Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Good Old Fashioned Nonsense

Joe Morgan chats!

Joe Morgan: It would be impossible to record black history without recording what baseball has contributed. From the Negro Leagues to Jackie Robinson breaking of the color barrier, baseball has contributed a lot towards our society moving forward together.

Well said, Joe. Let's do this!!!!

David (Florida) Hey Joe!Who do you think is the best improved team this year?

Trying to upstage Joe in "English Language Abuse" right off the bat, eh David? That's bold.

Joe Morgan: I guess you would have to say the Giants in the National League because they have made the most moves. If their moves work out or not, we'll have to wait and see. In the American League I'll say Seattle. On paper both teams did a good job of improving themselves.

The Giants??? The Giants are the most improved because they made the "most" moves? Like, the greatest number of moves? Here is a list of the players that the San Francisco Giants have playing for the major league team who were not in their organization last year:

1) Mark DeRosa
2) Aubrey Huff

Most improved team in the Major Leagues!!! Just look at all those moves!

Re: Seattle. Nice one Joey.

victor ( monroe,la): what are the cubs chances on winning the n.l.central this year?and do you think aramis ramirez will remain in chicago?

Joe Morgan: I think the Cubs chances are pretty good in that they have a lot of talent but they always seem to find a way to under achieve.

Q: Hey Joe, do the Cubs have a good shot?
A: Yes, because they're going to figure out a way to underachieve.

Until they get over that, it's always a mystery to see what they will do.

Until they get over that (underachieving), it's always a mystery to see what they will do (presumably either underachieving or not underachieving). Huh?

I'll handle that one for you Joe. Until they stop underachieving, they'll.....UNDERACHIEVE. Mystery solved!

I especially like their starting pitchers.

Fuck you, Victor. You can't get me to talk about Aramis Ramirez.

Chris Fiegler (Latham,NY): Between Joba Chamberlain & Philip Hughes who do you think will be the 5th starter for the New York Yankees?

Joe Morgan: I think Hughes will be the fifth starter. Chamberlain is a late inning set up man and maybe a future closer.

Phil Hughes, 2009 as starter: 5.45 ERA, 1.50 WHIP
Phil Hughes, 2009 as reliever: 1.40 ERA, 0.86 WHIP

I guess if it ain't broke, break it.

alex (dc): Joe how long till my nats can make a run for a wild card considering the moves we have made

Joe Morgan: I think they defiantly improved their team

Read: they flicked off every agent, player, and rival executive they were in contact with while building their roster.

and they do have some veterans like Ivan Rodriquez that can lead this team.

Lead them where, exactly?

Like everyone else, we're waiting to see what Strasburg can do.

The Wild Card Joe, the QUESTION, man!

I defiantly think they have an improved team this season.

I'm not kidding you. He repeated that, and made the same mistake again.

Q: Hey Joe, how long until the Nats can make a run at the Wild Card?
A: Defiantly Ivan Rodriguez can lead, waiting on Strasburg defiantly.

Dave (Boston): Joe, you were in the majors when Tommie Smith and John Carlos made their statement in the 1968 Olympics. As an athlete, what did that gesture mean to you?

Uh oh, Dave. You just tickled Joe's pleasure senses.

Joe Morgan: That's a great question! What it meant to me is that athletes understood that just because they were athletes that they weren't speared those indignities that other African Americans went through. The reaction by the Olympic Committee showed me that there was prejudice there as well. They kicked them out of the Olympic Village stating that the Olympics were no place for those kinds of political actions. In my opinion, the Olympics have always been a platform for political actions going back to Jesse Owens. Tommie and John have always been and will always be my idols because they stood up for what they believed in.

See what you did, Dave? You just caused the most coherent answer in JoeChat history. Even if he did use the phrase "speared those indignities".

Steve (Washington): Do you think athletes, regardless of color, are vocal enough about societal issues?

Joe Morgan: That's a difficult question for me to answer

pnoles: (::dies of shock::)

because each athlete needs to look inside themselves to see which path they what to take. You're a citizen of this country first and an athlete second. Being an athlete is only a short term job where as being a citizen is a long term job. You have to ask yourself, "do I want to make a difference"?

Steve, I'm sorry. Joe doesn't answer questions that do not directly involve his past.

eamonn (napa, ca): How big an impact do you think Brad Penny will have in the Cardinals rotation this year?

Joe Morgan: The fact that they have Wainwright and Carpenter takes a lot of pressure off of Penny. He's always had the stuff to be a No. 1 pitcher but now all he has to to is be a No. 3 pitcher. Playing with Wainwright and Carpenter will help him.

Yes, now that he's not on the same team as perennial screw-ups like Josh Beckett and Jon Lester, or Tim Lincecum and Matt Cain, or 2008 Derek Lowe and 2008 Chad Billingsley, he'll FINALLY be able to relax and just try to be a #3 pitcher.

Ahhhhh welcome back Joe. You were missed.

26 comments:

Larry B said...

Who the hell is Ivan Rodriquez?

Tonus said...

Joe is defiantly in mid-season form.

dan-bob said...

Maybe the Nats will try and defy the fact that they have never finished over .500.

Chris W said...

I think you're nitpicking a little here, Pnoles. JMO.

Derpsauce said...

The man just said that the Giants were the most improved team in Major League Baseball because they made the "most moves". Based on what has happened in the Giants' offseason, if that's nitpicking, I don't want to be alive.

Chris W said...

No, he said they were one of the most improved teams in the National League.

Chris W said...

Just to clarify, I don't necessarily think they're the most improved team in the NL, but aside from the Reds and the Nationals, who on earth could you possibly argue is obviously more improved going into 2010 than they were at the end of 2009?

Good grief.

Derpsauce said...

Diamondbacks
Braves
Mets (it's true)
Reds
Nationals

All of these teams are a very good bet to improve over last season's record (even the Braves, who were 5 games behind their pythag). If you think the Giants are going to win more than 88 games due to the signings of Mark DeRosa and Aubrey Huff, you're crazy.

It was an awful answer. Deal with it. Their team is basically identical to last year, unless Madison Bumgarner is awesome this year or something.

Chris W said...

The Braves? The Diamondbacks? Lol....

Like I said, nitpicking.

Anonymous said...

Last year the Braves did not go into the year with Tommy Hanson or Tim Hudson (who was barely there at all), they didn't go into the year with McLouth in CF and instead had one of the most atrocious combine OF's in history....now they'll have a former All-Star in CF all year, plus eventually the #1 prospect in all of Baseball manning RF. Prado is MUCH better than Johnson at 2B. McCann had eye problems for 2 months last year. The bullpen and bench are much deeper b/c they made a lot more moves than the Giants. Those things alone make a pretty good case for the Braves to be much improved over the course of the year....and that isn't even counting Glaus staying healthy...not sure why him saying the Braves as an answer well before the Giants is cause to laugh...they are a pretty good WC bet....and Joe's logic was terrible.

Chris W said...

i'm not saying him claiming those teams are moreimproved is cause to laugh. I'm saying his use of those teams as evidence that joe's claim is patently ridiculou is cause to chuckle at the reach pnoles is making to manufacture outrage at joe morgan.

this post seems to be perfunctory at best. Like I said: nitpicking

Adam said...

It's fair game to rip on JoeM for saying the Giants are the most improved team because of the terrible logic he uses to come to that conclusion. It is pretty clear he thinks they will be the most improved because they made the most moves. Not only is it typical dumbhead JoeLogic, it's shitty analysis. His job is to tell us which team made the moves he thinks will most improve themselves and why, not use pure quantity and a qualifier that "we'll have to wait and see." That's classic shitty Joe analysis. Make a generic and obvious statment and then qualify it by saying "we'll I can't say for sure".

Even if Joe is right, and he might be; the logic for coming to that conclusion is reason enough to have a laugh at him. If somebody were to write "Well, the reason the Yankees are the best team in baseball is because they have the best leadership", I would say let that person have it too because even though they came to the correct conclusion their method for doing so is completely wrong.

This is not the most awful thing Joe has done by far, but maybe your standards have fallen so low that you can excuse idiotic reasoning. But isn't the point of this site to say we should demand some actual analysis from the #1 baseball analyst on the #1 sports network in America?

Chris W said...

All I would say is that at this point, in the echelon of "Joe Chat stupidity" there isn't a single thing he says there that's egregiously wrong or shockingly dumb.

I think we can do better than nitpick judgment calls and critique grammatical and typographical errors from a live chat.

Unknown said...

Can you quit picking on my Nats? We get picked on enough!

Derpsauce said...

"tpyographical" is a typographical error. Thinking the word "definitely" is spelled "defiantly" (twice) is not a typographical error.

Giants being called most improved team in NL is shockingly dumb. Not being aware that Brad Penny hasn't been considered a staff ace in at least 3 years is shockingly dumb.

I don't understand how saying the Giants are the most improved team in the NL is a "judgment" call. It's an idiotic call (even without the shitty back-up he gave that they made "the most moves"). They're basically the same team, and they won 88 games last year. Is Joe saying they're going to tack on 12 wins and get to 100 or something? Because I bet that the most improved team in the NL will be about 12 wins better than last year, and maybe more. All the Diamondbacks need to do to accomplish that is post a .500 record.

Derpsauce said...

Worse still, the Nats would only need to win 71 games.

Derpsauce said...

I would probably give someone 500:1 odds against the Giants improving their record this year more so than any other team in the NL.

Chris W said...

I'll just let your nitpicking semanticizing speak for itself

Adam said...

FWIW Baseball Prospectus Wins Projections for 2010 and change from 2009:

Diamondbacks: 86 (+16)
Braves: 84 (-2)
Mets: 77 (+7)
Reds: 77 (-1)
Nationals: 76 (+17)
Giants: 82 (-6)

I don't totally believe BP's win projections, but It's mildly hilarious relative to JoeM because they believe the Giants will be one of the more diminishing teams this year. (Angels are at -22... ouch)

Derpsauce said...

Thanks for posting that, Adam. I'm kinda surprised how low they are on the Reds.

Chris, you sounded an awful lot like me eating my words in a recent Diamondbacks/Rockies argument Larry and I had.....let's remember we're playing for the same team here, eh?

Chris W said...

I don't have any idea what you're referring to. I was talking about your posts wherein you're moving the goalposts in re Joe's arguments.

It's not a big deal. I just think that Joe is generally getting better as an analyst and the niggling over minor inaccurcies or weakish arguments on his part doesn't do much to advance the discourse of intelligent mlb talk

Derpsauce said...

Do you.....do you know what this blog is for?

Chris W said...

Yes. Which is why it's kind of weird seeing posts that didn't really need to be made because the article in question isn't really very egregious whatsoever. Maybe if this blog were called "Fire Joe Morgan," it might be worthwhile to point out the erroneous minutia of a minor Joe-blunder.

I don't see what this adds to anything, to harp on a guy for grammatical errors, semantic points (i.e. Joe seems to be saying that SF will be most improved by making the playoffs this year rather than next, not that they will gain the most wins), judgmental disagreements (somehow you think that the Braves, who have lost their two best pitchers in Jurrgens and Vazquez have made up for it because of Heyward, but that the Giants who have gained at least league average bats to replace 67 OPS+ type talent don't even compare despite also having a stud-type prospect ready to play this year--and you're not necessarily even wrong--the problem is it's a fucking minor judgment dispute...not some dyed in the wool fact like you keep braying), and fucking misreadings on your part due to typographical errors (see your asinine snip at Joe's completely reasonable Cubs comment because he forgot to put a comma in..OH NO!)

It's just fucking silly. This post, forgive me, sucked. It's like you wanted to write an article, went to a Joe Chat figuring there'd be plenty to get righteously indignant about, found some minor errors and decided to press on with your post anyway.

But maybe I misunderstand the point of this blog. Why don't you condescendingly enlighten me.

Good grief.

Derpsauce said...

1) Nowhere did Joe say anything about SF being the most improved by implying they'll make the playoffs this year. He said it was because they have made the "most moves". You are making his argument for him, and assuming things about the way he was thinking that you have no way of knowing. Why you're trying this hard to defend him, I don't know. It was an idiot point with idiot reasoning.

2) The Braves did not lose Jair Jurrjens (Lies!!!!), and have plenty of pitching depth to make up for losing Vazquez. Anonymous (above) made all other relevant points here.

3) What missed comma? Nothing I said about Joe was making fun of him for a missed comma. This one's coming out of left field for me.

4) The Giants have acquired one league-average bat (DeRosa, who's probably above, anyway). Who are the others?

5) I'm done justifying making this post, because I shouldn't have to. Joe's points and general display of human intelligence were very poor. Believe it or not, you've posted a few things on here about articles that I didn't think were offensive, and I did you the common courtesy of either ignoring it, or reading it and just not commenting. Forgive me for expecting the same.

Jack M said...

If my memory serves me correctly, both The Beatles and GnR split up over a very similar disagreement.

Biggus Rickus said...

Is Joe Morgan the Yoko Ono of this would-be split?