I usually hum a Brian Wilson diddy, or Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue." When I read this article (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/art icle/2008/04/05/AR2008040502239.html?nav=emailpage ) by Dave Sheinin, I changed my tune to Handel's "Messiah." Steve Czaban asked during his afternoon duties on WTEM whether Alex Rodriguez would get a clutch hit in his Yankee career. Mike Schmist was on the same station today, asking the same thing. Schmidt also said that Manny Ramirez would be average if not for his clutch hits. In other news, Tom Brady's 2007 would have only been a####e if he threw for half the touchdowns that he did.
This clutch thing sounds great, but how do we define it? My regret about the online version of the linked article is that it omits the graphic that that accompanied it in print. Four hitters were evaluated four clutchiness. The evaluation covered the prior three years, and used three definitions. One was close and late. Another was RISP with two outs. The final definition was the Jamesian definition (which accounts for time of year and the opponent).
Ryan Zimmerman, perceived locally as a clutch player, was stacked up against Derek Jeter, David Ortiz, and Alex Rodriguez. In each situation, when a player's average exceeded his season average, it was considered a clutch performance. In all, you could say this evaluation provided nine opportunities fot clutchiness.
So who came out on top? Alex Rodriguez. Who's score was undetermined? Derek Jeter. From one season to the next, Jeter's clutchiness changed. If clutchiness is an actual thing, just shy of tangible, but nonetheless a possessed skill, shouldn't it stay with you throughout your career? It's not like speed or strength, which leaves when the body accumulates wear and tear. Clutchiness comes and goes. So it seems to be more happenstance than an actual trait.
And the four letter in Bristol is also guilty. A segment on the flagship show ran which asked "Bad game or defining moment?" Let it be known, that the four letter was willing to throw out 500 plus home runs, gold gloves, and multiple MVPs, because Alex Rodriguez had a bad game when his injury riddled team was six back of the wild-card in August. Joe Carter and Bill Mazerski never flew out I guess...
Please tell me I heard this wrong, and hopefully I didn't, for if I did, typing it is a waste of time. Karl Ravech posed this question to Buck Showalter: Who's line-up is affected more? A-Rod out of the Yankkes line-up, or Papi from the Red Sox? Now, this is a valid question. There are 180 broadcast days for BBTN. There have to be talking points for a Monday night in June. The problem is, it's one of those questions that has a right answer, and methinks Mr Showalter is carrying a grudge from his managerial days.
Buck Showalter said the Red Sox will miss Papi more than the Yankees did/would miss A-Rod. If anyone saw the broadcast, and would like to tell me it was the allergy medicine kicking in, please do so, and Mr Showalter will receive an official IJWMFTT apology (Which btw, apologies to Colin Cowherd for lighting up that nutjob who called Manny Ramirez "almost" a HOFer. I grill the guy too much not to point out when he's actually right on the mark).
Anyway, let's take a look at some things. For their careers, a team of nine David Ortizes would score 7.8 runs per game. A team of nine Alex Rodriguezes would score 8.3 runs per game. So they both round to 8 runs per game. Since the question is relevant to this year, A-Rod holds a 7.6 to 5.5 edge. Factor in the glove, and there's no doubt that A-Rod is a better player than Ortiz.
To be fair, the question has to do with each player relative to his line-up. So let's look at the replacements for each, and tally the drop-off. A line-up of nine Wilson Betemits would score 3.7 runs per game in 2008 (5.0 for his career). Couple this drop-off with the best htting catcher on the DL, and it's a recipe for disaster.
The Red Sox have a lot of options. From a simplistic standpoint, Sean Casey is the next man up. This season, nine Sean Caseys would produce 6.8 runs per game (5.9 career). Both are better than Betemit's contribution, and (small sample size alert) right now would represent an upgrade in the Red Sox line-up (Save it people. I wrote small sample size. I am not advocating that I would take 600 ABs of Casey over 600 ABs of Ortiz).
Let us also not forget that the Sox have the option of improving the outfield by putting Ellsbury and Crisp in the outfiled, thus allowing Manny to take the DH slot. While David Ortiz is possibly the greatest pure DH of all time (Harold Baines and Edgar Martinez may have a say), losing one still leaves you with options, whereas losing the AL MVP who plays the hot corner while your catcher is already hurt, probably gives you some kind of record like 28-30 on the year. [Checks standings]. 36>28 right?
Colin Cowherd, the much lambasted host of ESPN Radio's mid-day program, now gets an IJWMFTT free pass through Thanksgiving. I'm in a festive mood. Colin has put a chink in the armor of old Captain Deuce. I'm glad someone is finally taking him to task. Sure it took tax evasion for it to happen. But Colin went on to compare Jeter and A-Rod's numbers in ALCS whilst the two have been teammates. Jeter, as said here many times before, is living off his early October performances. Recent averages have been below the Mendoza line. Jeter's slugging is inferior to A-Rod in the postseason. I can get into the minutae of this if commenters wish. But I am so glad that this has come to light. Fortunately for Jeter, A-Rod has reupped with the Yanks. Jeter will always be sainted in New York, as long as A-Rod is in toe.
.....
Speaking of THE contract. Does anyone think that this is NOT the greatest contract ever signed? Sure the numbers look good. $275 million is greater than $252 million, but remember that the original contract is 7 years old. This is less than a 10% raise over a seven year period. With the trigger clauses supposedly in effect in the original contract, A-Rod is taking a pay cut in what can still be considered peak years. All that said, he will be the most handsomely paid 42 year old in MLB history (this side of Clemens I suppose). The disappointing thing is that someone with some creativity may have been able to get this thing done.
The extra E is for error. The official scoring is E-SPN Radio's morning show. The A-Rod subject came up - AGAIN! This lead to Greenie making confident assertions about A-Rod's postseasons - AGAIN! According to Greenie, A-Rod "never matches his regular season numbers in the postseason."
Here is A-Rod's stat line from the 2004 post season:
As you can see, he out averaged, OBPed, and slugged his regular season numbers. You may also want to check out 2000. baseball-reference.com will have what you need. Never say never. That was just player hating for the sake of player hating.
And just for the sake of argument, where is the rule written that you are SUPPOSED to outperform your regular season numbers? Am I supposed to believe that against better pitching, you should do better than what you did in an average game? Here's an idea, perhaps all the people who contributed to the victory totals amassed during the season, could match their perfmances in what would likely lead to the type of success found in said regular season. I'm looking at captain deuce and CMW.
Some time in the seventh inning, the news broke. A-Rod will test the free agent waters. If all goes well for the BoSox this offseason, the telling image from this past World Series (aside from the one below) will be owner John Henry, on his blackberry, clearly thrilled that the players union can't nix another deal his ballclub makes with A-Rod.
Of course, people in the media still don't get it. It was perfect that Mike Lowell was the MVP, because it exposed the short term memories of so many in the media. After all, how could you not re-sign Lowell? Why take the choking dog A-Rod, who only cares for himself, when you could have the World Series MVP for less?
Well I have a theory for you all. What if Boston were to sign both. In their best "Oliver Twist" schoolmaster voice, Joe Buck, Mike Greenberg, et al would likely say "Both?!?!" Yes, both. The Red Sox are not constrained by a salary cap. Seats at Fenway are a premium. People will pay whatever price necessary to see their beloved Red Sox. So how could I possibly claim that the Sox can land both?
Everyone is forgetting a MAJOR detail. What position has been a huge disappointment since the departure of Orlando Cabrera? Renteria tried, so did Lugo. The Red Sox could use a premier shortstop. "But A-Rod plays third." Ugh. Alex Rodriguez is A SHORTSTOP! In a move of utter selfishness, A-Rod moved his better shortstop glove over to third. He did this because if he were to play short, he would have upstaged captain deuce. Playing third was a compromise that allowed him to be a Yankee. That selfish choking dog jerkface. Every error committed by A-Rod at third was amplified, whilst any error made by Mr November was swept under the rug as a freak occurrence likely caused by one of A-Rod's Ben Franklins hitting Jeter in the face.
Anyhow. They all want to know now - just how will A-Rod be treated in New York. He'll be treated the same in a different uniform as he was in a Yankee uniform. And for those who don't listen to much WFAN or read the New York rags, what I mean is, he won't be treated very kindly. Hey, if you're going to treat him like a visiting player, he may as well BE a visiting player.
Colin Cowherd really needs to learn the difference between coincidence and causality. On multiple occasions today, he has said that there is no correlation between A and B, thus C is true. No, that's not true. It just makes A and B unrelated. A vs. C is a separate trial.
This post piggybacks on the post I did about denbunking the debunked myths held regarding the MLB playoffs. We try to find the golden key that guarantees playoff success. Frankly, it's hard. Even I, as a trumpeter of the statistical analysis cause, has to admit that 162 games get boiled down to a Dave Roberts steal or Joe Torre playing the infield in against Luis Gonzalez.
Back to Colin and his beliefs about the playoffs. He used the tired old phrase about good pitching beats good hitting - going as far as to suggest that only one of the past eight champions has hit their way to a title. Didn't Detroit have good pitching? He also said that home run champions TYPICALLY don't make the playoffs. In the wild card era, roughly half the home run champs have made the playoffs. It's not typical, one way or the other. A and B have no relation. All of this is, of course, laying the groundwork for A-Rod talk if the Yankees lose. "A-Rod needs to be clutch blah blah." Look. A-Rod was worth 13 more wins than a AAA call up, and worth 9 more wins than lovable Brosiusesque role players. It's just the way it is. Without A-Rod, we wouldn't have to worry about Yankees choke in October talk.
We can all have our beliefs about what wins in these playoffs, but there is no golden rule. The games have to be played. Enjoy it. And that's a "stat geek, mom's basement blogger" saying it.
I just heard one of those sports phrases that makes my skin crawl. Sure there are cliches. Who likes to hear those? But you can't expect much more than that, lest ye provide the opponent with bulletin board material (quickly becoming a cliche in its own right). I'm not talking about cliches though. I'm talking about those old sports axioms that have been accepted as common knowledge. Today on ESPN radio, Kirk Herbstreit (cohost with Mike Tirico for today) just gave us a "the way it's supposed to be played" sighting when speaking of baseball.
Now we all know the inferences made when we hear this phrase. Heck, Herbstreit elaborated for the benefit of the nine people who have yet to hear of this concept. Bunting to get the guy over to win 2-1 is how baseball is meant to be played. I try to be poignant whilst informative, so merely posting a Youtube video of Dr Cox saying "Wrong wrong wrong wrong, Wrong wrong wrong wronnnnnng" doesn't fit the latter criteria.
Whenever we have heard the name Barry Bonds and the associated word "cheater," you probably thought the inference was steroids. Wrong! Barry is just one of many cheaters like Alex Rodriguez, Vladimir Guerrero, Albert Pujols, and Adam Dunn who hit the ball so that the defense can't catch it. That's simply not fair. Umpires, out of sheer fear, won't call these batters out for failing to bunt. It's a crisis!
More over, why win 7-3, when you could win 2-1. Heck, even if you sacrificed your offensive opportunities and lost 2-1, you could still tell everyone that you played good old smartball. Before I went to create this entry, I was geared up to read last night's smartball box scores. Alas, I did not find any.
So I believe I have addressed the poignant portion of today's entry. Now let's move the informative portion. Below is a link for a run expectancy matrix. No, some geek in his mother's basement didn't create this matrix. This tool comes from data from actual MLB games. As an example: A runner on first with no outs yields .9 runs each occurrence (so the axiom about walking leadoff men is actually true). A runner on second with one out (the net result of a sac bunt) yields .7 runs per occurrence. So you're worse off in terms of runs expected and outs created. Someone tell A-Rod that he just simply doesn't create enough outs. It's killing the Yankees right now.
What I'm trying to do is hold hosts to egregious errors. Remember, this medium is increasingly becoming the choice of media for sports fans. The personalities have the opportunity to shape public opinion. Today's discussion on WFAN has been utterly ridiculous. I don't want to lambaste the callers, of whom I expect idiocy. But when the normally solid Chris Carlin lends credence to these crackbrain theories, I have to assign him some bandwith.
A-Rod is being toasted today. Yesterday was an off day. Lord help him if he flies out tonight. I'm going to go ahead and paraphrase the typical caller. "We need to cut him lose. I hope he opts out. We can save money. That's the problem with the Yankees, no role players. Where's the Scott Brosius on this team?" That's typical caller speak, but the host, when speaking of A-Rod, should NEVER suggest that perhaps "...they pickup Joe Crede or soemone like that" as a good fit. I can quote many statistics, some of which are called esoteric by old guard writers. None of said stats includes a trying really hard index. None of said stats is called PRORP (Plays role over replacement player). Let's reference some REAL numbers here. The typical year of A-Rod vs some "real ballplayers"
A-Rod: OPS .965, EqA .311, Avg WARP3 10.96, Avg FRAR 22 (Includes three seasons out of position), 2007 VORP 54.5 (76.5 total runs above replacement), Runs/27 8.1
Scott Brosius: OPS .745 (5 percent below adjusted all time), EqA .253, Avg WARP3 5.02, Avg FRAR 18, Avg VORP 7.52 (25.5 total runs above replacement), Runs/27 4.66
Joe Crede: OPS .751 (8 percent below adjusted all time), EqA .247, Avg WARP3 3.86 (repeating of course - Leeroyyyyy Jenkins!), Avg FRAR 14.5, 2007 VORP -9.8, Runs/27 4.64
Let me understand this, Yankee fans want to win. In order to win, the Yankees should 1) Rid themselves of A-Rod 2)Hire a role player like Joe Crede. To express their argument numerically, the Yankees should dump 76.5 runs per year and 7 wins per year. After all the Yankees are 10 games up and winning all their games by 4+ runs, so losing this production (and the payroll) is beneficial, correct? Oh the Yankees are 10 games back in the standings. So scoring fewer runs and winning fewer games helps how?
I can't believe I have to write this. Alex Rodriguez is the best player in baseball. Get it through your heads. I know it's en vogue, the cause celbre, the insert fancy French phrase here, to suggest any other name as the best player. After all, if we say it, and said person gets hot for ten games, we can jump up and down saying "Told ya!" If we're wrong, we just move on to the next crazy prediction.
