MLB on XM's Jeff Nelson takes a dumb subject (baseball's unwritten rules) and makes it sound ten times dumber than it usually does

You know what I mean when I refer to the unwritten rules. What methods you're allowed to use when you're trying to steal signs, when and how you can retaliate if the other team's pitcher throws at your team (answer, if I were in charge of baseball: IT IS MANDATORY. YOU WILL BE EJECTED IF YOU DON'T DO IT), and whether or not spitting on John Hirschbeck is permissible.

I find that most people in the media who like to talk about baseball's unwritten rules are morons. This is probably the case because most of those people are former players, and nearly every pro baseball player has an IQ below 60. Anyways, earlier today former overrated relief pitcher Jeff Nelson raised the stakes in the long-running competition for "stupidest opinion ever held by anyone on Earth at any point in time."

Scene: Nelson is doing a live update-style show with some other co-host dude. The show involves the two of them talking about baseball news (lots to cover during this particular show because of the trade deadline) while mixing in live updates from ongoing games and a little analysis of those games. At the time I was listening, Justin Verlander had a no-hitter through 7 innings against the Angels. For reference the Angels came into the day 2 games back of the Rangers in the AL West- very much in the playoff race.

At the time they came to bat in the top of the 8th they were trailing 3-0. That's trouble when you're facing Verlander to be sure. Erick Aybar led off the inning, and with the game still within reach, he decided that the best possible way for him to reach base was via a bunt attempt. He didn't get a good one down, but Verlander made a throwing error trying to get him at 1st and he would later come around to score. The Angels got another run in that same inning, and as a result, trailed only 3-2 in the top of the 9th and managed to get the tying run to 2nd before the game ended.

So what about Aybar's bunt attempt? A pretty savvy way for him to jumpstart his team's offense, no? When you're in the thick of a divisional race on the last day of July, and you're only trailing 3-0 in the 8th, anything goes, right? Not if you're Jeff Nelson. Now I get that because Nelson is a former pitcher his perspective is probably going to be slanted towards that side of the argument. But good ghost of Ty Cobb. In expressing his disgust towards Aybar's decision to try to break up the no-no with a bunt, he said all of the following things or something very close to them. (I'm going off memory 10 hours after I heard the segment in question, people. Work with me here.)

You don't do that.

That's bush league.

Detroit's fans were right to boo Aybar for that.

That's just absolutely inappropriate.

And my favorite, this one verbatim:

If you want to break up a no hitter, you get a hit the right way.

Seriously, he sounded like Joe Buck after Randy Moon pretended to moon Green Bay's fans. The indignation in his voice was noticeable. You don't DO that. Why, it's unsporting! It's like a play action fake! Or intentionally fouling in basketball when the other team is ahead and trying to run out the clock! Fuck trying to win- obey the CODE, people. The secret set of nonexistant rules that morons like Jeff apply arbitrarily from their ivory towers. THAT'S what's important. Playoff spot? Pshh. What good is it if you got there by bunting to break up a no hitter? What a zilcheroo.

Now I can understand if some people think it's inappropriate to do what Aybar did if you're down like 10-0, or if you're the Cubs or some other team that has no shot at making the playoffs. Neither of those fact patterns applies here. So at this point I'm starting to think that Jeff Nelson is not actually a human, because no human could be as dim as he sounded today.

In conclusion Jeff Nelson is a poorly programmed robot.

The Only Thing Worse Than How The NCAA Does Business...

...are blisteringly idiotic articles about how the NCAA does business.

Look--everyone with any sense of moral fiber and a concept of human decency and decorum has misgivings about the way the NCAA masquerades as a "Scholar Athlete" institution but pimps out their indentured servants as if they were professional athletes, reaping the same financial benefits of professional leagues with the added bonus of forcing the top 18-20 year olds in the country into a free-labor agreement which means that these students netting hundreds of millions of dollars for this conglomerate of major institutions are paid el zilcherino besides a negative-opportunity cost tuition remission. I mean, or something like that.

That still doesn't excuse this sort of inane argumentation. This article by some chotch named David Whitley, employed by the last company to employee woman-beating know-nothing Jay Mariotti, attempts to make the argument that since the NCAA (and the schools therein) function(s) as a corporate entity, there is absolutely no reason to behave at all otherwise in any aspect of their dealings. It also has a lot of shitty jokes.

Enough preamble. Let's get down to biznass:

The sky is again threatening to crash in on the Big 12 Conference. According to hypocrites...

Hoo boy. An article taking down NCAA hypocrites! Certainly he must be talking about how Ohio State athletes caught breaking no-payola rules got to play in the Sugar Bowl because Ohio State is a big money university, whereas the Baylors and Boise States of the world get ass-jammed at the slightest hint of violations. Certainly an article exposing hypocrisy in college sports would be against the sweetheart deals and selective enforcement major moneymakers are privy to, right? After all, any other hypocrisy in the sport pales next to that hypocrisy, right? Right David? Oh wait...

Anyway, Messr Whitley is going to take half past forever to actually get to his main point in doing just the opposite, so let's kill some time playing a new FJayM game I've invented. It's called: "Rimshot or Tumbleweed?" I'll tell you the answers at the end if you feel like playing at home

...it’s all Bevo’s fault.

RIMSHOT...OR....TUMBLEWEED?

Bevo is Texas’ mascot and the name behind the new Longhorn Network. ESPN’s brainchild is set to debut next month, giving eager fans nonstop coverage of everything from football to women’s cross country to Mack Brown shaving in the morning.

RIMSHOT....OR....TUMBLEWEED?

It’s also giving other conference members the heebie-jeebies.

RIMSHOT....OR....TUMBLEWEED?

They are grousing about how the network will be an unfair advantage. Texas A&M and Oklahoma are floating rumors they might bolt to the SEC if something isn’t done to rein in Bevo.

RIMSHOT...OR...TUMBLEWEED?

Ok. Feel free to scroll down to see how you did. Let's get on with the asinine article.

After the Texas A&M Board of Regents met Thursday, school president R. Bowen Loftin emerged to express grave concern over the Longhorn Network televising high school games and unduly influencing young studs to sign with Texas.

Wow! Yeah...that sounds like a reasonable concern, doesn't it? You're essentially giving the university carte blanche to engage in unprecedented and unfair recruiting tactics. Coaches at other colleges aren't even allowed to have recruits over to their house for a can of soda, but Texas can dangle nationally televised games for high school stars as an incentive for coming to play for Texas? I mean, yeah...that totally seems like it's beyond the pale. So that can't possibly be what the other schools are being hypocritical about, right? After all, a TV deal's a TV deal, but when you use that for recruiting that's pretty over the line.

Certainly Whitley's not saying that this TV deal should be considered the exact same as every other NCAA TV deal, right?...

“If we have an unequal playing field for various schools, that we think is a problem,” he said. “That creates uncertainty.”

The official school position: Unequal playing fields are a problem if we’re not equal. Otherwise, they’re just dandy.


This whole crisis sprang from the deal conjured up to save the Big 12 last summer. Nebraska and Colorado bolted and Texas was threatening to join the Pac 10.


That conference wouldn’t allow the Longhorns to start their own network. The Big 12 would, and commissioner Dan Beebe negotiated a sweet new contract with Fox.


It will pay Texas, Texas A&M and Oklahoma $20 million a year. The other seven conference members will get $14 to $17 million.


The Big Three also got to split about $20 million in buyout fees from Colorado and Nebraska. Baylor and the rest of the Big 12 got approximately squat.


Does that sound like the makings of an equal playing field?


Not quite, but A&M and Oklahoma were the beneficiaries. Now they’re saying the Longhorn Network epitomizes everything wrong with college football -- greed, self-interest, recruiting overkill.

Oh wait...so...that's exactly what he's saying. Texas A&M and Oklahoma got 20% more money than, say, Baylor with their new TV deal, therefore it's completely hypocritical for Texas A&M and Oklahoma to complain about Texas using their new TV deal for recruiting.

There’s something to that, but what would you do if you were Texas?

Well, shit, I mean, lord willing someday I WILL be Texas. Imagining that glorious day when I AM Texas, I suppose I would probably take the extra money and promotion such a TV deal provides and try to get an edge in recruiting doing it.

Certainly, it doesn't seem to me that Texas A&M and Oklahoma are arguing that Texas is ethically bankrupt in trying to get an edge in a sport where everyone gets an edge. But certainly OU and A&M are right to be concerned with why the NCAA would allow Texas to use a national television network as a recruiting boon. Certainly Whitley doesn't mean to argue that Texas should be able to do whatever it wants, right?

He spent the week assuring Big 12 members that it will be mere coincidence if a Longhorn Network satellite truck parks across the street from the home of a five-star recruit. However that issue is resolved, the Longhorn Network will only make the richest athletic department in America richer.


So is that wrong?


Not if you’re a capitalist who believes in equal opportunity.

Say what? Look...I'm no Commie...and I don't think there's anything wrong with the best universities getting their own private TV deals that give them a disproportionate financial payout from their higher-demand games bringing higher ratings than lower-demand schools. Considering my Alma Mater it would be asinine for me to make that claim.

But we're not talking about Texas making money. No one--as far as I can tell--is complaining that Texas is getting more money. From Whitley's own article...you know...the one going on right now:

After the Texas A&M Board of Regents met Thursday, school president R. Bowen Loftin emerged to express grave concern over the Longhorn Network televising high school games and unduly influencing young studs to sign with Texas.

You (presumably) typed that sentence, Mr. Whitley. Where in the process of typing that sentence do you see anything about A&M or Oklahoma complaining about Texas getting too much money? Also from your own cocksucking motherfucking article:

The league gave you its blessing to start a network. Along came ESPN waving a $300 million contract over 20 years. It will televise minor sports, coach’s shows, pep rallies, tailgating and generally be a 24-hour infomercial for Bevo.


It also plans to show one to three football games a year, along with 18 high school games. That’s what got the sabers rattling, especially after an ESPN honcho told an Austin radio station the Longhorn Network would target top recruits for good old UT. Those plans are now on hold as Texas officials try to calm fears.

Bolded for emphasis. Fuck. I'm not going to finish this article. The rest of it is soapboxing about how Texas has more fans and is thus entitled to more money.

No shit, asshole. That's the way the world works, and the NCAA is, above all other things, a business. We get it. I doubt anyone but the most dyed in the wool ostriches with their head still buried in "These kids are kids first, athletes second" sand would disagree.

But Christ on a Cracker, Whitley, you read the article you just wrote right? The money isn't the issue. The NCAA has pretenses to fairness vis a vis recruiting being separate from financial pull. That's the issue. Now we all know that's a suspect pretense, and we all know hypocrisy abounds in the NCAA. But what OU and A&M are doing (and don't get me wrong, OU and A&M aren't pure as the driven snow themselves) but what they are doing is trying to hold UT to the standards the NCAA purports to exact on its institutions. Seems to me that is what any non-moron will see when they see this controversy.

Here's what Whitley sees: "A&M and OU got more money from the Big 12 deal than a lot of other schools, therefore they are hypocrites for trying to hold Texas to the recruiting regulations all other institutions in the country are expected to abide by."

Let me leave you with, perhaps, the most obnoxious sentence in this article, then I'll relieve the suspense you all were feeling and reveal the answers to the RIMSHOT OR TUMBLEWEED game. But first, dickless is going to wax Adam Smith-ic:

What was Texas supposed to do, tell ESPN to give its $300 million to Kansas State?

Go fuck yourself, David Whitley.

ANSWER KEY:
1.) Tumbleweed
2.) Tumbleweed
3.) Tumbleweed
4.) Totally hilarious rimshot

Let's check in on this blog's namesake

----Update, written five minutes after I published this- I'm not 100% sure the Mariotti Facebook account is real. There isn't another one out there that suggests otherwise... but some of the stuff on this one is almost too good to be true. Hmmmmmm. Meh, fuck it, does it really matter either way?----

----Double update: dammit, Deadspin is saying it's fake. Well there goes that. I knew it was too good to be true. Even Mariotti isn't stupid enough to suggest that the MLB ASG be played after the whole season is over. Still, I'm shocked that he doesn't appear to have a (public) Facebook profile of his own. Come on Jay, what are you waiting for! You can be a celebrity in your own little world! It's everything you've always wanted!----

When we last left multiple Pulitzer Prize winner Jay Mariotti, he was being fired from everywhere and allegedly hitting his girlfriend in public (and pleading no contest to reduced charges... you know how it goes). On more than one occasion. Fortunately, thanks to Facebook he still has an outlet for the well-crafted pieces of brain poop that occasionally spill out of his head. (Full disclosure, I saw this on Deadspin. But rest assured that I'll be checking his news feed without being tipped off by anyone from now on.)

He always did have a way with clever nicknames. But he dropped the ball a bit here- that's the Blizzard of Stink Face to you, Jay.

Only Jay could be so intentionally contrarian and desperate for attention that he would take a shot at the USWNT when they're at their absolute apex of popularity. Big ups to Russell Paperz for burning Mariotti with the burniest of burnsauce.

Let's do one more. Why not.

1. No.

2. Hey, everyone loves the Pro Bowl, amirite?????!!?!?!?!

WRONG. (Have we used that title before?)

There is out of touch, then there's really out of touch, then there's plain batshit lunatic your-opinion-is-so-wrong-I-can't-quite-express-it out of touch. Look, I am as annoyed at the NFL as anyone, and I like soccer a lot, but.... no. No, no, no, and again, no. Shut your mouth, guy.

I'm not trying to take anything from American football. It was a great game once,

It's by far the most popular game in the US right now, regardless of subjective notions of great gameness or no longer great gameness.

before rule changes and technology turned it into an excuse to destroy amazing athletes for money.

Pretty much every rule change instituted in the last five years is aimed at reducing players' chances of getting hurt. As for technology- yeah, those damn helmets are the worst at keeping players safe, aren't they?

And still, I enjoy watching the Chicago Bears But it's a guilty pleasure, like watching prizefighting.

YEEEEEEEAH. Fire up the hyperbole machine.

And only the willfully evil

This means you, Roger Goodell. You dickhole.

or the willfully stupid

Roethlisberger?

can afford to pretend that premeditated violence to the skull doesn't come with a cost.

It does. Concussion safety and long term brain damage are obviously massive issues (as they should be). I don't think anyone is "pretending" they aren't. Unless you think enjoying the game in spite of those dangers counts as "pretending," in which case you are an idiot.

So if the NFL goes on strike,

It's not on strike, it's an ownership lockout, and it's been happening for four months now.

it might bother some of us,

It will absolutely bother the shit out the vast majority of American sports fans.

but it wouldn't be all that bad.

To many, it would be the end of life as we know it.

We'd have more time to spend with our families.

God, gag me with a fucking pogo stick. This is so tragically Reilly-esque. HEY EVERYONE, YOU KNOW, SPORTS AREN'T REALLY ALL THAT IMPORTANT. Let's try to keep that in mind and live our lives a little bit better and fuller and- OH LOOK, A CHANCE TO GRANDSTAND ABOUT A SPORT THAT I LIKE THAT ISN'T MAINSTREAM!

We'd have more time to enjoy soccer.

Grandstanding complete. Just substitute "golf" for "soccer" and you've got yourself one of Rick's masterpieces.

And Fox and ESPN, which have increased their soccer broadcasting, will be ready.

And the millions of Americans who hate soccer and live and breath for the NFL will not be watching.

It seems that the beautiful game is ascendant everywhere in America except perhaps in the minds of some American sports journalists.

If "ascendant" in this context means "getting more popular," sure. If it means "on the verge of becoming as popular as the NFL," trrrrrrry again. Look, again, I like soccer. I wish it was more popular. But you can't just be righteously indignant about the dangers of football, talk about how soccer is more popular than it was ten years ago, and think you've made a cogent argument that no one should or will care if the NFL misses time this fall because everyone's ready to embrace soccer.

Derek Jeter Derek Jeter Derek Jeter DEREK JETER JETERJETERJETERJETER!!!!!!

He's been in the news lately I guess. The best part about it (by which I mean the only non-stupid part about it) is that everyone has something to say about him, and they're all wrong. Join me for a brief tour of all opinions unsupportable, inane, or both.

Zilcharoo blogger 'Duk from Blig League Stew has some thoughts about whether or not Jeter should play in the All Star Game.

But considering Jeter has been healthy enough to play each game since returning from his rehab stint, I don't think it's asking too much of Jeter to put in some face time, both for the good of the sport and to thank his fans.

Yeah, I know, right? I mean, he's been healthy for five whole games. What a vajayjay. Don't worry about your rehab, dude. Truck yourself off to Arizona and smile for the cameras. Not that it isn't a little weak for him to bail on the game- but seriously, the fact the he's been healthy for about a week is a good reason to fly six hours for an exhibition game? Better arguments could have been made, people. BETTER ARGUMENTS. Chris forwarded me that article, and my snarky response was "Nah, if he skips the game, it'll be a move of pure class." Little did I know how right I unintentionally was (according to some).

"Derek Jeter is as great an ambassador for this game as we've seen in a long time," Weiner said.

That's players' union chief Michael Weiner. Hehehehe. Weiner.

"I don't think anybody can really question Derek's commitment to the game or, frankly, to being an All-Star."

Well the thing is, you can. He's not going to the ASG. Therefore he's not really committed to it. I don't blame him for his decision. I don't think it was wrong. But it shows that he's not committed to it. Also, how has he been "as great an ambassador" as anyone has seen in a long time? Is he super involved in charity work? If he is, he's doing it under the radar. The Google indicates that he's no more involved than the average star (and a lot less involved than many). By being a super popular player on a super popular team? If that's the case, then why doesn't anyone call Fish Fillet-Rod a great ambassador? Maybe it's because Jeter bangs lots of hot, famous women. Nope, that doesn't seem like enough. Well he's never been arrested in the aftermath of a bar brawl. Gotta hand him that.

Long story short, he's just your average run-of-the-mill Hall of Famer (and I don't say that as a backhanded compliment). He's played somewhere from good to amazing for about fifteen years. He's got rings. He's super popular. But he hasn't done anything more than the other 50 or so superduperstars with whom his career has overlapped. Why does he get this praise? Why? Whatever the reason is, I'm sure it has something to do with classy classiness, something I've heard Jeter has in spades even though no one can explain what that means or why he gets the label with any level of clarity.

Well in any case I'm sure baseball commissioner Bud "face like a catcher's mitt" Selig can bring some sanity to this fracas.

"There isn't a player I'm more proud of in the last 15 years than Derek Jeter," Selig said. "He has played the game the way it should be played, and he's been a better human being off the field."

What the fuck is Bud alluding to? Is Jeter secretly pulling off Clemente-esque feats of amazing generosity and somehow not being recognized for them? He's obviously a great player. IN WHAT DISCERNABLE WAY IS HE A GREAT HUMAN BEING, OR ANY GREATER A HUMAN BEING THAN ROY HALLADAY OR ALBERT PUJOLS OR DAVID ORTIZ?????? It's insane. He is immediately given full credit for being the second coming of Gandhi regardless of what he does. At this point he could go all OJ and murder his wife and a waiter in cold blood, and people would be like "See, that's just pure class right there. Pure class. Those two had it coming." It fucking boggles my mind. I can't get past it.

Maybe it is all the famous/hot women he's banged. And if FireJay was Barstool Sports, this is where we'd have links to Maxim photoshoots of all of them.

Make an immediate run for the Canadian border if Gregg Doyel is ever elected president

Bask in the glow of Gregg's mind-bogglingly stupid stance on how we should form public policy.

In the case of The United States v. Roger Clemens, the government thinks it's helping somebody. Not metaphorically or symbolically, but literally. The government thinks this is good. This is something we want.

No, the government thinks it's something the government wants, because the government really doesn't want people to perjure themselves in front of federal authorities.

This is helping.

Yes. A conviction will help, because the next time some asshole like Clemens is in front of Congress or a grand jury they'll be less inclined to be like GRRRRRR I AM ANGRY AND I LIKE LYING SO I WILL LIE NOW AND THEN I WILL THROW THIS PIECE OF A BROKEN BAT AT ORRIN HATCH BECAUSE HE'S AN ASSHOLE.

The government thinks this trial will remind everyone -- that's you, and that's me -- that lying under oath is wrong.

Assuming Clemens is found guilty or pleads to something, will it not? Will that result make you say "Nah, fuck it, I'm going to keep on perjuring myself anytime I get a chance. It's a fucking rush."

The government also thinks this trial will serve as a lesson for all you kids out there that steroids are bad. Don't take them, little Johnny Ballplayer. This is your reminder. That's what the government thinks.

Here's what I think about The United States v. Roger Clemens: I think the government's case is run by idiots.

Ohhhhh snap

This isn't a Tea Party rant about Big Government sticking its nose into our affairs. And this isn't a liberal plea for compassion toward Clemens, because he has been through so much already. No. This is neither of those.

I don't think you could find 10 people in the entire country with knowledge of the basic facts of this case who hold that "liberal" opinion.

This is steroid fatigue. That's all this is.

I see. The government's interest in showing people that lying to Congress will not be tolerated bores you. Hey everyone, Gregg is ready for something new- can we get some fresh news going on here? Can't the government just let this go and do something awesome like bomb the shit out of North Korea or give free money to everyone?

I'm tired of the whole issue, and I'm preaching to the choir because I know you're tired of it. And the irony doesn't elude me, because here I am complaining about steroid fatigue even as I slog through another set of steroid-story dumbbells.

I'm not tired of it. I want blood! Let's see this fucker get strung up! Eat a penis, Clemens. You're the worst.

Maybe I'm the dumbbell.

Yep.

Nah. The government is the dumbbell, because this is stupid.

No, you were right the first time. Also- what's with the government worrying about all this terrorism stuff? Ugh, it's been like 10 years. Can't they busy themselves with something else? Terrorism this terrorism that. BORING.

Christ. What a fucking asshole.

Open discussion in the comments

Here's your topic. Derek Jeter: is he classy? Sources say: definitely. But as there is no statistic for classiness, my basement-dwelling brain that has never played a game of baseball in my life can't figure out how to measure classiness. I'm also going to go out on a limb (this time I'm actually serious) and say that class is the kind of thing you can only discern by knowing someone pretty well. Like, you have to know them better than 99.9% of the people who claim Jeter is classy know him. But I dunno, maybe I'm crazy. Talk me off the ledge here.

But actually I should rephrase that question. Derek Jeter: classiest Yankee of all time, or classiest HUMAN of all time?

WHAT????!?!?

You're shitting me. How did they overcome his absence? Shortstops with no range who can rake to the tune of .260/.324/.324 don't just grow on trees, you know. He's actually accumulated -0.1 Baseball-reference WAR so far this year. The Yankees should have been expected to get ever so slightly better simply by having him get hurt.

So of course he's going to start the All-Star game, why wouldn't he? And of course there are people out there (who aren't from Yonkers or Jersey) more than willing to justify his All-Star selection, why wouldn't they? YOU KNOW WHEN YOU THINK ABOUT IT IT'S THE ALL *STAR* GAME- ONLY STARS SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO PLAY. AND ONLY GUYS WHO HAVE PLAYED IN THE ALL STAR GAME BEFORE COUNT AS STARS, WHICH CLOSES THE LOOP AND MAKES THIS LINE OF LOGIC FLAWLESS:

AL shortstop for life: Despite a subpar season, Trenton Thunder shortstop Derek Jeter was voted into his sixth straight Midsummer Classic and 11th overall. Just as you're sure to read plenty of profiles of Vogelsong's time in Japan, you're also going to hear plenty of bellyaching about Jeter's spot on the team with a 77 OPS+. Whatever. It's always been my position that the All-Star game should feature "stars" and there isn't a bigger one in baseball right now than Derek Jeter. With all apologies to Asdrubal Cabrera -- who could start the game anyway if Jeter isn't up to the task — no one's tuning into the game to watch Asdrubal Cabrera.

There "isn't a bigger (star) in baseball right now than Derek Jeter"? Fuck you, Yahoo Sports blogger. Regardless of the validity of this line of logic, you can't say that. I'm not having it. Even if you make "how many fans know who he is" your #1 qualification for stardom, Jeter's almost certainly not even the biggest star on his own team. He's probably in the top 10 in the league, but still. C'mon.

Now, Chris W and I discussed this today and we agree that the ASG is for the fans (insert snarky comment about how stupid it is for the game to determine WS home field advantage here), so if they want to see Jeter, they should vote to see Jeter. Of course, Chris then went on to make a number of important points that supersede that point:

1) Fans don't really know what's best for them or for the game. Which is better for both: letting the fans restrict themselves to a narrow and aging base of superstars who are about to be put out to pasture, or forcing the fans to acknowledge that younger better players like Asdrubal Cabrera are budding stars who are really actually good at baseball in the year 2011 and will be for the next 10 years? But don't bother telling any of that to Selig and his merry band of asshole owners, because

2) MLB is run by a bunch of fucking morons who let fans determine who gets coverage. The attention balance in MLB as compared to the NFL blows my mind. I shake my head in sadness at the fact that Colts vs. Jaguars or Chiefs vs. Chargers can get great ratings on Monday Night Football (provided those teams are playing well of course), but if a baseball game involves any team other than the Yankees, Red Sox, Phillies, or Cubs, 90% of sports fans don't give a shit. This is partially on media giants like ESPN and FOX, but more significantly it's on the league itself, which rams the GREATEST RIVALRY IN THE HISTORY OF SPORTS EVER (you know which teams I'm referring to) down our throats every year at the expense of developing any number of other available and compelling storylines. Fuck you, MLB. Fuck you with an oar, Bud Selig. You suck ass. And of course, on both the fan and ownership sides, the problem is accurately generalized by Chris when he points out that

3) The problem with sports (and really all of entertainment... but I'll skip ranting on a broader subject because this isn't Gruntland) today is that people won't let their perceived enjoyment now be lowered even if that means they'll be able to enjoy things more tomorrow.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR. And that pretty much sums up how talking about this with Chris/writing this post made me feel. Good luck to you in the ASG, Jeter. I hope you somehow ground into twenty double plays and get a standing ovation after each of them.

Hey everyone, just so you know

According to noted movie critic and cultural savant Bill Simmons, as published on the Official ESPN Spinoff Blog For Stuff That In Many Cases Is (Somehow) Too Stupid To Be Published On ESPN.com, the following people are not movie stars:

Paul Rudd

Josh Brolin

James Franco

Jesse Eisenberg

But the following people ARE movie stars:

Justin Timberlake

Zach Galifanakis

Seth Rogen

Kevin James

So in other words, even when taking part in an argument centered around a criterion that's so subjective that it should be impossible to be wrong, he's wrong. COOOOOOOOME ONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN. He's gotta be baiting me at this point. I'm very sorry for letting myself descend further into Bill's world of mental midgetry, and for inviting you to descend with me by making this post.

I'm not linking it, find it yourself.

How to Completely Misunderstand the Use of Sabermetrics

A novel by Jonah Lehrer

The Math Problem
Sabermetrics can help teams identify hidden talent and turn regular sports fans into math nerds. But can the numbers lie?

No, not by themselves. They need the help of idiots to do that.

I have to paste this whole awful analogy. Bear with me here fellas.

Buying a car is a hard decision. There are just so many variables to think about. We've got to inspect the interior and analyze the engine, and research the reliability of the brand. And then, once we've amassed all these facts, we've got to compare different models.

How do we sift through this excess of information? When consumers are debating car alternatives, studies show that they tend to focus on variables they can quantify, such as horsepower and fuel economy. (Psychologists refer to this as the "anchoring effect," since we anchor our decision to a number.) We do this for predictable reasons. The amount of horsepower directly reflects the output of the engine, and the engine seems like something that should matter. (Nobody wants an underpowered car.) We also don't want to spend all our money at the gas station, which is why we get obsessed with very slight differences in miles per gallon ratings.

Furthermore, these numerical attributes are easy to compare across cars: All we have to do is glance at the digits and see which model performs the best. And so a difficult choice becomes a simple math problem.

Long and short of it: Jonah thinks that evaluating an athlete based solely on statistics can be misleading, much like relying on "metrics" like horsepower and fuel economy for buying a vehicle.

Unfortunately, this obsession with horsepower and fuel economy turns out to be a big mistake. The explanation is simple: The variables don't matter nearly as much as we think.1 Just look at horsepower: When a team of economists analyzed the features that are closely related to lifetime car satisfaction, the power of the engine was near the bottom of the list. (Fuel economy was only slightly higher.) That's because the typical driver rarely requires 300 horses or a turbocharged V-8. Although we like to imagine ourselves as Steve McQueen, accelerating into the curves, we actually spend most of our driving time stuck in traffic, idling at an intersection on the way to the supermarket.

Dude. You could not have picked something that more PROVES the necessity of sabermetrics. Here's the analogy you set up on accident. Substitute batting average and pitcher wins for horsepower and fuel economy. Stuff you might think on the surface is important, but when the economists (sabermetricians) analyze what really matters, it's surprising stuff like.....

This is why, according to surveys of car owners, the factors that are most important turn out to be things like the soundness of the car frame, the comfort of the front seats and the aesthetics of the dashboard. These variables are harder to quantify, of course. But that doesn't mean they don't matter.

And that is the point of sabermetrics. To identify which elements of a baseball player (car) are actually important, weed out those that aren't, and use that information to value them properly.

I truly apologize to my many, many fans for that incredibly dry chunk of text. But I think it's important to show how clueless this guy is before we get into the crap. His car analogy far more easily lends itself to explaining why sabermetrics are important than proving that they're overly relied upon.

But this is not a column about cars. My worry is that sports teams are starting to suffer from a version of the horsepower mistake. Like a confused car shopper, they are seeking out the safety of math, trying to make extremely complicated personnel decisions by fixating on statistics.

There is not a single sports franchise in the world, not even the Oakland Athletics, that is this hell-bent on ignoring non-numerical data. You clearly have no idea how sports teams operate (hey, a label!).

Instead of accepting the inherent mystery of athletic talent — or at least taking those intangibles into account — they are pretending that the numbers explain everything.

Who??? Who is doing this? Didn't Milton Bradley just get cut? Doesn't Mark Kotsay still play professional baseball for some reason?

And so we end up with teams that are like the worst kind of car. They look good on paper — so much horsepower! — but they fail to satisfy. The dashboard is ugly, the frame squeaks, and the front seats make our ass hurt.

Examples please. These are just general statements with no proof. Were the Houston Astros, Cleveland Cavaliers, Buffalo Bills, and whoever the fuck is bad in the NHL good teams on paper?

This is largely the fault of sabermetrics.

No no no no no no no. Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong. You need to provide me with one fucking example to get me to even listen to you.

Although the tool was designed to deal with the independent interactions of pitchers and batters, it's now being widely applied to team sports, such as football and basketball.

First of all, sabermetrics is not a word applicable to any sport besides baseball. So stop using it. It comes from the acronym for the Society for American Baseball Research. Stop fucking telling me that people are analyzing football with sabermetrics, because unless xFIP is somehow helpful in evaluating a wide receiver, you're making no sense.

I am now going to assume that instead of "sabermetrics", Jonah instead means to say "big scary numbers that I don't understand".

The goal of these new equations is to parse the complexity of people playing together, finding ways to measure quarterbacks while disregarding the quality of their offensive line, or assessing a point guard while discounting the poor shooting of his teammates.

Yes, and that's a smart thing to do. An intelligent GM in any sport considers the context of a player's ostensible success or failure and tries to evaluate how he would perform if extracted from his environment and placed in that of the team he runs. Why is this a problem?

The underlying assumption is that a team is just the sum of its players, and that the real world works a lot like a fantasy league.

No one, not even Ed Wade, is this stupid.

In many respects, sabermetrics has dramatically improved personnel decisions. By relying on unusual measurements of performance, such as base runs and plus-minus ratings, teams have been able to identify neglected talent, whom they can sign on the cheap. Sabermetrics has also helped sports executives double-check their instincts. Instead of blindly trusting some errant whim — and thus making a terrible trade or picking the wrong free agent — they can consult the math.

Correct.

And now we come to the paragraph where I became 100% convinced that Jonah is clueless, rather than someone bad at arguing.

If the Giants had trusted the numbers, for instance, they wouldn't be saddled with Aaron Rowand's five-year, $60 million contract. (He batted .230 last year.)

I'd think this is a pretty good point if not for the fact that Jonah clearly thinks he's pegged Rowand for useless (and duh, he is, but still...) because of his batting average in a single season of his deal. That, after all, is a sabermetrically sabermetric statistic that will convince your argument's opposition (sabermetricians) that you know what you are talking about.

They would have realized that his OBS

I don't know what that is.

and OPS is pretty mediocre, especially once his two outlier seasons are taken into account.

Rule: If John Kruk knows what it is, it's not a sabermetric statistic.

(Edit: Jonah since crossed out "OBS" since my initial read of this article. But on the other hand..."OBS"??@?!?!?!??!#?@#?R#$!!!#!$!???????????????? It's not a typo, of "OPS", because he distinctly wrote "OBS and OPS".)

But sabermetrics comes with an important drawback. Because it translates sports into a list of statistics, the tool can also lead coaches and executives to neglect those variables that can't be quantified. They become so obsessed with the power of base runs that they undervalue the importance of not being an asshole, or having playoff experience, or listening to the coach.

Incidentally....that Rowand guy......

[x] Not an asshole
[x] Has playoff experience
[x] Coachable

If Jonah Lehrer was the GM of a baseball team, he'd start Derrek Lee at first base and David Eckstein everywhere else.

This is the moral of the Dallas Mavericks.

Uh oh. You don't want to do that Jonah.

By nearly every statistical measure, the Mavs were outmanned by most of their playoff opponents.

Pretty tough to debate this. Few people could seriously argue they were favorites on paper against the Lakers or even the Heat.

(According to one statistical analysis, the Los Angeles Lakers had four of the top five players in the series. The Miami Heat had three of the top four.)

Wow. Yeah let's only look at the top 5 players on each team to prove a point. There isn't an NBA fan in the world that doesn't understand that the Miami Heat are largely pathetic once you drop below the Bosh node in the pecking order.

And yet, the Mavs managed to do what the best teams always do: They became more than the sum of their parts. They beat the talent.

They beat the Lakers and Heat in 7-game serieseses. The *best* teams always win a 7-game series!

Consider the case of J.J. Barea. During the regular season, the backup point guard had perfectly ordinary statistics, averaging 9.5 ppg and shooting 44 percent from the field. His plus/minus rating was slightly negative. There was no reason to expect big things from such a little player in the playoffs.

But CONTRARY TO THOSE EXPECTATIONS......he averaged 8.9 ppg and shot 42 percent from the field in the playoffs.

And yet, by Game 4 of the NBA Finals, Barea was in the starting lineup. (This promotion came despite the fact that he began the Finals with a 5-for-23 shooting slump and a minus-14 rating.)

Primary reason: DeShawn Stevenson was playing like absolute shit. Let's not mention that though.

What Dallas coach Rick Carlisle wisely realized is that Barea possessed something that couldn't be captured in a scorecard, that his speed and energy were virtues even when he missed his layups (and he missed a lot of layups),

Not helping your case.

and that when he made those driving floaters their value exceeded the point score.

Please please please please Jonah, if you could take a moment to re-read that sentence....

Because nothing messes with your head like seeing a guy that short score in the lane.

Wow, there you have it. This is why LeBron James played like crap in the 4th quarter. J.J. Barea's floaters were just ::sniff:: too demoralizing! This is why Earl Boykins has won so many championships!

Although Barea's statistics still look pretty ordinary — his scoring average fell in the Finals despite the fact that he started — the Mavs have declared that re-signing him is a priority. Because it doesn't matter what the numbers say. Barea won games.

Wow. Big slap in the face to Dirk Nowitzki and Jason Terry, who could not have withstood the tremendous 4th quarter play of LeBron James without J.J. Barea's floaters that caused Chris Bosh to start openly weeping after they went in.

What follows that paragraph is a depressing and poorly-placed story.

I'm thinking here of a Philip Roth metaphor. When asked by David Remnick, in a 2000 New Yorker profile, how he felt about a cramped literary interpretation of one of his novels, Roth busted out a sports analogy. He imagined going to a baseball game with a little boy for the very first time. The kid doesn't understand what's happening on the field, and so his dad tells him to watch the scoreboard, to keep track of all the changing numbers. When the boy gets home someone asks him if he had fun at the game:

"It was great!" he says. "The scoreboard changed thirty-two times and Daddy said last game it changed only fourteen times and the home team last time changed more times than the other team. It was really great! We had hot dogs and we stood up at one point to stretch and we went home."

If that little kid were around today, he'd be obsessed with sabermetrics.

"Scoreboard changes" being one of the pivotal cornerstones of advanced baseball metrics.

He'd almost certainly win his fantasy league, but he'd miss the point of the game.

Tsk tsk. If only you left out that part about the hot dogs and the 7th inning stretch, you might have a point. Sabermetricians have never attended baseball games, and if they did, they surely wouldn't waste their time eating hot dogs or stretching. WHAT IF THEY MISSED A SCOREBOARD CHANGE!?!??!?!

Sure, he wouldn't have squandered center field on Rowand, but he also wouldn't have started Barea or bet on the Mavs.

Are you telling me that you, Jonah Lehrer, thought the Mavs would win the NBA Finals at the outset of the playoffs? They were a 16:1 shot. Not impossible for them to win, but there isn't ANYONE who knows shit about the NBA who would have bet on the Mavs at the onset of the playoffs if betting on all teams payed out equally.

His car would have way too much horsepower and shitty seats.

Stop with this crap already. It doesn't make sense.

For reasons that remain mysterious, some teammates make each other much better and some backup point guards really piss off Ron Artest.

Well since the GM of Ron Artest's team has no idea whether a player he's going to trade for will piss off Ron Artest or not, he might as well just not even bother trying to evaluate anyone, right?

These are the qualities that often determine wins and losses, and yet they can't be found on the back of a trading card or translated into a short list of clever equations.

Seriously, no shit. Obviously it matters in basketball if players play well together, accept their roles, and complement each others' skillsets. You'd have to be a total asshat to think otherwise. The issue is that no one knows which players specifically fit best with Deron Williams before they actually play on the same court together. GMs do the best they can with the information they have at hand, and most of that information is statistics and scouting reports. It's pointless speculating who's going to become best friends with your fucking point guard. I've had it with this. Your Mavericks argument is shit, because it's based 100% in hindsight. Your definition of a "winning player", in essence, is "a player who won something". Try arguing to me that J.J. Barea is by definition a "winner" if LeBron goes off for double-digit points in every 4th quarter of the Finals like he's more than capable of and the Mavs lose. Because that's essentially foresight that you're holding sports teams to be responsible for knowing and acting upon rather than the data they actually have.

This is the paradox of sports statistics: What the math ends up teaching us that is that sports are not a math problem.

Putrid. Horrid. That sentence makes me want them to free Mariotti.