Terry Frei Defends Nashville

You know what I like about Terry Frei? Nothing.

In this, his most recent article, he whines about how Nashville is such a great hockey market but they're in danger of losing their franchise. The Predators are a team that I love to hate, and last night made it even easier for me.

NASHVILLE -- The advertising signs are painted onto the sidewalks on Nashville's Broadway, including in the block as you're approaching Jack's Bar-B-Que, several honky-tonks, and the statue of the crooning Elvis outside of the famous Legends Gift Shop.

See? Terry Frei doesn't just stay in Denver. If he hadn't been to Nashville, he wouldn't have known about all of these things.

Nashville defensemen Shea Weber, Dan Hamhuis, and Ryan Suter are pictured, arms crossed and looking appropriately solemn.

And you are told of Predators hockey:

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"It Stays With You."

What? It Stays With You? Like bad Chinese food and genital herpes? Or painful losses?

The same sign, in the form of a huge banner, is on the side of the nearby Sommet Center.

The issue, of course, is: "OK … but for how long?"

Right, the hockey team. Here's where we hear the soft SportsCenter piano playing over black and white photos of the players slowly being panned by a camera and spot light. Lay on the guilt trip of this horrible team.

The Predators, now in their 10th NHL season, have been an amazingly resilient operation, playing on -- and remaining surprisingly competitive -- through so much drama, a gifted and hockey-minded songwriter could come up with a CD full of songs about it all.

Nashville has singers! Gaw-haw! It's Music City! Stompin' Tom Connors is the only hockey-minded songwriter that should release a CD.

After managing to make the playoffs last season, despite what essentially was a clearance sale in the 2007 offseason, the Predators are off to a decent start again under coach Barry Trotz, and their 3-2 victory over Colorado on Thursday night got them to 13-10-2.

It's funny how every article Terry writes for ESPN relates to the Avalanche. Not that a lot of mine don't relate to my favorite hockey team, but I'm not paid to be unbiased. This article very easily could have been written without reference to the Avalanche.

Yet, after an official crowd of 12,717 against Colorado, the Predators are averaging 13,716 for their 10 home games, and that's 29th in the 30-team league -- ahead of only the New York Islanders.

Ah, but without the Avalanche, how are we supposed to gauge how poor the attendance figures are? If Nashville can't draw with a team like Colorado in town, how do they draw with somebody like the Red Wings or Sharks in town?

Said Suter, the 23-year-old Madison, Wis., native who is the son of 1980 U.S. Olympian Bob Suter: "Our fans are good fans. They're coming the best they can to support us. It's tough down there because the football team [Tennessee Titans] is doing so good. We're competing with them. We always have our base crowd. Some nights are more than others, but they're loud."

It's always fun to go see the bad team when the good team is very successful. All the really good seats are empty because the rich people that own them are watching the successful team play and win. The stands are filled with people wearing the successful team's jersey and listening to them on the radio or watching them play on the concourse. Cheers erupt at inappropriate times because of the successful team scoring.

I've always been scornful of the hockey media's tendency to make value judgments about consumers' prioritizing, and having double standards -- including the tendency to come up with excuses for falloffs at the box office in traditional markets, yet consider the same fluctuations in the "new" markets to be prima facie cases that they didn't deserve teams in the first place.

I've always been scornful of Terry Frei making no fucking sense. Fans have to prioritize because they can't be in two places at once. I can't think of reading an article where fans are ridiculed for choosing to attend one sporting event over another, regardless of which market they're in. This sounds like Terry wrote about it a few years ago, but recently went to Nashville and fell in love with it, so now he's calling for the heads of those that hate Nashville.

And what often is overlooked is how deflating it can be for ownership to have short pockets and inadvertently lean into the punch that the survival of the team is in question, which creates self-fulfilling prophecies. Why invest emotions and money in an enterprise that has one eye on the door?

How about why invest money in the first place when you're going to lose money? Life must suck so much for these MILLIONAIRES to be asked about their hockey team moving. Nashville's investors knew the situation was dire going in. I'm sure they had a team of advisers telling them not to do it. The question should have been "Why invest money in a failing investment?" I find it very hard to feel bad for any of these people.

But the facts can't be ignored: This is the franchise's 10th season. Hockey 101 should have been off the curriculum long ago, and the fact that many move into Nashville from other "traditional" hockey areas also added to the potential fan base, anyway.

Oh really, Terry? Transplant fans? Don't you hate transplant fans, you fucking hypocrite?

In this economy and these times, it's not shocking that other franchises -- including Colorado, where the 487-game sellout streak is in the nostalgia-drenched past -- are having problems at the gate, too.

There are other teams in the league than Colorado, I assure you. Yuppies would rather spend money on season lift tickets than watch a team not win their division. I wouldn't be surprised if that dog wearing a cape left for a better gig with the Rockies chasing Dinger around on the field.

So, no, the Predators are far from alone, but in so many ways, the savvy management of the franchise has been amazing. General manager David Poile and Trotz have been like golfers trying to putt with the gallery screaming, given all the potential distractions and disadvantages. But instead of throwing a golfer's fit, they just putt out and plow on.

Nashville has an attendance problem. So does Colorado. So Nashville, your team isn't moving anywhere, because with a sample size of two, all teams are having problems. Terry could have pointed to the Red Wings cutting ticket prices as a sign of bad things around the league. Canadian teams are halving ticket prices. Terry would rather stick to Colorado, because that's enough for his argument.

At some point, it's not a matter of a value judgment or placing blame, but an issue of wondering about whether it's going to work. No finger-pointing. No name-calling. No distasteful portraying of NHL patronage, or any sports patronage, as some sort of litmus test for the moral fiber of a market.

It either works or it doesn't.

The local ownership, albeit with Del Biaggio's 27 percent as an asterisk, has given the Predators a chance to prove their viability in Nashville. Or, more accurately, Nashville to prove its viability as a hockey market.

Terry already pointed out that Nashville has had 10 years. It should already have been proven if Nashville can prove they are a hockey market. What he hasn't done is shown us how to keep them in Nashville. That would be a very hard undertaking and would take millions of man hours and - - what's that? It's already been done on Puck Daddy? And every point has evidence? Well son of bitch, then how does Terry Frei still have a job?

The Hockey News Bores You Anywhere Now

Using extremely flawed logic, I got a shiny new BlackBerry thinking that one of these interviews I've been on would give me a great new job that I would need it for. All I've gotten so far is The Hockey News application, which let me read this horrible item yesterday.

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman splashed cool water on the possibility of expansion this week,

Comma? There's more to this?

but there’s always a chance things will change in the next decade or so.

So why wait? Let's make stupid jokes now.

For the sake of this top 10 list, let’s say another wave of expansion in North America and across the Atlantic Ocean brings the league to 40 teams.

I, Brian Costello, really wanted to write a stupid top ten list. But I'm not creative enough. So I'm going to take my ridiculously stupid idea, and make it even more ridiculous and stupid. Now it's the Beverly Hills Chihuahua of top ten lists!

Sure, the on-ice talent will be watered down, but just think how much scoring would go up.

The idea of anybody thinking and reading this article have gone out the window. Just get to the bad jokes.

Here are 10 nicknames I’d like to see for 10 cities to consider. Just missing the top 10 were the Auckland Golden Seals and the Santiago Gulls.

See, because both the Golden Seals and Gulls were nicknames for teams that played in California/Oakland and San Diego. I wish somebody read this blog in New Zealand so I could find out if there are actually seals there. Somebody will have to write something stupid about rugby that I understand before any Kiwis show up, I suppose.

10. Bratislava Gears. Slovakia’s chief export is machinery and transport equipment.

Yeah, that's all he wrote.

9. Oklahoma City 66’s. It was the first major stop on the original Route 66.

As long as you don't count cities like Chicago, Springfield, IL; St. Louis, Springfield, MO; and Tulsa. But why would you do that when you have a crown city like Oklahoma City?

8. Prague Pils. No country makes a better beer.

Than the Czech Republic? Really? This is also where I remind everyone that I'm from St. Louis and have my own personal beliefs. And if you go on a free tour of the brewery, they give you free beer.

7. Kitchener-Waterloo Black Bears. The area is rife with the little devices.

Then make your stupid nickname joke BlackBerries. Shit. Why was this list made again? Because there is no expansion?

6. Moscow Freeze. Cold and intimidating

No period at the end. Freeze is also Brian Costello's favorite prostitute, for the same reason he likes the nickname.

5. Kansas City Fountains. The city claims to have the second most fountains in the world.

See, I would have gone with "worthless scrotums" here, but that's why I don't get paid to write. They do have a lot of fountains, and the city still sucks.

4. Stockholm Nordics. Quebec’s not using the moniker anymore.

Nobody used this moniker. Except for home fitness machines.

3. Winnipeg Jets. The old logo would need to be spruced up.

This guy had to make a list of these and then rank them to see which one was the best. And this hit #3.

2. Helsinki Formulas. Its players would have the best hairlines in the league.

HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA!!!!1!!! Like the shampoo! The players wouldn't be bald! Best hairlines in the league! As long as you disregard the fact that the IIHF wouldn't let the NHL just put a team anywhere in the world they want.

1. Las Vegas Gamblers. Let’s not try to fool anyone here.

Because every person in Las Vegas has a gambling problem. That's why they would live there.

Can't wait to keep up with this publication all season long. It's only preseason and already it sucks.

Fuckity Fuckity Fuck

I know it's a huge secret around these parts which baseball team I root for. Lets just say that whichever "team" it is "lost" a huge "game" this evening. And now I'm really mad. So I'm going to take this garbage and shove it up Tim Dahlberg's anal orifice.

Cubs-Red Sox would be World Series dream
But there are some ugly possibilities for Fall Classic as well

This article just screams "pointless."

The big, bad Yankees are finally out and for that most of the country can be grateful.

I'm not sure what rock you've been hiding under for the past 8 years, but Yankee hatred has declined significantly in all non-New Yorkish non-Bostonian metropolitan areas.

Instead of constantly hearing about the ghosts of past greats at Yankee Stadium, this postseason we can focus on the present at not-so-historic Tropicana Field.

Right there with you in re: shut the fuck up about Yankee Stadium. But why is Tropicana Field even important? It's not part of your "dream" World Series anyway.

Instead of filling up seats in the Bronx, they’ll be taking them out, just in time for the holiday gift-giving season.

Okay you're paying waaaaaaay more attention to this than necessary. I'm removing whatever credit I gave you for making fun of the ESPN Yankee Stadium ZOMG Brigade.

But that’s not the only thing different about a World Series that has every chance to be truly memorable and an equal chance to be truly forgettable.

This would be a very true statement if you were arguing from the perspective of "the series itself might not be that exciting." But you're obviously gonna ramble on about how Milwaukee is boring or something.

There’s a surprise team from Florida

Who?

chances of an all-Chicago or all-LA matchup,

Both of which you are about to shit on immensely. We're talking Randy Marsh in South Park's "More Crap" episode level shitting.

OFFICIAL PUBLIC STATEMENT: I am a nerd.

and a Boston team ready to lay claim to a dynasty of its own.

Which is exciting, but when the Yankees do it, that's bad, right?

About the only certainty is that the Cubs will implode at some point because they are, after all, the Cubs.

You are an idiot who says idiotic things.

Keeping that in mind, here’s a look at the good, the bad, and the ugly matchups that could be this year’s World Series:

You forgot "the useless." Oh wait, you're not playing in the playoffs are you? Nevermind.

BOOM! Nailed that one. ::high-fives everyone in the room::

THE GOOD:

CUBS-RED SOX: This is the ultimate matchup, one that makes Bud Selig and Fox television executives drool at the mere thought.

Why should anybody fucking care about Bud Selig or Fox. Fox hired Tim McCarver for crissake. Anything that makes them happy should be deemed pure evil.

The backdrop alone would make this worth tuning in for, but this World Series would have more story lines than just the two classic ballparks. The Red Sox would be staking a claim to dominance much like their pinstriped rivals, trying for their third championship in five years, and you might have heard something by now about the Cubs trying to win their first World Series in exactly 100 years.

Sure, fine, whatever, if the Red Sox blow the Cubs out in 4 games, it still kinda sucks. A lot.

The only downside for long-suffering Cubs fans is that Boston would have the home-field advantage. But after waiting since 1908 to win the World Series, they could wait a few more days to play at home.

You had me going there. First you said something meaningful. Then you said one of the most useless sentences to ever grace the internet.

RED SOX-DODGERS: Imagine Manny Ramirez returning to Fenway Park to hit two home runs over the Green Monster in Game 1. OK, just imagine him returning to run hard all the way to first base. Either way it will be a show, made all the better should Joe Torre be able to exorcise some Fenway demons while dressed in Dodger blue.

Or, alternatively, it will be bad, because the Dodgers blow. And because Ned Coletti would have a shot at winning the World Series, a thing he deserves less than K-Rod deserves the Cy Young.

METS-ANGELS: Yankees-Dodgers would have been better, especially with Torre against his old team. But New York versus Los Angeles is never bad

New York Knicks vs Los Angeles Clippers. Boom.

Actually, let's back this up a little bit. Why is that never bad? Explain this. What if the Mets and the Angels have 2 very, very boring teams that don't have very many exciting or interesting players and are incredibly different in skill level and the good team blows out the bad team. How is that "good?" Sure, the ratings will be stellar, but who cares? That's just because a lot of people follow those teams. It doesn't make the World Series good.

THE BAD:

CUBS-WHITE SOX: Yes, we know the Cubs haven’t won a World Series since 1908 and that such a warm and fuzzy occurrence would be even more warm and fuzzy for Cub fans if they could do it against their crosstown rivals. But any magic about the Cubs and White Sox playing each other evaporated with interleague play and, outside of Chicago, who really cares if the north side is better than the south.

I'm sort of with you on this one. But I bet you were the same person who was pulling hard for Yankees-Mets in 2000.

About the only fun for the rest of the country would be watching Ozzie Guillen chase rats down the right-field line.

What?

No no no. Seriously. What?

Where the hell did you come up with this joke?

What makes a man sit down in front of his computer, think this thought, and say to himself "oh man, that's gotta go in"? Early 90's Full House Bob Saget called, he wants his sense of humor back.

DODGERS-ANGELS: Back in the day when the Dodgers, Giants and Yankees all played in New York it wasn’t a big deal when two teams from the same city met each other in the World Series because it happened quite often. It doesn’t happen that often anymore — Mets-Yankees in 2000 were the only ones in the last 50 years — but Los Angeles is the wrong city to make it happen.

Again, you pretty much ruled out the White Sox and Cubs as an interesting crosstown World Series, so which is the "right" city. Oh. New York, right? Because the rest of the country totally gives a damn about Mets/Yankees. Fuck you. Fuck you with a blowtorch.

The Cubs and White Sox at least inspire passion from their followers. In LA, fans get worked up trying to figure out the best inning to leave the ballpark so they can beat traffic.

This is a completely stupid and totally false generalization that should be swallowed up by the earth. Cub fans flock to the Cubby Bear in great numbers before the conclusion of baseball games. And did you watch the World Series in 2002? I mean I hate Eckstein and all that, but Anaheim's crowd was blanketed with thunder sticks both pounding together and making that blasted "X" formation. There was a shitload of passion in that series.

THE UGLY:

RAYS-DIAMONDBACKS: Let’s get this straight: Eva Longoria is one of the stars on “Desperate Housewives” who is married to Tony Parker of the San Antonio Spurs. Evan Longoria is the third baseman for Tampa Bay who always seems to hit crucial home runs. That should take about 10 minutes for Tim McCarver to explain during Game 1, after which there will be little left to do other than ponder the dismal ugliness of Tropicana Field and wonder why Randy Johnson is always so surly.

I actually have to give it up here. Nice McCarver burn.

TWINS-BREWERS: The Twins are a decent enough story, a young team that wasn’t supposed to do anything this year after losing Johan Santana to the Mets. The Brewers aren’t bad, either, especially if they make the playoffs after firing their manager with just two weeks left in the season. Match them together, though, and you’ve got a dud of a World Series played out in small-market Midwestern cities that not even the
super-sized presence of Prince Fielder can save.

Everyone hates a World Series full of budding young stars, right? No, in all honesty, this paragraph is a lame copout and I'm pretty sure fuck Justin Morneau that Tim Dahlberg has some sort of financial stake in Fox's ratings or some shit like that, because that's honestly 100% of your reasoning behind each and every one of these claims. The Twins are a bunch of lucky fuckbags that admittedly play a very exciting style of baseball. I would definitely love to see the Brewers in the World Series. They're an incredibly exciting team with young talent all over the diamond. You can't see anything in them except the fact that they have a fat vegetarian slugger and fired their manager last week. Fuck you, Tim.

Let's Meet Filip.

This is Filip. Filip Bondy. (..what?) Filip has some beliefs about the New York Yankees. Sometimes, Filip thinks things that aren't true! I have been told that my job description entails shouting needlessly at screw-ups like Filip until I'm blue in the face (what's the deal with that figure of speech anyway?). So let's get started.

Betting on young arms cost Yankees the season
Starting pitchers’ injuries leave Bombers scrambling for makeshift rotations

Well this seems pretty reasonable. This is kind of what screwed up the Yankees this season. Point: Filip. Score: pnoles: 0, Filip: 1

By Filip Bondy

Oh boy. That's your actual name isn't it. That doesn't really help your cause. Score: pnoles: 1, Filip: 1

The Yankees are dead. Long live the Mets.

To which I thrust the following label into your face. "More hyperbole than you can shake a stick at." All hail the 77-61 Mets. Can you imagine how the Mets' royal subjects would address them? "Would you like a glass of wine today, Your Above-Averageness?"

By the way: The difference between the "dead" Yankees and the "long-living" Mets is 3 wins. I'm taking 2 points for this one, because those were two equally stupid sentences. Score: pnoles: 3, Filip: 1

In New York, nobody has much patience for non-playoff baseball teams — even those with 26 world championships, a 13-year postseason streak and a new, grandiose stadium on the horizon.

All of this is pretty fair and valid. Score: pnoles: 3, Filip: 2

The Yankees are mired hopelessly in third place right now in the AL East, and all that’s left is a postmortem analysis and a jolting prescription for the future, which is actually quite simple. The Yanks must remember again that they are the Yanks, and not the Oakland A’s.

The Yankees spent $209,081,579 this year. I'm pretty sure they're aware of the whole Yanks/A's inequality. Although this sounds a little ridiculous, I haven't given you a chance to dig your way out of this one, so no points are awarded here.

It is no great mystery where things went wrong this season. General manager Brian Cashman decided he wanted to be Billy Beane.

Again, this sounds insane. Brian Cashman spent $209,081,579. It is nearly impossible for him to identify with Billy Beane. But fine, you still haven't made your point yet, so no score for this. I'm getting very impatient though! What are you going to (finally) tell me?

And while it’s a nice, feel-good notion to develop your own homegrown stars through the minor-league system, the Steinbrenner Yankees never did that before when it came to starting pitchers.

I'm sorry....have you....paid attention to anything that's happened in New York in the past few years? The Yankees have finished 8th, 7th, 9th, and 6th in the AL in ERA over the past 4 seasons. Their offense has been fucking carrying them into the postseason each year. Can you really blame Cashman for taking a different angle here, especially given that he had a glut of young, seemingly MLB-ready starters? No, no you cannot. Score: pnoles: 4, Filip: 2

From Catfish Hunter to David Cone to Roger Clemens, the club’s aces were traditionally mercenaries, imported to get the job done for two or three years before retiring or moving elsewhere.

And baseball is a business that never evolves or changes. The Yankees were in a situation that is prospect-wise exactly the same as all those years in the past, competing in a market that is exactly as intelligent as the ones from decades past. Never change or adjust to the way business is currently being carried out. I, personally, invested in Krispy Kreme back in 2000, when everyone said it was going to do well long-term. And since nobody got smarter and figured out that you can basically make Krispy Kreme doughnuts in your basement, and that the company isn't anything special, the stock is still probably doing really well (I haven't checked it in the past 4 years to make sure).

What the hell was I talking about? Oh well, I deserve a point for working Krispy Kreme into the equation. He said something pretty irrelevant anyway. Score: pnoles: 5, Filip: 2.

You're falling behind, Filip! Be careful!

Cashman, however, decided to change all that because he and the Tampa cabal experienced a troubled history recently while chasing outside talent pools. In direct competition with Theo Epstein of the Red Sox, Cashman signed the wrong former Marlin (Carl Pavano vs. Josh Beckett), the wrong former Japanese star (Kei Igawa vs. Daisuke Matsuzaka) and the wrong former Arizona Diamondback (Randy Johnson vs. Curt Schilling).

This is actually fairly interesting to see side by side. Score: pnoles: 5, Filip: 3

Having been burned so many times before, Cashman went the youth route. He turned his back on Johan Santana, refusing in a proposed deal to give up the quintessential mediocre prospect, outfielder Melky Cabrera.

What are you talking about? He was offering Phil Hughes and Cabrera in a package together! And we're talking about Phil Hughes the phenom, not whatever you want to call him today. There is absolutely no way that you can claim that he simply turned his back on Johan Santana. Score: pnoles: 6, Filip: 3

Instead he dived headlong into the 2008 season with a projected starting rotation that included young arms Chien-Ming Wang, Phil Hughes, Ian Kennedy and swingman Joba Chamberlain.

All four of those pitchers projected to pitch very, very well. But you're right, the Yankees should have totally signed like, Carlos Silva or something this offseason.

What followed was an unmitigated disaster, and one that should not have been wholly unexpected. You place your chips on immature arms, no matter how promising, and a raft of injuries and setbacks are bound to follow.

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Filip! My goodness! That is simply not a good thing to say! It's wrong! Very very wrong! Thing B does not directly follow from Thing A! That is not a theory! That is just a non-truth!

Who's leading the AL East? Who pitches for that team? Were Matt Garza and James Shields considered "mature arms"? John Danks and Gavin Floyd...are they having decent-ish seasons? How about Nick Blackburn and Glen Perkins? Is Tim Lincecum experiencing "a raft of injuries and setbacks?" "A raft of injuries?" Raft? WHERE ARE YOU GETTING THESE UNITS OF MEASUREMENT????

Score: pnoles: 7, Filip: 3 (I resisted the urge to give myself a billion points)

In New York, fans witnessed this sort of meltdown a dozen years ago with the Mets, when that organization figured Bill Pulsipher, Paul Wilson and Jason Isringhausen were the starting rotation of the future.

Stephen Drew is a baseball player.
Stephen Drew is a shortstop.
Therefore, all baseball players are shortstops.

I like using your logic, Filip. It makes proving things way easier!

Score: pnoles: 8, Filip: 3

One by one, these young Yankee arms and tendons met similar fates. Each one went down for at least a large chunk of the season. And while Wang and Chamberlain retain substantial promise, nobody even knows whether Hughes (9.00 ERA in six starts) or Kennedy (8.17 in 10 appearances) owns enough talent to succeed at the major-league level.

OK, sure. You aren't acknowledging how devastatingly unlucky any of this was, but Hughes and Kennedy are definitely, at the very least, question marks right now. Score: pnoles: 8, Filip: 4

This has left the Yankees in the uncomfortable position of slapping together makeshift rotations throughout the season. Even the unexpected resurrection of Mike Mussina wasn’t sufficient to offset the disastrous starting situation. As of this writing, the Yankees owned a 4.33 ERA, 16th in the majors, despite mostly solid efforts out of the bullpen.

But...but that ERA and MLB ranking is totally not out of line with anything the Yankees have been doing hiring mercenaries in the past few years! You really aren't convincing me of much here.

You can talk about the offense underachieving, and you’d be right there too.

Oh okay. I was reallly worried that you wouldn't even acknowledge this.

The Bronx Bombers were batting .273, sixth best in the majors, but their run production was ranked 13th. Alex Rodriguez had regressed into familiar non-clutch performances. Injuries to Jorge Posada and Hideki Matsui didn’t help, and this was a team with too many DHs, too few Golden Gloves.

Alex Rodriguez has been one of the best 5 hitters in the American League this year. But he's just such a fun punching bag!

Too many DHs, too few Golden Gloves......alright so if a team's defense is bad, don't you think that adversely affects how many runs the pitching staff allows? This is just taking too much away from your argument that betting on young arms was stupid. Even if you didn't say anything blatantly wrong in this paragraph, the way you worded and analyzed that entire thing has me 100% convinced that you know zero things about baseball. Score: pnoles: 9, Filip: 4

Yet those were not the reasons the Yankees have dropped so far, so fast.

WHAT??!?!??!?! You're making me fairly angry right now Filip! Here are things you have said. The offense has been mediocre, 13th in MLB. The pitching has been mediocre, 16th in MLB. Now you're telling me that only the pitching is the reason that the team has been mediocre this season? Your brain is a disaster zone. Score: pnoles: 10, Filip: 4. This is quickly turning into a blowout.

They were goners because the starters collapsed and because the Tampa Bay Rays emerged from nowhere.

By counting on young pitching, the Tampa Bay Rays emerged from nowhere to surpass the New York Yankees, who were completely and totally stupid for banking on young pitching. Score: pnoles: 11, Filip: 4

They failed because Cashman threw money at position players, but not at starters.

Because the market for purchasing starting pitching in this offseason were terrible. You could either 1) Trade for one year of Johan Santana, or 2) Sign Carlos Silva. That's. About. It. Score: pnoles: 12, Filip: 4

From here, then, there needs to be a radical change of philosophy and course. Hank Steinbrenner needs to sit down with Cashman and tell him, flat out: We are not the A’s. If you want to be general manager of a small market team, that can easily be arranged.

Wooo hoo! You tell 'em Hank! Give him hell! That's the last time you'll put any faith in some of the best pitching prospects in the game on my watch!

It’s time to chase some free-agent pitchers again, to start making deals, to fill a rotation with 30 year-olds instead of 22 year-olds. The Yankees have a new, expensive stadium to fill, demanding outrageous ticket prices. They can no longer be outbid for the Santanas and CC Sabathias of the world.

Oh yeah, because 30 year-olds are automatically better than 22 year-olds.

The Yankees’ dynasty of the late ‘90s was built around a largely homegrown cast of position players, and with talented temps on the mound. Somewhere along the way, things got reversed in the Bronx. The Yankees chased expensive sluggers, and fell in love with their starters in the farm system.

BECAUSE THE COMPOSITION OF THE FARM SYSTEM CHANGED! HOW IS THIS SO FUCKING HARD TO UNDERSTAND??

Score: pnoles: 13, Filip: 4

That romance has failed. The sooner the Yankees remember their bullying, big-market roots, the faster their recovery.

Now that ever blood vessel in my head has popped, you're finally done speaking. Wow. In re: big-market roots, I guess leading MLB in payroll wasn't enough. Just fuck off, Filip. By the way, you owe me $61,343.87 for surgeries to repair all the damage you just did to my brain.

I win. 13-4.

Every Time You Watch FOX Saturday Baseball With the Volume Unmuted, You Get Stupider

They've got the "B" team announcers working today's Rays/White Sox game. (I'm not going to take the time to look up their names.) If people are below Joe Buck and Tim McCarver on the depth chart, you know they're useless.

Play by play guy: You know, an all-Chicago World Series is a real possibility this year!
Color guy: Sure, it's a possibility, but they both still have to get there.

Thanks, pal. Thanks so much. You know, it's hot outside, but it's not cold. My couch is comfortable, but it's not lumpy. I'm hungry, but it's not like I don't want to eat something.

What a zilch.

FMTMQR: Gregg Easterbrook is an Unfunny Lummox

Jack and CHart (say "see heart," not, "chart") covered the most egregiously stupid stuff he put in last Tuesday's column. But there's still plenty more where that came from. In fact, I bet I don't have to try particularly hard to pick out one morsel of dumbassery or tragic unfunnyness from each and every one of his 16 AFC team previews.

Baltimore: In the 2007 season finale, Baltimore, which at that point had lost nine straight, defeated a Pittsburgh team that had locked its best seed and was resting starters for the playoffs. In the postgame news conference, Billick called the game "an outstanding win." Coaches use any opportunity to praise themselves, but that statement crossed some kind of nuttiness line.

Yes, clearly he was praising himself and only himself with that comment. And certainly it would be much more appropriate for him to tell the media (while his job was on the line, no less) "Well, we really shouldn't give a shit about this win because the Steelers were resting all their good players." Makes sense. Brutal honesty when dealing with the press- always a great policy when you're in a management position.

Animal activist note: The Ravens hope to have two actual ravens trained to fly around their stadium this fall. Ravens are intelligent animals with some ability to mimic speech; according to The Associated Press, the trainer is trying to teach the birds to say "Go, Ravens." TMQ thinks the birds should be trained to squawk the word "nevermore."

OK. Like the poem. And then they could use it to taunt or intimidate the other team. We get it, you don't have to explain-

If the visiting team scores a touchdown, they could flutter around the end zone proclaiming, "Nevermore! Nevermore!"

WE GOT IT, THANKS.

Buffalo: The Ivies played well on special teams and on defense -- subtract two blowouts by New England, and Buffalo allowed 18 points per game, a strong figure. But the offense was cover-your-eyes awful: predictable (57 percent rushing on first down, despite opponents OBVIOUSLY stacking the box on first downs),

I'm sure that comment is based on Gregg reviewing hours and hours of Bills game footage from last year. Either that, or he pulled it directly out of his rectum and through his pretentiously clinched sphincter. (And I just won $20 off Dan-Bob by using "sphincter" in a post.)

Buffalo's Ivy League coach, Dick Jauron, is a fine man but low-voltage personified; he's like a car battery that won't turn the engine on a cold morning. Jauron has just one winning season in seven as a head coach. Losing does not seem to bother him; he's never animated on the sidelines or upset after a loss, and he wasn't upset even after the Bills allowed two scores in the final 20 seconds to lose 25-24 to Dallas before a national audience on "Monday Night Football."

I'm not going to say that the level of passion displayed by a coach isn't at all important. I'm just going to say that when you look at a team's record and try to list the reasons their season ended up like it did, the level of passion displayed by their coach should probably be really close to the bottom. Like... at the bottom.

Jauron's gift is lowering expectations; this is his third season in Buffalo, yet he's still talking only about "improvement," not winning. Much of the time, the objective seems to be to lose with dignity.

I'm really sure that this guy, who has worked his entire life to become a professional football coach, doesn't care whether or not his team wins. It's not like, you know, his future as a professional coach (which ostensibly is very important to him) depends on his ability to win or something. We've been over this with Gregg before. It's too bad he's too much of a clod to learn.

Cincinnati: Other teams have bed checks, the Bengals have ankle-bracelet checks.

Yes, their players get in trouble with the law to a disproportionate degree.

Along the sidelines are coaches, trainers, defense attorneys and bail bondsmen.

Right, the whole criminal thing.

Maybe a defense attorney should coach the defense, which finished 27th in 2007.

In this case, the third time unfortunately is not the charm.

Cleveland: Ohio has become the Hall of Fame state -- it has Canton, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland and also the Inventors Hall of Fame in Akron. The latter's members ought to be a lot better known than the members of the first two Halls mentioned, since their contribution to society is greater.

Well, fuck it- why are you even writing this column? Shouldn't you be using your incredibly sophisticated and intelligent brain to educate readers about something a little more important than football? Let's just go ahead and disband professional sports as a whole. Unimportant. Useless. Mariottiesque.

Benched quarterback note: TMQ shook hands with Brady Quinn in LAX on the way back from the ESPYS.

I'm surprised the encounter didn't create a black hole of douche.

Denver: Drop a Fizzie into a glass of water; it bubbles madly, then disappears. That's the Denver Broncos since November 2006. At that point, the Broncos were 7-4 with the inside track to a wild-card berth, quarterbacked by Jake Plummer, a career 41-22 with Denver, and boasting one of the league's top defenses. Then The Ultimate Leader, Mike Shanahan, benched Plummer and sent in rookie signal-caller Jay Cutler. Since that moment, the Broncos are 9-12, their defense has gone Fizzie and even their vaunted rushing game has become mortal, slipping to ninth in 2007.

Gregg is apparently unfamiliar with the difference between correlation and causation. This is only about the 50th time he's brought up the QB switch in question during the last 20 months, and somehow, it's the sole reason the Broncos have not enjoyed success since. Poor defense? Cutler's/Shanahan's fault. Poor offensive line play? Cutler's/Shanahan's fault. In reality, although the last two years have been disappointing, the future couldn't be brighter as Cutler (who played well all last season despite having undiagnosed diabetes) establishes himself as a franchise player. Drop it, Easterbrook. Drop it.

Houston: Houston now has Alex Gibbs -- the guy who directed the blocking for the Denver rushing game which made [Insert Name Here] into star tailbacks. Gibbs is coaching the Texans' offensive line and bearing the title assistant head coach. Because most sportswriters don't understand how the Gibbs blocking system works, they call it "zone blocking." That's like calling all short passing attacks a West Coast offense. (TMQ has long believed most full-time football writers and sportscasters cannot diagram most standard football tactics.)

And yet, tragically, TMQ himself is unable to understand basic timing devices or why people are interested in Olympic medal counts. Really puts things into perspective.

Indianapolis: This team was ranked third on defense (in yards allowed per game) last season despite Dwight Freeney going on injured reserve at midseason, and was ranked fifth on offense (in yards per game) despite Marvin Harrison missing 11 games. The Colts lost close games to the Patriots and the Chargers; change a couple of plays in either of those contests, and Indianapolis might have repeated as Super Bowl champions.

Other teams who can make a similar claim: Patriots, Packers, Chargers, Steelers, Cowboys, and probably a couple others. Just saying. It's pretty useless to point out that changing a couple plays in a couple games could have resulted in a different end to a team's season.

Publishing note: Over the winter, Tony Dungy wrote, or at least signed his name to, a children's book. It begins, "Once upon a time there was a good little boy named Peyton who had a bad, evil brother named Eli."

Did Carlos Mencia write that joke? Jesus, It's almost bad enough to have originally been heard on "American Dad."

Jacksonville: Head coach Jack Del Rio's name means "of the River," and he is living up to that. A Jacksonville local news station reported that during the Georgia-Florida water shortage, Del Rio's house was gulping through 3,512 gallons of water per day. The typical home in Jacksonville uses 230 gallons per day, so Del Rio was at 15 times the local water-consumption average. Does Del Rio have a wave tank in his backyard?

What the fuck is a "wave tank?" Is it like a wave pool, the kind of attraction you'd see at a waterpark? Because even then, it would just be cycling the same water through its system over and over. I mean, I get what he's trying to say. But it comes out like "I can't believe the Tampa Bay Rays are so good this year. Do they have a magical good baseball player creating machine down there or something?"

New York: I'm not going to pick on what Easterbrook had to say about them, because most of it consisted of him flagrantly shitting all over Brett Favre and obviously I fully approve of that.

Kansas City: Scripture note: The apostle Paul's Letter to the Romans notes at 14:2, "Some believe in eating anything, while the weak eat only vegetables." Obviously Paul never played flag football with Gonzalez, one of the NFL's few vegetarians. The translation is from the New Revised Standard Version, endorsed by most biblical scholars. The New International Version, favored by evangelicals, renders the passage as, "One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables." Evangelical translators want being a vegetarian to sound wimpy!

I want my eleven seconds back.

Miami: The Marine Mammals have been at sea (yuck, yuck) since Richmond Webb left the team in 2000.

Making fun of your own comedic incompetence doesn't make it any more tolerable.

Arguably, the departure of Webb hurt the Dolphins more than the departure of Dan Marino, because Miami had a decent new quarterback waiting in the wings in Jay Fiedler, while the left tackle position has been a disaster since.

If Jay Fiedler was a "decent" quarterback, I'd hate to have one Gregg would qualify as "terrible" leading my team.

New England: In terms of memory power, New England's accomplishments exceeded what the Giants did, even if Jersey/A got to stand in the confetti shower on the sliding tray in Arizona. All New England needed to do was stop a third-and-11 snap with 45 seconds showing, and the word "perfect" would have shimmered into view.

They'd also have to have stopped a fourth-and-11 snap with 40-odd seconds remaining. Just saying.

The snap was not stopped, because nobody's ever been 19-0 and most likely nobody ever will be.

This is like saying Russia defeated Nazi Germany in the Battle of Stalingrad because good always triumphs over evil. Can we get some weaker analysis, please?

The Patriots are one terrific football team. Tuesday Morning Quarterback thinks the Colts are the club to beat this year, because the football gods will exact vengeance on the Patriots for all the bad karma they created with poor sportsmanship in 2007.

More "football gods" garbage, a week after belittling anyone who resorted to a god/karmic explanation for other worldly events.

One reason the Flying Elvii got to 16-0 in the 2007 regular season was a schedule without any West Coast trips; the Super Bowl was the sole time the team had to kick off west of the Rockies last season.

Yeah, I really think their ability to win would have been significantly diminished if they had to spend an extra 12 hours on an airplane over the course of four months.

Oakland: Camp note: the Raiders train at Redland Middle School in Napa, heart of wine country, while staying at the Marriott Napa. Head coach Lane "Hey Mom, I Got My Learner's Permit" Kiffin must really feel like the big man on campus when he's striding the halls of a middle school! Plus the Raiders' wine-and-cheese reception regime is grueling.

Disaster. Train wreck. Abortion.

Pittsburgh: (Not much to see here, except...) The Steelers were the best 2007 team to draw little media notice.

Little media notice? Little media notice? Is he referring to the Canadian media? Tell this to Browns or Buccaneers fans. Turn on or log in to any major media outlet's coverage, and you'll find heaping doses of certain teams year in and year out. The 2007 Steelers received the same treatment any decent Steelers team receives, which is to say, the public heard plenty about them. I know I'm arguing about something subjective here, but this statement is pretty obviously false in my book.

San Diego: Seven months later I still can't fathom it. San Diego has reached the AFC Championship Game and trails host New England 21-12 with 9:21 left, facing fourth-and-10 at the Pats' 36. Norv Turner sends in the punting unit. Trailing by two scores late against the highest-scoring team of all time, Turner punts in opposition territory. At least let your Pro Bowl kicker attempt a field goal! Boom goes the fraidiest fraidy-cat punt in football annals and the Chargers never touched the ball again. Not only was the punt an incredible case of chicken feathers, three times Turner ordered field-goal attempts inside the New England 9. To beat the highest-scoring team of all time on its own field, you need touchdowns! Instead, Turner used hyperconservative strategy, seeming to think he would just wait for the Patriots to make some killer mistake -- the Patriots, who had the NFL's fewest giveaways in 2007.

Hmmmmm. Well, it didn't happen on the Patriots' home field, but a game was played last February in which someone beat the Patriots despite 1) attempting a field goal from the New England 14, 2) punting on separate occasions from the New England 39 and the New England 41, and 3) taking advantage of several sizable New England mistakes.

But oh, how it helps to look good: Surely the sharp appearance of the Chargers' unis, and beauty of their powder-blue throwbacks, is a factor in the love San Diego gets.

If you're referring to any love they might get from teenaged female fans, maybe. If you're referring to the love they get from intelligent members of the sports media, no.

Tennessee: Vince Young continues to improve, but needs a star wide receiver;

Second part, yes. First part, not really. His QB rating climbed from 2006 to 2007, but his TD/INT ratio plummeted to a miserable 9:17 and his ability to pick up yards on the ground was greatly diminished as teams began to scheme against that aspect of his game. What can I say, I'm a hater; I don't think Young will ever be an above average NFL quarterback.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand... I'm spent. Goodnight, parents' basement dwellers. See you next week.

This Just In......

"RAYS CHOOSE TO PLAY THEIR OWN BASEBALL GAME INSTEAD OF SKIPPING IT TO WATCH BOSTON vs BALTIMORE ON DIRECTV" EXTRA! EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT!

I've never heard of Chris Gentilviso. And I'm quite certain that I don't like him one little bit.

Internal focus keeping Rays on top
Young team more worried about own play than Yankees, Red Sox

Rays Talent: [gets insulted and storms out]

Rays: [lose division by 13 games.]

SEATTLE - The Tampa Bay Rays’ eyes were glued to the television in the visitors’ clubhouse.

ZOMG dude. You've got my attention. What are they watching? Huh? What? Tellmetellmetellme!

This is how teachers tell you to write in like 6th grade and stuff.

They watched Brett Favre introduce himself to the New York media. They reacted to team USA defeating China in its Olympic basketball opener. They celebrated their series win over cheers for Padraig Harrington capturing the PGA championship.

But did they watch other baseball games? No way Jose! I bet you that's where this is going. Oh my God. I bet.....

There was little interest in DirecTV’s 14-channel Major League Baseball package — a sign of a club focused on no team but itself.

BOOM! Everyone here owes me an all-expense-paid trip to Old Country Buffet. Including transportation.

“Regardless of which way you look at the situation, we have to focus on ourselves,” first baseman Carlos Pena said. “It's focusing on within, not from without. When you start focusing outside, you lose sight on what you need to think about working on, and expend your energy the wrong way. If you play the game hard, everything else will take care of itself.”

Pretty standard deliver-to-media quote from a baseball player. Everyone pretty much understands what he's getting at, but it's best not to make too much of it.

The situation Pena was referring to? The Rays’ daily battle with the AL East goliaths: the Yankees and Red Sox.

Gentilviso's audience: [gets insulted and storms out]

Gentilviso: [loses his job in 13 days]

Outfielder Eric Hinske knows that battle well. When Hinske left Boston for Tampa Bay this season, he had hopes of the Rays being good, but not this good. Anyone who claimed to have predicted Tampa Bay’s success in April was “lying through their teeth.”

Oooooohhhh....Sheesh...oh boy. Listen....I hate to be, ya know...that guy but ummmm....you really should look at this.

But.....eh....computers don't have teeth.

In their quest to become the first team other than New York or Boston to win the AL East since the 1997 Baltimore Orioles, the Rays harnessed their success by choosing not to think about teams in the opponent’s dugout.

You know what's really underrated today? Hitting. Hitting is way more attributable to teams winning than any of this dribble.

“We go out there and play the same way every day, whether it's the Royals, Yankees, A’s …whatever,” Hinske said. “That's the way we go about our business. That's one of the keys to our success for sure.”

See, you never blame a player for saying this. This is the stuff you need to feed the media to get them to shut up and you know, look good for 8-year-olds. This is not baseball analysis in the least, and it's not supposed to be. When you write a column that basically feeds you re-worded player quotes like this one, you really need to reconsider your decision to write about sports.

For Rays manager Joe Maddon, dealing with the thought of beating the Red Sox or Yankees could be as simple as thinking of the Commissioner’s Trophy.

The Commissioner's Trophy....that thing they give you when you win the World Series.....thinking of beating the Red Sox or Yankees is as simple as thinking of that.....

(5 hours later)

This sentence does not make any sense.

Maddon was named Mike Scioscia’s bench coach with the Angels in 1999, surviving as a leftover from the dysfunctional Terry Collins era. The club suffered through two mediocre seasons under Scioscia, before emerging in 2002 with something never experienced before in the franchise’s then-41-year history — a World Series title.

This is pretty much completely irrelevant to everything you've talked about thus far.

That season, the Angels eliminated the Yankees. The Red Sox missed the playoffs. Maddon could project that example to prove that the AL East goliaths have been conquered before.

Or, you could just point out that 5 of the last 7 World Seriesezes weren't won by either of them.

But he chooses not to. The Rays have no plans to bank on history through a difficult final month of the season, which includes 12 games with Boston and New York.

Hah. Watch out world, because unlike some teams (who SHALL remain nameless) the Rays aren't counting on what happened in 2002 to help them today.

“The race doesn't matter,” Maddon said.

I wholeheartedly disagree.

“It’s what we're doing that matters. We're going to scoreboard watch, and I'm O.K. with that. I want us to take care of our effort and our mental preparation each night, and I'm good with what happens.”

But ultimately all that matters is that you finish with more wins than the Red Sox and the Yankees......

The 2002 Angels took care of their effort, with a lineup that included strong young talent with a smattering of veterans. Their home run leader was Troy Glaus with 30, a talented 25-year old with more strikeouts than hits in each of his first four seasons. Their RBI leader was Garret Anderson with 123, an unheralded lifelong Angel taken in the 4th round of the 1990 amateur draft.

This is, again, approaching dangerously extreme levels of irrelevance. Perhaps he has a crush on David Eckstein or something. Chris does, after all, write about sports.

But the efforts of one player meant nothing. It was the entire roster that emerged victorious in a three-team AL West battle. The 101-win Oakland A’s were axed in the Division Series, while the 93-win Mariners missed the playoffs.

In conclusion: Rays' internal focus is winning them the division.

What. The. Hell. Does. This. Have. To. Do. With. Anything.

Outfielder Cliff Floyd knows the Rays have used a similar recipe of flying under the radar this season.

Flying under the radar is the recipe for winning now?

Take:

1 cup of historical irrelevance
3 tablespoons of not playing in Boston or New York
1 pinch of playing in a horrible baseball town
Jason Bartlett
1 country full of idiots working in the media

And there you have it, the recipe to win a divisional race.

But in his mind, it’s irrelevant what past teams have done.

Yet for some reason, you decided to spend 35% of this article on that.

After three days in a Tampa Bay uniform, the newest member of the Rays had yet to receive the memo about avoiding comparisons.

Troublemaker! Cut him! (Chad Bradford)

Relief pitcher Chad Bradford has made six trips to the playoffs, with three different teams, in 11 major league seasons. While the Yankees and Red Sox bolstered their rosters with blockbuster trades, Bradford was picked up from the Orioles a few days after the deadline.

Bradford quickly noticed the looseness of the Rays’ clubhouse, and it reminds him of the dominant Oakland squads he played with from 2001-2004.

3.68, 4.37, 3.63, 3.97, 3.21. Those are the starters' ERAs for the Rays. Does this deserve no credit whatsoever? Is this more or less important than the looseness of the clubhouse? The Rays have scary good pitching. Scary good. The only one over his head is Sonnanstine. And there's more awesome pitching on the way. And I've heard they're all tighter than a male stripper's pants in the clubhouse. Not loose at all. And guess what? They'll make the team more awesome.

That process begins at the minor league level, through the creation of an organization-wide code of discipline. With that uniformity in place, both the Tampa Bay Rays and Princeton (W. Va.) Rays are aware of how players with issues are treated.

And there's an organization-wide flood of awesome pitching. Pitching. Don't forget about pitching! Gawd, he's just not gonna listen to me.

In turn, Maddon believes winning will be a consistent part of Rays baseball.

“It has to bleed through the entire organization if it’s going to work,” Maddon said. “You look at the Angels, that's why they're good right now.”

Also: The Angels are good due to pitching. Pitching.

At a major league-leading 31 games over .500, the Angels appear primed to return to their first World Series since 2002. No matter who surfaces as a winner in the AL East, all three teams face the proposition of going through Los Angeles to reach the Fall Classic.

That’s another scenario that Maddon doesn’t get too caught up in. The only channel he watches is his franchise moving forward.

What an outstanding manager he must be. This is the man that once said that David Eckstein helps you even if he goes 0-4 and makes 3 errors. This is the man who has the priviledge of managing a team who has some of the best prospect classes coming up through the system in history. Life just isn't fair. Want to swap teams with Manny Acta?

Pitching.

Speaking of Bill Simmons

ESPN is now running a simple 5 second promo advertising The Sport Guy's work on their website and ESPN360. After what I'm sure was hours of brainstorming and debate, here's the slogan they decided to use for the spot-

"It's like watching sports with your best friend- if your best friend knew what he was talking about!"

Things Bill thinks, as advertised in his own columns:

-Excessive use of the serve and volley tactic makes tennis today less interesting
-Only in Boston do professional athletes attend local sporting events (besides the ones they're playing in)
-The quality of starting pitching in the AL would be worse in 2008 than 2007 because young starters like Felix Hernandez are on strict pitch counts
-Greg Oden will not be any good in the NBA because he walks oddly
-It's harder to be a fan of a team that wins a lot and then stops winning, than to be a fan of a team that never wins at all
-It's been settled- Tom Brady is better than Peyton Manning
-There just aren't any good real life sports villains these days

Nice slogan, ESPN.

Oh, and one last time, I would like to extend sincere thanks to the 2007 New York Giants. I honestly don't know where I would be right now if not for you guys.

This Is Not an Anti-Boston Post

This is an anti-dumbass radio personality post. Earlier today (before game 5 of the NBA Finals, obviously), I'm flipping radio channels. I decide to head over to the local ESPN affiliate. What is the very first thing I hear from the talking head of the hour?

You know why this series is 3-1 Boston instead of being tied 2-2? Because the Boston Celtics never stopped believing in themselves.

Yeah, that must be it. Or maybe, just maybe, it's any one of a hundred more substantive reasons. Down the stretch execution. Matchups. Defensive adjustments. Rebounding. But sure, the degree to which the Celtics "believe[d] in themselves" in game four might have been the key factor too. You never know. Hey, nameless Sunday mid-afternoonish ESPN Radio guy, whose actual identity is not revealed by their scheduling webpage: go fuck yourself. You stink.

Chat Wrap With...

A fucking retard.

Ladies and gentleman: Jayson "Proper statistical analysis is for queers" Stark.

This weeks' question? WHICH MLB TEAM IS IN TROUBLE AFTER 6 GAMES? IS IT THE ROCKIES OR THE TIGERS. I MEAN, FUCK, THERE'S ONLY LIKE 156 GAMES LEFT.

THE CASE FOR THE ROCKIES

Let's be honest. This may have been a dominant team for 22 games last September and October but that's about it. Throw out that 21-1 streak, and the Rockies are 75-79 since Opening Day 2007.

Let's be honest. What the fuck is the point of using single season records if you are just gonna pick out large hunks of data and throw them out the fucking window? Take away a horrendous June 1-9 road trip, and the rockies suddenly win the NL west by 9 games! Wow, Look at that!

Dan (Chicago): When a team is sub .500 for 90% of the year and .950 for 10% of the year, I tend to believe in the larger sample size.

Jayson Stark: Well put. In their defense, and in the interest of presenting accurate facts, they were four games over .500 for 90 percent of the year (through Sept. 15) before that 21-1 magic kicked in.

Jayson and Dan from Chicago using big 9th grade statistics vocab here! "Percent" and "Sample Size?" I'm not sure how the average ESPN.com user will deal with these difficult words. Here's the thing though: when a hitter can't really hit for average and strikes out a lot, but hits for power (ie a shitload of home runs,) when he makes contact, we (as smart baseball fans) say he still has plenty of value. Why in the world would you throw out a streak like that when looking at the 2007 rockies? It makes no sense.

Plus that streak plays into the overall sample size for the 2007 season, which said that the Rockies were without a doubt one of the elite teams last year.

For reference, the rockies in 2007 had the best run differential of any team, the lowest second half ERA (and they play at Coors Field) and a pretty good lineup.

Nevertheless, the Rockies are in a very difficult division to dig their way out of.

Speaking of sample size: THE 2008 SEASON IS LIKE, A WEEK OLD!

Also, so this quick post isn't all Rockies-centric, here's this gem:

I refuse to believe, by the way, that Trevor Hoffman will have this many issues all year. People can't wait to write that guy off, for some reason. And he's one of the five greatest closers of all time.

Um, Jayson, maybe it's because:

1. he's getting up there in years
2. Has shown a steady decline over the past few season in all his peripherals (WHIP, k/9, k/bb etc), not to mention the easy to observe decrease in the velocity and movement of his pitches. Oh but i forgot, he's one of the greatest closers of all time. stupid me

I didn't realize until like half an hour ago how much I hate Jayson Stark. But man do I hate that guy

One More Thing

Oh yeah, since I didn't post yesterday, here's one more super awesome little anecdote for you. It's about someone who should not be working in the business of analyzing sports. I bet you saw that coming.

Earlier today I flip on ESPN. And lo and behold, what do I stumble into right off the bat? Why, it's Skip Bayless doing his argument show thingy! (First Take? Cold Pizza? The Place Where Sensible Ideas Go To Die?) Skip was trying to claim that LeBron James is hurting the Cavaliers, which is kind of like claiming that alcohol is hurting the world's reproductive rate. First he cited some essentially meaningless statistic like the Cavaliers being 5-2 when James isn't in the lineup the past two years, and then tried to claim that mediocre players like Larry Hughes and Daniel Gibson are actually really awesome. I don't remember the exact quote, but his conclusion was something like:

"LeBron is holding this Cavs team back!"

Fortunately, Skip's guest/opponent for the day was some dude who actually knows his butthole from his elbow. (I'm not sure who, and I'm sorry clarifying that he was smarter than Skip doesn't exactly narrow it down). He quickly pointed out that the Cavaliers averaged 55 losses a season during the four years before James arrived. Since then they've won 35, 42, 50, and 50 games. Skip, confronted by this fact, backed down but offered the following rebuttal. I'm not sure if he could have said anything stupider. (This one is an exact quote.)

"Well, he's holding them back from advancing in the playoffs."

Let's look at the 2007 NBA Playoff bracket. Where is Cleveland? How far did they adv- Oh, OK. There they are. Great.

And hey, don't forget to go two posts down and throw your hat in the ring for Reader Extra Participation Friday. If you don't, it'll hurt my feelings.

Don't Ever Watch NBC's "Football Night In America"

It's their pregame show for "Sunday Night Football." It features Bob Costas, Peter King, and Keith Olberman reviewing highlights of all the afternoon's NFL action. And it's absolutely atrocious. Costas is Costas- I like him a lot during the Olympics, but could do without him pretty much any other time. He makes for a capable frontman but gives off a very strong "bored" vibe. That's a bad thing. If I'm handing out grades, which I am, he gets a C-. King is King- he's actually a lot more tolerable on screen than in print. On "Football Night in America," he spends less time than usual cooing about Brett Favre and Tom Brady and more time just giving analysis, which is obviously a step in the right direction. Still, he doesn't mesh with Costas or Olberman at all. Whenever they defer to him it sounds like his voice is being piped in from a different sound stage and neither of the other guys ever engages him in dialogue. I'll give him a C, but that's only because today he managed to go a whole half hour without calling Brady or Favre "adorable."

Olberman, however, is the real reason I'm making this post. (Grade: F) I guess you could say he's lost a step. In my wistful mind, he'll always be paired alongside Dan Patrick and offering quippy one-liners while calling highlights on Sportscenter as he did five nights a week until 1997. He was fantastic back then. Now? He's completely intolerable. They hired him to do exactly what he used to do; narrate highlights while adding a couple funny one liners here and there. Today, there were two key problems with his attempts to do so. 1) He couldn't keep up with the highlights, and didn't seem to know what was going on in many of them. 2) He was completely and totally unfunny. Here's one example that stuck with me because of how bad it was. During the New Orleans/Arizona game, at one point Kurt Warner fumbled while standing in the pocket. Saints LB Scott Shanle recovered and returned the ball. Olberman:

And the ball is picked up by Shanle! It's a "Shanle Production!" *pause* If anyone gets that reference, I'll buy them something.

If your references are self-admittedly obscure, you suck at your job as a highlight narrator. This one is so obscure I couldn't even decipher it with the help of Google. There's a writer/director somewhere out there named John Patrick Shanley, who is credited on imdb.com as having a hand in 12 Hollywood productions since 1987 (less than half of which I had heard of). That's my only guess as to who Keith was talking about. If it's correct, that's the lamest shit ever. Olberman and this Shanley guy have to be close friends or something. If it's not correct, then congratulations are in order for Keith. He made a completely and totally indecipherable reference, on national television no less. America appreciates his efforts. And of course, that's just one example. There were many others that were much easier to understand and still fucking stupid. What happened, Keith? Where have you gone? Has becoming a smarmy political commentator robbed you of your ability to tell me what's happening during a football game without sounding like a jackass?

I know, I know- it's not like there are a lot of options when it comes to highlight shows like this one. If you spent Sunday afternoon anywhere but on your couch or in a sports bar, you need to get caught up somewhere as soon as you get home from wherever. All I'm saying is, don't do it on NBC. If you feel like you can't put up 30 minutes of Chris Berman on ESPN's "The Blitz," just go to ESPNews. Those anchors are the JV guys- they're not yet full enough of themselves to try and upstage the highlights with awful jokes. They're just there to calmly say what happened. I speak only for myself, but that's all I'm ever looking for anyways.

Jemele Hill Check...

Unfortunately she hasn't been fired, and to the joy of our five readers, she's still writing piece of shit throwaway garbage.

A-Fraud: Give me Kobe over A-Rod any day

Pay-Rod, Slappy McSlapperson, Me-Rod, Gay-Rod, and now this???? How did Hill come up with A-Fraud? I can just imagine her sitting at the typewriter:

"Pay-Rod? Nah that's been done before. What rhymes with 'A?' Hmmmmmmm. Play? Pay? Gay? Nay? Nope. Let's try two syllables. Cache? Dismay? Buffet? Dang. What about three syllables? Disarray? Fish Filet? Puppet Play? Well, Fuck. Oh I know! I'll keep the 'A' and Rhyme something with 'Rod.' Facade? Nah... let's see..... AHA! I'll call him A-Fraud because he's not the real deal!"

Say what you will about Kobe Bryant, but at least he's not a mercenary who wants all of the money, but none of the pressure, and doesn't perform in the playoffs.

In other words, at least he's not Alex Rodriguez.

According to this, last year Kobe Bryant made 17.7 million in salary, 16 million in endorsements, for a grand total of 33.7 million. In the same time frame, A-Rod made 22 million in salary and 6 million in endorsements, totalling 28 million. And that's not even considering that A-Rod plays in an uncapped league and plays in twice as many games per year as Kobe.

Both players are generally viewed as selfish, whiny divas. But as we approach the unusual sports phenomenon of having the best player in baseball head to a new team and arguably the best player in basketball also potentially on the move, understand that A-Rod and Kobe are two very different creatures.


I'll take this Ford F-450 work truck over that Yamaha Crotch Rocket any day. But am I a Construction Foreman or a Yakuza henchman? Who cares?

A-Rod's decision to opt-out of New York is far more self-absorbed than Kobe's finagling to get out of Los Angeles.

Here's where the comparison completely falls apart. Yes both players are guys who seem to be consumed with padding their stat lines. Kobe is notorious for throwing up low chance lopsided jumpshots while being tripled covered. Even if Kobe has a %50 chance of making said shot, he's hurting his team by shooting instead of passing to an open player with an opportunity to make a higher percentage shot. A-Rod just gets lots of walks, hits, and plays above average defense. When he makes a play (which happens A LOT), he's helping his team every single time.

Or to quote this anonymous internet poster:

Baseball is great partially because it's the only sport where, on the field, every single player can be completely greedy and do what maximizes their personal value every single play and it's to the team's best interest. Every other sport is a zero sum game, where every shot you take is one your teammate doesn't--in baseball, every hit you get provides another opportunity. There's no clock besides individual failure. If Ayn Rand and Adam Smith fucked, she'd give birth to a baseball

Despite Kobe's flaws, we at least know he is consumed with winning championships. A-Rod is consumed with being A-Rod.

Maybe A-Rod wants to get out of New York because they have an aging, below average pitching staff on a team who made the playoffs this season entirely because of the merits of A-Rod and his 14 wins above replacement.

And what the fuck does "A-Rod is consumed with being A-Rod" even mean?

Kobe doesn't always demonstrate his aspirations maturely. It also can't be ignored that a key aspect of his championship ambitions is that he has to be the guy in the lead role. But if the worst you can say about Kobe -- whose competitive streak was cloned from Michael Jordan's -- is he no longer wanted to play alongside a once-dominant, but injury-prone center, it's not exactly a sign of the apocalypse. And considering some of the things that Lakers owner Jerry Buss has said about Kobe in recent weeks, we've seen that Buss is his own man -- if he really wanted to keep Shaq, he would have kept him. Buss' main concern was dumping another $100 million into the fourth Fu-Schniken.

Are you serious? Last time I checked, Shaq went on to win another title with Miami. "Hey don't fault the guy because he drove the other player who was largely responsible for all those championships out of town. He just wants to win. And also sell Nutella"

But does anything in A-Rod's history or demeanor suggest he's remotely obsessed with winning the way Kobe is? A-Rod seems more obsessed with being loved than winning. He wants all the perks, but none of the responsibility. He wants 100-plus RBIs, and to eventually be the home run king. Just don't expect him to bring any of the necessary intangibles it takes to win something meaningful.

This argument has been beaten into the ground. A-Rod has shown up in the playoffs. Several times before. It's not him out there pitching meatballs to David Ortiz and Travis Hafner. Give me Yadir Molina or David Eckstien any day. They know how to win!

Sounds like a perfect fit for the Chicago Cubs.

Get it? Because they haven't won a World Series in a really long time. The Cubs and their 100+ million payroll also definitely don't care about winning it all. Just like Buffet-Rod!

A-Rod isn't a leader, comes off as insecure and teams mysteriously seem better off when he's gone.

I'll take a 177 OPS+ hitting infielder over a "clubhouse leader" any day.

Also no mystery here:

2000 Mariners: Lost in ALCS (with a 101 Team ERA+)
2001 (post A-Rod) Mariners: Lost in ALCS (with a 118 Team ERA+)

2003 Rangers: 69 wins (team ERA+ of 88)
2004 (post A-Rod) Rangers: 87 wins (team ERA+ of 111)

So I guess A-Rod causes pitchers on his team to suck. That means we should expect a 120 ERA+ season from the 2008 Yankees.

The only thing Jemele has proved here is that she is mystified by the impact pitchers have on the success of baseball teams.

Kobe? The three-time champion thrives under pressure and the low opinions some people have of him.

How many championships has Kobe won since the rape accusations? Oh, none?

Kobe was criticized for brutally assessing the Lakers' lack of progress. But when A-Rod was a Yankee, the only thing that seemed to bother him was his own personal slumps.

Wouldn't you prefer a player who gets upset about losing more than a player who seems fine with it as long as he can stare at his pretty statistics and pay stubs? Can you blame Kobe for complaining about any plan that included passing on a skilled player who could help the Lakers in the present in favor of the long-term coddling of Andrew Bynum? Has A-Rod ever exhibited that kind of passion and determination? Has he ever given answers that didn't sound rehearsed?

I thought A-Rod said he'd take a pay cut to play for a winner? Once again, maybe he's sick of playing on teams who cannot put together a competent pitching staff. I think he's a bit greedy when it comes to his salary, but isn't the same true of Kobe? They're both the highest paid players in their respective sports.

Even if A-Rod somehow wound up playing for the world champion Red Sox -- and if you're listening Boston, adding this guy to your clubhouse is akin to putting Britney Spears on "Nanny 911" -- it would be difficult to interpret A-Rod's actions as that of a man driven to win.

Jemele made it three quarters of the way through this column without making an awkward pop culture reference. Of course it wouldn't be a Jemele Hill column without at least a couple of FOX reality shows/pet rock/Celebrity DUI comparisons thrown in for good measure.

A-Rod, of course, has the right to chase as much money as he wants. It's not his fault if the market dictates he earn an astronomical figure. There's no denying there were times he was unfairly brutalized in New York. The stalking by the tabloids was unacceptable, as was the fascination with his personal life. But the problems he had there will follow him into his next clubhouse.

I can't wait for two things:

1) The yankees finish with 80 wins in 2008 and miss the playoffs
2) A-Rod is appreciated in his new city for his eye-popping, guaranteed to improve whatever team he plays on performance.

It's fair to accuse A-Rod and Kobe of being types who can't operate in a locker room unless they control it.

The difference is, there've been signs that Kobe has outgrown some of that. A-Rod doesn't seem like he ever will.

One thing I can assure you, dear reader, is that Jemele Hill will never make a well written argument based on real facts instead of baseless accusations.

How NOT To Convince Your Readers That You Understand Sports

CNNSI.com's Andrew Perloff is here to put on a little clinic for all the kids out there. Are you ready, aspiring young journalists? Like the title says, after reading this you will hopefully have an understanding of how NOT to be a good journalist.

Patriots won't go undefeated

Given the way I regularly demonstrate my hatred for New England, you can tell this article must really suck if I'm going to mock it even though it speaks negatively about their beloved Patriots.

The perfect season talk surrounding the Patriots will be kicked up a notch after their win over the Colts on Sunday. New England will be favored by more than a touchdown in each of its remaining seven games, so the quest for 16-0 seems reasonable.

I don't think the Pats can do it and I'll argue with any FanNation user who disagrees. Here are my key reasons.

OK, so like I was saying, pay attention, kids. When you say you're going to provide "key reasons" to back up a point, you might want them to not resemble what you're about to read. At all.

1. The Patriots will sit starters. If they go 15-0, they visit the Giants in Week 17. New York will almost certainly be playing for playoff position, and New England will have nothing at stake. As heartless as Bill Belichick is, he won't risk injuries for a record that is insignificant if they don't win the Super Bowl. Belichick has benched starters in similar situations through the years.

WRONG. WRONG. First, Belichick has (seemingly) never been as mad at other teams and willing to stop at nothing to humiliate them as he is this year. Second, he's never had a 15-0 team. Do you really think he'd pass up a chance to knock those smarmy '72 Dolphins down a peg or two? I hate the guy and I hate his team. But the reality of the situation appears to be that they're pulling out all the stops in an effort to beat the shit out of everyone. I'm 99% sure a chance to go undefeated would entice the Patriots into playing as hard against the Giants in week 17 as they did against the Colts last weekend.

2. They face the No. 1 and No. 2 ranked defenses in the NFL: Baltimore and Pittsburgh. The Colts proved you can get to Tom Brady, and they didn't need to blitz much to do it. The Ravens and Steelers will come up with creative ways to rush the passer and they'll try to rattle Randy Moss with big hits. Brady led Moss into some dangerous territory against Indy. Moss bounced off smallish Indy defenders like they were gnats. Not sure if he'll have the same luck against Baltimore and Pittsburgh.

Well, those two teams just played, and Pittsburgh hung 38 on Baltimore. So it may be time to stop thinking the Ravens are some kind of elite defensive team. The Steelers? Christ, they let the Broncos put 31 on them. These are the same Broncos that have cracked the 20 point threshold exactly two other times this season, and have finished with less than 16 points a whopping 5 times. Furthermore, look at who each team has played. The Ravens' list of opponents (minus the Steelers) resembles a SEC school's non-conference schedule. The Steelers' isn't much better. In short, BAL and PIT's defensive rankings are a crock of crap and New England would probably put 45 on either of them.

3. The target on their back is even bigger. On paper, none of these teams should beat the Patriots. But emotionally, you have to give New England's opponents an edge. How long can Belichick convince his team everyone is against him because of Spy-gate?

I'm guessing all season. Have we seen anything that would indicate otherwise in 2007 so far?

The Pats are now the evil empire. They're the new New York Yankees or Duke Blue Devils.

So, everyone hates them. Therefore they will lose a game. God, if only it were so simple. This is the definition of terrible analysis. Please, children. If you somehow make it big in the sports journalism world, and are one day trying to talk down an obviously dominant team in one of your articles, saying ANYTHING but what Andrew said here.

4. Injuries. They haven't had many. That will change. It always does.

Also, don't say this. Not in these words, anyways. Or with this complete and total lack of context or depth.

5. Strange things happen in the NFL. Not a great reason, but for my money, it's the most compelling. The Patriots were vying with the Colts for homefield last season and got shut out by the Dolphins in Week 14. Explain that. Other teams that have gone late into the season undefeated have lost games they shouldn't have. New England won't prove to be an exception.

And you might want to avoid basing your "most compelling" reason entirely on A) the fact that strange things happen in sports sometimes and B) the fact that at other times in history, teams have lost games they shouldn't have. This is not how people that get paid money to write about sports should go about their jobs.

OK, so going back to the kids and the lessons I was trying to help them learn, what did we cover today?

1. Andrew Perloff = a pile of elephant poop
2. If you want to write about specific teams, try to have at least a basic understanding of them first
3. Injuries: they usually occur during the season
4. The existence of "strange happenings" is a compelling reason to go against all reasonable logic

i'm not 100% sure this counts as a mixed metaphor

but i am 100% sure it counts as stupid. bob griese, calling the penn st.-michigan game on abc, talking about how michigan needs to establish a ground attack because they don't want to put too much pressure on their freshman quarterback:

"Once they get that running game going, anything else is just the cherry on top of the iceberg."

you sure it's not gravy at the end of the tunnel?