Homage to "Fire Joe Morgan"

while we're making these confessions, i've kinda been digging mccarver this year.

Obviously Yard Work is great, although the novelty has worn off for me a bit. Sorry guys! I guess I prefer direct critique to the oblique parody you fellas dish out.

Miller is much better when he does Giants games, imo. His rapport with Kuiper, Krukow, and Fleming is outstanding.

To me, Joe Morgan is more troublesome precisely because he carries the ethos that comes with being the best second baseman of all time. Some random schlub who doesn't know what he's talking about is easy to dismiss precisely because he has no particular expertise with respect to baseball.

And writing article after article in the voice of various baseball-related personages doesn't? Like YW, it's a fun way to kill some time, both for the writer and the reader.

It's not for everyone, as this thread certainly proves.

This (specifically the point-by-point breakdown) reminds me of scary dudes who call into talk radio LIVID that Bill Parcells is switching to the GODDAMNED 3-4 defense...

as for yw vs. fjm, i don't have much to say except yw is easily the greatest thing i've ever been involved with.

I think the title "Fire Joe Morgan" is just a tip of the cap to firejimtracy.com. I don't think the mission statement of the site is to get Joe Morgan fired any more than Yard Work is about gardening.

I think it's the opposite -- sportswriters need to take the time to learn their craft for precisely this reason. Why would I want to read some random schlub who never played the game, talks out of his ass, and therefore has zero credibility? Why should I care about this person's opinion, particularly when compared with my own? Morgan talks about the way the game was played in his day (or at least, the way *he* perceived it being played) and it's understood that that's where he's coming from. His commentaries show that he's stubborn and set in his ways, which doesn't make him very different from every old-timer in every sport in every era. But his opinion is worth listening to precisely because of who he is, as Jams wrote in his post. A sportswriter has to do a lot more work to convince me that his or her opinion is worth my time.

Bayless' post-Tour article about Lance Armstrong, in which he didn't even understand the cycling equivalent of the difference between batters and pitchers, was 100000000000000000000000000000000000 times more asinine than anything Joe Morgan has ever written, said, or thought.

I won't TS on YW vs FireJoe, for obvious reasons, but suffice to say that any blog has to offer some variety to avoid become tiresome in a hurry. I wouldn't want to read a music blog where the author talks about the same five bands all the time, and I wouldn't want to read a baseball blog where the author goes apeshit every time "Moneyball" is slammed or Joe Morgan says a few dumb things in an online chat.

Bayless is an idiot, obviously.

Which makes it all the more frustrating that he refuses to read or hear about the specifics of sabermetrics/moneyball, since he blatantly misunderstands and misrepresents it nonstop. You'd think his job description would include being thoughtful and open-minded, hence he can accurately be called a professional weenie.

>now i very much disagree with joe, but to some extent i gotta say that his knowledge of baseball is a bit more informed than mine<

Somebody, maybe Bill James, said expecting players to have a "macro" perspective on how games are won is like expecting trees to understand the forest. I have no doubt Morgan's PLAYING intelligence was stratospheric, but no Jams, you are the superior analyst!

Replace "sportswriters" with "the ILM altweekly/pitchfork brigade" and you have a guaranteed 4 ZILLION POST thread with more snarky jabs than you could ever find a use for!

not to get all devil's advocate but sometimes i think of the sports color commentator position (in any sports) as analogous to any random political pundit you'd care (or not) to name on cnn or whatever. i don't watch a ton of that stuff but i don't expect, say, james carville to be "thoughtful and open-minded." not that sports dudes should be measured with the shitstick that is televised political commentary (i generally only watch cspan for that stuff since it's one of the few places where it's CIVIL anyfuckingmore), but still. morgan was hired, for better or for worse, to give opinions.

ie, they ALL suck.

Yeah, my expectations have never been lower, but I increasingly find MUTE is the way to go. Jeff Brantley's babbling on Cards-Brewers last night was much more painful than Morgan.

xpost - yeah they all pretty much suck EXCEPT when brian lamb is talking to him, because he's cool.

Morgan faces tough pitches

Tuning In

Karl Ravech wouldn't let Joe Morgan off the hook.

In a contentious Sunday one-on-one viewers rarely ever see on ESPN - especially between two colleagues - the host of "Baseball Tonight" had the Hall of Famer dancing around issues during an interview about steroids and Rafael Palmeiro.

Ravech asked Morgan if he would leave Palmeiro's "numbers" alone. .Morgan said there isn't an asterisk "big enough" to cover this era of steroids. "I'm only talking about people who tested positive," Morgan said.

"Well, he (Palmeiro) tested positive," Ravech shot back. "What are you going to do about those numbers, Joe?"

Morgan punted, saying Bud Selig had to make that decision. "I can't regulate baseball," Morgan said. Ravech wasn't asking him to. He just wanted an opinion. Undaunted, Ravech came back with another question Morgan would not answer directly.

"Do you want Rafael Palmeiro next to you in the Hall of Fame," Ravech asked.

Morgan "answered" by repeating a line he has used before. Morgan said if anyone who has tested positive for steroids is allowed in the Hall, Pete Rose should go in as well.

Ravech: "Then, can I draw from that conclusion there . . ."

Morgan: "No, I don't want you to draw any conclusion. I want you to listen to what I just said."

Ravech: "Then clarify it for me because I don't understand the correlation between Pete Rose and Rafael Palmeiro."

Morgan reasoned that both men had done something that "supposedly hurt the game," so if Palmeiro gets in Rose should get in as well. Oh. Okay. Credit Ravech with getting Morgan to reach this brain-numbing conclusion in what, until the end, was entertaining television.

Unfortunately, Ravech did not have more time. If so he could have asked Morgan two more questions:

# If Palmeiro gets in the Hall, should Shoeless Joe Jackson be enshrined, too?

# And Joe, considering - during your work in both the ESPN and Giants TV booths - that you never really offered any commentary on Barry Bonds, isn't it hypocritical to come out swinging on steroids now?

No, but Miller does.

Don't forget Papa and Fleming on the radio! The Giants have more people working on games than probably any team in history. It's unbelievable.

http://firejoemorgan.blogspot.com/

Dave, Sacramento: Hi Joe, I love your work, but I'm wondering why you won't read "Moneyball?" It's short, readable, and the pages won't bite, I promise.

KT: I literally cannot wait to read the response. I haven't read it yet. I feel like it's Christmas and I'm nine years old and my parents promised me a dirtbike and there's a dirtbike-shaped present under the tree.

Joe Morgan: I haven't read a lot of books.

KT: Already, I couldn't be happier.

I didn't read Canseco's book or Game of Shadows. I'm not sure the last baseball book I read.

KT: I'm guessing it was "Win Shares" by Bill James? No?

I form my own opinions because I played the game and have 40 years of experience in the game. There isn't much that others can teach me about the game.

KT: The wrongest thing you have ever written.

I've been taught by the best .. the players I played with and against. I know what it takes to win out there.

KT: There is steam coming out of Joe's head and leaking through his computer and coming out of my computer.

I've seen players who are winners and just good players.

KT: I've seen guts, and I've seen determination. I've seen Pete Rose slide head-first into second and bust up a double play with his head. I've seen Bob Gibson throw a baseball clear through a guy's stomach, just to send a message. I've seen Smokey Joe Wood eat a baseball like an apple to intimidate a batter. I've seen Three-Finger Brown shove his whole arm up Honus Wagner's ass when Wagner didn't run out a groundball -- in a goddamn exhibition game!!!! So don't you go telling me about computers!!!!!!!!!!!! Or books!!!!!!!!!!!!! And how they are "good"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.firejoemorgan.com/2008/10/omg-omg-omg.html

hope they start working on mccarver next, that guy's ruined more games for me than morgan ever has

^tru fax

olol

http://www.shutuptimmccarver.com/

http://www.petitiononline.com/stopbuck/petition.html

whoa.. just found out the writer of Fire Joe Morgan ended up becoming the creator of Parks & Recreation. who knew?

http://theclassical.org/articles/we-didnt-know-what-the-f-we-were-doing-fire-joe-morgan-on-fire-joe-morgan

helps 4 u

http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/193j6ma66sku4jpg/k-bigpic.jpg

guess that would explain this

https://kentremendousblog.tumblr.com/post/156678456323/20-reasons-why-patriots-falcons-super-bowl-is-a

are you testing me?

always