I start this blog a while back to blast the truth on sports. A couple of years ago, I got booted from White Sox boards after they found out I am a Cubs fan. Every now and then, I visit White Sox boards to see what crap they say about me. I don’t care for what they say, but this time, they crossed the line. They found this blog. I’m not posting the link to the thread here, it’ll just give them free advertising, but do you idiotic fans really have no life, always talking crap about me??

Memo to ESPN: We don’t give a fuck about Beckham. So what if he’s coming to ESPN on July 21? Look at your front page polls. 55% of the people don’t give a shit. Is it really a surprise? People here don’t care for soccer to begin with. What makes you think we’ll watch if Beckham comes? All the ESPN broadcasters are stupid and don’t know anything about soccer. The only one who knows anything is that dorky looking British guy with the annoying accent. Soccer is only good to watch in Spanish, where the broadcasters don’t piss you off, and they actually entertain. GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!!!!

As Jim Rome said, “Soccer is not a sport, it’s a reason to riot.” We don’t care, ESPN

What the Cubs need right now is a 12th pitcher. Unfortunately, the Cubs have been unable to clear a roster spot to do it. The culprit is one of their right fielders, Jacque Jones. Thanks to our dope of a GM, in the winter of 2005, old Jimmy Boy gave him a 3 year, $15M deal. It was a horrible deal from the get-go. After playing like garbage, Jones turned it around, and put up respectable numbers in 2006. Following the winter of free agent signings, Jones’ deal looked like a bargain.

However, old Jimmy Boy continued to fuck things up, signing Cliff Floyd. With Alfonso Soriano, Matt Murton, Jones, Floyd, and Felix Pie and Angel Pagan waiting in the wings in AAA, it was clear there was going to be a logjam in the outfield.

Then with the sale of the Tribune Company to Sam Zell on Opening Day, all transactions past 2007 were put on hold, including Big Z’s extension.

A few weeks ago, Jimmy Boy seemed to have rid himself of a problem, agreeing to trades with the Minnesota Twins, Jones’ old team, where he would be more useful as he can destroy the White Sox, the only team he can actually do anything against, and after that was turned down, the Marlins. That deal, too, was turned down. Due to Jones playing like garbage to start the 2007 season, to make both trades work, Jimmy Boy would have had to pick up $6.6 million of the $7.2 million remaining on Jones’ deal. This is still a give him his dough and tell him to pack his bags move, but at least he’s getting something back. Because of the change of ownership, both the deals were nixed. Contrary to popular belief, it was not the dick of a commish who nixed it, but rather Zell, saying he didn’t want the new owner to incur any more debt.

There has got to be something organized going on here, and I wouldn’t put it past MLB if this is all a ploy to keep the Cubs from winning. Let me get this straight. Because Zell doesn’t want the new owner to incure more debt, he vetoes the trade? If anything, this trade will put less debt on the tab, as Jones is still going to be on the tab, and for $7.2 million. I say this, because this has all started since Zell bought the team. In case you didn’t know, Zell is a part owner of the White Sox. You can’t have shares in 2 MLB teams. But why didn’t Zell have to sell his shares in the White Sox?? Oh, because White Sox majority owner Jerry Reinsdorf said no big deal, this is all a formality. That was good enough for Bud Selig. Funny, huh? JR says he can have shares in both the teams, and Zell nixes this deal. Very interesting. See where I’m going? This is all to keep the Cubs from winning. As I said in a previous post, Reinsdorf is abusing his power and his clout as Selig’s butt buddy and right-hand man.

Recently, Bud Selig touched off an a bunch of different topics

Selig said baseball might re-evaluate the manner in which All-Star rosters are announced after some glitches arose in the system.

An Atlanta-Florida game before the TBS announcement show dragged on longer than expected because of a rain delay and extra innings.

B/c of this, ESPN accidentally announced the rosters b4 the selection show. MLB reacted to this by banning ESPN from having their set inside the park. Great idea. Is it really that big of a deal?

He said doesn’t anticipate any problems with the Giants trying to manipulate the schedule so that Bonds can hit Nos. 755 and 756 at AT&T Park in San Francisco. In 1974, commissioner Bowie Kuhn stepped in and ordered the Atlanta Braves to play Aaron in Cincinnati while citing the integrity of the game.

He can’t order the G-Men to play steroids boy, citing “integrity of the game.” Does a team out of the playoff race in September playing unproductive veterans count as “maintaining the integrity of the playoff races” as the Dust Bag said in 2005? If they want him to get 755 and 756 at home, they can do whatever they want. IIRC, the Astros were going to bench Biggio once he was at 2,999 hits until they returned to Houston, so he could get hit 3,000 at home. Did MLB step in then? Also, we know Selig won’t be attending when Bonds does it, just say it already.

Selig added that he hopes the sale of the Chicago Cubs by the Tribune Company can move along with “dispatch.”

“I think it’s important for the future of the Chicago Cubs franchise to get it done, get it over with and move on,” Selig said.

Yeah right. He doesn’t care at all. He and Jerry Riensdorf are butt buddies, and he’s got butt buddies who own the Brewers. Because his butt buddy Reinsdorf can, he is going to block Mark Cuban from buying the team. Reinsdorf is just abusing his power. He knows deep down inside, Cuban will be looking to build an empire, and is going to turn the team into a title contender, while Reinsdorf sticks to his stupid principles and runs the team into the ground. He doesn’t want to look bad. He’s only doing this because he can. Besides, you got to have connections to become an MLB owner. You either got to be butt buddies with Selig, or you got to be tight with his butt buddies. I remember back in 2002-03 when the Red Sox, Marlins, and Expos were sold, there was an under the table deal, something about the group that submitted the 3rd highest bid winning b/c they had connections to Selig. Selig doesn’t care, he just wants to be sure that the new Cubs owner doesn’t challenge Reinsdorf’s White Sox or Selig’s beloved Brewers, meaning no matter how much Cuban puts up, or someone else who isn’t a butt buddy of Selig puts up, the highest bid among his butt buddies is the one that will be the winning big.

Fuck you, Bud Selig. You and David Stern are also great butt buddies.

In case you didn’t hear the news, the Minnesota Twins scored 32 runs in both their games against the White Sox today. Is this how bad the White Sox really are? Heck, even the Bears defense can do better than this. In the 2 games the ViQueens played against the Bears in 2006, they scored a total of 29 points. It’s amazing how pathetic the White Sox play has been. Kenny and Jerry decided they would not play along with the market, and instead stick to their dumb financial principals. Good luck, gang. In this market, all you’ll get is sub-standard crap. Here’s to the White Sox sucking for a long time!!! :cheers:

“The draft has never been anything but a fucking crapshoot. We take 50 guys and we celebrate if 2 of them make it. In what other business is two for fifty a success? If you did that in the stock market, you’d go broke.” – Billy Beane. (pg 17, Moneyball, Lewis)

That was Billy Beane, Oakland Athletics general manager shortly after the 2001 draft on the way players were being drafted. He was sick of seeing high school players being drafted and so few players drafted making it to the big leagues.

The reason behind all of this was because Oakland was about to lose several star players to free agency because they were not going to be able to afford them. They were going to have to change the way they drafted if they were to be a successful team, despite being poor. While the market seems to have corrected itself today, by the time the players Oakland drafted in 2002 were making it to the majors, the ideas behind this change in philosophy were critical to keeping Oakland competitive despite a low payroll.

According to Michael Lewis, author of Moneyball, Beane, was forced to find players that had been rejected under the notion of what the “model” player should be: wheels (speed), power, and a hose (strong arm), the kind of player Billy Beane was touted as coming out of high school. He had no choice if he were to stay competitive.

On-base percentage (OBP) had been undervalued, Oakland discovered. The A’s brass had begun realizing this in the mid 90’s. Sandy Alderson, Oakland GM in the mid-90’s and GM before Beane believed that evaluating players was better done through looking at the stats, rather than what “baseball men” said. (Lewis, 56)

Managers tended to discuss batting average when talking about runs scored. Conventional wisdom would have it that average and runs would be correlated. Alderson looked into this, and found that runs and average had no correlation, but rather they were more correlated with on-base percentage. (Lewis, 57)

Stats from the 1999-2002 seasons seem to prove that Alderson is wrong, Oakland aside, and that Steven Levitt, author of Freakonomics, was right, that Oakland is winning because they have their talent cheap, they’re not doing anything special. Here are the averages (AVG), on-base percentages (OBP), slugging percentages (SLG), and walks (BB) of the 5 most potent offenses (in terms of runs scored) compared with Oakland:

1999 (MLB ranks in OBP and AVG parentheses)
R… BB… OBP… SLG… AVG

1. Cleveland Indians 1009 743 .374 (1) .467 .289 (2)
2. Texas Rangers 945 611 .361 (4) .479 .293 (1)
3. Arizona Diamondbacks 908 588 .347 (15) .459 .277 (10)
4. Colorado Rockies 906 508 .348 (13) .472 .288 (3)
5. New York Yankees 900 718 .366 (2) .453 .282 (5)
6. Oakland Athletics 893 770 .355 (7) .446 .259 (26)

2000
R… BB… OBP… SLG… AVG

1. Chicago White Sox 978 591 .356 (7) .470 .286 (4)
2. Colorado Rockies 968 601 .362 (2) .455 .294 (1)
3. Cleveland Indians 950 685 .367 (1) .470 .288 (2)
4. Oakland Athletics 947 750 .360 (6) .458 .270 (16)
5. Houston Astros 938 673 .361 (4) .477 .278 (7)
6. San Francisco Giants 925 709 .362 (3) .472 .278 (8)

2001
R… BB… OBP… SLG… AVG

1. Seattle Mariners 927 614 .360 (1) .445 .288 (2)
2. Colorado Rockies 923 511 .354 (2) .483 .292 (1)
3. Cleveland Indians 897 577 .350 (3) .458 .278 (3)
4. Texas Rangers 890 548 .344 (6) .471 .275 (4)
5. Oakland Athletics 884 640 .345 (5) .439 .264 (15)
6. Houston Astros 847 581 .347 (4) .451 .271 (6)

2002
R… BB… OBP… SLG… AVG

1. New York Yankees 897 640 .354 (1) .455 .275 (3)
2. Boston Red Sox 859 545 .345 (4) .444 .277 (2)
3. Chicago White Sox 856 555 .338 (9) .449 .268 (8)
4. Anaheim Angels 851 462 .341 (6) .433 .282 (1)
5. Texas Rangers 843 554 .338 (12) .455 .269 (7)
9. Oakland Athletics 800 609 .339 (7) .432 .261 (16)

Levitt claims in his book that conventional wisdom is wrong. Yet conventional wisdom seems to prevail in this case. “X can cause Y, Y can cause X, or it may be some other factor is causing both X and Y.” (Levitt, p. 163) Note that aside from Oakland, the most potent offenses during this time had batting averages among the top 10 in the league. How is Oakland seemingly defying conventional wisdom and having such a potent offense? The answer perhaps is element Z: base-running.

Part of Oakland’s offensive philosophy was that stealing bases was luck. They therefore discouraged it, not wanting to run themselves out of innings. From 1999-2002, their ranks in stolen bases were 28, 30, 24, and 30. Their ranks in times thrown out trying to steal, or caught stealing those 4 years were 28, 30, 30, and 29. This is perhaps the major reason, in addition to others, why Oakland seemed to defy logic. They were being efficient on the bases, getting these runners on base to home plate, not getting thrown out on the bases.

Perhaps what best exemplifies this is what happened following the 2001 season. They had lost Johnny Damon and Jason Gaimbi on offense to free agency that winter. Their DH, Olmedo Saenz, was headed to the bench. So they had 3 holes to fill. The average OBP of these 3 players was .364, 30 points above the league average. So they needed 3 players who between them could get on base at this rate. (Lewis, 141)

The A’s brass was shocked at the cheap cost of these players who had a high penchant for getting on base. To be able to get these players, they had to give up other qualities, such as speed, which they didn’t value anyways, as evidenced by their relatively speaking low stolen base attempts.

Scott Hatteberg, David Justice, and Jason Gaimbi’s younger brother, Jeremy were signed or promoted from within the organization to fill these vacancies. The rest of MLB had viewed them as useless, but Oakland didn’t, allowing them to get the players cheap. (Lewis, 142) To fill Damon’s vacancy in the lead-off hole, they put Jeremy Gaimbi in there.

To most people, the one thing wanted from a lead-off hitter is speed. Gaimbi had no speed. As Art Howe put it once, he’s “the only manager in baseball who has to pinch-run for his lead-off man.” (Lewis, 158) But Gaimbi was in the lead-off hole because of his high OBP.

So the question comes down to this: How did Oakland find this glitch in the market when the numbers show other potent offenses from this time were among league leaders in OBP? Perhaps the answer is in the other traits of the players these teams had.

Jim Thome, Manny Ramirez, Steve Finley, Matt Williams, Alex Rodriguez, Frank Thomas, Jeff Bagwell, Craig Biggio, Derek Jeter, Todd Helton, Larry Walker, Ivan Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, Ichiro Suzuki, and Jason Gaimbi (in 2002) are some of the players associated with these teams with the potent offenses.

When fans and managers around the game think of them, they see these guys as players with speed, players with power. They don’t see the OBP. Take Gaimbi for example. Oakland liked him because he got on base. But the rest of baseball didn’t see him that way. They saw him as a guy who is going to hit 30-40 home runs, knock in 100-120 runs a season.

It just so happened that all these players did have high OBP, but that it was secondary because they had the attributes everyone else thought was what was needed for success. In Oakland’s eyes, OBP was primary. Speed and power were secondary.

Because the guys with the speed and the guys with the power were the types of players Oakland could not afford, they had to settle on these guys who were never supposed to have a chance, because they didn’t have power or speed.

In conclusion, Levitt and Lewis were both correct to an extent. Oakland did win with cheap talent and good pitching that was also cheap, as Levitt claims, but it turns out that they also won by placing high value on OBP, as Lewis claims. It was the way Oakland used OBP that led them to get the talent cheap.

Sources:

Mlb.com, historical team stats tracker

Lewis, Michael. Moneyball, the Art of Winning an Unfair Game, W.W. Norton and Company, copyright 2003 by Michael Lewis

Levitt, Steven D. “Will the real Billy Beane please stand up!?,” Freakonomics Authors’ Blog
http://www.freakonomics.com/blog/2005/04/23/will-the-real-billy-beane-please-stand-up

A few days ago, I ran into an old friend who reminded me of a time in 5th grade when I broke a guy’s arm. I thought back about it and remembered why it happened. The guy had gone after me in school one day for breaking up his perfect game the day before.

This was back when I lived in Skokie, which is becoming a shithole of a town. Turning into a gang town too. It was a Skokie League baseball game. The guy pitching had a perfect game against our team, he needed only 2 more outs to get it. We were losing 10-0 at the time also.

I was up. I went to my coach, I was like, “Coach, this guy is a bully to me in school, they don’t do nothing about it, can I please, please, please break up his perfect game with a bunt?” Coach was like, “Sure, go ahead. I didn’t even realize he had a perfect game against us.”

So I come up. I decided to hit left-handed instead of right-handed this time. I am a right-handed hitter, despite the fact I do almost everything else left-handed. At certain times, I would hit left-handed just to mix things up, as I can hit left-handed, but I am stronger from the right side. I would bat lefty whenever I bunted or when I was trying to advance a runner with a ground ball.

At any rate, I come up hitting left-handed. First pitch he throws, I lay down a drag bunt, the reason I batted left-handed whenever bunting. I manage to push the bunt into no-man’s land, past the triangle of the pitcher, 1B, and 2B. I reached first base safely, breaking up his perfect game and no-hitter. I then promptly steal 2B, and then 3B. The batter flied out, and I scored on the sacrifice fly, breaking up the shutout as well. We end up losing 10-1, but I managed to break up his perfect game, no-hitter, and shutout.

The next day in school, he tries to punch me for breaking up his perfect game. I was at my locker, getting some stuff. He throws his punch. I duck. Arm goes right into my locker. I slam the door shut on his arm. I slammed it so bad, you could hear the bone breaking. Got off scot-free too. Guy never pitched again.

So I ask you, is it okay to break up a perfect game with a bunt, or is it Bush League?

Some people think that Kenny Williams is a better GM than Billy Beane. I beg to differ. Beane is a genius. No one in baseball talked about On-Base % until Beane started using it to draft players. Billy Beane is the best GM in baseball today. He has lost several superstar players and Oakland is a perennial playoff team. What has KW done? NOTHING. Big deal he won the 2005 World Series. I’m still sticking by my story that the Sox got in b/c of Buerhle’s attempted murder of Pronk. The White Sox were a 1-and-done deal. Billy Beane’s time when Oakland wins a World Series will come. Heck, if he had a big budget, his use of Sabermetrics might have netted a World Series by now. Kenny Williams can’t keep leaning on the 2005 World Series title. Give it up. Beane is a better GM.

Dusty Baker and Jim Hendry should send job applications to Billy Beane’s front office. I hear Beane is looking for some Sabermetricans while he cares for Eric Chavez’s 2 dogs during games

“I think walks are overrated unless you can run. If you get a walk and put the pitcher in a stretch, that helps, but the guy who walks and can’t run, most of the time he’s clogging up the bases for somebody who can run. Have you ever heard the Yankees talk about on-base percentage and walks? Walks help. They do help. But you aren’t going to walk across the plate, you’re going to hit across the plate. That’s the school I come from. Do you ever see the top 10 walking (rankings)? You see top 10 batting average. A lot of those top 10 do walk, but the name of the game is to hit.” – Dusty Baker.

LMAO. Knowing how Beane thinks, those first 5 words would be enough to get a rejection letter. First off, Sabermetrics don’t care for speed. Stealing bases is luck. Furthermore, if a walk clogs the bases, how come a single doesn’t?? Turns out, I do hear the Yankees talk about OBP. They value it more than average. Batting average is a useless stat. Would you rather want Adam Dunn or Derrek Lee? Lee clobbers Dunn in the average department, but Dunn has a better OBP. Dusty takes Lee over Dunn. Beane takes Dunn over Lee. I side with Beane.

“The statistical analysis is something to factor in… When you see a guy in the dugout day in and day out or you’re at every game, like we are, you know whether a guy can help you when it counts or not. We’re probably more of the old, pure, go by our scouts, go by our coaches, go by our manager’s gut feeling and try to make the right decisions.” - Jim Hendry

“When you manage against a guy or you coach against a guy or you have him in your dugout all the time, you know a lot of things already than just pure numbers can tell you.” - Hendry

“Sometimes numbers can be deceiving… Take a guy like (outfielder) Tom Goodwin. I don’t think Goody’s numbers over time are such that his pure stats are something you’d marvel at. But we all know down the stretch last year when it counted, he got a lot of big hits, ran the bases great, made some great plays and did the little things that don’t show up in stats.” - Hendry

“Sometimes, somebody has to make a decision or collectively you make a decision whether guys are winners or not. Numbers alone can’t give you that.” - Hendry

“I look at runs scored, runs knocked in, when the runs are knocked in, man on third, and one-out RBIs and two-out RBIs.” - Hendry, on what are the most important offensive statistics

“It depends where he is in the order… If he’s in the top one or two, the most important stat is runs scored and on-base percentage. For your third, fourth and fifth hitter, it’s RBIs and runs scored. And runners in scoring position, what your average is.” - Baker, on what are the most important offensive statistics

“Then, you hope again your seventh hitter is a good clutch man and drives in more than he scores. Your eighth hitter, you hope he drives in some key runs and scores fewer runs than he drives in. That’s the guy where you need a higher on-base percentage because he gets the pitcher to the plate. That’s my little-basics stuff.” - Baker

Wow. After reading all that, this application would make great toilet paper for Billy Beane. RBI is a useless stat, as it is an indicator of the team make-up, not the player’s ability. Runs scored is also a measure of the team make-up. Batting average is useless as it does not take walks into account. The single most important stat is On-Base Percentage. You want 9 guys (or 8 if you’re in the NL) who have a high penchant for getting on base. This stuff about speed and clutch and intangibles is garbage. This stuff doesn’t exist in Sabermetrics. Having it is nice, but to Sabermetricans, it does not exist.

You might be asking me, don’t most baseball people think this way?? I say yes, but I choose to analyze Hendry and the Dust Bag, b/c of the sheer stupidity of some of the remarks that even traditional scouts would laugh at. Like Dusty’s baseclogging remark or Hendry’s remark that number’s alone don’t tell if a guy can win.

Give Hendry/Dusty and Beane a pool of 18 players to assemble their offense (we’ll use a DH). I would rather have Beane as my architect and not Hendry. Another kick to Hendry’s balls, Beane does this with limited resources. Here are 18 players. Assuming all things are equal (available money), here is how Oakland would build their team.

OF:
Nick Swisher
Adam Dunn
Alfonso Soriano
Matt Murton
Jeff Francoeur
Manny Ramirez

Beane would take Swisher, Dunn, and Murton
Hendry/Dusty want Soriano, Francoeur, and Manny

1B:
Kevin Youkilis
Richie Sexson

Beane: Youkilis
Dusty/Hendry: Sexson

2B:
Chase Utley
Placido Polanco

Beane: Utley
Dusty/Hendry: Polanco

SS:
Jose Reyes
Carlos Guillen

Beane: Guillen
Dusty/Hendry: Reyes

3B:
Eric Chavez
Aramis Ramiez

Beane: Chavez
Dusty/Hendry: Ramirez

C:
Michael Barrett
Paul Lo Duca

Beane: Lo Duca
Dusty/Hendry: Barrett

DH:
Pronk
Big Papi

Beane: Pronk
Dusty/Hendry: Papi

Now you may be laughing at me for the team Beane would assemble if he could. You think Dusty and Hendry’s team is better. But it’s not. Beane’s is. Go look up their stats and come back to me with who the better players are.

A couple of years ago, when I was reading White Sox message boards, I came across a bunch of posters who said that Buerhle, Garland, Contreras, and Garcia are better pitchers than Johan Santana. Really??

They may have won more games than Johan, but King Johan had more a better ERA than all of them. I fell out of my chair when I read those posts. Win-loss record is a useless stat. Any stat that is dependent on things you can’t control is a useless one. No one is better than Johan Santana, not even his fellow country-man Big Z, although he is also way better than that gang the Sox had in 2005. Johan Santana is the most dominant pitcher in MLB.

He and Big Z give Venezuela a deadly 1-2 punch in the rotation. Now if only Venezuela could get some guys to hit to match up with Team Dominicana’s Murderer’s Row lineup, they might win the 2009 WBC, even though Z and Johan can shut them down. Or maybe they ought to let Big Z hit. GO VENEZUELA!!