Terence Moore had an issue with the idea of a six-man rotation a few years ago. He did not like the idea that the Atlanta Braves may use a six-man rotation for a limited period of time. Now it's Joel Sherman who is furious and confused as to why in the hell the Mets would dare use a six-man rotation until late August. Why does it matter? The Mets are thinking outside the realm of conventional thinking because they choose to do so. What's the issue with this? I can't figure out why the idea of a six-man rotation is so offensive to Joel Sherman that he believes the mere suggestion should not be proposed. The Mets want to give their pitchers extra rest. I can't figure out what is so wrong with a different type of thinking about how many starting pitchers the Mets will choose to use. In baseball, any new idea is immediately met with resistance from sportswriters and I can't figure out why. So many sportswriters cling so tightly to how things were always done.
The Mets insist the six-man rotation is about more than protecting Matt Harvey.
Why does it matter what the reasoning is? The Mets have six pitchers they think are starter-worthy and want to use all of them for the time being. Why is it a huge deal to use a six-man rotation in order to give a pitcher an extra day of rest? It's just a strategy the Mets are employing, not the idea which will end baseball forever. I'm always miffed at why new ideas or an idea that is old, but different, seems to always meet resistance.
They also want to throttle back on 42-year-old Bartolo Colon, recognize
that neither Jacob deGrom nor Noah Syndergaard has ever pitched a full
major league season, and even prep for having Steve Matz step into a
forum in which his innings can be better regulated.
HOW DARE THEY! HOW DARE THE METS HAVE A LONG-TERM PLAN FOR THEIR PITCHERS AND TAKE MEASURES TO EXECUTE THIS PLAN AS THEY SEE FIT! THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY TO DO SOMETHING AND THAT IS THE WAY JOEL SHERMAN WANTS IT DONE!
I get it. Still, this is mostly about Harvey.
Which is why I don’t completely get it.
You don't have to get it. The Mets want to rest their young arms and not overextend Bartolo Colon's arm. Whether you think this is babying the pitchers or not, it's their plan. It's not the end of the world and if it doesn't work then they will change the plan. It's not the Mets plan for Harvey that Sherman has an issue with though, it's that the plan is a six-man rotation. The Mets are daring to try something different and that is not all right. It goes against what Joel Sherman thinks a team should do in order to keep young pitchers healthy. Also, this six-man rotation isn't simply being used for the benefit of Matt Harvey. It's for the benefit of all the Mets young starting pitchers.
Harvey is a client of Scott Boras, who is renowned for taking his best
clients to free agency to seek peak market value. Remember, the Tigers
offered Max Scherzer $144 million before last season, the Boras client
rejected it and got $210 million from the Nationals. Harvey is due to be
a free agent after the 2018 season. The Mets have a financially
conservative general manager and ownership. The chances Harvey is
pitching for the Mets in 2019 is what? Five percent?
The chances are actually 6.7%.
So the Mets should be building their rotational plans around the fact they believe they will lose Matt Harvey to free agency after the 2018 season, as opposed to building their rotational plans around helping the team win games between now and then? This doesn't make sense to me.
That being the case, shouldn’t the Mets be maximizing Harvey now?
Notice “maximizing,” not “abusing.”
Except the Mets are consciously keeping Harvey under 100 pitches as much as possible. Harvey is coming off major elbow surgery too. So when Harvey throws 110 pitches in three straight starts and blows his elbow out again, take a guess at who will be the one writing a column about how the Mets are "abusing" Matt Harvey and he thought the purpose of the six-man staff was to protect Harvey and not injure him? Joel Sherman, that's who. He'll be the one writing this column.
No one is suggesting Harvey throw 125 pitches regularly or be pushed
extra innings within games. But I would want more starts, not fewer from
Harvey for the next 3 ¹/₂ years.
I'm sure the Mets want more starts too. Here's the thing though...the idea of a six-man staff usually works itself out. One pitcher starts performing terribly or another pitcher gets injured. So it's not bad to aim for a six-man rotation, while knowing eventually the rotation will go back to a traditional five-man rotation out of necessity. If the Mets did use a six-man staff until August then that's not that many fewer starts for Harvey on the season. They have not indicated they plan on using a six-man staff for the next 3.5 years, just until late August. Let's simmer down a bit and gain some perspective. Maybe the Mets will go past that August date they want to "at least" go to with a six-man rotation, but again, starting pitchers are hard to find and usually a rotation goes back to five men due to injuries or ineffectiveness.
Both Terry Collins and Mets assistant GM John Ricco made the case this
is a way of making sure you get those starts between now and the end of
the 2018 campaign, by limiting Harvey’s innings and giving him five
days’ rest regularly.
I am not wearing a hat, but I will eat my hat if the Mets regularly use a six-man rotation from now until the end of the 2018 season. I am betting the vast majority of the time, if he stays healthy, Harvey will make 30+ starts during a season from now until 2018. It's hard enough to find five quality starters, which is why it's no big deal that the Mets want to use six quality starters. It's a nice goal to aim for, but not reasonable to expect over a three year period.
Nevertheless, the baseball industry is still not at peace if workload is the be-all and end-all in causing arm injuries
And of course when writing "the baseball industry" Joel Sherman is referring to himself as not being at peace if workload is the end-all in causing arm injuries. He clearly feels this way and is just passing it off as the entire industry agreeing with him to make himself feel like he's in much better company than he possibly really is.
The Mets did not seem to be abusing Harvey before he needed Tommy John
surgery, the same for Zack Wheeler. The reality is most pitchers —
particularly power pitchers — will break.
Okay, so knowing this would it make sense for the Mets to aim for a six-man rotation, where they have six guys capable of starting a baseball game, while fully knowing they won't be able to use this six-man rotation over a full season? The Mets would have six guys ready and used to starting games, as opposed to having a guy coming out of the bullpen who gets long relief work only, then has to step in as a starter.
There is no magic formula to keep that from occurring
Other than robots replacing humans on each MLB team to where the game of baseball is played by computers instead of real, live players. At that point, only a hard drive crash or other technological issue would stop power pitchers from breaking. This is obviously what Sabermetericians like Andrew Friedman are hoping for in the future.
Stars such as Harvey are assets and do you begin to devalue your asset by
going from a five-man rotation to six? Why not a seven-man rotation? You can’t put the pitchers in Bubble Wrap.
At least Joel Sherman isn't reacting so negatively to the idea of a six-man rotation that he is suggesting absurd ideas like a seven-man rotation. You can actually put the pitchers in Bubble Wrap. They just can't pitch on the mound that way or else Fredi Gonzalez will tell on them for using a foreign substance, since obviously the popping of the bubbles would cause so much glee for the batter that he couldn't focus on hitting the baseball.
You use them, you do it with the best practices for keeping them healthy and you hope for the best.
But see, that's what the Mets are doing. They are trying to keep their pitchers healthy by aiming to have a six-man rotation. The problem is that Joel Sherman, who is not a doctor or specialist of any kind in the medical field, thinks that using a six-man rotation is not the best way to keep young pitchers healthy. He may be right, he may be wrong. But his suggestion that a team use "best practices" to keep a pitcher healthy, as if this isn't what the Mets believe they are doing, is incorrect.
“There is a big picture in this and that is even if we don’t have him
[after free agency,] we want to make sure we have him the next three
years,” Collins said. “And right now we think the best thing for Matt is
to have the extra day.”
But again, reality will eventually probably creep in. The Mets won't trot a shitty starter out there every sixth day for the sake of a six-man rotation. I really doubt they would do that. So Harvey will most likely pitch for the majority of his Mets career as part of a five-man rotation. It's so hard to find five quality starters, much less six quality starters, I can't imagine the six-man rotation lasting for 3.5 years like Joel Sherman seems to believe it will.
Collins recently referred to Harvey enduring “a dead arm” phase and the
stats show that after 100 pitches, Harvey morphs from Cy Young to Curt
Young.
So maybe keeping Harvey under 100 pitches in a game is a good thing? OF COURSE NOT! Joel Sherman thinks this is another example of the Mets babying their pitchers. Fuck stats. What do they mean anyway?
But it also should be noted that in his 45-start career, Harvey has faced
just 58 batters after 100 pitches. Translation: The Mets already have
been babying him.
Babying him = Seeing his effectiveness greatly wanes after 100 pitches and removing him from the game so the Mets have a better chance of winning said game.
Pitching coach Dan Warthen said he envisioned staying with a six-man
rotation until at least mid-August. The Mets believe they will be in
contention and that the conservative approach now will keep their
starters strong for a six-week dash to the finish line — and perhaps
into October.
It's funny how Sherman writes "at least" mid-August when Dan Warthen indicated in other articles that mid-August was when the six-man rotation would most likely stop. A little bit of semantics here, but to prove his point Sherman seems to have added "at least" when other news outlets report the six-man rotation would be "through" mid-August, "until" mid-August, and "until" the middle of August. Other news outlets have a sense of finality in August regarding the six-man rotation, while presumably in order to help prove the point he wants to prove, Joel Sherman uses a term with less finality when describing how long the six-man rotation would last.
Warthen conceded none of the starters was enthused about this process
and Collins told Harvey he is on an innings limit this year and the
alternative to accepting the six-man rotation was to sit out September,
go on the DL a time or two or be pulled constantly after five innings.
I'm guessing that Collins dressed it up better than this when talking to Matt Harvey.
But, again, are we positive 180 innings is going to keep Harvey
healthier than 200 or 210? It is well-intentioned guesswork, but
guesswork nevertheless.
Yes, it is guesswork, but what isn't guesswork is that Matt Harvey is coming off elbow surgery and he becomes less effective after 100 pitches, thereby giving the Mets two reasons not to see if he stays healthier at 180 innings than 200 or 210 innings. I don't believe in babying pitchers, but I also don't pretend to know the best way to prevent Tommy John surgery.
The same as in limiting Syndergaard, whose effort Wednesday made you
want to see more — not less — of him. He was facing the woeful Phillies
in a matinee after a night game.
Still, his 7¹/₃ shutout innings were impressive against any opponent,
any time. He cranked two-seam fastballs he only refined last week that
were scary — topping out at 100.7 mph (according to Brooks on Baseball
data) and averaging 97.7.
Well of course Mets fans want to see more of Syndergaard. I wanted to see Craig Kimbrel throw every single night, but that doesn't mean his having 110 appearances in a season was a smart move.
The Mets want to keep Syndergaard, Harvey, deGrom, eventually Matz and Wheeler healthy for the short and long term. I get it.
You say you get it, but then you claim to know the best way to keep these young pitchers healthy for the short and long term. It just so happens that way (in Joel Sherman's opinion) isn't to use a six-man rotation, which is an idea that is new and obviously won't work simply because new things are scary. Because a five-man rotation helped to keep Wheeler and Harvey so healthy and all.
And I respect their forward thinking in trying the six-man rotation.
The Braves tried a six-man rotation a few years ago (much to Terence Moore's chagrin) and it lasted two times through before an injury caused them to go to a five-man rotation again. I can completely see this happening again, which is why the Mets trying a six-man rotation isn't a reason for gnashing of teeth and questioning the sanity of the Mets' front office.
But at full health, Gee should be used as a safety net, not an equal to the Mets’ best starters.
A safety net? Like a long reliever or a guy who can step into the rotation if an injury should occur? I don't get how it matters. If a pitcher gets injured, then the idea of the six-man rotation is kaput anyway. If anything, this six-man rotation negatively affects the bullpen and bench depth the Mets have as much as it affects their starting rotation. But I don't get why Sherman's next beef is with Gee being considered equal to the Mets' best starters. Gee projects as a pretty good fifth starter. Why can't he be a good fifth or sixth starter rather than relegated to the bullpen?
That is why this doesn’t make sixth sense to me.
What a horrible way to end the column. The point is that Dillon Gee should be treated as an equal to the Mets' best starters because the Mets' best starters haven't proven they can pitch 180 innings in a season on a consistent basis, partially due to their young age. This six-man rotation is going to be a short-term thing. Something always goes wrong with a starter that moves the six-man rotation back to a five-man rotation. Don't be afraid of new ideas and hide behind the illusion there is a certain way to prevent arm injuries to young pitchers.
Showing posts with label Joel Sherman. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joel Sherman. Show all posts
Thursday, June 4, 2015
Monday, April 13, 2015
2 comments Ten Things I Think I Think Peter King Has Not Thought Of: David Steele Uses Quotes from Five Years Ago to Advocate for Tim Tebow Edition
I have a huge backlog of links that don't deserve a full post but should be mentioned on this blog in some form. So I thought I would clear them out and share little tidbits of bad sports journalism (or "nuggets" of bad journalism as Peter King would say). As always, the topic of these links bounce around all over the place. It's a real problem when an article doesn't merit a full post here and I will try to rectify that situation.
1. Let's start first with the ex-NFL quarterback who won't go away. That's Tim Tebow. David Steele lets his readers in on a secret. Those people who have coached and worked with Tim Tebow still think he can be an NFL quarterback. No way! And by the way, David takes testimonials from five years go to prove that Tebow can still play in the NFL. Doesn't that seem a bit ridiculous to try and prove Tebow can still be an NFL quarterback in 2015 by using a quote from 2010, prior to the time Tebow confirmed that he indeed is not an NFL quarterback?
Tim Tebow got another look from the NFL Monday, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, and he arrived to his tryout with the Eagles off of workouts with Tom House, the longtime major-league pitching coach who has worked on mechanics with Tom Brady and Drew Brees, among others.
Tom House made Drew Brees and Tom Brady into the quarterbacks they are today, so he can do the same for Tim Tebow. Obviously, the indication David Steele is giving here is really true.
House, who had worked with the ex-Bronco and Jet before, was complimentary of Tebow, who hasn’t played a regular-season game since 2012 and was last on a roster in 2013 Patriots training camp. “He went from being a little inaccurate and didn’t throw a whole lot of spirals, to throwing very accurate and real good at spinning the ball,” House told the Boston Globe last week.
With all due respect to House and his track record, this all sounds familiar.
Coaches that Tebow has worked with or paid to have work with him think he'll be a good NFL quarterback? I don't believe it. It's not like these coaches have a vested financial interest in reinforcing their ability to turn college quarterbacks into good NFL quarterbacks or anything. No coach would say something in order to increase the perception he is good at his job.
House is the latest in a line of personal coaches Tebow has enlisted to work on his quarterback shortcomings, dating back to his days preparing to enter the NFL out of Florida in 2010.
People Tebow has paid to work with him and improve his ability think they did a good job in improving Tebow's ability. I'm not sure this should be news.
Nevertheless, here’s the list of Tebow tutors and their testimonials.
— “If this guy can’t be a starting quarterback in the NFL, then I was in the wrong profession for a lot of years.” — former NFL head coach Sam Wyche, who worked with Tebow before the draft, February 2010.
Considering Sam Wyche stated this prior to Tebow being drafted and failing out of the NFL, my only takeaway from this is that Sam Wyche was in the wrong profession for a lot of years.
Does David Steele realize using testimonials from BEFORE Tebow was drafted and failed in the NFL serves to only undermine the point he wants to prove that Tebow can play in the NFL? See Wyche made this statement in 2010 and then this statement was proven to be incorrect after that. So, that seems to run counter to the idea Tebow can play the quarterback position well in the NFL.
— “I don't know that I’m the only one who has the sense of Tim’s ability to be developed and become a very good player in the league. I believe in the right environment Tim Tebow will figure this out. He doesn't have explosive arm strength, but he has more than adequate arm strength to throw the ball in the NFL and make all the throws.’’ — then-CFL head coach Marc Trestman, who trained Tebow before the Senior Bowl, April 2010
This quote is from 2010, which is prior to the time Tebow washed out of the league. And again, this is a person with a vested interest in making it seem like Tebow can play in the NFL. Trestman wanted to make it seem like he can improve a quarterback's ability through training that quarterback.
— “I would hope wherever he ends up, they give him an opportunity to play, because if they do, they'll be pleasantly surprised. I think the guy can still play.” — quarterback consultant Steve Clarkson, April 2013
He can "still play"? Why use the word "still" there as if Tebow ever did play well in the past?
Also, Tebow got a shot with the Patriots in 2013, but I'm sure Bill Belichick just doesn't have the right eye for the talent that Tebow showed in training camp. Belichick is well-known for having a poor eye for talent at the quarterback position.
— “Do I think he can play the quarterback position in the NFL? Yeah, no question. Like I told Tim when I found out … that he signed, ‘You're locked and loaded, ready to go.’” — former Heisman Trophy winner and NFL quarterback Chris Weinke, June 2013
Except the Patriots didn't keep Tebow around. Notice how none of these quotes are from 2014 or 2015? There is a reason for that.
— “In shorts, out there on the football field, he changed his motion and he’s very smooth. I’ve got it on film, and film doesn’t lie. What he does when he goes out in a game situation and live bullets, I’m not sure what will happen. I just know he’s a great guy, a hard worker, and this off-season his throwing motion became 100 times better.” — quarterback trainer Dennis Gile, who worked with partner Mike Giovando on Tebow, June 2013
And that's it. Another quarterback trainer swearing that Tim Tebow is an NFL quarterback. This quote is from a relatively recent two years ago. I'm not sure the point David Steele wanted to prove, unless his point was, "Hey 2-5 years ago people who have a vested interest in Tim Tebow succeeding stated he could succeed. That has to mean something as long as you ignore their vested interest and the fact years have gone by where their statements have been proven to be incorrect, right?"
2. Joel Sherman thinks the Yankees dodged a huge bullet by not signing Cliff Lee as a free agent in 2010. Because sure, Lee was great during 2011-2014, but he's injured now. Clearly, Cliff Lee could not have helped the Yankees win any games during that stretch of time from 2011-2014.
The current rotation concerns of the Yankees and Rangers could be worse — Cliff Lee could have accepted one of the two highest total bids in December 2010.
Lee turned down the Yankees’ seven-year, $150 million offer and the six year, $138 million bid of the Rangers — the teams viewed as the strong front-runners — to sign a five-year, $120 million pact with the Phillies.
Cliff Lee's performance from 2011-2014. I'll let you decide if this would have been helpful for the Yankees to have as a part of their starting pitching staff.
2011: 32 starts 17-8 with a 2.40 ERA and 1.027 WHIP
2012: 30 starts 6-9 with a 3.16 ERA and 1.114 WHIP
2013: 31 starts 14-8 with a 2.87 ERA and 1.010 WHIP
2014: 13 starts 4-5 with a 3.66 ERA and 1.377 WHIP
Now, after missing the final two months last year, Lee has received two diagnosis the tear in the region needs surgery. That would end his 2015 season and, since this is the final year guaranteed on his contract, Lee has suggested he might retire if he needs the procedure.
Cliff Lee performed at a high level for three of the five years on his contract during a time when the Yankees certainly could have used another starter during the 2011 and 2012 playoffs, especially since they lost the ALDS 3-2 to the Tigers in 2011.
The Rangers, already with a thin rotation, are likely to lose ace Yu Darvish for the season if he opts for Tommy John surgery. The Yankees’ rotation is shaky in part due to the uncertainty of CC Sabathia. There is, in fact, strong parallels to Lee and Sabathia — both won Cy Youngs for the Indians (Sabathia in 2007, Lee in 2008) and both were extreme lefty workhorses with Sabathia leading the majors in innings from 2005-13 (1,999 ¹/₃ innings) and Lee fifth (1,833 ²/₃), which probably explains why they have broken down.
OR Cliff Lee broke down because he's 36 years old and older pitchers tend to break down more. The fact Lee broke down for 1.5 years of his 5 year contract doesn't mean the Yankees couldn't have used him during the 3.5 years when he was pitching at a high level.
Sabathia tried hard to recruit Lee to the Yankees in the winter of 2010. Maybe the Yankees would have won championships with Sabathia and Lee together or Lee would not have broken down as a Yankee. But in 2015, it sure looks fortunate Sabathia’s recruitment didn’t succeed.
But from 2011-2014, it sure looks like pure stupidity to think the Yankees couldn't have used Lee. Why would Joel Sherman think at all about Lee's past performance though? After all, it's not like the Yankees have ever signed an expensive free agent only to have him get injured.
3. Rick Telander furthers a narrative he wants to further by claiming the guy who worked with Bill James while employed by the Red Sox eschews Sabermetrics.
In 2002, at age 28, Epstein became the Red Sox’ general manager, the youngest in major-league history. He would win two World Series titles in the next five years, ending an 86-year championship drought for the Red Sox.
Here’s the relevance of this to Theo’s current job as president of the Cubs: Sabermetrics and those algorithms he and his crew punched into computers, which then spat out genius statistical info . . . that stuff is dead as prairie chickens.
Epstein has learned the error of his ways. Sure, his use of Sabermetrics helped to win the Red Sox two World Series titles, but it's all about the humanity for Epstein now.
Well, moneyball is not actually dead — it’s just no more special than a pile of dead chickens.
‘‘Fifteen years ago there weren’t that many teams specializing in the statistical model to succeed,’’ he says. ‘‘You could really get an advantage using it. In the offseason of 2002, into 2003, the Red Sox needed to improve our offense, and we needed to get on base more. So we could sign Davey Ortiz to a one-year deal, Bill Mueller to a two-year deal, and also sign Kevin Millar, whom no one wanted and was going to Japan, based largely on the numbers, on the things you could learn from the statistical analysis. Now the world is so flat — everyone’s doing that!’’
Oh, that makes sense. Moneyball isn't dead, it's just being so used in such a wide and prevalent manner by every MLB team that it's now become a part of the evaluation process for a team's front office. So by saying Moneyball is dead, what Rick Telander really means is that Moneyball is more alive than it ever has been.
So what does a smart man do to once again move beyond the herd? He goes new age. He looks at the game he loves and sees that a really big part of it has been taken over by the numerical lists he helped make so popular, yet an equally large part of it has seemingly been ignored—the emotional, human part. How’s that for irony, moneyballers?
You certainly told them, Rick. Feel good about yourself and pat yourself on the back---oh, you are already patting yourself on the back. Just carry on then.
‘‘I think the real competitive advantage now is in player development—understanding that your young players are human beings,’’ says Epstein, whose sky-blue shirt and sky-blue cap made this reporter mistake the now-41-year-old at first for a beer salesman. ‘‘Understanding them physically, fundamentally, and mentally — investing in them as people — and helping them progress. And there’s no stat for that.’’
For example, as human beings Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo are really fucking good at baseball. There is a statistic to show this as true.
He finds it embarrassing that he and so many of the front-office people don’t speak Spanish, so a Spanish tutor is coming in two mornings a week to teach it to the brass.
WHERE'S THE STATISTIC SHOWING TO LEARN TO SPEAK SPANISH, MONEYBALLERS? THERE IS NO STATISTIC THAT TEACHES SPANISH. YOUR COMPUTERS ARE USELESS NOW AREN'T THEY?
‘‘I don’t think everything in baseball — or life — is quantifiable,’’ he says. ‘‘Sure, if you ignore the stats, if you ignore empiricism, if you ignore objective evidence, then you’re a fool.
Rick Telander conveniently ignores this quote when talking about how Theo Epstein has made a change in how he evaluates players. Epstein calls people "fools" for ignoring statistics and other information used by Sabermetricians to evaluate players, but it doesn't fit the narrative so it's useless to Rick.
But if you invest in stats so fully that you’re blind to the fact the game is played by human beings, then you’re just as much of a fool.’’
Amen.
So Theo Epstein evaluates players using a mix of Sabermetrics and scouting by watching the players play? You know, like every other MLB team does. Rick worked hard to paint this as an anti-stats statement by Theo Epstein. The narrative takes precedence over reality.
4. Now Rick Telander gets increasingly depressed about the hiring of John Fox.
On January 10, 2015 when Ryan Pace was hired, Rick was pretty optimistic.
But if you count teams that simply made it to the Super Bowl, the field opens up. Indeed, in the last 16 years, seven other teams have gotten to the Super Bowl and lost. They are the 49ers, Cardinals, Eagles, Panthers, Titans and Falcons. And, almost forgot, the Bears. That makes 18 teams that have played in the Super Bowl since 1999.
So is it wrong to ask, Why not us?
The point being: Why not the Bears? Why not soon? Like 2015?
But who cares about the Cardinals? The Bears went 5-11 this season. Can they return to title quality in one year, as chairman George McCaskey said they should? Yes. And, they should.
It can be done.
So what if you’ve got Jay Cutler at quarterback? You win with him, not because of him. Or you dump him and get a young Russell Wilson or a cagey Joe Theismann or Phil Simms or Jeff Hostetler or Brad Johnson.
IT CAN BE DONE! THIS BEARS TEAM CAN TURN IT AROUND IN ONE YEAR! RICK BELIEVES!
Then on January 17, 2015 after the Bears hired John Fox, Rick became a little more pessimistic about the Bears chances of turning it around.
I’ll join the masses and say that the Bears’ hiring of John Fox was a nice thing.
But am I blown away?
Not really.
A football team is so much more than its coach, and sometimes folks don’t want to admit this. Mike Ditka has always said that if you don’t have the player talent, you can’t win.
Oh no, now the same players the Bears had a week earlier that could turn it around can't turn it around anymore.
You go, John Fox! But the ferret in that box over there is named Jay Cutler, and he’s yours. Hope you’ve got gloves and a plan.
Oh boy, looks like the Bears may want to get a Russell Wilson (you know, that type of quarterback like Wilson that's just hanging around on a street corner waiting to be signed) or a cagey Joe Theismann type. Rick's depression has begun.
Then two days later on January 19, 2015 Rick hits rock bottom about the John Fox hiring.
John Fox walks and talks like a coach, and, of course, he was one, and he is one again. Your brand new Bears leader, folks, hot off the rails from Denver, where he was the Broncos’ coach as recently as seven days ago — John (no middle name) Fox!
Thirteen years of NFL head-coaching success for the man who will turn 60 next month. Hoo-rah.
What happened to signing cagey quarterbacks and winning with the players the Bears have, because IT CAN BE DONE? Where did the happiness go?
Risking such, I just want to say that maybe Fox isn’t perfect. Maybe, that’s all. Nor can I think of anyone better at the moment to take the spot of Marc Trestman, who leaves after a 5-11 season.
It's all over now, baby blue. Cue the Morrissey (not Rick) and start to anticipate the downward spiral from the eternal happiness that Rick felt just nine days earlier.
So let’s get away from groupthink for a moment — that is, Bears fans’ and management’s certitude du jour that a veteran coach who has been to two Super Bowls, winning neither, is a stroke of pure genius. (May I remind you that Lovie Smith, who took the Bears to a Super Bowl and had a final season of 10-6, was run out of town so that the professorial Trestman could go 13-19 in two seasons.)
It is possible, you know — and don’t stone me for simply mentioning it — that Fox is here to chill and run out the skein on a nice, if unspectacular, career. Five more years, and he’s got Medicare, baby!
It says he’s a fairly mellow, bland guy who will bore you to death at news conferences and show that much pizzazz on the field. He’s good at defense, and he’s known as a players’ coach. But he has never made it all the way to the top.
‘‘He drove Elway crazy because he didn’t hold himself, the players or coaches accountable after losses. He’ll be an improvement in Chicago, but he won’t win a Super Bowl.’’
No, this isn’t gospel. Nor am I a prophet. Nor is Shapiro.
Just trying to tell it like it might be.
Nine days earlier the future was so bright for the Bears. Then the Bears hired a head coach that Rick Telander admits was probably the best person for the vacant head coaching position and the future suddenly turned cloudy. Weird how that happened when nothing else changed, isn't it?
5. To add to Rick Telander's dismay, he doesn't know what's happened to Bruce Jenner. More importantly, how does Bruce Jenner's gender change impact Rick Telander?
Bruce Jenner and I are the same age — or we will be on Oct. 28, when he turns 66, like yours truly — and I guess that’s as far as the similarities go.
I used to think we had things in common.
Rick Telander does not want breasts. Let's get this out of the way at the very beginning.
I used to idolize Jenner, such as idolization flows from a guy in his mid-20s who follows a white, similar-sized (6-1, 195 pounds — though far more muscular), similar-aged, Midwestern college-educated, long-locked, striving athlete who soon would be an Olympic gold-medal winner in the brutal decathlon and, thus, the ‘‘world’s greatest athlete.’’
I can deal with a lot of things in life. But Jenner, who is, if we believe reports — and our eyes — transitioning to become a woman, throws me for a loop. I’m sorry, it just does. I am who I am. I apologize if I have offended anyone.
Well Rick, Jenner's transition to a woman is mostly about you and how you handle his transition. After all, prior to transitioning Jenner should have at least consulted you on how your memories of him as a decathlete would be impacted by his transition.
If Jenner knows he is a woman long trapped in an incredibly masculine body, then so be it. The extreme plastic surgery, the Adam’s apple apparently shaved, the ponytail, the breasts supported by a sports bra, the nail polish — no man would do that for kicks.
Except for Jay Cutler. He just wants to watch the world burn.
Jenner was featured on the front of a Wheaties box, for God’s sake, the signature placement for the greatest American heroes. But I’ll ask you: Does anybody eat Wheaties anymore? Does anybody notice what’s on the cover of what they eat?
No Rick, nobody eats Wheaties anymore. You know why? Because Bruce Jenner has affected your memories of the past. Much like you, no one else can eat a bowl of cereal without searching inside themselves while eating that cereal wondering, "How can I eat this delicious goodness knowing 40 years ago a man appeared on the front of the box and that man is now a woman? Can women even eat Wheaties? If so, SHOULD women be allowed to eat Wheaties?"
In 1976, Jenner’s gold medal reaffirmed Americans’ belief in our ability to counter communist determinism with democratic freedom. That’s what I felt; that’s what I believed.
Now that Jenner is transitioning to a woman, communism has won. Mr. Putin, build that wall back up. Bruce Jenner is looking for high heels and communism is in style again.
Jenner was somebody I could look up to, a role model so close to me in so many ways, I felt, that he became almost a fantasy. He didn’t just beat a foe, like a heavyweight boxer. He beat the best in the world all at once.
I had the Sports Illustrated cover of him with his jacked arms raised, his fists clenched, his eyes closed in ecstasy, pinned on my wall. The headline read, ‘‘AWRRIGHT!’’
Now when he looks at the headline all Rick reads is "AWASALEONPURSES!"
I’ve seen Chaz Bono.
Rick has one gay friend and one black friend. He counts them. This makes him a non-racist and definitely not a bigot.
But I’m writing this from my perspective, my world. It’s all I know.
And I’m dizzy. I’m almost lost.
Bruce Jenner definitely should have thought about Rick Telander's nostalgia and the fate of Wheaties cereal before taking steps to make himself happier.
6. Phil Mushnick warns his readers about "dangerous" basketball. Yep, you guessed it. Much like how Florida Gulf Coast won games by dunking, Phil doesn't like it when amateur athletes dunk. It sends a bad message to the kids.
“Would I have yanked one of my kids for doing that? In a heartbeat.”
Jack Alesi, 62, reckons he has been coaching basketball “since I was 18,” the last 30 years at Brooklyn’s Xaverian High School, the last 20 of those as head varsity boys coach. Friday night, Xaverian plays Christ The King in the Diocesan final.
Alesi is talking about this dunk:
“I’m not one to stifle creativity,” Alesi said Wednesday.
Just don't do any creative or fancy dunks. That's not stifling creativity, it's only standing up for what's right and good about sports. Sports are NOT entertainment.
“If a kid finds it easier to dunk the ball than lay it in, fine by me. Bob Cousy dribbled between his legs to the benefit of his teams. There’s a difference between creative and plain stupid. TV can’t seem to distinguish between the two. It doesn’t even try.
“I wouldn’t try to embarrass that LSU kid, but if ever there was a teaching moment, that was it. Take him out, explain it, put him back in.”
"I'm old and have some weird thing about how you shouldn't use your athleticism to put on a show for those who pay to watch you play basketball. Don't make me uncomfortable by dunking the basketball in a creative manner. This isn't my issue, this is YOUR issue. It was stupid to try that dunk, even though you pulled it off. I'm old, if I haven't made that clear enough. I don't want to stifle your creativity, but just don't do anything creative that the fans might enjoy. Here, have some Wheaties."
Alesi was still flabbergasted and frustrated by the glorious hysteria the deep-thinking ESPN basketball experts, studio anchors and production shot-callers made over LSU forward Jarell Martin’s breakaway slam dunk that was preceded by a between-his-legs, greater degree-of-difficulty move — versus no one — in a tie game Saturday against Florida.
I like how Phil Mushnick goes through life trying to find things to be offended by. It's a bitter, sad life when your only purpose is to complain about how offended you are by the present and continuously long for the past.
“Would these TV guys coach kids to do such a thing, especially in a tie game, instruct them to turn an easy two points into a difficult two points? Do they really believe that that kid made a great play, did the right thing? Really? Honestly?
Did he do "the right thing?" An unpaid amateur athlete chose to dunk in a creative manner during a tie game and it's being couched in terms of "right" and "wrong." Unbelievable.
“I watch what TV has done to this game, and I shake my head. I do. It’s enough to make you cry.”
Cry? Like you would cry over an athlete dunking the basketball in a tie game? That's something you would actually cry about? The only thing shameful or dangerous in regard to this story is how Phil Mushnick and Alesi manage to turn an amateur athlete dunking a basketball into a story about "right and wrong."
7. Want to know why Max Scherezer isn't back with the Tigers? It's because he knew his market value and that hurt Mike Ilitch's feelings.
The pitcher had wiggled out of a bases-loaded jam with two strikeouts and a line drive to center in a critical playoff game. He spun around and bounced off the mound. He pumped his fist toward the heavens. And then he walloped his teammates with a series of monstrous high-5s, shrieking in triumph.
Those were human emotions. Joy in triumph. Max's overwhelming display of his joy was understandable at the moment.
But emotions are common to all people. And some people do not display them as openly as Scherzer did that October afternoon in 2013 when he rescued the Tigers, in relief, from the brink of playoff elimination by the Athletics.
Mike Ilitch is private and he is proud. Winning means just about everything to him. It has since he and Marian, his wife, blended some flour in a pot of water and created a pizza mixture that would turn into heavy millions.
Long story short here, the Tigers made a contract offer to Max Scherzer that he rejected and this made Ilitch upset and sealed that Scherzer would not be back with the Tigers after the 2014 season. Apparently Ilitch is so proud that he doesn't understand how business negotiations work.
One year ago this month, Ilitch approved an offer of $144 million to cement Scherzer to the Tigers for six years.
The offer was rejected. Scherzer, the projected Tiger for life, turned down the money and the security. He and his slick agent, Scott Boras, gambled that there would be more money offered and more security in a year.
Two things:
1. I love how Green calls Boras "slick" because he got the most money possible for his client in free agency. That's pretty much the job Boras was hired to do and he did it well. That's not "slick," that's competent.
2. There was more money and more security offered in a year. So Ilitch doesn't have to offer Scherzer another contract after the $144 million was rejected, but Scherzer gambled and it paid off.
But you don't reject Mike Ilitch. You don't snub him. You don't scoff at Ilitch's generosity.
Haha..."generosity" that ended up being less than Scherzer could make on the open market. I'm not sure I would call that being "generous" more than it would be offering Scherzer a contract which was fair, but not what he ended up being worth on the open market. Scherzer thought he was worth more and it turns out he was right. There's no reason to take it personally.
You don't stamp on Ilitch's ego. Even the best pitcher in the American League, advised by the shrewdest player agent in the business, could never get away with insulting Ilitch.
Except, Scherzer did get away with a bigger contract that had more security.
"I think we've made it clear that we have not been pursuing the situation," Dombrowski told The News' Chris McCosky after Scherzer agreed to sign with the Nationals in January. "We've said it numerous times . . .
"We made a real run at Max last spring and it didn't work."
Ilitch never cared to match the Washington offer. The guess here is if the Tigers had made a matching offer a couple of months ago, Scherzer would have grabbed it. Even if the Tigers came somewhat close the Nationals' jackpot, Scherzer, I reckon, would have grabbed less money in defiance of Boras.
Maybe he would have. I don't know. A pitcher who turns down $144 million certainly sounds like a pitcher who is looking to maximize his value on the free agent market.
My theory is, "Goodby." You don't dare to rankle Mike Ilitch. Farewell!
So hurt feelings caused by a rejected business contract is the reason Scherzer isn't with the Tigers anymore. Scherzer landed with a team that is competing for a World Series title and he got more money and a longer contract than the Tigers offered...Ilitch sure showed him didn't he?
8. Steve Dilbeck has not been pleased with the Dodgers for hiring Andrew Friedman and his Stats Geek army. So he is taking great pride in the Dodgers' best pitching prospect being sent down to minor league camp. After all, who didn't expect an 18 year old to make the Dodgers' Opening Day roster?
The first cut is the deepest, particularly if you’re one of the four sent out. And especially if you’re been hyped as much as left-hander Julio Urias.
An 18 year old pitcher who has never pitched above A+ ball is expected to be one of the first cuts out of camp. Nothing else would make sense. It's entirely possible for Urias to be a great pitcher one day, but he's 18 years old and Steve Dilbeck shouldn't take such idiotic glee in Urias being sent down.
But Urias, the 18-year-old wunderkind, was one of the first four players reassigned to the minor-league camp Saturday by the Dodgers.
Most of the winter Dilbeck thought Urias should have been traded for a proven baseball player. That's what this is all about. It's about Dilbeck disagreeing with the direction of the Dodgers franchise and doing whatever he can to make it seem like Andrew Friedman is constantly screwing up.
Despite his electric stuff, Urias looked like a teenager who could use some more seasoning in his two spring outings.
This is most likely because he IS a teenager who could use some more seasoning before he's ready to play in the majors. Dilbeck can't believe this is true though. If Urias isn't ready to dominate in the majors RIGHT NOW then he'll never be ready. The Dodgers should just trade him now while his value is still high.
Dilbeck needs to stop being passive-aggressive in his constant assault against Andrew Friedman. This assault against Friedman is based on Dilbeck's dislike of advanced statistics. That's it. So it's come to where Dilbeck is being sarcastic and snarky about an 18 year old pitcher being sent down to minor league camp, as if this means anything long-term for the Dodgers or the 18 year old pitcher. I hate it when sportswriters have agendas.
9. Dilbeck also didn't want the Dodgers to trade Matt Kemp. Despite being a critic of Kemp's in the past, once Dilbeck saw a chance to criticize Andrew Friedman he immediately became Kemp's biggest fan. Now Dilbeck is writing stories about Kemp in order to point out that he wasn't a bad teammate. It's just sometimes his teammates didn't like him. This wouldn't affect the clubhouse chemistry. Steve Dilbeck is going to run Andrew Friedman out of town, no matter what it takes. He blames Friedman for using too many statistics to evaluate players and now he thinks Friedman factored in the human element of having good clubhouse chemistry too much by trading Matt Kemp.
Matt Kemp is mystified, and perhaps some of you are mystified that he would be mystified. He’s not bewildered at his trade by the Dodgers to the Padres, but by the implication that his departure has helped rid the L.A. of some evil clubhouse cancer.
I can't recall anyone in the Dodgers organization saying that Kemp was a cancer, so this implication is being brought up and furthered by sportswriters like Steve Dilbeck. He suggested that Kemp was a cancer and has set about to disprove this as true.
I’d say this was the most overblown Dodgers story of the off-season, but really it has only been propagated by a couple of national baseball writers -- and it takes no imagination to figure out whose ear they have -- and not the local beat writers who actually know the team.
Yeah! The Dodgers players liked Matt Kemp and no one should write differently!
Kemp had a way of strutting and enjoying the spotlight that may have rubbed some teammates the wrong way. But his days of “see how cool I can look playing center field” were well past him.
Oh, well I guess there is that too.
At midseason, when he unhappily had been moved from center to left and was playing something slightly less than every day, he would have been served sharing his thoughts only with management.
“I want to play every day, if it's with the Dodgers, if it's with somebody else,” Kemp said then.
Being unhappy with his role on the team and not wanting to change positions to help the team, these are two things that absolutely would NOT affect how Kemp's teammates liked him. Plus, this is all Andrew Friedman's fault somehow.
Looking back, Kemp told Hernandez, “I kept hearing maybe he's going to platoon. For me, it wasn't something I was able to wrap my mind around. I felt like if I wouldn't have said anything, just let it all play out the way it played out, they would have said I didn't care about playing on the field. But when I said I had to be in there playing every day, they said I was a bad teammate. I don't feel like that makes me a bad teammate. I know my abilities and I know when I'm healthy and I'm on the field, I could have helped my team win.”
So Kemp was just saying that he thought he should play everyday and didn't want to platoon. If he had just kept his mouth shut and not worried about platooning then "they" would have written that he doesn't care about the team because he was willing to put his ego aside for the betterment of the team. Great point.
That might sound a bit more selfish than many would like, but it’s nothing outlandish, either.
No, but it is the sort of thing that can rankle teammates just a little bit. Kemp was basically saying, "I want to play everyday and I'm better than a guy who platoons in the outfield." I can see how that wouldn't cause Kemp's teammates to clap him on the back and congratulate him on taking one for the team.
Kemp is only 30 and hopefully has a long career still ahead of him. He actually looks pretty good in a Padres uniform, though looking good was never his problem. And neither was being some grand clubhouse cancer.
I think the only ones saying that Kemp was a clubhouse cancer are those like Steve Dilbeck who want to explain a reason why Kemp was traded away that doesn't deal with his performance on the field. The truth is in the middle, that while Kemp wasn't a great teammate (despite Dilbeck's protests that Kemp wasn't THAT bad, which is enough to piss off a few teammates), nobody should think Kemp was traded because he was a bad teammate. The funny part is that Dilbeck speaks out against Friedman using too many computers and numbers to evaluate players while ignoring the human aspect, but also claims that Friedman only paid attention to the human aspect and ignored the numbers and statistics by trading Matt Kemp. Friedman is too numbers-oriented unless that perception doesn't fit the agenda Steve Dilbeck has. In that case, Dilbeck feels free to flip this perception around to fit whatever agenda he has on a given day.
10. Here is something that isn't bad sportswriting from Bruce Jenkins. He dares to take a measured approach to the use of analytics.
Charles Barkley seems to think there’s some sort of war going on. He fights it alone, well on his way to becoming chairman of the “I don’t get analytics” committee.
He ridiculed analytics as “crap,” apparently not realizing he was also denouncing rebound totals and points per game. As far as his dismissing stat wizards as “people who never played the game,” there’s some truth to that. But if Barkley wants to believe that such NBA icons as Gregg Popovich and Pat Riley don’t conduct extensive studies of advanced metrics, he’s wildly misguided.
The statistical revolution hasn’t taken over the major sports, it merely enhances player evaluation at every level. Every smart executive crafts a harmonious relationship between long-trusted scouts (as in “trust your eyes”) and the volumes of advanced metrics that prove invaluable in analyzing matchups, tendencies and percentages.
This is impossible. It's either one or the other. Just ask Rick Telander. A team either hates or loves advanced statistics. There can be no in between. Ever. Never. No NBA coach or GM would ever admit to use advanced statistics.
Warriors GM Bob Myers, to FM 95.7: “When we make decisions, analytics are never more than 50 percent of the process.”
Dallas coach Rick Carlisle: “There’s a lot of information available, but 'selectively’ is the word. There are tools there that are extremely useful. You just have to make sure you don’t overdo it.”
Houston coach Kevin McHale: “It’s just another tool in the toolbox, and very useful. But the toughest thing in this business is how much does a guy love to play? How much does he love to compete? How tough is he? How is he going to play when someone kicks his ass? What’s he going to do the next day?”
Oh. So Bruce Jenkins is writing that NBA teams use advanced statistics as part of the evaluation process and admit to it? What happened to "either/or" and sportswriters claiming that statistics are ruining the sport? This is happening, lack of evidence be damned.
This is a war that doesn’t exist. Only a fool dares to belittle either side.
Exactly. Maybe when the anti-advanced stats crowd stops belittling the use of these statistics "idiots" like Daryl Morey will feel free to not belittle those who sound ignorant when dismissing new ideas, simply because they are threatened by these ideas.
1. Let's start first with the ex-NFL quarterback who won't go away. That's Tim Tebow. David Steele lets his readers in on a secret. Those people who have coached and worked with Tim Tebow still think he can be an NFL quarterback. No way! And by the way, David takes testimonials from five years go to prove that Tebow can still play in the NFL. Doesn't that seem a bit ridiculous to try and prove Tebow can still be an NFL quarterback in 2015 by using a quote from 2010, prior to the time Tebow confirmed that he indeed is not an NFL quarterback?
Tim Tebow got another look from the NFL Monday, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, and he arrived to his tryout with the Eagles off of workouts with Tom House, the longtime major-league pitching coach who has worked on mechanics with Tom Brady and Drew Brees, among others.
Tom House made Drew Brees and Tom Brady into the quarterbacks they are today, so he can do the same for Tim Tebow. Obviously, the indication David Steele is giving here is really true.
House, who had worked with the ex-Bronco and Jet before, was complimentary of Tebow, who hasn’t played a regular-season game since 2012 and was last on a roster in 2013 Patriots training camp. “He went from being a little inaccurate and didn’t throw a whole lot of spirals, to throwing very accurate and real good at spinning the ball,” House told the Boston Globe last week.
With all due respect to House and his track record, this all sounds familiar.
Coaches that Tebow has worked with or paid to have work with him think he'll be a good NFL quarterback? I don't believe it. It's not like these coaches have a vested financial interest in reinforcing their ability to turn college quarterbacks into good NFL quarterbacks or anything. No coach would say something in order to increase the perception he is good at his job.
House is the latest in a line of personal coaches Tebow has enlisted to work on his quarterback shortcomings, dating back to his days preparing to enter the NFL out of Florida in 2010.
People Tebow has paid to work with him and improve his ability think they did a good job in improving Tebow's ability. I'm not sure this should be news.
Nevertheless, here’s the list of Tebow tutors and their testimonials.
— “If this guy can’t be a starting quarterback in the NFL, then I was in the wrong profession for a lot of years.” — former NFL head coach Sam Wyche, who worked with Tebow before the draft, February 2010.
Considering Sam Wyche stated this prior to Tebow being drafted and failing out of the NFL, my only takeaway from this is that Sam Wyche was in the wrong profession for a lot of years.
Does David Steele realize using testimonials from BEFORE Tebow was drafted and failed in the NFL serves to only undermine the point he wants to prove that Tebow can play in the NFL? See Wyche made this statement in 2010 and then this statement was proven to be incorrect after that. So, that seems to run counter to the idea Tebow can play the quarterback position well in the NFL.
— “I don't know that I’m the only one who has the sense of Tim’s ability to be developed and become a very good player in the league. I believe in the right environment Tim Tebow will figure this out. He doesn't have explosive arm strength, but he has more than adequate arm strength to throw the ball in the NFL and make all the throws.’’ — then-CFL head coach Marc Trestman, who trained Tebow before the Senior Bowl, April 2010
This quote is from 2010, which is prior to the time Tebow washed out of the league. And again, this is a person with a vested interest in making it seem like Tebow can play in the NFL. Trestman wanted to make it seem like he can improve a quarterback's ability through training that quarterback.
— “I would hope wherever he ends up, they give him an opportunity to play, because if they do, they'll be pleasantly surprised. I think the guy can still play.” — quarterback consultant Steve Clarkson, April 2013
He can "still play"? Why use the word "still" there as if Tebow ever did play well in the past?
Also, Tebow got a shot with the Patriots in 2013, but I'm sure Bill Belichick just doesn't have the right eye for the talent that Tebow showed in training camp. Belichick is well-known for having a poor eye for talent at the quarterback position.
— “Do I think he can play the quarterback position in the NFL? Yeah, no question. Like I told Tim when I found out … that he signed, ‘You're locked and loaded, ready to go.’” — former Heisman Trophy winner and NFL quarterback Chris Weinke, June 2013
Except the Patriots didn't keep Tebow around. Notice how none of these quotes are from 2014 or 2015? There is a reason for that.
— “In shorts, out there on the football field, he changed his motion and he’s very smooth. I’ve got it on film, and film doesn’t lie. What he does when he goes out in a game situation and live bullets, I’m not sure what will happen. I just know he’s a great guy, a hard worker, and this off-season his throwing motion became 100 times better.” — quarterback trainer Dennis Gile, who worked with partner Mike Giovando on Tebow, June 2013
And that's it. Another quarterback trainer swearing that Tim Tebow is an NFL quarterback. This quote is from a relatively recent two years ago. I'm not sure the point David Steele wanted to prove, unless his point was, "Hey 2-5 years ago people who have a vested interest in Tim Tebow succeeding stated he could succeed. That has to mean something as long as you ignore their vested interest and the fact years have gone by where their statements have been proven to be incorrect, right?"
2. Joel Sherman thinks the Yankees dodged a huge bullet by not signing Cliff Lee as a free agent in 2010. Because sure, Lee was great during 2011-2014, but he's injured now. Clearly, Cliff Lee could not have helped the Yankees win any games during that stretch of time from 2011-2014.
The current rotation concerns of the Yankees and Rangers could be worse — Cliff Lee could have accepted one of the two highest total bids in December 2010.
Lee turned down the Yankees’ seven-year, $150 million offer and the six year, $138 million bid of the Rangers — the teams viewed as the strong front-runners — to sign a five-year, $120 million pact with the Phillies.
Cliff Lee's performance from 2011-2014. I'll let you decide if this would have been helpful for the Yankees to have as a part of their starting pitching staff.
2011: 32 starts 17-8 with a 2.40 ERA and 1.027 WHIP
2012: 30 starts 6-9 with a 3.16 ERA and 1.114 WHIP
2013: 31 starts 14-8 with a 2.87 ERA and 1.010 WHIP
2014: 13 starts 4-5 with a 3.66 ERA and 1.377 WHIP
Now, after missing the final two months last year, Lee has received two diagnosis the tear in the region needs surgery. That would end his 2015 season and, since this is the final year guaranteed on his contract, Lee has suggested he might retire if he needs the procedure.
Cliff Lee performed at a high level for three of the five years on his contract during a time when the Yankees certainly could have used another starter during the 2011 and 2012 playoffs, especially since they lost the ALDS 3-2 to the Tigers in 2011.
The Rangers, already with a thin rotation, are likely to lose ace Yu Darvish for the season if he opts for Tommy John surgery. The Yankees’ rotation is shaky in part due to the uncertainty of CC Sabathia. There is, in fact, strong parallels to Lee and Sabathia — both won Cy Youngs for the Indians (Sabathia in 2007, Lee in 2008) and both were extreme lefty workhorses with Sabathia leading the majors in innings from 2005-13 (1,999 ¹/₃ innings) and Lee fifth (1,833 ²/₃), which probably explains why they have broken down.
OR Cliff Lee broke down because he's 36 years old and older pitchers tend to break down more. The fact Lee broke down for 1.5 years of his 5 year contract doesn't mean the Yankees couldn't have used him during the 3.5 years when he was pitching at a high level.
Sabathia tried hard to recruit Lee to the Yankees in the winter of 2010. Maybe the Yankees would have won championships with Sabathia and Lee together or Lee would not have broken down as a Yankee. But in 2015, it sure looks fortunate Sabathia’s recruitment didn’t succeed.
But from 2011-2014, it sure looks like pure stupidity to think the Yankees couldn't have used Lee. Why would Joel Sherman think at all about Lee's past performance though? After all, it's not like the Yankees have ever signed an expensive free agent only to have him get injured.
3. Rick Telander furthers a narrative he wants to further by claiming the guy who worked with Bill James while employed by the Red Sox eschews Sabermetrics.
In 2002, at age 28, Epstein became the Red Sox’ general manager, the youngest in major-league history. He would win two World Series titles in the next five years, ending an 86-year championship drought for the Red Sox.
Here’s the relevance of this to Theo’s current job as president of the Cubs: Sabermetrics and those algorithms he and his crew punched into computers, which then spat out genius statistical info . . . that stuff is dead as prairie chickens.
Epstein has learned the error of his ways. Sure, his use of Sabermetrics helped to win the Red Sox two World Series titles, but it's all about the humanity for Epstein now.
Well, moneyball is not actually dead — it’s just no more special than a pile of dead chickens.
‘‘Fifteen years ago there weren’t that many teams specializing in the statistical model to succeed,’’ he says. ‘‘You could really get an advantage using it. In the offseason of 2002, into 2003, the Red Sox needed to improve our offense, and we needed to get on base more. So we could sign Davey Ortiz to a one-year deal, Bill Mueller to a two-year deal, and also sign Kevin Millar, whom no one wanted and was going to Japan, based largely on the numbers, on the things you could learn from the statistical analysis. Now the world is so flat — everyone’s doing that!’’
Oh, that makes sense. Moneyball isn't dead, it's just being so used in such a wide and prevalent manner by every MLB team that it's now become a part of the evaluation process for a team's front office. So by saying Moneyball is dead, what Rick Telander really means is that Moneyball is more alive than it ever has been.
So what does a smart man do to once again move beyond the herd? He goes new age. He looks at the game he loves and sees that a really big part of it has been taken over by the numerical lists he helped make so popular, yet an equally large part of it has seemingly been ignored—the emotional, human part. How’s that for irony, moneyballers?
You certainly told them, Rick. Feel good about yourself and pat yourself on the back---oh, you are already patting yourself on the back. Just carry on then.
‘‘I think the real competitive advantage now is in player development—understanding that your young players are human beings,’’ says Epstein, whose sky-blue shirt and sky-blue cap made this reporter mistake the now-41-year-old at first for a beer salesman. ‘‘Understanding them physically, fundamentally, and mentally — investing in them as people — and helping them progress. And there’s no stat for that.’’
For example, as human beings Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo are really fucking good at baseball. There is a statistic to show this as true.
He finds it embarrassing that he and so many of the front-office people don’t speak Spanish, so a Spanish tutor is coming in two mornings a week to teach it to the brass.
WHERE'S THE STATISTIC SHOWING TO LEARN TO SPEAK SPANISH, MONEYBALLERS? THERE IS NO STATISTIC THAT TEACHES SPANISH. YOUR COMPUTERS ARE USELESS NOW AREN'T THEY?
‘‘I don’t think everything in baseball — or life — is quantifiable,’’ he says. ‘‘Sure, if you ignore the stats, if you ignore empiricism, if you ignore objective evidence, then you’re a fool.
Rick Telander conveniently ignores this quote when talking about how Theo Epstein has made a change in how he evaluates players. Epstein calls people "fools" for ignoring statistics and other information used by Sabermetricians to evaluate players, but it doesn't fit the narrative so it's useless to Rick.
But if you invest in stats so fully that you’re blind to the fact the game is played by human beings, then you’re just as much of a fool.’’
Amen.
So Theo Epstein evaluates players using a mix of Sabermetrics and scouting by watching the players play? You know, like every other MLB team does. Rick worked hard to paint this as an anti-stats statement by Theo Epstein. The narrative takes precedence over reality.
4. Now Rick Telander gets increasingly depressed about the hiring of John Fox.
On January 10, 2015 when Ryan Pace was hired, Rick was pretty optimistic.
But if you count teams that simply made it to the Super Bowl, the field opens up. Indeed, in the last 16 years, seven other teams have gotten to the Super Bowl and lost. They are the 49ers, Cardinals, Eagles, Panthers, Titans and Falcons. And, almost forgot, the Bears. That makes 18 teams that have played in the Super Bowl since 1999.
So is it wrong to ask, Why not us?
The point being: Why not the Bears? Why not soon? Like 2015?
But who cares about the Cardinals? The Bears went 5-11 this season. Can they return to title quality in one year, as chairman George McCaskey said they should? Yes. And, they should.
It can be done.
So what if you’ve got Jay Cutler at quarterback? You win with him, not because of him. Or you dump him and get a young Russell Wilson or a cagey Joe Theismann or Phil Simms or Jeff Hostetler or Brad Johnson.
IT CAN BE DONE! THIS BEARS TEAM CAN TURN IT AROUND IN ONE YEAR! RICK BELIEVES!
Then on January 17, 2015 after the Bears hired John Fox, Rick became a little more pessimistic about the Bears chances of turning it around.
I’ll join the masses and say that the Bears’ hiring of John Fox was a nice thing.
But am I blown away?
Not really.
A football team is so much more than its coach, and sometimes folks don’t want to admit this. Mike Ditka has always said that if you don’t have the player talent, you can’t win.
Oh no, now the same players the Bears had a week earlier that could turn it around can't turn it around anymore.
You go, John Fox! But the ferret in that box over there is named Jay Cutler, and he’s yours. Hope you’ve got gloves and a plan.
Oh boy, looks like the Bears may want to get a Russell Wilson (you know, that type of quarterback like Wilson that's just hanging around on a street corner waiting to be signed) or a cagey Joe Theismann type. Rick's depression has begun.
Then two days later on January 19, 2015 Rick hits rock bottom about the John Fox hiring.
John Fox walks and talks like a coach, and, of course, he was one, and he is one again. Your brand new Bears leader, folks, hot off the rails from Denver, where he was the Broncos’ coach as recently as seven days ago — John (no middle name) Fox!
Thirteen years of NFL head-coaching success for the man who will turn 60 next month. Hoo-rah.
What happened to signing cagey quarterbacks and winning with the players the Bears have, because IT CAN BE DONE? Where did the happiness go?
Risking such, I just want to say that maybe Fox isn’t perfect. Maybe, that’s all. Nor can I think of anyone better at the moment to take the spot of Marc Trestman, who leaves after a 5-11 season.
It's all over now, baby blue. Cue the Morrissey (not Rick) and start to anticipate the downward spiral from the eternal happiness that Rick felt just nine days earlier.
So let’s get away from groupthink for a moment — that is, Bears fans’ and management’s certitude du jour that a veteran coach who has been to two Super Bowls, winning neither, is a stroke of pure genius. (May I remind you that Lovie Smith, who took the Bears to a Super Bowl and had a final season of 10-6, was run out of town so that the professorial Trestman could go 13-19 in two seasons.)
It is possible, you know — and don’t stone me for simply mentioning it — that Fox is here to chill and run out the skein on a nice, if unspectacular, career. Five more years, and he’s got Medicare, baby!
It says he’s a fairly mellow, bland guy who will bore you to death at news conferences and show that much pizzazz on the field. He’s good at defense, and he’s known as a players’ coach. But he has never made it all the way to the top.
‘‘He drove Elway crazy because he didn’t hold himself, the players or coaches accountable after losses. He’ll be an improvement in Chicago, but he won’t win a Super Bowl.’’
No, this isn’t gospel. Nor am I a prophet. Nor is Shapiro.
Just trying to tell it like it might be.
Nine days earlier the future was so bright for the Bears. Then the Bears hired a head coach that Rick Telander admits was probably the best person for the vacant head coaching position and the future suddenly turned cloudy. Weird how that happened when nothing else changed, isn't it?
5. To add to Rick Telander's dismay, he doesn't know what's happened to Bruce Jenner. More importantly, how does Bruce Jenner's gender change impact Rick Telander?
Bruce Jenner and I are the same age — or we will be on Oct. 28, when he turns 66, like yours truly — and I guess that’s as far as the similarities go.
I used to think we had things in common.
Rick Telander does not want breasts. Let's get this out of the way at the very beginning.
I used to idolize Jenner, such as idolization flows from a guy in his mid-20s who follows a white, similar-sized (6-1, 195 pounds — though far more muscular), similar-aged, Midwestern college-educated, long-locked, striving athlete who soon would be an Olympic gold-medal winner in the brutal decathlon and, thus, the ‘‘world’s greatest athlete.’’
I can deal with a lot of things in life. But Jenner, who is, if we believe reports — and our eyes — transitioning to become a woman, throws me for a loop. I’m sorry, it just does. I am who I am. I apologize if I have offended anyone.
Well Rick, Jenner's transition to a woman is mostly about you and how you handle his transition. After all, prior to transitioning Jenner should have at least consulted you on how your memories of him as a decathlete would be impacted by his transition.
If Jenner knows he is a woman long trapped in an incredibly masculine body, then so be it. The extreme plastic surgery, the Adam’s apple apparently shaved, the ponytail, the breasts supported by a sports bra, the nail polish — no man would do that for kicks.
Except for Jay Cutler. He just wants to watch the world burn.
Jenner was featured on the front of a Wheaties box, for God’s sake, the signature placement for the greatest American heroes. But I’ll ask you: Does anybody eat Wheaties anymore? Does anybody notice what’s on the cover of what they eat?
No Rick, nobody eats Wheaties anymore. You know why? Because Bruce Jenner has affected your memories of the past. Much like you, no one else can eat a bowl of cereal without searching inside themselves while eating that cereal wondering, "How can I eat this delicious goodness knowing 40 years ago a man appeared on the front of the box and that man is now a woman? Can women even eat Wheaties? If so, SHOULD women be allowed to eat Wheaties?"
In 1976, Jenner’s gold medal reaffirmed Americans’ belief in our ability to counter communist determinism with democratic freedom. That’s what I felt; that’s what I believed.
Now that Jenner is transitioning to a woman, communism has won. Mr. Putin, build that wall back up. Bruce Jenner is looking for high heels and communism is in style again.
Jenner was somebody I could look up to, a role model so close to me in so many ways, I felt, that he became almost a fantasy. He didn’t just beat a foe, like a heavyweight boxer. He beat the best in the world all at once.
I had the Sports Illustrated cover of him with his jacked arms raised, his fists clenched, his eyes closed in ecstasy, pinned on my wall. The headline read, ‘‘AWRRIGHT!’’
Now when he looks at the headline all Rick reads is "AWASALEONPURSES!"
I’ve seen Chaz Bono.
Rick has one gay friend and one black friend. He counts them. This makes him a non-racist and definitely not a bigot.
But I’m writing this from my perspective, my world. It’s all I know.
And I’m dizzy. I’m almost lost.
Bruce Jenner definitely should have thought about Rick Telander's nostalgia and the fate of Wheaties cereal before taking steps to make himself happier.
6. Phil Mushnick warns his readers about "dangerous" basketball. Yep, you guessed it. Much like how Florida Gulf Coast won games by dunking, Phil doesn't like it when amateur athletes dunk. It sends a bad message to the kids.
“Would I have yanked one of my kids for doing that? In a heartbeat.”
Jack Alesi, 62, reckons he has been coaching basketball “since I was 18,” the last 30 years at Brooklyn’s Xaverian High School, the last 20 of those as head varsity boys coach. Friday night, Xaverian plays Christ The King in the Diocesan final.
Alesi is talking about this dunk:
Jarell Martin's amazing dunk captured #LSU @wafb pic.twitter.com/P3C7FDjanJ
— Jacques Doucet (@JacquesDoucet) February 22, 2015
“I’m not one to stifle creativity,” Alesi said Wednesday.
Just don't do any creative or fancy dunks. That's not stifling creativity, it's only standing up for what's right and good about sports. Sports are NOT entertainment.
“If a kid finds it easier to dunk the ball than lay it in, fine by me. Bob Cousy dribbled between his legs to the benefit of his teams. There’s a difference between creative and plain stupid. TV can’t seem to distinguish between the two. It doesn’t even try.
“I wouldn’t try to embarrass that LSU kid, but if ever there was a teaching moment, that was it. Take him out, explain it, put him back in.”
"I'm old and have some weird thing about how you shouldn't use your athleticism to put on a show for those who pay to watch you play basketball. Don't make me uncomfortable by dunking the basketball in a creative manner. This isn't my issue, this is YOUR issue. It was stupid to try that dunk, even though you pulled it off. I'm old, if I haven't made that clear enough. I don't want to stifle your creativity, but just don't do anything creative that the fans might enjoy. Here, have some Wheaties."
Alesi was still flabbergasted and frustrated by the glorious hysteria the deep-thinking ESPN basketball experts, studio anchors and production shot-callers made over LSU forward Jarell Martin’s breakaway slam dunk that was preceded by a between-his-legs, greater degree-of-difficulty move — versus no one — in a tie game Saturday against Florida.
I like how Phil Mushnick goes through life trying to find things to be offended by. It's a bitter, sad life when your only purpose is to complain about how offended you are by the present and continuously long for the past.
“Would these TV guys coach kids to do such a thing, especially in a tie game, instruct them to turn an easy two points into a difficult two points? Do they really believe that that kid made a great play, did the right thing? Really? Honestly?
Did he do "the right thing?" An unpaid amateur athlete chose to dunk in a creative manner during a tie game and it's being couched in terms of "right" and "wrong." Unbelievable.
“I watch what TV has done to this game, and I shake my head. I do. It’s enough to make you cry.”
Cry? Like you would cry over an athlete dunking the basketball in a tie game? That's something you would actually cry about? The only thing shameful or dangerous in regard to this story is how Phil Mushnick and Alesi manage to turn an amateur athlete dunking a basketball into a story about "right and wrong."
7. Want to know why Max Scherezer isn't back with the Tigers? It's because he knew his market value and that hurt Mike Ilitch's feelings.
The pitcher had wiggled out of a bases-loaded jam with two strikeouts and a line drive to center in a critical playoff game. He spun around and bounced off the mound. He pumped his fist toward the heavens. And then he walloped his teammates with a series of monstrous high-5s, shrieking in triumph.
Those were human emotions. Joy in triumph. Max's overwhelming display of his joy was understandable at the moment.
But emotions are common to all people. And some people do not display them as openly as Scherzer did that October afternoon in 2013 when he rescued the Tigers, in relief, from the brink of playoff elimination by the Athletics.
Mike Ilitch is private and he is proud. Winning means just about everything to him. It has since he and Marian, his wife, blended some flour in a pot of water and created a pizza mixture that would turn into heavy millions.
Long story short here, the Tigers made a contract offer to Max Scherzer that he rejected and this made Ilitch upset and sealed that Scherzer would not be back with the Tigers after the 2014 season. Apparently Ilitch is so proud that he doesn't understand how business negotiations work.
One year ago this month, Ilitch approved an offer of $144 million to cement Scherzer to the Tigers for six years.
The offer was rejected. Scherzer, the projected Tiger for life, turned down the money and the security. He and his slick agent, Scott Boras, gambled that there would be more money offered and more security in a year.
Two things:
1. I love how Green calls Boras "slick" because he got the most money possible for his client in free agency. That's pretty much the job Boras was hired to do and he did it well. That's not "slick," that's competent.
2. There was more money and more security offered in a year. So Ilitch doesn't have to offer Scherzer another contract after the $144 million was rejected, but Scherzer gambled and it paid off.
But you don't reject Mike Ilitch. You don't snub him. You don't scoff at Ilitch's generosity.
Haha..."generosity" that ended up being less than Scherzer could make on the open market. I'm not sure I would call that being "generous" more than it would be offering Scherzer a contract which was fair, but not what he ended up being worth on the open market. Scherzer thought he was worth more and it turns out he was right. There's no reason to take it personally.
You don't stamp on Ilitch's ego. Even the best pitcher in the American League, advised by the shrewdest player agent in the business, could never get away with insulting Ilitch.
Except, Scherzer did get away with a bigger contract that had more security.
"I think we've made it clear that we have not been pursuing the situation," Dombrowski told The News' Chris McCosky after Scherzer agreed to sign with the Nationals in January. "We've said it numerous times . . .
"We made a real run at Max last spring and it didn't work."
Ilitch never cared to match the Washington offer. The guess here is if the Tigers had made a matching offer a couple of months ago, Scherzer would have grabbed it. Even if the Tigers came somewhat close the Nationals' jackpot, Scherzer, I reckon, would have grabbed less money in defiance of Boras.
Maybe he would have. I don't know. A pitcher who turns down $144 million certainly sounds like a pitcher who is looking to maximize his value on the free agent market.
My theory is, "Goodby." You don't dare to rankle Mike Ilitch. Farewell!
So hurt feelings caused by a rejected business contract is the reason Scherzer isn't with the Tigers anymore. Scherzer landed with a team that is competing for a World Series title and he got more money and a longer contract than the Tigers offered...Ilitch sure showed him didn't he?
8. Steve Dilbeck has not been pleased with the Dodgers for hiring Andrew Friedman and his Stats Geek army. So he is taking great pride in the Dodgers' best pitching prospect being sent down to minor league camp. After all, who didn't expect an 18 year old to make the Dodgers' Opening Day roster?
The first cut is the deepest, particularly if you’re one of the four sent out. And especially if you’re been hyped as much as left-hander Julio Urias.
An 18 year old pitcher who has never pitched above A+ ball is expected to be one of the first cuts out of camp. Nothing else would make sense. It's entirely possible for Urias to be a great pitcher one day, but he's 18 years old and Steve Dilbeck shouldn't take such idiotic glee in Urias being sent down.
But Urias, the 18-year-old wunderkind, was one of the first four players reassigned to the minor-league camp Saturday by the Dodgers.
Most of the winter Dilbeck thought Urias should have been traded for a proven baseball player. That's what this is all about. It's about Dilbeck disagreeing with the direction of the Dodgers franchise and doing whatever he can to make it seem like Andrew Friedman is constantly screwing up.
Despite his electric stuff, Urias looked like a teenager who could use some more seasoning in his two spring outings.
This is most likely because he IS a teenager who could use some more seasoning before he's ready to play in the majors. Dilbeck can't believe this is true though. If Urias isn't ready to dominate in the majors RIGHT NOW then he'll never be ready. The Dodgers should just trade him now while his value is still high.
Dilbeck needs to stop being passive-aggressive in his constant assault against Andrew Friedman. This assault against Friedman is based on Dilbeck's dislike of advanced statistics. That's it. So it's come to where Dilbeck is being sarcastic and snarky about an 18 year old pitcher being sent down to minor league camp, as if this means anything long-term for the Dodgers or the 18 year old pitcher. I hate it when sportswriters have agendas.
9. Dilbeck also didn't want the Dodgers to trade Matt Kemp. Despite being a critic of Kemp's in the past, once Dilbeck saw a chance to criticize Andrew Friedman he immediately became Kemp's biggest fan. Now Dilbeck is writing stories about Kemp in order to point out that he wasn't a bad teammate. It's just sometimes his teammates didn't like him. This wouldn't affect the clubhouse chemistry. Steve Dilbeck is going to run Andrew Friedman out of town, no matter what it takes. He blames Friedman for using too many statistics to evaluate players and now he thinks Friedman factored in the human element of having good clubhouse chemistry too much by trading Matt Kemp.
Matt Kemp is mystified, and perhaps some of you are mystified that he would be mystified. He’s not bewildered at his trade by the Dodgers to the Padres, but by the implication that his departure has helped rid the L.A. of some evil clubhouse cancer.
I can't recall anyone in the Dodgers organization saying that Kemp was a cancer, so this implication is being brought up and furthered by sportswriters like Steve Dilbeck. He suggested that Kemp was a cancer and has set about to disprove this as true.
I’d say this was the most overblown Dodgers story of the off-season, but really it has only been propagated by a couple of national baseball writers -- and it takes no imagination to figure out whose ear they have -- and not the local beat writers who actually know the team.
Yeah! The Dodgers players liked Matt Kemp and no one should write differently!
Kemp had a way of strutting and enjoying the spotlight that may have rubbed some teammates the wrong way. But his days of “see how cool I can look playing center field” were well past him.
Oh, well I guess there is that too.
At midseason, when he unhappily had been moved from center to left and was playing something slightly less than every day, he would have been served sharing his thoughts only with management.
“I want to play every day, if it's with the Dodgers, if it's with somebody else,” Kemp said then.
Being unhappy with his role on the team and not wanting to change positions to help the team, these are two things that absolutely would NOT affect how Kemp's teammates liked him. Plus, this is all Andrew Friedman's fault somehow.
Looking back, Kemp told Hernandez, “I kept hearing maybe he's going to platoon. For me, it wasn't something I was able to wrap my mind around. I felt like if I wouldn't have said anything, just let it all play out the way it played out, they would have said I didn't care about playing on the field. But when I said I had to be in there playing every day, they said I was a bad teammate. I don't feel like that makes me a bad teammate. I know my abilities and I know when I'm healthy and I'm on the field, I could have helped my team win.”
So Kemp was just saying that he thought he should play everyday and didn't want to platoon. If he had just kept his mouth shut and not worried about platooning then "they" would have written that he doesn't care about the team because he was willing to put his ego aside for the betterment of the team. Great point.
That might sound a bit more selfish than many would like, but it’s nothing outlandish, either.
No, but it is the sort of thing that can rankle teammates just a little bit. Kemp was basically saying, "I want to play everyday and I'm better than a guy who platoons in the outfield." I can see how that wouldn't cause Kemp's teammates to clap him on the back and congratulate him on taking one for the team.
Kemp is only 30 and hopefully has a long career still ahead of him. He actually looks pretty good in a Padres uniform, though looking good was never his problem. And neither was being some grand clubhouse cancer.
I think the only ones saying that Kemp was a clubhouse cancer are those like Steve Dilbeck who want to explain a reason why Kemp was traded away that doesn't deal with his performance on the field. The truth is in the middle, that while Kemp wasn't a great teammate (despite Dilbeck's protests that Kemp wasn't THAT bad, which is enough to piss off a few teammates), nobody should think Kemp was traded because he was a bad teammate. The funny part is that Dilbeck speaks out against Friedman using too many computers and numbers to evaluate players while ignoring the human aspect, but also claims that Friedman only paid attention to the human aspect and ignored the numbers and statistics by trading Matt Kemp. Friedman is too numbers-oriented unless that perception doesn't fit the agenda Steve Dilbeck has. In that case, Dilbeck feels free to flip this perception around to fit whatever agenda he has on a given day.
10. Here is something that isn't bad sportswriting from Bruce Jenkins. He dares to take a measured approach to the use of analytics.
Charles Barkley seems to think there’s some sort of war going on. He fights it alone, well on his way to becoming chairman of the “I don’t get analytics” committee.
He ridiculed analytics as “crap,” apparently not realizing he was also denouncing rebound totals and points per game. As far as his dismissing stat wizards as “people who never played the game,” there’s some truth to that. But if Barkley wants to believe that such NBA icons as Gregg Popovich and Pat Riley don’t conduct extensive studies of advanced metrics, he’s wildly misguided.
The statistical revolution hasn’t taken over the major sports, it merely enhances player evaluation at every level. Every smart executive crafts a harmonious relationship between long-trusted scouts (as in “trust your eyes”) and the volumes of advanced metrics that prove invaluable in analyzing matchups, tendencies and percentages.
This is impossible. It's either one or the other. Just ask Rick Telander. A team either hates or loves advanced statistics. There can be no in between. Ever. Never. No NBA coach or GM would ever admit to use advanced statistics.
Warriors GM Bob Myers, to FM 95.7: “When we make decisions, analytics are never more than 50 percent of the process.”
Dallas coach Rick Carlisle: “There’s a lot of information available, but 'selectively’ is the word. There are tools there that are extremely useful. You just have to make sure you don’t overdo it.”
Houston coach Kevin McHale: “It’s just another tool in the toolbox, and very useful. But the toughest thing in this business is how much does a guy love to play? How much does he love to compete? How tough is he? How is he going to play when someone kicks his ass? What’s he going to do the next day?”
Oh. So Bruce Jenkins is writing that NBA teams use advanced statistics as part of the evaluation process and admit to it? What happened to "either/or" and sportswriters claiming that statistics are ruining the sport? This is happening, lack of evidence be damned.
This is a war that doesn’t exist. Only a fool dares to belittle either side.
Exactly. Maybe when the anti-advanced stats crowd stops belittling the use of these statistics "idiots" like Daryl Morey will feel free to not belittle those who sound ignorant when dismissing new ideas, simply because they are threatened by these ideas.
Friday, March 6, 2015
0 comments What A-Rod Has Done Wrong Today: He Prevented the Yankees From Signing Free Agents
It's not hard for the media to find things that A-Rod has done wrong. They simply exaggerate something small or turn a good thing A-Rod has done into a bad thing. So what A-Rod has done wrong today is he signed a contract that allows him to earn $61 million over the next three years and this is singlehandedly prevented the Yankees from signing Yoan Moncada. His contract is the only bloated contract on the Yankees roster, so it's definitely his fault the Yankees lost Moncada to the Red Sox. Look at the Yankees payroll. See A-Rod at the top as the fourth-highest paid player on the team? Not only can't he earn his keep like Mark Teixeira does, but his contract is causing the Yankees to lose free agents. By existing, A-Rod is hurting the chances the Yankees have of competing. I'll let Joel Sherman explain better than I can.
Early Monday, the Yankees found out Yoan Moncada wasn’t coming to their minor league complex and Alex Rodriguez was.
I know the Yankees were probably hoping he wouldn't, but were they under the impression that A-Rod just wouldn't show up to spring trainig at all?
This was a symbolic crossroads moment for the organization. A 19-year-old they wanted got away — to the Red Sox — and a 39-year-old they wished would go away came back.
But it's not a crossroads because the Yankees still have a ton of resources and Moncada is an unproven entity who could very well be Jose Abreu or could very well just not be Jose Abreu while being overpaid.
Ultimately, the Yankees refused to invest $63 million to inject more talent into their farm system.
Perhaps that is because they never were able to make the $61 million they owe Rodriguez go away.
The Yankees lost out on Moncada because they wouldn't give him $9 million more to match the offer the Red Sox made. I'm sure that $9 million wasn't spent because A-Rod is owed $61 million and not because A-Rod is only the fourth-highest paid player on the roster during the 2015 season. The Yankees still owe Teixeira $45 million, owe C.C. Sabathia $73 million, $133 million to Masahiro Tanaka, $131 million (or $110 million if they don't pick up his club option in 2022) to Jacoby Ellsbury, and $68 million to a 31 year old catcher (Brian McCann). It's totally A-Rod's fault that the Yankees couldn't spend an extra $9 million to bid on Moncada. It's not like there are other bloated contracts on the roster. Yes, "perhaps" it is A-Rod's fault that Moncada isn't a Yankee. The team that gave Chris Capuano, Garrett Jones and Stephen Drew $15 million for next year couldn't find $9 million to spend on Moncada. It's not possible that "perhaps" the Yankees just didn't want to up their bid. It has to be A-Rod's fault they lost out on Moncada.
The albatross contracts of A-Rod, CC Sabathia and Mark Teixeira have two or three more years to run, and until they expire, the Yanks are drawing firmer financial lines in the sand rather than following their long-held policy of “Get ’em at any price.”
True, but the title of this column is "On Day 1, Yankees find new reason to shun A-Rod." If it's about A-Rod, it leads.
So the Yankees were willing to offer Moncada $25 million with an indication they would go to $27 million. Thanks to a 100 percent penalty tax for exceeding the international signing pool, that $27 million sum would have actually cost the Yankees $54 million, and the Red Sox’s winning bid of $31.5 million will cost them $63 million.
For the difference of $9 million, the Yanks allowed the Red Sox to deepen what already is perceived as a far superior feeder system.
This is typical stupid, nonsensical sportswriting from a New York sportswriter. Joel Sherman seems to believe the Yankees are only competing with the Red Sox for the AL East or World Series title, so any move the Red Sox make must immediately be matched by the Yankees. Because the working assumption is that every big move the Red Sox make is a really, really smart move that will propel them to the top of the division. If the Red Sox get a deal with Gatorade, then the Yankees must spend more to get a deal with Powerade. This is how the brain dead New York sports media works. Beating the Red Sox at whatever game the New York media decides must be played is all that really matters.
After more than a year away, Rodriguez spent his first day back on Yankees soil treated with — at best — distance. The Yanks say that is because they weren’t expecting him. But they had several hours to audible into a more helpful posture to Rodriguez and never did.
They were probably still enraged that A-Rod showed up to camp early AND singlehandedly prevented them from signing Moncada by refusing to allow the organization to spend $9 million more to match the Red Sox bid. A-Rod now apparently controls the purse strings of the Yankees front office. Who knew?
Maybe it is because they still are issuing tough love for all the bile and lawsuits Rodriguez hurled at them last year, and because of his refusal to have a Yankee Stadium press conference before pitchers and catchers reported this year.
Yes, the tough love the Yankees are giving A-Rod from all the bile he's hurled at them. I forgot, was it A-Rod who was trying to take $61 million from the Yankees organization or was it the Yankees organization who worked hard to make sure they didn't have to pay $61 million to A-Rod? It seems Joel Sherman has forgotten too. I guarantee you if the "New York Post" was trying to take money from Joel Sherman's pocket, even for reasons that were Sherman's fault, he wouldn't consider the "Post" to be the victim. Again, logic goes out the window when A-Rod is involved.
Not one significant Yankees official attended his first workout in a team facility since his suspension. Can you imagine another player owed the money Rodriguez is owed who would not draw Joe Girardi or a major league hitting coach or general manager Brian Cashman or head of personnel Billy Eppler?
And of course, the Yankees refusal to watch the guy who they owe $61 million to and is singlehandedly holding them back from signing free agents is a knock on A-Rod. Logic wouldn't indicate that perhaps it is a fault of the Yankees organization that they won't invest time into making sure a guy they are paying $61 million to will contribute to the team. The refusal to attend A-Rod's first workout shows what an asshole A-Rod is and isn't at all an indication of how the Yankees may bitch and moan about A-Rod's contract, but they aren't willing to help him succeed either.
And can you imagine any other player the Yankees would let fend for himself with 35 reporters without sending even one media relations employee over to help at such a delicate time?
No, but again, the immaturity of the Yankees organization is the fault of A-Rod. Hey, maybe the reason A-Rod wouldn't have a press conference at Yankee Stadium is because he knows the Yankees organization would let the reporters have a field day asking him questions that they can use to bash him and they don't have his best interests at heart? Joel Sherman doesn't think about this. He's not smart enough to think, "The Yankees have left A-Rod to fend for himself, rightly or wrongly, so maybe that's why he won't do exactly as they say when it comes to talking to the press." It's another fault of A-Rod that he won't do exactly as the Yankees wish of him, while knowing they don't at all have his best interests at heart. He shouldn't look out for himself. That's just selfish.
Instead, A-Rod leaned against a parking lot gate outside the minor league complex and, with cars whizzing by on Himes Avenue, answered questions for eight minutes.
Any credit given for answering the questions? No? Great. Let's get back to blaming him for the Yankees being outbid by the Red Sox for Moncada.
Monday, when the Yankees learned A-Rod was planning to work out at the minor league complex around 11 a.m., they intercepted to say he needed to take a physical first across the street at George M. Steinbrenner Field.
Rodriguez — in his current pose as good employee — did just that. He arrived at the minor league complex around 1 p.m. and worked out for about an hour. If you did not know it was Rodriguez, his batting practice was a veteran prepping for the season. Nothing special.
A-Rod is an asshole for not holding a press conference at Yankee Stadium, yet he gets mocked for doing exactly as the team wants him to do otherwise. It's hard to win if the media keeps moving the goalposts.
If you wanted to try to apply meaning, he did hit a half-dozen over the fence, but his fly balls did not have the backspin from his prime that seemed to turn baseballs into golf balls and give them extra distance. Is that because it is the third week of February and it is a normal progression? Or is it because he is in the late December of his career?
I don't know, Joel. It could be because he's 39 years old. Derek Jeter hit 4 home runs last year in 581 at-bats when he was 40 years old. It's almost like age catches up with players later in their career...except for those players who are using PED's. Which of course, if A-Rod did hit home runs with the normal backspin of his prime then Joel Sherman would suggest A-Rod was still using PED's. Again, it's hard to win if the media keeps moving the goalposts.
He said he was not on any illegal performance enhancers and — asked how he could justify tarnishing a game he claims to love — Rodriguez responded: “No mistake that I’ve made has any good answer. There’s no good answer. It’s unexplainable. I’ve dug a big hole for myself. I paid a price.”
WHY DIDN'T ANYONE ASK HIM HOW IT FELT TO PREVENT THE YANKEES FROM IMPROVING THEIR TEAM?
Rodriguez has put on a fake face before to try to escape low moments. But we should think of him as the child in the team-player relationship, and the Yanks as the adult.
Okay, I can see that. A-Rod can sort of be a child. If the Yankees are the adult then they are the adult who tries to take money from the child and won't support the child when he is in need of support, while making a passive-aggressive attempt to ensure that child fails. That certainly sounds like an adult to me.
I understand the well-earned Yankees rage at this child, but now they should rise above it — remember they are the adults. A-Rod needs the organization’s assistance on the field and with media.
Yes, but the fact they won't provide this assistance shows they aren't the adult. Funny how the Yankees organization gets the benefit of the doubt from Sherman. Both sides can't be dipshits and in the wrong. Sides must be taken and Sherman has taken the Yankees' side.
At a crossroads moment, the Yankees decided not to spend $60 million-plus on Moncada. As for the $60 million-plus they already owe, the Yankees have to transition back to good cop and see if they can get the most out of this man-child.
Such a weak attempt to bring A-Rod's contract into the reason the Yankees didn't get Moncada. It certainly couldn't be the other contracts the Yankees have which prevented them from bidding $9 million more to match the Red Sox bid. Maybe the guy the Yankees are paying $15 million to this year who says his best years are behind him was part of the reason the Yankees wouldn't spend $9 million more on Moncada. The Yankees owe $30 million to a guy who can't stay healthy and admits he's not such a great player anymore. But that should be ignored in favor of trying to connect the Yankees missing out on Moncada to A-Rod's existence on the roster. There's definitely more correlation there.
Early Monday, the Yankees found out Yoan Moncada wasn’t coming to their minor league complex and Alex Rodriguez was.
I know the Yankees were probably hoping he wouldn't, but were they under the impression that A-Rod just wouldn't show up to spring trainig at all?
This was a symbolic crossroads moment for the organization. A 19-year-old they wanted got away — to the Red Sox — and a 39-year-old they wished would go away came back.
But it's not a crossroads because the Yankees still have a ton of resources and Moncada is an unproven entity who could very well be Jose Abreu or could very well just not be Jose Abreu while being overpaid.
Ultimately, the Yankees refused to invest $63 million to inject more talent into their farm system.
Perhaps that is because they never were able to make the $61 million they owe Rodriguez go away.
The Yankees lost out on Moncada because they wouldn't give him $9 million more to match the offer the Red Sox made. I'm sure that $9 million wasn't spent because A-Rod is owed $61 million and not because A-Rod is only the fourth-highest paid player on the roster during the 2015 season. The Yankees still owe Teixeira $45 million, owe C.C. Sabathia $73 million, $133 million to Masahiro Tanaka, $131 million (or $110 million if they don't pick up his club option in 2022) to Jacoby Ellsbury, and $68 million to a 31 year old catcher (Brian McCann). It's totally A-Rod's fault that the Yankees couldn't spend an extra $9 million to bid on Moncada. It's not like there are other bloated contracts on the roster. Yes, "perhaps" it is A-Rod's fault that Moncada isn't a Yankee. The team that gave Chris Capuano, Garrett Jones and Stephen Drew $15 million for next year couldn't find $9 million to spend on Moncada. It's not possible that "perhaps" the Yankees just didn't want to up their bid. It has to be A-Rod's fault they lost out on Moncada.
The albatross contracts of A-Rod, CC Sabathia and Mark Teixeira have two or three more years to run, and until they expire, the Yanks are drawing firmer financial lines in the sand rather than following their long-held policy of “Get ’em at any price.”
True, but the title of this column is "On Day 1, Yankees find new reason to shun A-Rod." If it's about A-Rod, it leads.
So the Yankees were willing to offer Moncada $25 million with an indication they would go to $27 million. Thanks to a 100 percent penalty tax for exceeding the international signing pool, that $27 million sum would have actually cost the Yankees $54 million, and the Red Sox’s winning bid of $31.5 million will cost them $63 million.
For the difference of $9 million, the Yanks allowed the Red Sox to deepen what already is perceived as a far superior feeder system.
This is typical stupid, nonsensical sportswriting from a New York sportswriter. Joel Sherman seems to believe the Yankees are only competing with the Red Sox for the AL East or World Series title, so any move the Red Sox make must immediately be matched by the Yankees. Because the working assumption is that every big move the Red Sox make is a really, really smart move that will propel them to the top of the division. If the Red Sox get a deal with Gatorade, then the Yankees must spend more to get a deal with Powerade. This is how the brain dead New York sports media works. Beating the Red Sox at whatever game the New York media decides must be played is all that really matters.
After more than a year away, Rodriguez spent his first day back on Yankees soil treated with — at best — distance. The Yanks say that is because they weren’t expecting him. But they had several hours to audible into a more helpful posture to Rodriguez and never did.
They were probably still enraged that A-Rod showed up to camp early AND singlehandedly prevented them from signing Moncada by refusing to allow the organization to spend $9 million more to match the Red Sox bid. A-Rod now apparently controls the purse strings of the Yankees front office. Who knew?
Maybe it is because they still are issuing tough love for all the bile and lawsuits Rodriguez hurled at them last year, and because of his refusal to have a Yankee Stadium press conference before pitchers and catchers reported this year.
Yes, the tough love the Yankees are giving A-Rod from all the bile he's hurled at them. I forgot, was it A-Rod who was trying to take $61 million from the Yankees organization or was it the Yankees organization who worked hard to make sure they didn't have to pay $61 million to A-Rod? It seems Joel Sherman has forgotten too. I guarantee you if the "New York Post" was trying to take money from Joel Sherman's pocket, even for reasons that were Sherman's fault, he wouldn't consider the "Post" to be the victim. Again, logic goes out the window when A-Rod is involved.
Not one significant Yankees official attended his first workout in a team facility since his suspension. Can you imagine another player owed the money Rodriguez is owed who would not draw Joe Girardi or a major league hitting coach or general manager Brian Cashman or head of personnel Billy Eppler?
And of course, the Yankees refusal to watch the guy who they owe $61 million to and is singlehandedly holding them back from signing free agents is a knock on A-Rod. Logic wouldn't indicate that perhaps it is a fault of the Yankees organization that they won't invest time into making sure a guy they are paying $61 million to will contribute to the team. The refusal to attend A-Rod's first workout shows what an asshole A-Rod is and isn't at all an indication of how the Yankees may bitch and moan about A-Rod's contract, but they aren't willing to help him succeed either.
And can you imagine any other player the Yankees would let fend for himself with 35 reporters without sending even one media relations employee over to help at such a delicate time?
No, but again, the immaturity of the Yankees organization is the fault of A-Rod. Hey, maybe the reason A-Rod wouldn't have a press conference at Yankee Stadium is because he knows the Yankees organization would let the reporters have a field day asking him questions that they can use to bash him and they don't have his best interests at heart? Joel Sherman doesn't think about this. He's not smart enough to think, "The Yankees have left A-Rod to fend for himself, rightly or wrongly, so maybe that's why he won't do exactly as they say when it comes to talking to the press." It's another fault of A-Rod that he won't do exactly as the Yankees wish of him, while knowing they don't at all have his best interests at heart. He shouldn't look out for himself. That's just selfish.
Instead, A-Rod leaned against a parking lot gate outside the minor league complex and, with cars whizzing by on Himes Avenue, answered questions for eight minutes.
Any credit given for answering the questions? No? Great. Let's get back to blaming him for the Yankees being outbid by the Red Sox for Moncada.
Monday, when the Yankees learned A-Rod was planning to work out at the minor league complex around 11 a.m., they intercepted to say he needed to take a physical first across the street at George M. Steinbrenner Field.
Rodriguez — in his current pose as good employee — did just that. He arrived at the minor league complex around 1 p.m. and worked out for about an hour. If you did not know it was Rodriguez, his batting practice was a veteran prepping for the season. Nothing special.
A-Rod is an asshole for not holding a press conference at Yankee Stadium, yet he gets mocked for doing exactly as the team wants him to do otherwise. It's hard to win if the media keeps moving the goalposts.
If you wanted to try to apply meaning, he did hit a half-dozen over the fence, but his fly balls did not have the backspin from his prime that seemed to turn baseballs into golf balls and give them extra distance. Is that because it is the third week of February and it is a normal progression? Or is it because he is in the late December of his career?
I don't know, Joel. It could be because he's 39 years old. Derek Jeter hit 4 home runs last year in 581 at-bats when he was 40 years old. It's almost like age catches up with players later in their career...except for those players who are using PED's. Which of course, if A-Rod did hit home runs with the normal backspin of his prime then Joel Sherman would suggest A-Rod was still using PED's. Again, it's hard to win if the media keeps moving the goalposts.
He said he was not on any illegal performance enhancers and — asked how he could justify tarnishing a game he claims to love — Rodriguez responded: “No mistake that I’ve made has any good answer. There’s no good answer. It’s unexplainable. I’ve dug a big hole for myself. I paid a price.”
WHY DIDN'T ANYONE ASK HIM HOW IT FELT TO PREVENT THE YANKEES FROM IMPROVING THEIR TEAM?
Rodriguez has put on a fake face before to try to escape low moments. But we should think of him as the child in the team-player relationship, and the Yanks as the adult.
Okay, I can see that. A-Rod can sort of be a child. If the Yankees are the adult then they are the adult who tries to take money from the child and won't support the child when he is in need of support, while making a passive-aggressive attempt to ensure that child fails. That certainly sounds like an adult to me.
I understand the well-earned Yankees rage at this child, but now they should rise above it — remember they are the adults. A-Rod needs the organization’s assistance on the field and with media.
Yes, but the fact they won't provide this assistance shows they aren't the adult. Funny how the Yankees organization gets the benefit of the doubt from Sherman. Both sides can't be dipshits and in the wrong. Sides must be taken and Sherman has taken the Yankees' side.
At a crossroads moment, the Yankees decided not to spend $60 million-plus on Moncada. As for the $60 million-plus they already owe, the Yankees have to transition back to good cop and see if they can get the most out of this man-child.
Such a weak attempt to bring A-Rod's contract into the reason the Yankees didn't get Moncada. It certainly couldn't be the other contracts the Yankees have which prevented them from bidding $9 million more to match the Red Sox bid. Maybe the guy the Yankees are paying $15 million to this year who says his best years are behind him was part of the reason the Yankees wouldn't spend $9 million more on Moncada. The Yankees owe $30 million to a guy who can't stay healthy and admits he's not such a great player anymore. But that should be ignored in favor of trying to connect the Yankees missing out on Moncada to A-Rod's existence on the roster. There's definitely more correlation there.
Monday, November 10, 2014
3 comments Immediately After That Annoying World Series Ends, Joel Sherman Goes Back to Churning for Pageviews Using Alex Rodriguez As Bait
When I say "immediately" in that title I am not exaggerating. If there were ink on Joel Sherman's "Madison Bumgarner is a great pitcher" column, then it would not have been dry by the time he posted an article about the 10 biggest questions of A-Rod's Yankees return. Sherman posted his World Series column on October 30 at 12:40am. At 12:42am on October 30, his article about A Rod's Yankees return was posted. Two minutes. That's how long Joel Sherman focused on the World Series before churning out an obviously already written A-Rod column. This is typical of the New York media. They tend to care less about the sport of baseball and prefer to focus on the drama around the sport of baseball. An article about 10 questions surrounding A-Rod's return can be posted at any point for the next couple of months. There is no expiration date on an article like that for the next couple of months because A-Rod isn't returning until February, but Sherman had to get that article out as soon as possible to focus on what's important. What's important is pageviews. And an article about questions surrounding A-Rod's return brings those pageviews, while an article about the Giants winning the World Series will not, unless there are thousands of New Yorkers who think it is 1946 and the Giants still play in New York.
Let's have Joel get the game summary of an actual MLB game out of the way before he gets to the real topic at hand, which is all the questions surrounding A-Rod's return.
He walked unhurried in from the right-field bullpen. Into Game 7, deeper into baseball history.
Joel Sherman was all like this after he wrote this sentence.
However, think of this like the Beatles giving us “Let It Be” at the end. They didn’t need to do it; their legacy already was their legacy.
But we are sure glad they did.
Let's scale it back a little bit with the epic-sounding sportswriting. Just a little bit.
Going .gif crazy today, sorry.
Reliever Jeremy Affeldt continued to be the most unsung October stalwart in history.
Uh-oh, it's time to hand out the superlatives! Jeremy Affeldt gets "Most unsung October stalwart in history." Joe Panik gets "Person whose last name does not describe how he behaved in key moments during the World Series" and Madison Bumgarner receives the award for "Pitcher whose name sounds like it should be a character on 'Gossip Girl.'"
Still, Bumgarner towered over this October as if he were Manute Bol and everyone else was Muggsy Bogues. He was a Giant in all forms of the word.
And the Royals weren't very Royal in all forms of the word when they had to face Bumgarner. And Buster Posey wasn't having no busters stop him from winning another World Series title. Brandon Belt took a belt to the Royals' chances of winning a World Series. Sergio Romo played like a star unlike that other Romo who wears a star on his helmet, but doesn't deserve to.
Bumgarner, as it has been throughout this stunning month, answered all questions. He came in with the Giants leading 3-2 to start the bottom of the fifth. He never left. He insisted pitch count did not enter his mind — only executing pitches, getting outs.
Very Jack Morris of him. Now sportswriters need to create narratives around Bumgarner's performance that never actually existed and the comparison will be complete.
“He’s our guy,” Giants starter Jake Peavy said. “We live with him and die with him and he took us to the promised land.”
Kansas City. Apparently Kansas City is the promised land.
Of course the final score was 3-2. Because that was the score when Bumgarner took the ball.
Yes, of course...because Bumgarner was pitching to his Giants teammates as well and that's why they couldn't score any more runs once he entered the game?
When Affeldt was asked if he expected Bumgarner — not closer Sergio Casilla — to pitch the ninth, the lefty said, “If [manager Bruce] Bochy had told him he was done, you would have had two pitchers on the mound in the ninth.”
Which I am pretty sure would have increased ratings, so keep that in mind Rob Manfred. Baseball is dying. Would having two pitchers on the mound at the same time increase ratings?
It was about watching artistry and endurance, craft and fortitude.
“There is a lot of makeup there,” pitching coach Dave Righetti said.
Don't give away all of Bumgarner's beauty secrets! At least he doesn't photoshop his appearance.
Bumgarner’s demeanor allows him to execute, to be a master of hitting corners with multiple pitches at various speeds, to block out even all that comes with the World Series. A young Clint Eastwood would play him in the movie.
Unfortunately, an old Jessica Lange would play Buster Posey in the movie. The character of Bruce Bochy would obviously be played by Sam Elliott with a cameo appearance by Amy Adams as a scrappy bartender who catches the eye of Madison Bumgarner and shows up just in time to see him clinch the series. He would propose to her on the pitcher's mound and everyone would live happily ever after...except for Pablo Sandoval, who is inexplicably played by Sarah Jessica Parker.
Only in the end could he admit, “I can’t lie to you anymore, I’m a little tired.”
The character of Amy Adams would then say in a coy fashion while grabbing Bumgarner's arm (Bumgarner's arm would be played by a young John Wayne), "I hope you aren't TOO tired," as they laugh at this brief allusion to sexual relations later in the evening and walk off the field together. The field at Kaufmann Stadium will be played by Tommy Lee Jones' face.
The tying run was just 90 feet away. One last chance — but not. At 2-2, Bumgarner threw a 93 mph fastball — he still had that in his arm.
So Bumgarner had a 93 mph fastball IN his arm? Maybe he's a robot if he is shooting baseballs out of his arm?
At the end, it looked as if Bumgarner could throw into a Game 8 or 9 or …
Jack Morris would throw into Game 8 or 9. He did it seven times back in the early 1980's during the World Series.
But he already had pitched the Giants to another title, himself into forever.
Enough of this flowery writing, Joel Sherman has to get to the real concern he has. He can't wait more than three minutes to talk about A-Rod's return to the Yankees in five months. Sherman couldn't even wait a day to post this column, he had to do it two minutes after his column about Game 7 of the World Series was posted.
The 2014 season has ended and so the next chapter of Alex Rodriguez’s baseball career has begun.
YOU WAITED TWO WHOLE MINUTES TO POST THIS! Thank God Joel Sherman didn't post this during the World Series and take the focus off the World Series games. That's a totally A-Rod dick move that nobody else (Joe Maddon, ahem) would do.
What does this mean? Here are 10 questions that come along with the most polarizing player in the game:
1. Will Alex talk?
Nope, he'll probably stay silent all season never to speak again.
As much as A-Rod can curry favor with the Yankees and MLB, he did so this year by mainly — as he promised he would — falling into the background and not overshadowing Derek Jeter’s farewell season, in specific, and the season, in general.
As his tour of college and pro football stadiums has shown, though, Rodriguez does not do undercover particularly well. He hates obscurity and indifference to his existence. So he is going to try to put his current status into context at some point.
Yes, how dare Alex Rodriguez appear in public during his year of exile from playing for the Yankees! Doesn't he know that his mere existence in public forces the media to cover his every move and this overshadows a sporting event because the media HAS to overly-focus on A-Rod's presence at a sporting event? They have no choice but to talk about how he is present at a sporting event.
Or does he try to go to a friendly inquisitor such as Mike Francesa? Or does he decide to seem less over-privileged and less guarded? In that case, he would probably do something in a group setting.
Great analysis on this super-important issue.
2. When will Alex talk?
February 7th at 2:00pm. Then at 2:02pm A-Rod will want to focus on the upcoming season and Joel Sherman will wonder why A-Rod wants to move on from the topic so quickly.
Is it possible A-Rod could actually act like just about every other player and be quiet all winter and make it a one-time comment when he arrives with the rest of the Yankees come February? That might be the safest route — but that is not a route that A-Rod usually takes.
The New York sports media before A-Rod talks: When will A-Rod talk? He has to talk soon so that he can answer these questions we have for him! He has to explain what he's been doing during the offseason and how he is approaching the upcoming year while discussing his suspension for PED use. If he doesn't do this, he's dodging the issue.
The New York media after A-Rod talks: We just knew that A-Rod couldn't keep his mouth shut. He just HAD to come out and talk about his PED suspension. Look at him trying to overshadow the new college football playoffs by talking about his PED suspension. He just can't keep his mouth shut and has to explain how he is approaching the upcoming year and answer the questions we have for him.
4. What kind of shape is he in?
Since A-Rod has been taking "his tour of college and pro football stadiums" then isn't it easy to see what kind of shape he is in? Take a look at him since he's always looking to get in the public's eye despite his suspension from MLB that apparently also means he isn't supposed to go out in public.
The worries are what kind of work can he do at age 39 and after two major hip surgeries. And it can’t be ignored — what kind of work can he do clean? PEDs allow for more frequent workouts done at high intensity with less need for long recovery times.
I'm sure it's the lack of PED's and not the two major hip surgeries that will determine whether A-Rod is still able to play at a high level or not during the 2015 season.
Of course, that is assuming that he is going to try to play clean.
Ah yes, in October 2014 two minutes after the 2014 World Series has ended Joel Sherman starts the speculation on whether A-Rod is going to be using PED's during the 2015 season. Never change, Joel. Never change. Keep the wild speculation going as long and often as possible.
5. Can A-Rod still hit?
Even if he is crappy (relative to his previous performance) he can still contribute compared to the guys the Yankees put on the field during the 2014 season, especially compared to the shortstop that the Yankees put on the field for the 2014 season.
The Yankees would like to re-sign Headley — clearly the better defender at the position — to play third base next year with A-Rod morphing into a third baseman/first baseman/DH.
If A-Rod were Michael Young then he would demand a trade at the prospect of Chase Headley taking over third base duties during the 2015 season and I am sure the New York media would totally support him the way the Texas Rangers media supported Michael Young's trade demands.
Of course, again, the question is whether Rodriguez was even playing clean in 2013.
Of course, that should be a question, but keep bringing up whether A-Rod was playing clean in 2013 or will play clean in 2015. Gotta keep those pageviews churning. Was A-Rod playing clean at the age of 9 when he played coach-pitch? The question still remains.
6. What do injury/age mean?
Here is the definition of "injury."
Here is the definition of "age."
Geez Joel, why are you too lazy to look up your own definitions?
He was troubled in 2013 by high-octane fastballs, and velocity is better now in the sport than ever.
Baseball has changed so much in the year that A-Rod has been gone? WILL HE EVEN UNDERSTAND HOW TO PLAY THE GAME WHEN HE RETURNS? OR WILL HE USED PED'S TO HELP HIM UNDERSTAND HOW TO PLAY THE GAME OF BASEBALL?
7. Does Alex believe in Alex?
Namely does Rodriguez think he can succeed as a clean player? Did the drugs give A-Rod the psychological edge a player with his level of self-doubt needs to thrive?
Considering that Joel Sherman is apparently a part-time psychologist/full-time sportswriter, he is clearly one of the few capable of accurately diagnosing A-Rod's level of self-doubt and whether it will allow him to thrive. It's amazing that some psychologists march around the world showing off their fancy degrees, while Joel Sherman doesn't need no degree to be a psychologist.
What happens if he does not believe in himself now? Actually that is a good question
Joel Sherman thinks he asks good questions. Joel Sherman approves of the questions that Joel Sherman thinks of.
8. What if he does not believe in himself now?
Does anything that happens in offseason workouts convince Rodriguez he cannot come back? For example, if he is working out with the University of Miami and the ball is not coming off the bat or he cannot move particularly well would that move him to avoid the embarrassment of showing that to the world come February/March?
I wonder how many times Joel Sherman can re-phrase the question, "Can A-Rod still play at a high level coming off his injuries and without PED's?" So far we are at six questions that are some derivative of this main question. Can Joel Sherman get two more questions to finish this column off? What if Sherman gets writer's block or can't figure out a way to re-phrase the same question for the seventh time? Would he avoid the embarrassment of showing that he can't come up with 10 questions and only have 8 questions in this column?
Could he think that if he shows he cannot play now, it removes all doubt that the only way he succeeded in his career was with the aid of drugs?
It is probably much more likely he has an athletic arrogance that he can succeed even with all in his recent past. Plus, he actually loves to play and will not give that up without one more full shot at doing so —
See this is where the psychology degree (that Joel Sherman doesn't have and he doesn't need because he can obviously tell what goes on in Alex Rodriguez's head) comes in handy. Of course A-Rod will come back no matter what. He's arrogant, he wants to prove he can play without the use of PED's, he wants to control the narrative...oh, and he actually enjoys playing baseball, but that's just a small part of it all. Mostly it's about proving he can play without using PED's.
10. Can A-Rod be a Yankee ass
Yes, he can be.
et?
Oh, an "asset." Based on last year's Yankees team and how much trouble that team had hitting the baseball, I would say that A-Rod can still be an asset to the Yankees team. Granted, that's a low bar to clear, but if the Yankees can handle an entire season of Derek Jeter's bat in the lineup, I think they could handle A-Rod hitting .260/.324/.410 with 18 home runs and 78 RBI's (I'm making up numbers that are below his career averages, make no mistake about whether I am just naming random numbers that I think could reflect A Rod's 2015 line) in the lineup with improvements made at other parts of the lineup. The question is whether the Yankees are relying on A-Rod to be his old self, in which case they are probably going to be disappointed. He's old, he's come off two hip injuries, and isn't capable of even being the A-Rod from 2010. Some semblance, or slightly less, of 2012 A-Rod is probably what the Yankees will get.
For him to be helpful as a player, he needs to be able to play some first base and be an option behind the brittle Mark Teixeira. Anyone who watched how hard Rodriguez worked in spring training 2004 to make the transition from shortstop to third knows he will put in the time. Those close to him say he will do whatever work is necessary to try not to embarrass himself on the field.
But he probably was using PED's, so he only worked hard because he was on PED's. And as Joel Sherman wildly speculates, A-Rod could use PED's during the 2015 season, so that could give him the ability to work hard that he otherwise wouldn't have.
But with Jeter gone, there are less eggshells to walk on gingerly. He can actually draw attention away from others who do not like the spotlight.
If you play for the New York Yankees then you probably want to make sure you like the spotlight. That's just a pro tip for future Yankee players.
Also, Rodriguez does love to talk the game with and instruct young players. He is not a leader in anywhere near the traditional sense. But he is not afraid to share a baseball-obsessed brain.
Don't say anything nice about him. Go back to passively-aggressively accusing him of possibly using PED's during the 2015 season.
Like with most issues involved with A-Rod now, it really is about whether he has the skills to be sincere and make the rest of his career — however long that lasts — about making life better for those around him rather than continue in the selfish vain that brought him great wealth and substantial ignominy.
So whether A-Rod will thrive during the 2015 season really depends on how nice he is to people. Makes sense. I can't wait for an offseason of Alex Rodriguez articles coming out of New York. I should probably be proud of Joel Sherman for waiting two minutes after the World Series was over to write this column.
Let's have Joel get the game summary of an actual MLB game out of the way before he gets to the real topic at hand, which is all the questions surrounding A-Rod's return.
He walked unhurried in from the right-field bullpen. Into Game 7, deeper into baseball history.
Joel Sherman was all like this after he wrote this sentence.
However, think of this like the Beatles giving us “Let It Be” at the end. They didn’t need to do it; their legacy already was their legacy.
But we are sure glad they did.
Let's scale it back a little bit with the epic-sounding sportswriting. Just a little bit.
Going .gif crazy today, sorry.
Reliever Jeremy Affeldt continued to be the most unsung October stalwart in history.
Uh-oh, it's time to hand out the superlatives! Jeremy Affeldt gets "Most unsung October stalwart in history." Joe Panik gets "Person whose last name does not describe how he behaved in key moments during the World Series" and Madison Bumgarner receives the award for "Pitcher whose name sounds like it should be a character on 'Gossip Girl.'"
Still, Bumgarner towered over this October as if he were Manute Bol and everyone else was Muggsy Bogues. He was a Giant in all forms of the word.
And the Royals weren't very Royal in all forms of the word when they had to face Bumgarner. And Buster Posey wasn't having no busters stop him from winning another World Series title. Brandon Belt took a belt to the Royals' chances of winning a World Series. Sergio Romo played like a star unlike that other Romo who wears a star on his helmet, but doesn't deserve to.
Bumgarner, as it has been throughout this stunning month, answered all questions. He came in with the Giants leading 3-2 to start the bottom of the fifth. He never left. He insisted pitch count did not enter his mind — only executing pitches, getting outs.
Very Jack Morris of him. Now sportswriters need to create narratives around Bumgarner's performance that never actually existed and the comparison will be complete.
“He’s our guy,” Giants starter Jake Peavy said. “We live with him and die with him and he took us to the promised land.”
Kansas City. Apparently Kansas City is the promised land.
Of course the final score was 3-2. Because that was the score when Bumgarner took the ball.
Yes, of course...because Bumgarner was pitching to his Giants teammates as well and that's why they couldn't score any more runs once he entered the game?
When Affeldt was asked if he expected Bumgarner — not closer Sergio Casilla — to pitch the ninth, the lefty said, “If [manager Bruce] Bochy had told him he was done, you would have had two pitchers on the mound in the ninth.”
Which I am pretty sure would have increased ratings, so keep that in mind Rob Manfred. Baseball is dying. Would having two pitchers on the mound at the same time increase ratings?
It was about watching artistry and endurance, craft and fortitude.
“There is a lot of makeup there,” pitching coach Dave Righetti said.
Don't give away all of Bumgarner's beauty secrets! At least he doesn't photoshop his appearance.
Bumgarner’s demeanor allows him to execute, to be a master of hitting corners with multiple pitches at various speeds, to block out even all that comes with the World Series. A young Clint Eastwood would play him in the movie.
Unfortunately, an old Jessica Lange would play Buster Posey in the movie. The character of Bruce Bochy would obviously be played by Sam Elliott with a cameo appearance by Amy Adams as a scrappy bartender who catches the eye of Madison Bumgarner and shows up just in time to see him clinch the series. He would propose to her on the pitcher's mound and everyone would live happily ever after...except for Pablo Sandoval, who is inexplicably played by Sarah Jessica Parker.
Only in the end could he admit, “I can’t lie to you anymore, I’m a little tired.”
The character of Amy Adams would then say in a coy fashion while grabbing Bumgarner's arm (Bumgarner's arm would be played by a young John Wayne), "I hope you aren't TOO tired," as they laugh at this brief allusion to sexual relations later in the evening and walk off the field together. The field at Kaufmann Stadium will be played by Tommy Lee Jones' face.
The tying run was just 90 feet away. One last chance — but not. At 2-2, Bumgarner threw a 93 mph fastball — he still had that in his arm.
So Bumgarner had a 93 mph fastball IN his arm? Maybe he's a robot if he is shooting baseballs out of his arm?
At the end, it looked as if Bumgarner could throw into a Game 8 or 9 or …
Jack Morris would throw into Game 8 or 9. He did it seven times back in the early 1980's during the World Series.
But he already had pitched the Giants to another title, himself into forever.
Enough of this flowery writing, Joel Sherman has to get to the real concern he has. He can't wait more than three minutes to talk about A-Rod's return to the Yankees in five months. Sherman couldn't even wait a day to post this column, he had to do it two minutes after his column about Game 7 of the World Series was posted.
The 2014 season has ended and so the next chapter of Alex Rodriguez’s baseball career has begun.
YOU WAITED TWO WHOLE MINUTES TO POST THIS! Thank God Joel Sherman didn't post this during the World Series and take the focus off the World Series games. That's a totally A-Rod dick move that nobody else (Joe Maddon, ahem) would do.
What does this mean? Here are 10 questions that come along with the most polarizing player in the game:
1. Will Alex talk?
Nope, he'll probably stay silent all season never to speak again.
As much as A-Rod can curry favor with the Yankees and MLB, he did so this year by mainly — as he promised he would — falling into the background and not overshadowing Derek Jeter’s farewell season, in specific, and the season, in general.
As his tour of college and pro football stadiums has shown, though, Rodriguez does not do undercover particularly well. He hates obscurity and indifference to his existence. So he is going to try to put his current status into context at some point.
Yes, how dare Alex Rodriguez appear in public during his year of exile from playing for the Yankees! Doesn't he know that his mere existence in public forces the media to cover his every move and this overshadows a sporting event because the media HAS to overly-focus on A-Rod's presence at a sporting event? They have no choice but to talk about how he is present at a sporting event.
Or does he try to go to a friendly inquisitor such as Mike Francesa? Or does he decide to seem less over-privileged and less guarded? In that case, he would probably do something in a group setting.
Great analysis on this super-important issue.
2. When will Alex talk?
February 7th at 2:00pm. Then at 2:02pm A-Rod will want to focus on the upcoming season and Joel Sherman will wonder why A-Rod wants to move on from the topic so quickly.
Is it possible A-Rod could actually act like just about every other player and be quiet all winter and make it a one-time comment when he arrives with the rest of the Yankees come February? That might be the safest route — but that is not a route that A-Rod usually takes.
The New York sports media before A-Rod talks: When will A-Rod talk? He has to talk soon so that he can answer these questions we have for him! He has to explain what he's been doing during the offseason and how he is approaching the upcoming year while discussing his suspension for PED use. If he doesn't do this, he's dodging the issue.
The New York media after A-Rod talks: We just knew that A-Rod couldn't keep his mouth shut. He just HAD to come out and talk about his PED suspension. Look at him trying to overshadow the new college football playoffs by talking about his PED suspension. He just can't keep his mouth shut and has to explain how he is approaching the upcoming year and answer the questions we have for him.
4. What kind of shape is he in?
Since A-Rod has been taking "his tour of college and pro football stadiums" then isn't it easy to see what kind of shape he is in? Take a look at him since he's always looking to get in the public's eye despite his suspension from MLB that apparently also means he isn't supposed to go out in public.
The worries are what kind of work can he do at age 39 and after two major hip surgeries. And it can’t be ignored — what kind of work can he do clean? PEDs allow for more frequent workouts done at high intensity with less need for long recovery times.
I'm sure it's the lack of PED's and not the two major hip surgeries that will determine whether A-Rod is still able to play at a high level or not during the 2015 season.
Of course, that is assuming that he is going to try to play clean.
Ah yes, in October 2014 two minutes after the 2014 World Series has ended Joel Sherman starts the speculation on whether A-Rod is going to be using PED's during the 2015 season. Never change, Joel. Never change. Keep the wild speculation going as long and often as possible.
5. Can A-Rod still hit?
Even if he is crappy (relative to his previous performance) he can still contribute compared to the guys the Yankees put on the field during the 2014 season, especially compared to the shortstop that the Yankees put on the field for the 2014 season.
The Yankees would like to re-sign Headley — clearly the better defender at the position — to play third base next year with A-Rod morphing into a third baseman/first baseman/DH.
If A-Rod were Michael Young then he would demand a trade at the prospect of Chase Headley taking over third base duties during the 2015 season and I am sure the New York media would totally support him the way the Texas Rangers media supported Michael Young's trade demands.
Of course, again, the question is whether Rodriguez was even playing clean in 2013.
Of course, that should be a question, but keep bringing up whether A-Rod was playing clean in 2013 or will play clean in 2015. Gotta keep those pageviews churning. Was A-Rod playing clean at the age of 9 when he played coach-pitch? The question still remains.
6. What do injury/age mean?
Here is the definition of "injury."
Here is the definition of "age."
Geez Joel, why are you too lazy to look up your own definitions?
He was troubled in 2013 by high-octane fastballs, and velocity is better now in the sport than ever.
Baseball has changed so much in the year that A-Rod has been gone? WILL HE EVEN UNDERSTAND HOW TO PLAY THE GAME WHEN HE RETURNS? OR WILL HE USED PED'S TO HELP HIM UNDERSTAND HOW TO PLAY THE GAME OF BASEBALL?
7. Does Alex believe in Alex?
Namely does Rodriguez think he can succeed as a clean player? Did the drugs give A-Rod the psychological edge a player with his level of self-doubt needs to thrive?
Considering that Joel Sherman is apparently a part-time psychologist/full-time sportswriter, he is clearly one of the few capable of accurately diagnosing A-Rod's level of self-doubt and whether it will allow him to thrive. It's amazing that some psychologists march around the world showing off their fancy degrees, while Joel Sherman doesn't need no degree to be a psychologist.
What happens if he does not believe in himself now? Actually that is a good question
Joel Sherman thinks he asks good questions. Joel Sherman approves of the questions that Joel Sherman thinks of.
8. What if he does not believe in himself now?
Does anything that happens in offseason workouts convince Rodriguez he cannot come back? For example, if he is working out with the University of Miami and the ball is not coming off the bat or he cannot move particularly well would that move him to avoid the embarrassment of showing that to the world come February/March?
I wonder how many times Joel Sherman can re-phrase the question, "Can A-Rod still play at a high level coming off his injuries and without PED's?" So far we are at six questions that are some derivative of this main question. Can Joel Sherman get two more questions to finish this column off? What if Sherman gets writer's block or can't figure out a way to re-phrase the same question for the seventh time? Would he avoid the embarrassment of showing that he can't come up with 10 questions and only have 8 questions in this column?
Could he think that if he shows he cannot play now, it removes all doubt that the only way he succeeded in his career was with the aid of drugs?
It is probably much more likely he has an athletic arrogance that he can succeed even with all in his recent past. Plus, he actually loves to play and will not give that up without one more full shot at doing so —
See this is where the psychology degree (that Joel Sherman doesn't have and he doesn't need because he can obviously tell what goes on in Alex Rodriguez's head) comes in handy. Of course A-Rod will come back no matter what. He's arrogant, he wants to prove he can play without the use of PED's, he wants to control the narrative...oh, and he actually enjoys playing baseball, but that's just a small part of it all. Mostly it's about proving he can play without using PED's.
10. Can A-Rod be a Yankee ass
Yes, he can be.
et?
Oh, an "asset." Based on last year's Yankees team and how much trouble that team had hitting the baseball, I would say that A-Rod can still be an asset to the Yankees team. Granted, that's a low bar to clear, but if the Yankees can handle an entire season of Derek Jeter's bat in the lineup, I think they could handle A-Rod hitting .260/.324/.410 with 18 home runs and 78 RBI's (I'm making up numbers that are below his career averages, make no mistake about whether I am just naming random numbers that I think could reflect A Rod's 2015 line) in the lineup with improvements made at other parts of the lineup. The question is whether the Yankees are relying on A-Rod to be his old self, in which case they are probably going to be disappointed. He's old, he's come off two hip injuries, and isn't capable of even being the A-Rod from 2010. Some semblance, or slightly less, of 2012 A-Rod is probably what the Yankees will get.
For him to be helpful as a player, he needs to be able to play some first base and be an option behind the brittle Mark Teixeira. Anyone who watched how hard Rodriguez worked in spring training 2004 to make the transition from shortstop to third knows he will put in the time. Those close to him say he will do whatever work is necessary to try not to embarrass himself on the field.
But he probably was using PED's, so he only worked hard because he was on PED's. And as Joel Sherman wildly speculates, A-Rod could use PED's during the 2015 season, so that could give him the ability to work hard that he otherwise wouldn't have.
But with Jeter gone, there are less eggshells to walk on gingerly. He can actually draw attention away from others who do not like the spotlight.
If you play for the New York Yankees then you probably want to make sure you like the spotlight. That's just a pro tip for future Yankee players.
Also, Rodriguez does love to talk the game with and instruct young players. He is not a leader in anywhere near the traditional sense. But he is not afraid to share a baseball-obsessed brain.
Don't say anything nice about him. Go back to passively-aggressively accusing him of possibly using PED's during the 2015 season.
Like with most issues involved with A-Rod now, it really is about whether he has the skills to be sincere and make the rest of his career — however long that lasts — about making life better for those around him rather than continue in the selfish vain that brought him great wealth and substantial ignominy.
So whether A-Rod will thrive during the 2015 season really depends on how nice he is to people. Makes sense. I can't wait for an offseason of Alex Rodriguez articles coming out of New York. I should probably be proud of Joel Sherman for waiting two minutes after the World Series was over to write this column.
Saturday, July 19, 2014
3 comments The New York Media Loves Discussing Alex Rodriguez at Any Given Opportunity
You can't give the New York media any daylight to talk about Alex Rodriguez. Any conversation can suddenly take a sharp turn towards a discussion of A-Rod. It gets pageviews, comments, and a discussion going. Any conversation or topic can be taken down the A-Rod road by a New York writer.
Kate Upton is on the cover of Sports Illustrated?
"I bet A-Rod has been on the cover of Sports Illustrated more than she has!"
It's raining outside?
"A-Rod never played well in the rain because he was always worried about his appearance more than he was worried about playing well!"
Tom Hanks said 'Captain Phillips' was his all-time favorite movie to make?
"A-Rod will never be the captain of the Yankees because he isn't a selfless winner like Derek Jeter!"
Don Zimmer has died?
"A-Rod is probably too focused on himself to concern himself on whether Zimmer died or not. I bet Don Zimmer didn't even like A-Rod!"
Manny Ramirez got a player/coach position in the Cubs organization?
"I wonder if a team would give A-Rod a player/coach position in their organization?"
Well done, Joel Sherman, well done. You have managed to bring a non- Alex Rodriguez story around to another discussion about Alex Rodriguez. After all, everything has to come back to A-Rod and what a pariah he is doesn't it?
Cubs president of baseball operations Theo Epstein had a tough sell in explaining why he hired Manny Ramirez as a player-coach for his Triple-A squad and offered this in a statement:
"I fucking wanted to do it. I'm the president of baseball operations and if I want to name Carrot Top the new head athletic trainer I can do it"?
“Manny is not only one of the best hitters of all time, he is also a dedicated student of hitting and has proven to be a gifted teacher with younger teammates who have worked with him in the batting cage. Behind the scenes he has always been a tireless worker who is very serious about the craft of hitting. Manny has made real mistakes in the past but he has owned up to them and moved his life in a positive direction the last couple of years. He is in a really great place right now and wants to share the lessons he’s learned along the way. We think he deserves another chance and that our young hitters will benefit from it.”
Now re-read that statement and replace the name “Manny” with “Alex.”
Now re-read that statement and replace the name "Manny" with "This story isn't about Alex Rodriguez and so stop making it about him." It doesn't flow as well, but it certainly makes me feel better.
Now re-read that statement and replace the name "Manny" with "Cockgoblin McShitfits." I think it gives the quote a real levity that was missing originally.
It works doesn’t it? Alex Rodriguez is one of the best hitters of all-time, a dedicated student of hitting, a tireless worker, a proven gifted teacher who loved to share his knowledge with youngsters and a player who has made real mistakes in the past.
And Joel Sherman is desperately tying these two players together as hard as possible.
"See, both athletes play baseball and were two of the best hitters in baseball, as well as have made mistakes in their life. They are pretty much the same person."
Stop there.
You can't make me. I'm down the road already. Would A-Rod be too busy prancing around and making pouty faces in the mirror while checking out his butt to show his teammates/students hitting tips? Most likely. Would A-Rod teach his teammates/students how to properly inject steroids? Very, very likely. If A-Rod became a player/coach then it would open a whole new Pandora's box of criticism for him. I mean, the New York media could then blame him for the performance of his teammates and do so with a more straight face.
Rodriguez’s latest contrition tour is certainly nearing. Will he own up to his mistakes? Will he convince people that he really has moved into a positive place?
More importantly, will he try to grow some dreadlocks to be like Manny Ramirez? Obviously the dreads were the key to Manny's redemption.
My guess is he will try.
My guess is your guess is simply a guess and therefore is just speculation. Of course if Joel Sherman's guess was that A-Rod would not try to rehab his image then there isn't much of a point in this column.
After all, he sold it once after his 2009 steroid outing and generally received the best coverage and fan support of his Yankees tenure. Of course, he ended up betraying all of that.
This may have had something to do with the Yankees having won the World Series and A-Rod actually contributing to the World Series. I also like the idea that Sherman "betrayed" the fan support and coverage provided by the reporters. The fans probably care less about A-Rod's PED use than Joel Sherman probably knows, especially Yankees fans who have seen a truckload of suspected and PED users on the roster. And if Sherman really believes the Yankees reporters were betrayed by A-Rod's PED use then he needs to realize he and his colleagues are not a part of the story. They cover the story and can not be betrayed.
Plus, when it comes to Rodriguez will anyone ever believe he is sincere — or simply putting on yet another act?
I don't really care if he's being sincere or putting on an act. Don't you like how this column started off with Manny Ramirez becoming a player/coach for the Cubs and has turned into the textbook by-the-number A-Rod bashing column? It's like these New York area writers can't help themselves.
I actually think you can make a case Ramirez is the more offensive of the two.
I think you can actually make a case neither player is really offensive. Comparing which player is more offensive is silly anyway. What's most offensive is Joel Sherman has to use any excuse possible to write about Alex Rodriguez.
But no one ever questioned if A-Rod — like with Manny — had stopped trying on the field as a protest about future salaries or treated defense as a necessary evil needed to hit. He never attacked an aged traveling secretary. Ramirez did that.
Really, who hasn't attacked an aged traveling secretary? Especially if that aged traveling secretary has a service dog she may or may not actually need who takes multiple craps while traveling on a plane.
Yet, Ramirez benefitted from a perception of zaniness rather than cruelty — “Manny being Manny” became shorthand for poor behavior. No one sees A-Rod as zany. Calculating, yes. Fraudulent, definitely. Self-absorbed, you bet.
Actually, "Manny being Manny" was shorthand for bizarre behavior more than it was shorthand for his poor behavior. If an MLB team wants to hire A-Rod as a player/coach then whether he is more offensive or fraudulent won't really matter. Mark McGwire has been a hitting coach, Barry Bonds has been a special assistant in spring training and Jason Giambi is considered a managerial candidate once he finally retires. If a team wants to hire A-Rod, no matter what Joel Sherman thinks of him, he will be hired and very well could succeed.
Because the Yankees owe him $61 million for 2015-17, they may bring A-Rod back after his yearlong suspension...But once that drama concludes, A-Rod will be a man without a team. I can’t imagine any of the three clubs that employed him — Mariners, Rangers or Yankees — wanting anything to do with a man who I believe loves baseball, hates irrelevancy and would want to stay involved in some fashion.
Joel Sherman says it could very well happen that A-Rod tries to become a player/coach, then says none of the teams that A-Rod played for will probably employ him. So will A-Rod have to go to wherever Brian Cashman may end up in the future? Most likely not given their history. Since Joel is so sure that A-Rod could take the same road as Manny Ramirez, then who the hell would hire A-Rod?
Of course, I never thought any former employer of Ramirez would dance with him again.
How shocking that Theo Epstein would hire a guy who was a fantastic hitter to teach young players how to be a fantastic hitter. Unforeseen.
Perhaps, this could happen for Rodriguez — someone such as Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria thinking there is upside PR value in employing A-Rod in his Miami hometown. But keep in mind Rodriguez disenchanted fellow players in a way Ramirez never did by essentially suing them all when he sued the players association.
I know the players don't care about this, but the way MLB went about suspending A-Rod without a positive test and after they had essentially bought the witness against A-Rod was a little shady. I'm not an A-Rod fan, but he got railroaded in some ways. MLB bent the rules a little bit to bust him. They went a little Vic Mackey on A-Rod. Sure, the guys Vic Mackey bent the rules to arrest were probably guilty in some way, but he went outside of what he should be able to do in order to get the arrest. The same thing goes for A-Rod. MLB bought the witness against A-Rod and then suspended him on potentially stolen documents.
Ramirez never publicly took on the commissioner and the whole sport in what for months was a scorched-earth legal and media assault. Finding an A-Rod ally within the confines of the game is difficult, and unearthing someone in power who will put his name to employing him (beyond the Yankees in the short-term) is akin to hunting unicorns.
But remember, this entire article is written around the premise that A-Rod could easily want to be a player/coach like Manny Ramirez. So basically Joel Sherman has written a JemeHill article. He has introduced a premise as a potential reality that others may believe to be true and then disproved that reality in his column.
My suspicion, though, is all that has led to this moment will not go away, and there will be a lifetime penalty for A-Rod being A-Rod.
So basically this whole column was just an excuse for Joel Sherman to re-hash everything A-Rod has done wrong and then state that nobody likes A-Rod so the hypothetical coach/player job that Joel Sherman thinks A-Rod will want despite A-Rod never actually saying he would want this job will not be available to him. It sounds like Sherman just wanted an excuse to write about how nobody likes Alex Rodriguez and get a few pageviews by putting "A-Rod" in the title of a column while his clickbait subject is serving his yearlong suspension.
Kate Upton is on the cover of Sports Illustrated?
"I bet A-Rod has been on the cover of Sports Illustrated more than she has!"
It's raining outside?
"A-Rod never played well in the rain because he was always worried about his appearance more than he was worried about playing well!"
Tom Hanks said 'Captain Phillips' was his all-time favorite movie to make?
"A-Rod will never be the captain of the Yankees because he isn't a selfless winner like Derek Jeter!"
Don Zimmer has died?
"A-Rod is probably too focused on himself to concern himself on whether Zimmer died or not. I bet Don Zimmer didn't even like A-Rod!"
Manny Ramirez got a player/coach position in the Cubs organization?
"I wonder if a team would give A-Rod a player/coach position in their organization?"
Well done, Joel Sherman, well done. You have managed to bring a non- Alex Rodriguez story around to another discussion about Alex Rodriguez. After all, everything has to come back to A-Rod and what a pariah he is doesn't it?
Cubs president of baseball operations Theo Epstein had a tough sell in explaining why he hired Manny Ramirez as a player-coach for his Triple-A squad and offered this in a statement:
"I fucking wanted to do it. I'm the president of baseball operations and if I want to name Carrot Top the new head athletic trainer I can do it"?
“Manny is not only one of the best hitters of all time, he is also a dedicated student of hitting and has proven to be a gifted teacher with younger teammates who have worked with him in the batting cage. Behind the scenes he has always been a tireless worker who is very serious about the craft of hitting. Manny has made real mistakes in the past but he has owned up to them and moved his life in a positive direction the last couple of years. He is in a really great place right now and wants to share the lessons he’s learned along the way. We think he deserves another chance and that our young hitters will benefit from it.”
Now re-read that statement and replace the name “Manny” with “Alex.”
Now re-read that statement and replace the name "Manny" with "This story isn't about Alex Rodriguez and so stop making it about him." It doesn't flow as well, but it certainly makes me feel better.
Now re-read that statement and replace the name "Manny" with "Cockgoblin McShitfits." I think it gives the quote a real levity that was missing originally.
It works doesn’t it? Alex Rodriguez is one of the best hitters of all-time, a dedicated student of hitting, a tireless worker, a proven gifted teacher who loved to share his knowledge with youngsters and a player who has made real mistakes in the past.
And Joel Sherman is desperately tying these two players together as hard as possible.
"See, both athletes play baseball and were two of the best hitters in baseball, as well as have made mistakes in their life. They are pretty much the same person."
Stop there.
You can't make me. I'm down the road already. Would A-Rod be too busy prancing around and making pouty faces in the mirror while checking out his butt to show his teammates/students hitting tips? Most likely. Would A-Rod teach his teammates/students how to properly inject steroids? Very, very likely. If A-Rod became a player/coach then it would open a whole new Pandora's box of criticism for him. I mean, the New York media could then blame him for the performance of his teammates and do so with a more straight face.
Rodriguez’s latest contrition tour is certainly nearing. Will he own up to his mistakes? Will he convince people that he really has moved into a positive place?
More importantly, will he try to grow some dreadlocks to be like Manny Ramirez? Obviously the dreads were the key to Manny's redemption.
My guess is he will try.
My guess is your guess is simply a guess and therefore is just speculation. Of course if Joel Sherman's guess was that A-Rod would not try to rehab his image then there isn't much of a point in this column.
After all, he sold it once after his 2009 steroid outing and generally received the best coverage and fan support of his Yankees tenure. Of course, he ended up betraying all of that.
This may have had something to do with the Yankees having won the World Series and A-Rod actually contributing to the World Series. I also like the idea that Sherman "betrayed" the fan support and coverage provided by the reporters. The fans probably care less about A-Rod's PED use than Joel Sherman probably knows, especially Yankees fans who have seen a truckload of suspected and PED users on the roster. And if Sherman really believes the Yankees reporters were betrayed by A-Rod's PED use then he needs to realize he and his colleagues are not a part of the story. They cover the story and can not be betrayed.
Plus, when it comes to Rodriguez will anyone ever believe he is sincere — or simply putting on yet another act?
I don't really care if he's being sincere or putting on an act. Don't you like how this column started off with Manny Ramirez becoming a player/coach for the Cubs and has turned into the textbook by-the-number A-Rod bashing column? It's like these New York area writers can't help themselves.
I actually think you can make a case Ramirez is the more offensive of the two.
I think you can actually make a case neither player is really offensive. Comparing which player is more offensive is silly anyway. What's most offensive is Joel Sherman has to use any excuse possible to write about Alex Rodriguez.
But no one ever questioned if A-Rod — like with Manny — had stopped trying on the field as a protest about future salaries or treated defense as a necessary evil needed to hit. He never attacked an aged traveling secretary. Ramirez did that.
Really, who hasn't attacked an aged traveling secretary? Especially if that aged traveling secretary has a service dog she may or may not actually need who takes multiple craps while traveling on a plane.
Yet, Ramirez benefitted from a perception of zaniness rather than cruelty — “Manny being Manny” became shorthand for poor behavior. No one sees A-Rod as zany. Calculating, yes. Fraudulent, definitely. Self-absorbed, you bet.
Actually, "Manny being Manny" was shorthand for bizarre behavior more than it was shorthand for his poor behavior. If an MLB team wants to hire A-Rod as a player/coach then whether he is more offensive or fraudulent won't really matter. Mark McGwire has been a hitting coach, Barry Bonds has been a special assistant in spring training and Jason Giambi is considered a managerial candidate once he finally retires. If a team wants to hire A-Rod, no matter what Joel Sherman thinks of him, he will be hired and very well could succeed.
Because the Yankees owe him $61 million for 2015-17, they may bring A-Rod back after his yearlong suspension...But once that drama concludes, A-Rod will be a man without a team. I can’t imagine any of the three clubs that employed him — Mariners, Rangers or Yankees — wanting anything to do with a man who I believe loves baseball, hates irrelevancy and would want to stay involved in some fashion.
Joel Sherman says it could very well happen that A-Rod tries to become a player/coach, then says none of the teams that A-Rod played for will probably employ him. So will A-Rod have to go to wherever Brian Cashman may end up in the future? Most likely not given their history. Since Joel is so sure that A-Rod could take the same road as Manny Ramirez, then who the hell would hire A-Rod?
Of course, I never thought any former employer of Ramirez would dance with him again.
How shocking that Theo Epstein would hire a guy who was a fantastic hitter to teach young players how to be a fantastic hitter. Unforeseen.
Perhaps, this could happen for Rodriguez — someone such as Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria thinking there is upside PR value in employing A-Rod in his Miami hometown. But keep in mind Rodriguez disenchanted fellow players in a way Ramirez never did by essentially suing them all when he sued the players association.
I know the players don't care about this, but the way MLB went about suspending A-Rod without a positive test and after they had essentially bought the witness against A-Rod was a little shady. I'm not an A-Rod fan, but he got railroaded in some ways. MLB bent the rules a little bit to bust him. They went a little Vic Mackey on A-Rod. Sure, the guys Vic Mackey bent the rules to arrest were probably guilty in some way, but he went outside of what he should be able to do in order to get the arrest. The same thing goes for A-Rod. MLB bought the witness against A-Rod and then suspended him on potentially stolen documents.
Ramirez never publicly took on the commissioner and the whole sport in what for months was a scorched-earth legal and media assault. Finding an A-Rod ally within the confines of the game is difficult, and unearthing someone in power who will put his name to employing him (beyond the Yankees in the short-term) is akin to hunting unicorns.
But remember, this entire article is written around the premise that A-Rod could easily want to be a player/coach like Manny Ramirez. So basically Joel Sherman has written a JemeHill article. He has introduced a premise as a potential reality that others may believe to be true and then disproved that reality in his column.
My suspicion, though, is all that has led to this moment will not go away, and there will be a lifetime penalty for A-Rod being A-Rod.
So basically this whole column was just an excuse for Joel Sherman to re-hash everything A-Rod has done wrong and then state that nobody likes A-Rod so the hypothetical coach/player job that Joel Sherman thinks A-Rod will want despite A-Rod never actually saying he would want this job will not be available to him. It sounds like Sherman just wanted an excuse to write about how nobody likes Alex Rodriguez and get a few pageviews by putting "A-Rod" in the title of a column while his clickbait subject is serving his yearlong suspension.
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