Dumbbutt media 2010

walks = more runs

tru

Today baseball includes fewer hits, less contact and more walks and strikeouts. Baseball remains a beautiful, fascinating game that becomes even more interesting the more you know about it. But if you're the kind of fan who simply likes to see the ball put into play, there is less to like.

One-pitch at-bats. Ball = walk. Strike or foul ball = batter out. Unconditional shin-to-shoulder strike zone.

it's a stupid column because a. it's romanticizing "the crack of the bat" which 75% of the time in baseball results in an out and b. because what's one or two less combined hit a game, anyway? & if there are higher walk rates that means more runners on base & more "pressure" situations, more drama etc imo

lol andy

Team averages, NL

1979: 6176 plate appearances, 1436 hits, 241 doubles, 43 triples, 119 home runs
2009: 6221 plate appearances, 1421 hits, 288 doubles, 35 triples, 155 home runs

some sanity in this whole debate http://joeposnanski.com/JoeBlog/2010/05/07/the-charm-of-modern-baseball/

Pos OTM.

Verducci's argument doesn't make sense even if you follow its own stupid internal logic -- which kind of out is more exciting to watch, K's or routine fly balls to RF? And I never saw anyone stand up with two outs and two strikes and root for a ground ball to short.

Standing up w/ 2 strikes and 2 out is one of the dumbest things the Great Unwashed do.

(even worse, w/ 2 strikes in a double-play situation. Same reason they go to deafening superhero movies I guess)

nickcafardo
Great seeing a gutsy player like Dustin Pedroia playing with a gimpy knee and sacrificing personal stats so he stay in the lineup.

just saw this gem from richard roeper:

For those of us who will always have baseball at No. 1, there's something pretty cool going on with the game these days.

Almost every big-picture preseason article I've read notes how there's an increased emphasis on defense, speed, fundamentals and smart baseball, as opposed to just relying on behemoths to hit three-run homers.

Granted, fearsome hitters such as Albert Pujols (who just hit one out as I'm writing this) and Prince Fielder still can dominate. But in the post-steroids (or at least not nearly as many steroids-users) era, it's great to see something of a return to baseball that was played in the 1960s and '70s.

earl weaver rolls his eyes.

bob costas stop sucking stephen strasburgs dick

i think this guy is really on to something revolutionary here:
http://joeposnanski.si.com/2010/07/19/diary-of-a-losing-team-batting-champs/?xid=cnnbin&hpt=Sbin

not everyone is as "bright" as you are

yeah joe pos is getting to be a bit of a broken record on the royals posts

i still like his stuf fthough

dumbutt?

yeah, Shasta knows that anyone who wants to lay out the details of Jason Kendall's season to the 97% of baseball fandom that doesn't care about KC is OBVIOUSLY a moron!

so he's dum in thinking anyone cares about KC royals then

i mean it wasn't dumb but why on earth are you devoting 4000 words to "why batting average isn't as important as obp" in july of twenty ten.

my 3rd grade nephew who lives in the sticks has written a book report on moneyball.

Why is Chris Rose allowed to do play by play? This is a development that I find completely disturbing.

jon heyman:

• Ichiro, with 179 hits, will need to hustle to get to 200 again.

why would he need to "hustle" to get to 200, he had 179 hits through 138 games, i think he can get 21 hits in the final 24....

(now at 183 through 140)

heyman hate maths

sometimes i wonder if heyman's just a big troll at this point, since his opinions via twitter are 100% of the time the 'wrong' ones by sabermetrics and associated logic. no one can be that perfectly imperfect without trying, right?

http://espn.go.com/mlb/notebook/_/page/bbtn100910/baseball-tonight-clubhouse

As the postseason draws near, however, there are also pressing reasons not to believe in the Rays. They don't hit very much. Yes, they've scored 57 runs in their last 10 games, but Tampa Bay is 23rd in the majors in batting average and 25th in hits.

Or you could say they are THIRD in what matters most: runs scored (behind the Yankees and Red Sox). But that wouldn't fit into the story.

there are questions without clear answers

Welcome to baseball.

Ichiro really had to throw it into overdrive to pick up 21 hits in 16 games.

If he could somehow harness that momentum and maintain it over the course of a grueling 162-game season, he'd end it with 213 hits. And he'd have to play every game to do that.

I am sorely tempted to create a Worst Sportswriter Poll -- y/n?

Uh Plaschke holds the title for this already. Sorry guys.

becuz hat guy just died, right?

Mitch Albom is worse in my opinion.

Lee, how about worst sportscaster? cuz listening/watching JT Snow enduces more awkward cringes per minute than I thought possible.

JT doesn't bother me much. I mean, compared to the Rob Dibbles of the world he is a saint.

Stuart "Left Eye" Scott

stuart "gonna just hold this football while i talk about football" scott

btw i know these aren't sportswriters, but this exec has some awesome old-school opinions:

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/writers/jon_heyman/09/19/daily.scoop.monday/index.html

Here's one AL exec's well-reasoned explanation why he would favor Price or Sabathia slightly: "I think wins should factor in. I'm not a big proponent of wins counting for a lot, but it is a factor. I'm not into the extreme that wins are totally circumstantial. But I don't totally discount wins.

"Clearly, a bunch of guys are having superlative seasons. But it comes down to three guys -- Sabathia, Price and Felix, with (Clay) Buchholz, (Trevor) Cahill and Weaver in the next tier. I would probably go with Price. The peripheral numbers have been extremely impressive. Felix has the best peripheral numbers. ... But when the team needed him to win, I'm not sure how much winning he did at that point. If you're going to give it to a guy on a last-place team, the guy has to perform when he is needed most.''

billy beane?

the funny thing about that quote is that "second tier" guy weaver is having a *slightly* better season than sabathia except weaver just doesn't have what it takes to get those extra few wins.

I've seen/heard a few Felix-versus-CC discussions/arguments and JUST ONCE I would like someone to mention that, yeah, CC pitches in the almighty AL East, but he doesn't face THE YANKEES. Felix has faced the Yankees three times: 26 innings, one run, one earned, 31 Ks.

dan shaughnessy is so far and away the worst sportswriter in america that he makes mitch albom & bill plaschke look like gary smith

Good call, Jordan. Hate that guy.

i generally can't stand boston sportswriter homers

what lil weav lacks in cy youngs, he makes up for in his wealth of tacos

Has Shaughnessy ever written moralist articles in which inanimate objects talk to one another?

no but he writes the same 'red sox are a boring team this year' article the first week of EVERY season which pisses me off more than anything for some reason

i wonder how many more decades/championships it's gonna take for boston sportswriters to stop having auch a massive hard-on for the 2004 red sox that they can't fully appreciate any current players

it's kind of some weird reverse w/NYY where there are always one or two players on the current incarnation who are not "true" yankees, and in boston there are only one or two players who are "true" bosox.

*inverse

Uh Plaschke holds the title for this already. Sorry guys.

Lee, how about worst sportscaster? cuz listening/watching JT Snow enduces more awkward cringes per minute than I thought possible.

It's October, so everybody line up and give blowjobs to Derek Jeter:

http://sports.espn.go.com/new-york/mlb/columns/story?columnist=matthews_wallace&id=5645405

broken wrist (right arm): Typing this lefty (but not as well as Clif Lee!) -- Do you see the Mariners going after Jorge De La Rosa this offseason, they need another good pitcher even with the putrid offense.

Steven Goldman: Man, I did a similar thing when I was 16, broke my left thumb playing baseball and had a cast on up to my elbow for forever. There was one upside, which is that I got very good at unsnapping bras with one hand, a skill that has not deserted me to this day. Is that TMI?

uh, FUCK YES. Why am I reading about this in a baseball chat?

jon heyman's yearly "why i am a moron" column

and this thread has come full circle

hold on, that really says "December 20, 2010"???????????????????????????????????????

he does it every single year, right?

The list is even worse than the article.

somehow, Alomar, Raines and Larkin slipped through

19. Marquis Grissom. He is one of only seven players with 2,000 hits, 200 home runs and 400 stolen bases. He has four Golf Gloves, not to mention a .390 career World Series average, fourth best ever for those with at least 50 at-bats. His career was better than you probably remember, but it was not quite good enough.

Clubhouse chemistry matters!!!

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2015/08/24/field-front-office-many-believe-chemistry-still-matters-baseball/32271291/

There's a reason why the Blue Jays traded for LaTroy Hawkins instead of Papelbon! That's what winning is all about!!

i think it does matter! just not as much as talent.

If the answer is LaTroy Hawkins or David Ross I don't like the question

Papelbon is a clubhouse cancer obviously (WITH TWO MORE RINGS THAN ANYONE ON THE FUCKING BLUE JAYS)

latroy is a lot cheaper than papelbon (and has actually been better with his new team thus far)

from what i understand, papelbon is actually pretty popular with his teammates -- although i suspect he'd throw quite a tantrum if asked to pitch the eighth instead of the ninth. fortunately matt williams would never ask him to do that

I watched Latroy a lot the last few years. He's not good. Also he's 42.

dan shaughnessy is so far and away the worst sportswriter in america that he makes mitch albom & bill plaschke look like gary smith

icymi honey

http://mlb.nbcsports.com/2015/12/08/dan-shaughnessy-of-the-boston-globe-wins-the-j-g-taylor-spink-award/

CHHoF

"meritous"

https://www.fanragsports.com/inside-baseball-jon-heymans-top-60-heroes-of-2017/

weird article that alternates between interpreting "hero" as "someone who is good at baseball" and "someone who was charitable"

Herman's piece from the beginning of the thread is still hard to top, love his revisionist history.

Jack Morris, a bulldog who was considered the best pitcher of the '80s

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/so-what-do-we-think-about-bullpenning-now/

I don't have a problem with the article itself but he uses "nails" as an adjective three times in the same article, a usage I've never seen before. Is that a common baseball phrase? Or a Cameron-ism?

it's a baseball phrase, if not so common as to use three times

Not that I read minor-league baseball stories off the wire (or from anywhere, for that matter), but still.

http://www.sporttechie.com/a-computer-will-now-write-minor-league-baseball-stories-for-the-associated-press/

yeah that's been going on for almost two years; it's not very good but will no doubt get there eventually

Oops. Turned up on my FB wall yesterday--I ought to check dates.