressure rises. Because no one does that. Because "clutch" comes and goes.

Seventh, look at the dignified way he carries himself.

Amazingly, this might be the most salient point of them all. He hasn't done anything to offend the people voting for him and he won't lose any votes to vindictive writers like many others have. But recent inductees Cal Ripken and Tony Gywnn carried themselves with the same level of class and still came up 8 and 13 votes short, respectively.

I'll add one thing of my own, which I mentioned above... #8 - He's never won an MVP. I personally don't think that should keep him off the first ballot, but that might have been the difference between the 5 voters who went for Ripken but not Gywnn. Or maybe they were racists. In which case 2 or 3 of them should vote for Jeter.

I thought it utterly insane that Rickey Henderson had a handful of voters who didn’t support his Hall bid, but the Rickster was, factually, arrogant and a wee-bit selfish. He didn’t deserve any Nays, but he didn’t always carry himself with professionalism.

And that handful will be the same people who, in defense of Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Christy Matthewson and Honus Wagner, won't vote for Derek Jeter.

Jeter is, for lack of a better word, perfect.

You already said that. Putting in a one sentence paragraph doesn't make it a better point.

To vote against the man would be illogical. And downright stupid.

The BBWAA doing something illogical? Or stupid? I refuse to believe it.

Derek Jeter is a surefire first ballot Hall of Famer is he never records another hit. He's the greatest Yankee shortstop of all time and like Tim Marchman said, he's as winning a winner as ever won. But there are going to be at least a few complete assholes out there who, instead of individually deciding whether or not they they he belongs in the Hall of Fame, will take it into their own hands to block his unanimous induction. It's ridiculous but it's reality.

However, had Pearlman made his case with actual facts or sound logic, we could have saved ourselves a lot of time.

Some Links To Get You Over The Hump

It's Wednesday. It's 3:00PM. It's one of the low points of the week. It's not an especially great day in the Yankisphere either, but here are some links to get you through the rest of the workday.

Fire Joe Morgan has been resurrected and taken over Deadspin for the day. I'm guessing that most of you are familiar with one or both of those entities, but even if you're not, check out this piece skewering Allen Barra's pitch for Derek Jeter as MVP. The headline sarcastically says it all.

PeteAbe reports that the Yanks have hit Torontowith pitches 8 times in the last five games between them while the Jays have hit the Yanks only twice and wonders if there is more to come tonight. We would also be remiss if we didn't point out that Pete is still claiming that the pitch Carlson threw behind Posada was off-speed and that John McDonald caused Joe Girardi's injuries that were visible on TV last night. It was a 90 MPH fastball according to Gameday and McDonald clipped Joe G. on the right side of his head as Matt pointed out this morning.

Pete also checks in with the official press release on 2010 ticket pricing which the Yankees oddly released a few minutes after the brawl last night.

Mike at RAB wraps up a three part series on Yankee prospect Andrew Brackman's tumultuous season down in Charleston. Check out parts one (the good) and two (the bad) as well.

Right on cue, Will Leitch ponders the implications of the loss of Andy Pettitte. To answer his last question, no, it isn't nice to finally have something to worry about.

Rob Neyer doesn't seem too concerned, though.

Tom Verducci checks in with his All-Decade Team and statistical leaders of the Aughts. Andy Pettitte has the most wins, A-Rod the most homers, Mo the most saves, and Jeter and Posada both find themselves with spots on the roster.

Here's someone from Boston who thinks Youk doesn't get the respect he deserves, in the national press (via BBTF). I think I know someone who would agree with that sentiment.

The fine folks at the Wall Street Journal have created a board game in honor of the Mets' season.

A complaint about Yankee Stadium security from the Bronx County Examiner. Don't worry, the problem had nothing to do with the writer of the article being a dick.

While looking for some background on the National Sports Daily, mentioned in a Deadspin post yesterday, I found a video promoting the now defunct newspaper that was supposed to revolutionize sports journalism back in 1991. It features editor-in-chief Frank Deford as the pitch man and has a cameo by the always smarmy Mike Lupica.

Game 75: I Wish You Wouldn't Say That

For the players, it seems, being on Sunday Night Baseball is a fairly big deal. Only once a week during the regular season does the baseball world grind to halt and showcase two teams in a nationally televised game without any others running concurrently. The ESPN banners get put up on the packed camera wells down the first and third baselines and the personalities of the Worldwide Leader in Sports roam the clubhouses. The atmosphere is at the ballpark is undoubtedly elevated

Conversely, most fans at home dread Sunday Night Baseball. It might be because they have to wait until 8PM to watch their team play and it keeps them up later than they'd like. It's probably not because it overlaps with Law and Order SVU or Extreme Makeover: Home Edition or Million Dollar Password, although that might be part of it. It doesn't matter to Yankees fans that the team gets national exposure, because if anything, there's already too much of that. I think you know where I'm going with this.

Jon Miller and Al Michaels are both smooth and competent play by play guys who do their job and set the table the Joe Morgan and John Madden, respectively. For all the fun that people have at Madden's expense, I think most can agree that that his understanding of the game of football runs far deeper than the average fan's, even if in his effort to transmit it, all the clumsy chuckles and "booms" get in the way. That has never seemed to be the case with Joe Morgan. Plenty of man hours have been dedicated to explaining how and why Morgan is a terrible baseball analyst and an even worse broadcaster. He's overly nostalgic and unabashedly anti-intellectual and it comes across crystal clear in every broadcast, but I think the real difference between the two guys comes down to the differences between the sports.

Baseball is easy to digest because it unfolds slowly in front of you, one play at a time. The average viewer doesn't need to have an RBI double to left center broken down by the TV crew in order to understand what is happening. The best broadcasters provide context when it's necessary, but otherwise step aside and let the game unfold. Each play in football, on the other hand, occurs like an explosion, while the announcers work frantically in between snaps to piece together what happened.

Since baseball is played 6 or 7 days a week, fans are much more familiar with the team than the broadcast team who is stopping by to do just one game. The context is far more important to fans and the Sunday Night Baseball crew, as it is currently composed, it's terrible at providing any sort of valuable insight as to how this game fits into the season thus far. Instead Morgan tries too often to relate what's happening to his own playing experience and the newly added Steve Phillips offers insipid big picture "insights" that are either factually incorrect or painfully obvious to any regular follower of either of the teams involved.

Yes, the broadcast is meant for a national audience, but it's at the expense of the fans of the teams on the field. I'm not Michael Kay's biggest fan, but listening to a Yankee game with him behind the mic is infinitely more enjoyable than one with the ESPN crew.

Tonight, expect Miller and Morgan to laud the Mets for signing Livan Hernandez and point to his 5-2 record and 4.05 ERA as proof that he is in the middle of a resurrection. Never mind the fact that last year he started out 6-1 with a 3.90 in Minnesota before watching his ERA balloon two runs northward, his WHIP expand to 1.667 before getting DFA'd. His numbers might look decent right now but Livan is only one start away from being the rubber-armed base hit machine he's been for the last three years of his career.

Don't expect any grand insights into Chien Ming Wang's lack of success this year aside from his inability to "keep the sinker down" and recover from his foot injury last year. Wang has taken small steps towards being not historically terrible, coming off of back to back 5 inning, 6 hit, 3 run, four strikeout outings against fellow National League East members Washington and Atlanta. Perhaps the spacious confines of Citi Field will be home to Wang's first quality start of the season.

Derek Jeter returns to the line up tonight, but Johnny Damon is still down with the flu.

Miller and Morgan aren't so much "talking heads" as "disembodied voices", but you get the idea...

There are places that I won't forget,
And I guess I'm never going back,
Guess it's information that I lack,
I've told lies without a hint or regret.

Jim Baumbach Needs To Work On His Columns

That is the title of a column written by Newsday's Jim Baumbach. With Bruney poised to return from the DL shortly, perhaps you would interpret that to mean that he literally needs to work on his pitching motion, which he probably does. It does not.

Bruney needs to work on his delivery
Jim Baumbach
10:13 PM EDT, June 14, 2009

The funniest part about that quote, of course, is that Brian Bruney started this war with Francisco Rodriguez by doing the exact opposite.

What quote, Jim? It's the first sentence of the article and I'm already lost. Do you mean the headline? Because that's neither a "quote", nor "funny". What would be the "exact opposite" of working on one's delivery? Was Bruney was practicing his receiving?

So while Bruney respects the Mets closer for going shoulder to shoulder with him in the outfield during batting practice and yelling at him, perhaps the real question here is this:

Does Brian Bruney respect Brian Bruney?

What is/are the other question(s) you are alluding to which necessitate you to refer to your question as the "real" one? My question is actually this: Why did you insist on typing out Brian Bruney the second time instead of just saying "himself"?

Whether you agree with Bruney that K-Rod's celebrations are "embarrassing" and a "tired act," as Bruney told reporters after his rehab appearance in Trenton on Saturday, is not the point. The fact remains, Bruney's verbal attack was completely unprovoked and downright unnecessary.

I agree with this in principle, but I never heard such faux media outrage when other players were attacking Joba's fistpumping. Joba was destroying the integrity of the game with his unsportsmanlike showmanship, but any commentary on K-Rod's histrionics are "downright unnecessary"?

Hey, I'm all for a war of words through the media, because let's face it, on this topic, I'm 100 percent biased. If a Yankee wants to rip another Met, or vice versa, I have my recorder ready.

We know, Jim. You are ready to mail in a half-assed column on a "war of words" in a tenth of a second, because it keeps you from having to write about anything insightful. And I'm more than willing to do a line by line critique of it because it's easier than coming up with original material, so we are on the same side.

But you always must look at the person who's doing the criticizing, and take that into consideration, as well. If Mariano Rivera, Dennis Eckersley or, heck, John Franco, even, said those same words, then wow!

Way to undermine the importance of your entire article.

But Bruney? Try staying off the disabled list for 62 straight days before you start questioning the on-field behavior of the guy who set the major-league single-season record with 62 saves.

If you didn't rely entirely on a trite numeric device, you would have a point here. Bruney avoided the DL for well over 62 straight days in 2007. That's not really saying much, aside from the fact that Baumbach's original 62 days/62 saves set up was lazy and stupid.

At least he realized he made a mistake, admitted as much after Sunday's game and also didn't escalate matters when K-Rod went after him during batting practice.

For those keeping score at home, this is the 8th paragraph of the column and none have been over two sentences long.

Should Rodriguez have simply responded, "Who's Brian Bruney?" and leave it at that? You can make that case, sure. But I don't have a problem with him going on the offensive.

Let me see if I understand you correctly, Jim. Brian Bruney's verbal attack (which you didn't disagree with) was unnecessary, but K-Rod excaserbating the situation by actually confronting him in the outfield over it and having to be physically restrained by a teammate, that you agree with? Gotcha.

From the video, Rodriguez clearly let Bruney have it - verbally, not physically - before being ushered away by teammate Mike Pelfrey.

And Bruney, to his credit, stood there and accepted it, rather than open his mouth and say something else stupid. "He had some things he had to say," Bruney said, "and I'll leave it at that."

Please watch the video again, Jim. Bruney did not just stand there an accept it. Words were exchanged from both sides.

Hours later, both players said their tiff was over, and rightfully so.

This is over when Jim Baumbach says it's over.

As Mets infielder Alex Cora correctly pointed out, it's not like either pitcher will get a chance to drill the other with a pitch.

"They're two relievers," Cora said. "What are they going to do?"

Yell at each other in the outfield during BP?

After the first installment of Subway Series games, we've learned a few things about these teams. Luis Castillo should use two hands on pop-ups. The Yankees can't hit unknowns but do just fine against Cy Young Award winners. And Bruney really should start thinking before he talks.

We've learned a few things by reading this column. Any complaints about K-Rod's spastic victory celebrations are "downright unnecessary". Jim Baumbach looks forward to writing about trival bullshit.

And he loves one sentence paragraphs.

Remember, this is a guy who Saturday admitted he was lying when he told his bosses earlier this year his elbow felt good.

That doesn't indicate that he wasn't thinking before he spoke.

Admirable? Please.

Group these two one-words sentences into another paragraph? Please.

Days later, he was back on the DL and the Yankees were without their eighth-inning pitcher.

AHHHHHH! Maybe that was why he didn't want to tell them him elbow hurt in the first place, you dick. If he had told them eariler, they would have lost their eighth inning pitcher even sooner.

As K-Rod went looking for Bruney Sunday, he was asking teammates: "Is that him? Is that him?" Their one-sided chat lasted no more than a few seconds, and Bruney came away impressed.

"I heard he's a good dude," Bruney said. "I'm sure he is. It wasn't anything personal."

Okay, what? He "came away impressed" from K-Rod verbally assaulting him in the outfield?

Nothing personal? Ha! The question posed to Bruney was about the crazy end to Friday night's game, and he responded by offering this gem: "Couldn't have happened to a better guy on the mound, either. He's got a tired act."

Hmmm, I think you might have wanted to introduce the quote that sparked this entire feud a little earlier in the story, no?

Sunday, Bruney saw the Hunterdon County Democrat reporter who asked that question, and sarcastically thanked him for creating the stir.

Later, he turned his ire to the reporters surrounding him.

"I think it is ridiculous," Bruney said, "that this is a big story."

Joke's on us, I guess, for lending any credibility to his words.

Yes. Yes it is Jim. But thank you for acknowledging as much at the very end of your 600 word column which ran after the entire scenario had already played out.

846 Words Too Many

This article by Wallace Matthews of Newsday was published on Saturday but for some reason it didn't show up in my Google Reader until this morning. I wish it never had. 

Why he thought it was necessary to spend 850 words wandering around the topic of poor attendance at Yankee Stadium and Citi Field is beyond me to begin with. To make matters worse, it's not like he gets right to the heart of the matter. He tiptoes around anything that could be considered "topical" or "relevant" like he's slowdancing with his mother and instead churns out paragraphs like the one below. 

So far, the Yankees are averaging 44,636 in their new crib, the Mets 38,806. If baseball is so popular in this town and Yankees and Mets games truly are must-see events, as both clubs insisted throughout the offseason, why aren't there 10,000 people milling around outside their ballparks every game night, trying to buy up every last ticket in the house, and the rest going home empty-handed and disappointed?

Well, since you asked... Ticket. Prices. TICKET PRICES. The price of admission, the cost of entry, door fees, gate charges. Call it whatever you want. Incredibly, Matthews does not mention pricing once in his column. Prices were set it a totally different economic climate that the one that exists now and since some of the seats were already sold, it's tough to go back and change them.

One of the reasons, of course, is simple and self-evident. It's the economy, stupid. 

Hmm... does that phrase sound familiar? I'm guessing that Jason's recent national exposure and resulting media tour had a little something to do with that, although Matthews would certainly never admit it. Those four words sum it up pretty nicely, though. So that's the end of the article, right...?

But in a metropolitan area that certainly has more than 83,442 people - the combined average attendance at both parks - wealthy enough to buy their way into these exclusive clubs dressed as ballparks, there has to be something more to it.

It's not the same 83,442 people showing up at the parks every night, you dummy. 

Does there have to be more to it? I'm pretty sure those last two points - ticket prices and the economy - pretty much cover it. But, okay, let's humor him. Tell us, Wallace. What is this incredible insight you have into the matter? What could be this mysterious X-factor keeping fans from coming to the park? It's not going to be some meaningless cliche, is it?

It just might be that the remarkably deep-pocketed, thick-skinned and resilient sports fans of this town finally have reached their limit.

Deep-pocketed? Remember eight seconds ago, when you said it was "about the economy, stupid"? Not every sports fan is deep-pocketed, especially not at the moment. And what does being "thick-skinned" or "resilient" have to do with attending a sporting event?

It never has been easy to be a fan, especially around here, where aside from the Yankees' transcendent five-year run in the late 1990s and the occasional Giants Super Bowl appearance, our teams have never given much return for what always has been a hefty investment.

You know, aside from 1971-1977, Led Zeppelin wasn't that great of a band, anyway. The Yankees made the playoffs for 13 straight fucking years and appeared in six World Series you ungrateful prick. It's been insanely easy to be a fan around here.

The Giants have won three Super Bowls in the last 23 seasons. Given that there are 32 teams in the salary-capped NFL, that's pretty amazing. The Mets had some bad stretches, but made a good run in the late 90's, have been competitive for the past four seasons and project to be good for quite a while. 

And what the fuck do you want from your "investment"? No one is making you buy tickets to the game. When I head up to the Stadium, I don't need a promise that the team is going to win a championship that year. I go because it's a fun time, the team is competitive and I enjoy watching sporting events in the venues in which they are played.

It's simply no longer worth it, no matter how good the team is or how deeply ingrained in your DNA the ritual of going to the ballpark on a summer night really is.

Attention baseball fans: Don't bother going to games anymore. Yankees vs. Red Sox battling for first place on a Friday night? Nope. Wallace Matthews says it's not worth it.

He ends the column with not one, but two one-sentence paragraphs. 

Even in a city this big, sooner or later, you run out of suckers.

Then the only suckers left are the teams themselves, and the people who run them.

Wallace Matthews might be a total fucking moron, but at least he's not a sucker!

It's Only One Game, Now Excuse Me While I Blow It Out Of Proportion

Hat Guy is at it again. Someone must have told him that FJM shut down their operation and he's taunting them into starting it back up again. I don't care if this is unoriginal. Ken Tremendous is rolling over in his digital grave right now, and I must do something about it. It would be a bigger sin to let this article sit there on NBC Sports without pointing out how factually incorrect and schizophrenic it is. Celizic is simultaneously telling everyone to relax because it's only one game, and totally, wildly, insanely overreacting to that game.

"Leash Just Got Shorter For Girardi, Yanks"

Yes... 1/162nd shorter. 0.0617% shorter.

It’s a good thing for the Yankees that you don’t draw broad conclusions from one game, because if you did, the conclusion would be expressed in two words: they stink.

It's a good thing the first part of that sentence doesn't say you can't do something, only to have the second half of the sentence do that exact thing.

Most of the time when a team loses, they are going to look like "they stink". If a team wins 90 games in a season, they are going to look good in probably 90 of them (most wins, but some close losses) and look bad in the other 72 (most of their losses and a few sloppy wins). No matter how good a team is, they aren't going to impress you in every game they appear in. That's baseball.

The offense rallied to cut the Baltimore lead to 6-5, but when Derek Jeter, who had three hits in the game, had a chance to tie it, he failed. And then when expensive free-agent acquisition Teixeira had a chance to put the team ahead, he, too, failed.

I can see knocking Teixeira for having a bad day at the plate after the Baltimore fans put the focus on him by booing him mercilessly, but Jeter? He went 3 for 5 and left one guy on-base. Reading this column, you would think that the first three hits counted towards Spring Training. A message from Mike Celizic to Derek Jeter: If you can't hit in the clutch, don't bother hitting at all.

You wouldn’t expect to find panic in the clubhouse after one loss with 161 left to play, and you didn’t. Girardi was calm. The players were calm. It’s a powerful team and they just need to play Yankee baseball.

So why are you writing this article again?

This is all good, but the fact remains that the Yankees didn’t just lose. They played a bad baseball game. That’s not supposed to on Opening Day.

YES IT IS!!!! This is exactly when it is supposed to happen. It's the first fucking day of the season. Everyone is still rusty. Teixeira is a notoriously slow starter. Sabathia had a 7.76 ERA in April last year.

What had to be mystifying to Yankee fans was watching Sabathia’s pitch count mount into mid-season levels without getting any relief. Even when it was obvious Sabathia had nothing left (How could he? He had nothing to begin with.), Girardi left him in the game as his pitch count climbed to 96.

Count me among the unmystified. 96 pitches is not "mid-season levels" for CC Sabathia, you hysterical moron. You know how many times he threw fewer than 96 pitches last year? Fucking TWO (April 11th & 16th), and he gave up nine earned runs in both of them.

Too much may be made of pitch counts in today’s game.

Sort of like what you are doing right now?

But when your ace pitcher is struggling in the season’s first game and it’s so cold he has to hold a heating pad to his stomach — Sabathia’s favorite organ — between innings, it seems senseless to let him throw that many pitches.

If Sabathia is like any other guy I know, his favorite organ is a little further South. And it's 96 pitches. I've never heard anyone complain about a starter throwing fewer than 100 pitches before. Senseless is letting him take the hill in the ninth inning when his pitch count was already 111 and the Brewers were up by 7 runs.

Sabathia is not in mid-season form. Why give him a mid-season pitch count? It just seems a risky thing to do in a game that the Yankees were already out of.

Except they weren't out of it, were they, Mike? Take a look at the box score. Yes, they were down 6 to 1, but if you hadn't rushed to your computer to start writing this retarded column, you might have noticed that they Yankees pulled to within one run in the 7th. You mentioned it above. Remember? It was when you were crushing Jeter and Teixeira for being unclutchiferous.

But it’s early; just one game and one questionable pitching decision by the manager.

Questionable if you wear a fedora and refuse to look up Sabathia's pitch counts on Baseball-Reference.com.

If the Yankees win on Wednesday and keep winning, it will all be forgotten. If they don’t, by the time the team opens their new park, there will be calls in the tabloids for Congressional investigations.

What sort of Congressional investigations they would be calling for? That doesn't even begin to make sense or be funny.

Somewhat ironic that he uses "tabloids" derisively here. This is the epitome of knee-jerk, tabloid "journalism", except it's not even well written enough to appear in the Post or Daily News.

Last year was a free one for Girardi and the Yanks. This year isn’t. It’s just one game and one loss, but the pressure is already on.

It's just one column which constantly contradicts itself, but Mike Celizic still has no idea what he's talking about. The pressure was on when they signed Sabathia, Burnett and Teixeira. It didn't come from losing the first game of the season.

-----

Keep them coming, Mike. I'll be here waiting.

"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.

-----

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

"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.

-----

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.