The extremely long and yet still incomplete Cooperstown write-up
People said they were interested, and here at U.S.S. Mariner labs we’re constantly striving to serve our customers, so — here’s my very long writeup of my week in Cooperstown, which still has gaps in it remaining to be filled (or not, I haven’t decided yet), and I need to go through and hyperlink stuff. So you can either brave it or wait until Monday, when I hope to have another chance at it.
“This Baseball Season, Just Take Me Out”
I love articles like this. Weren’t people saying the same thing after 1994? And when Alex Rodriguez signed his $252M contract? Yeah, they were. And — I’m just guessing here, based on attendence numbers — most of those people either came back to the game or didn’t even give it up in the first place.
Seriously, though, I think the world is a better place with one less smug Yankees fan… so I say good riddance, Matt Villano!
“Oriental players that could hit or pitch”
The Hall of Fame library has giant clipping files of newspaper and magazine artiles, organized by subject. I’ve been reading them all week (my eyes! ooooh my eyes) and came across this today, part of a tiny newspaper clipping with a handwritten date (“6/17/76”), which I’ll copy here, exactly as it appears, [sic] implied:
Pete Gebriam, Met farm director, received phone call. “Some guy from Staten Island wanted to know why we don’t have any Oriental players,” Gebriam said. “I asked him if he knew any who could hit or pitch. He didn’t.”
Six days after the scrawled date on this clipping, Sadaharu Oh hit his 700th home run while playing for the Yomiuri Giants.
Ben Davis released, Pokey to start year on DL?
One of the many cast-offs from San Diego once obtained by the Mariners, Ben Davis, has been cut by the White Sox, who opted to go with the mighty right-handed bat of your friend and mine, Chris Widger.
Davis cleared waivers and has been assigned to the minors. He could refuse and become a free agent, but would forfeit his guaranteed $1 million salary. Apparently, he hasn’t made a decision.
I mention this not for a former Mariner schadenfreude experience, but because the article contains still another amazing quote from Ozzie Guillen. Oz tried to talk Big Ben into staying with the organization thusly:
“I talked to him and I said ‘We want you here. You never know what will happen,’ ” Guillen said. “It’s a lot of money involved and (chairman) Jerry (Reinsdorf) did it because he wanted the team to get better and we know we’re going to need this guy … hopefully not soon, but we will need him.”
Kid we’re gonna need you. And it may be soon. [Pause] But boy, I hope not.
In other news: Larry LaRue’s TNT notes column mentions that Pokey Reese, whose shoulder is still bothering him, could be placed on the disabled list to start the year. This would enable the Mariners to carry an extra infielder at the start of the season, potentially making our dreams of seeing both Greg Dobbs and Ramon Santiago on opening day come true.
Diamond Mind 2005 Predicted Standings Out
Every year, Diamond Mind (makers of Diamond Mind Baseball 9, the finest baseball simulation game available) runs a ton of seasons based on projected performances and publishes their results. Historically, they’ve been far more accurate than the picking-names-from-hats or picking-teams-by-experts methods. Check out methodology, etc, at the Diamond Mind article.
The good news: Mariners came out with an average record of 83-79, which is only a hair better than we’ve been kicking around here. They won the division 25% of the time, and the wild card 2%. That’s a lot better than I’d guess.
The bad news: Oakland’s at 85 wins, Angels at 84. Texas returned to the cellar with 80, and 80’s still a strong finish in this division.
Other interesting points: Cleveland, who I’ve been touting as a breakout candidate, is at 79. AL East is neck-and-neck.
The results should be taken only as what they are — seasons based on simulated games generated from projected statistics. Still, one of the problems with pre-season predictions generally is that everyone has to fight the natural inclination to hand out more wins than are available, and running actual simulated seasons like this makes that impossible.
83 wins, though — I’d be happy with that.
Caple on Yanks-Sox
Jim Caple’s got a book out on the Yankees (which appears to be about why they’re both vile and a required part of the game), and there’s an excerpt up on ESPN.com worth reading.
I’m not sure it needs a book, as Caple nails the fandom part in one sentence:
Yankees fans not only think their team is the greatest in the history of sports, they consider themselves to be the most knowledgeable, the most loyal and the most supportive fans in the history of the game. They refuse to acknowledge that fans in other cities love baseball and the local team as much as they do.
There are smart, witty Yankees fans — like Steve Goldman, for instance, author of the Pinstriped Bible, who I highly recommend as a fine writer and quality dude.
But as a whole, I’ve found this to be true. I’ve met a lot of Yankee fans, and this is exactly the thing that makes me want to drag them off into the wilderness and hack them up with an axe.
With Red Sox fans, it was always the belligerent “our suffering is better than your suffering” attitude.
And I can support Caple’s jokes about getting hate mail from Yankee fans. In my own experience, writing for any mainstream outlet and saying anything about any Yankee that isn’t glowing will chew up your email quota before your horrified eyes instants after it goes out.
Really — I wrote something about Chuck Knoblauch’s play in left field that said he wasn’t “good”. People wrote me hate mail.
The problem, though, is that I always feel a little bad when I say stuff like this. Is there something about Yankee fandom that inspires this? Is this a defensive reaction to constant attacks for being a fan of the richest, most successful franchise in baseball? Is it a New York thing I’m never going to understand?
Or is it simply a population issue — because there are so many Yankee fans, does the vocal minority of jerks every team carries mean that there are too many of those jerks, and they’re out reinforcing each other?
I don’t know.
And, as a stickler for this kind of stuff, I want to point out that from the page — “No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.”
Um, claiming that’s the case won’t make it true. Fair use, kids, let’s all play nicely.
Bill Plaschke, Adrian Beltre and Paul DePodesta
In Bill Plaschke’s LA Times column this morning, he offers one portrayal of what caused Adrian Beltre to leave the Dodgers and sign with the Mariners.
The portrait Plaschke paints is of an incompetent and dysfunctional organization, one that told Beltre he was their top priority, then disappeared from negotiations almost entirely. According to the veteran columnist, Beltre never wanted to leave L.A., would have taken less money to stay, and even nearly cried when talking about leaving.
Here’s the thing about this portrait: Plaschke has demonstrated multiple times that he has an axe to grind regarding Paul DePodesta. An old school guy, he previously described DePodesta in terms usually reserved for Lewis and Gilbert from Revenge of the Nerds. Even in this piece, he sneaks in this shot: “In the new Dodger lingo, Beltre apparently did not compute.” Get it?
Reading with this in mind, it’s easy to see that Plaschke’s distate for DePo shaped his viewpoint here. But there seem to be too many other details — many of them direct quotations from Beltre — to dismiss the larger point about organizational communication entirely. Sadly for Dodger fans, DePo has also had an offseason that gives his critics ammunition.
If I had to slap a percentage on it, I’d say this reads like 70 percent anti-DePo propaganda, 30 percent legitimate criticism. What’s your take?
BP 2005 in hands
People are starting to get their copies of Baseball Prospectus (since, as noted earlier in this space, it did ship). And in the table of contents, yes, my name is wrong on the first bylined piece I’ve ever written for the book.
So who wrote the team chapters, you ask? As in the past they’ve run without bylines, which I totally think is dumb. As in the past, you’re free to ask who wrote specific chapters, and I’m happy to answer them.
Revealed so far:
American League
Seattle Mariners: DMZ
National League
Milwaukee Brewers: essay by ?, player comments by Dave
Montreal Expos: DMZ
So shoot.
Cool New Site
New baseball blog out there from two talented guys: Richard Lederer (formerly of Rich’s Baseball Beat) and Bryan (with a Y) Smith have teamed up to create baseballanalysts.com. Bryan will continue his Wait ‘Til Next Year posts about up-and-coming players.
No word on whether Rich and Bryan put fists together to activate Wondertwin Powers. But already, they’ve produced a series of interest, polling prominent baseball writers and observers about their favorite players from childhood.
Ever wanted to hear folks from front offices, the blogosphere and the baseball media at large wax nostalgic? Then this three-parter is for you. Some big names responded to the survey, and there is an interesting mix of answers here — from Hall-of-Famers to also-rans, from Willie Mays to Damon Berryhill.
Give it a look. You won’t be disappointed.
MLB’s fantasy rampage
If you’re at all interested in the ongoing war between MLB’s web arm (MLBAM) and everyone who wants to play fantasy baseball, Neil deMause wrote an article on this available (for free) at Prospectus on what’s going on and what the issues are. Check it out.