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For those of you who are interested, there are several infielders available through free agency right now. Two of them are David Eckstein, an adorable 11 inch-tall translucent man who cannot play baseball very well, and Alex Rodriguez, who is better at hitting baseballs than every other person in the entire world.
Let's go to the journalistic/public opinion round-up. First, we have an ESPN.com poll, the final question of which is:
9. Which player would you rather have?
69.6% Alex Rodriguez 30.4% David Eckstein
Now, I suppose it is possible that some of the 150,000+ people who have voted in this poll were taking into consideration things like salary, or the current 3Bman on their favorite team, or something. But the question is, straight-up, who would you rather have?
And 30% say Eckstein. Thirty percent. Thir. Ty. Per. Ce. N. T.
That means that more than 45,000 people sat at their computers, and thought it over, and they said, you know, I don't want the guy who is 32 and had a .354 EqA+ last year with 54 HR. I want the 32 year-old who only played in 117 games last year (and 123 the year before) and hit 3 HR and had a .275 EqA+, and who needs a relay man to get the ball from short to first.
Who are you people? What is wrong with your brains?
Speaking of people whose brains are wrong, ESPN's Buster Olney has some things to say about Eckstein: 3. David Eckstein, SS
Injuries have limited the shortstop to 240 games over his last two seasons, and he doesn't have the body or playing style of someone who will last.
Sign him!
But nobody can argue this: When Eckstein plays, he produces.
I can argue that. I can easily argue that. You want me to argue that? I will argue that.
The man's career OPS+ is 89. That is below average for baseball players. His career high OPS+ is 101. That is one percent better than the average baseball player. He has never had more than 26 doubles in a season. He has never had a slugging percentage in the .400s. He is a terrible hitter.
His batting average in each of his last three seasons is .294, .292 and .309, and he made a couple of All-Star teams.
Oh my God. If Buster Olney were a GM, he would stock his teams with Ecksteins and Juan Pierres and Christian Guzmans and they would go 20-142.
He has been a shortstop and the Cardinals need a shortstop, and Eckstein may end up returning to St. Louis. But Eckstein could also be, for a big-market contending club, a very interesting buy as a super utility player, because he can play second base, and perhaps even third base, along with some shortstop.
David Eckstein playing third base would be amazing. I would love to see that. If Jacoby Ellsbury hit a ball down the line to David Eckstein and Eck had to backhand it and throw from foul territory, by the time the ball landed in the first baseman's glove Ellsbury would be sitting on the bench after his inside-the-park little-league HR and Kevin Youkilis would be at the plate with a count of 2-0.
You could move him around, give him days off when he had a nagging injury, and always inject energy into your team -- like a sixth man in basketball.
This is a reason to sign him?
GM: So, tell me why we should sign your client.
Eckstein's Agent: Tons of reasons. First of all, he's a winner. Second, he can inject energy into your team. Third, when we gets injured -- and he will definitely get injured -- you can give him days off!
GM: (has long since left room)
Pay him well on a two-year deal and promise him 400 plate appearances, and he could help you get to October.
Pay him well on a two-year deal, and he will certainly collect his paychecks while not helping your team at all. And if your team makes it to October despite his mediocre/bad play, he will totally help you win in October, with his career .278/.333/.335 line in the postseason.
Finally, here is the voice of reason, in the form of Keith Law:
Quite possibly the most overrated player in baseball because people say "gritty" and "scrappy" and "smart" when they really just mean "short." Eckstein has had a nice run in the National League as a slap-and-run guy who does all of the little things and not many of the big things: He's got a short swing and isn't strong, so he hits for very little power, and he's never drawn many walks or worked the count. He's still an above-average runner, but not a burner and not worth much on the base paths; the speed is most valuable in helping him bunt for hits or leg out some ground balls. He's a bad defensive shortstop, and given his age he's likely to get worse, so it makes much more sense for someone to sign him as a second baseman.
Ahhhhhh. Soothing. Although how he is at #15 I will never know.
I just don't know who yet. Let's find out, as we look at this article from Pittsburgh Post-Gazette writer Dejan Kovacevic.
It was a week ago today, fewer than 24 hours after the Pirates had put down a sizzling St. Louis rally in the ninth inning, that catcher Ronny Paulino reflected upon it and offered this surprising tidbit.
"You know what the key was to that whole inning?" he said. "When David Eckstein got hit by that pitch."
Say what?
Hitting Eckstein -- not intentionally -- loaded the bases and, ultimately, forced closer Salomon Torres to pitch to Albert Pujols with a one-run lead.
"Doesn't matter," Paulino said. "Eckstein's the guy you don't want to face there."
There's a lot of stupid stuff in this article. I am happy to say -- since I get bored of disparaging journalists only -- that most of it is said by actual baseball players. That's new and fun!
David Eckstein's career EqA is .260, which is exactly league average. Albert Pujols's career EqA is .341, which is easy, don't-even-think-twice Hall of Fame shoo-in. Anyone who ever wants to pitch to Albert Pujols over David Eckstein in any situation, including pick-up whiffle ball games at family barbecues when Pujols has dengue fever and Eckstein gets to use one of those over-sized red bats while Pujols has to hit with a live cobra, is a goddamn moron of the highest order. So I'm sure Paulino is the only one who thought this.
Others agreed without hesitation, players and coaches alike.
"Can't let Eckstein beat you there," shortstop Jack Wilson said.
Huh.
Albert Pujols Career OPS: 1.042
David Eckstein Career OPS: .708
I feel stupid even comparing these two people. They almost don't play the same sport.
OK, so, just to be clear here: The Pirates are happy to duck a 5-foot-7 career .282 hitter to take on the sport's most imposing hitter?
And why, exactly, is this?
"Because," Wilson said. "Eckstein's clutch."
I don't like that stupid "close and late" stat, but...
Eckstein "Close-and-Late" 2004-2006: .722 OPS
Pujols "Close-and-Late" 2004-2006: 1.088 OPS. He has 24 HR in 231 AB.
On page 191 of the famed book, "Moneyball," Billy Beane, the innovative Oakland general manager and prime subject matter, barks at a television as he hears a broadcaster describe his Athletics as failing in the clutch.
"It's [expletive] luck," Beane says.
Those words resonate with some as gospel, mostly because they are so easy to support.
Easy to support? My whole effing life all I do is yell at people that there's no such thing as "clutch." Everyone tells me I am wrong. My friends and I had to start a blog so we could stop shouting into the wind and start typing into the wind (easier on the vocal cords). Easy? Easy?!?!
The numbers will show, the game's statistical-minded followers will say, that a hitter with a .280 career average will hit ... well, right around .280 in whatever anyone might define as a clutch situation.
Some use batting average with runners in scoring position. Some use a fairly new statistic called close-and-late, which measures average in the seventh inning or later with the score no more than a run apart. Some just count up RBIs.
Whatever the bar, it is true that the disparity of numbers is little different between clutch and non-clutch.
At least this Dejan Kovacevic fellow seems to have read Moneyball. Unlike some ESPN Moneyball-disparagers I could name, named Joe Morgan.
"It's obvious that some players perform better in clutch situations," said Dan Fox, author for the statistics-based journal Baseball Prospectus. "The question is whether that difference, as measured in a week, a month or a season, actually reflects an underlying ability to come through more often."
A BP reference in a mainstream newspaper. I bet this is how Galileo felt (posthumously, obviously) when the Church finally admitted that the earth revolved around the sun.
"What they've found is that while there may be a small clutch ability -- for example, hitters who can adjust their approach in different situations seem to have a small advantage -- that ability is dwarfed by the normal differences in overall performance. In other words, in the bigger scheme of things, it's the best players who do best in the clutch."
Take the cases of David Ortiz and Derek Jeter, the widely recognized kings of clutch.
Over the past three years, Ortiz has batted .296 in all situations, .331 with runners in scoring position. Jeter has batted .315 in all situations, .310 with runners in scoring position.
Some difference, but not much.
Still, every time Ortiz launches one of those extra-inning bombs for the Boston Red Sox, it leads "SportsCenter" and resonates far more in the psyche than anytime he might fail. And when Jeter wins Game 4 of the 2001 World Series with a home run, he gets dubbed Mr. November, never mind that he batted .148 for the series.
Did I write this article somehow? Is this like a Fight Club-style thing where I split my personality and got a job writing for a Pittsburgh newspaper under the pseudonym Dejan Kovacevic? If not, I'm really enjoying reading this. What's next?
Oh, and Eckstein's clutch reputation? His average with runners in scoring position is .280, one point lower than his regular average.
I would have added that in Games 1-3 of the WS last year he was 2-13. Then he went 4-5 and 2-4 and won the MVP award and no one has shut up since.
The strongest anti-clutch argument on the Pirates' roster can be made by Freddy Sanchez.
He won the National League batting title with a .344 average last summer, and his .386 mark with runners in scoring position was the team's highest. Only Pujols' .397 mark was higher in the league.
Seems plenty clutch.
Not the case at all, he maintains.
"To me, it's pretty simple," Sanchez said. "If you're hot going into that clutch situation, you have a good chance. You're already feeling good. Obviously, there are times when a hitter can tense up, and there are some better mentally prepared than others. All I can say is that, for me, when I go up to the plate, it's not about the men on base. It's about how I'm feeling."
He rolled his eyes, remembering those four consecutive strikeouts in a game last week in Milwaukee.
"Trust me: If I'm feeling lousy at the plate like that, I'm not just going to walk up there with bases loaded and get a hit because I'm some great clutch hitter."
Freddy Sanchez: FJM's new favorite non-Red Sox. (I can't resist pointing out here that he used to be. Hometown pride.)
Still, come on ... no such thing as clutch?
What, then, of Reggie Jackson launching those three home runs in a World Series game?
He hit 563 HR in the regular season. He was excellent at hitting HR. It was probably his greatest skill. One day, in a big game, he hit 3.
What of Michael Jordan nailing that last-second jumper to sink Utah?
He was the best basketball player ever in history.
What of John Elway driving a stake through the heart of Cleveland?
This one kills me. In the eyes of basically everyone, Elway was a Choke Artist, a Big-Game-Failure, until Terrell Davis came along and the Broncos won two Super Bowls, and suddenly all of Elway's terrible SB performances were forgotten and he became Clutch. So incredibly stupid. The guy was always good. He ran into some awesome coaches and defenses in Super Bowls. Then one day, with a more complete team, he won. Like Peyton Manning. And Kobe. And Shaq. And McNabb getting over the NFC Championship hump. And like 1000 other examples.
What of Mario Lemieux burying that rebound behind Ed Belfour to raise the dome at the Igloo?
He is probably the second-best hockey player ever in history. He scored a lot of goals.
Those focusing on the numbers would lean toward the notion that those were elite athletes simply being themselves.
Yessir.
But those inside the games -- players, coaches and managers -- are almost universal in their belief in clutch.
Of those who feel otherwise, Pirates pitching coach Jim Colborn said, "Dead wrong. There is an element in certain people that allows them to focus at their peak and get into a zone when the situation is more important."
Well. I'm not "inside the game," which invalidates my opinion in the eyes of some. But isn't this quality merely one aspect of what determines a "good" player? And thus, isn't it sort of making our argument for us? In other words, the players one thinks of as "clutch" are just always good. Or, in Eckstein's case, "clutch" is simply a false notion, since very basic statistics show that he is no better in "clutch" situations than in regular situations. The end.
He cited, from his playing days, Joe Rudi, a career .264 hitter who had a reputation of elevating his level every postseason for the Athletics, at least as measured by the intangibles of timely hits and key defensive plays.
"Believe me: For all the great players in that lineup, Joe Rudi was not the one you wanted to face. He just had a knack."
You're not going to believe this. I was not familiar with Joe Rudi's postseason stats, so I looked them up on my Computational Machine. Kovacevic goes out of his way to mention that Rudi was a career .264 hitter. Want to guess what his career postseason average was?
Did you guess: .264? You're right.
In his career, Rudi went .264/.311/.427. Postseason: .264/.329/.386
He was essentially exactly the fucking same in the postseason. 3 HR in 140 postseason AB. 179 in about 5500 regular season AB. So, his HR rate was actually higher in the regular season. (Small sample size alert in the PS, obviously. But what do you want me to do?)
Perhaps anecdotally Rudi did all kinds of amazing Lemke-esque shit in some postseason games. A lot of middle-of-the-road guys do a lot of better-than-that things in postseason games. Endy Chavez made like the greatest catch I've ever seen in the NLCS last year. Does that mean he is a "clutch" fielder? No. It means he is a pro baseball player, which means he is one of the best 600 or so baseball players in the whole wide world, which in turn means that he has the ability to do extraordinary things in specific situations. Other players, who are better than Endy Chavez, will do those amazing things more consistently. Is this really hard to grasp for anyone? Really?
Some players, the argument can be made, do become better in trying situations. But those cases -- and this is one area where statisticians and those inside the game tend to agree -- are much rarer than those where performance decreases.
In other words, the absence of clutch might be more prevalent than a rise to a clutch level. The athlete rises to the level of competition and, in doing so, maintains similar numbers. And the rest ... well, for every Joe Rudi, there are many more like Barry Bonds and Alex Rodriguez.
Uh oh.
Bonds has a .300 career average and a home run every 12.9 at-bats. But in the playoffs, as the still-bitter baseball fans of Pittsburgh can attest, his drop-off is dramatic: His average in seven playoff appearances is .245, and the home runs come once every 16.7 at-bats.
Bonds had six pretty crappy postseasons. Then he had four awesome ones after he started using steroids. They are all small sample sizes. Also, would you have pitched to Bonds in 1990 if he had Steve Buechele hitting behind him?
Rodriguez is having a superhuman April, but that will do nothing to quell doubts about his clutch value. He has batted .306 in the regular season for his career, .280 in the playoffs.
Basically the same.
The home runs come once every 14.3 at-bats in the regular season, once every 22 at-bats in the playoffs.
Dumb way to look at this. Here's a better way. And please, after I go through the trouble to type this out, let's end this.
1997 ALDS: 5-16, 1 HR, .313/.313/.563 (Very Good)
2000 ALDS: 4-13, .308/.308/.308 (Eh)
2000 ALCS: 9-22, 2 HR, .409/.480/.773 (Monster)
2004 ALDS: 8-19, 1 HR, .421/.476/.737 (Monster)
2004 ALCS: 8-31, 2 HR, .258/.378/.516 (Very Good)
2005 ALDS: 2-15, .133/.381/.200 (Bad, though he got on base)
2006 ALDS: 1-14, .071/.071/.071 (Terrible)
In seven series, he has two absolute beasts, two very good series, three kind of crummy ones. How can you say this guy falls apart in the postseason? In 2000-04 he went 25-72 with 5 HR and 7 2B. Now hear this, people:
Derek Jeter's Career Splits: .317/.388/.463
Derek Jeter's Career Postseason splits: .314/.384/.479
Mr. Clutch is actually Mr. Exactly the Same No Matter What Month You Are Talking About. He is Mr. Equally Excellent Hitting SS Every Month from April to November. He is Mr. Outrageously Similar Statistics Every 30 Days.
And for the record, in that huge 2004 ALCS against Boston, which earned ARod the reputation as a non-clutch player, Jeter went 6-30, .200/.333/.233.
The Pirates' Jason Bay never has known playoffs, but he batted .346 with runners in scoring position in 2005, then saw that drop nearly 100 points to .242 last season and to .133 in the early going this year. Surely, some clutch factor was involved.
How is that the conclusion?! The conclusion should be: in small numbers of data points, there is bound to be enormous fluctuation. This is like saying: yesterday it was sunny, today it poured. Surely, some Fertility God disapproved of our elk sacrifice.
"It's not so much a matter of raising your level in a clutch situation. It's a matter of keeping your level the same," Bay said. "Baseball is predicated on the idea that the people who are the most successful are the ones who do things the same way most consistently. It's not an emotion game like football or hockey, where you can go bust some skulls."
Jason Bay: possibly replacing Freddy Sanchez as FJM's new favorite non-Red Sox.
Bob Walk, among the living Pirates to have participated in a playoff game, is very much a believer.
"There are some guys who are better hitters in tough situations, and the stats will show that, too," he said.
I think we have sort of disproved that...with actual stats. I like it when guys just say "the stats will show it!" without actually looking at stats.
"They take a different approach to the plate. They're maybe not thinking so much about themselves and trying to pull the ball or hit it out of the park."
No. They take the exact same approach, and are already good, so they perform well.
"The guys who are successful don't have that fear of failure. Some guys have that, believe me."
I believe this. I also believe that they are good baseball players.
There is no bigger proponent of clutch in the Pirates' clubhouse than the man in charge.
When his team wins, Jim Tracy invariably points to "big" hits that were delivered. When the team loses, he points to the lack of same.
If you win a baseball game, ipso facto, you have gotten some "big" hits. If you lose a baseball game, ipso facto, you have failed to get some "big" hits. This is tautology, Mr. Tracy. Tautology, I say! (I mean, even if you are up 15-5 in the seventh inning and you fall apart and lose 16-15, you could look back and say, "If we had only cashed in on that bases-loaded-nobody-out in the fourth..." You get the idea.)
Even after the Pirates were blanked on three measly hits in their home opener April 9, Tracy lamented, "We had chances."
Yes. At least 27 of them. Like in every game.
Tracy's view is reflected in how he forms his lineup, bucking the modern thinking that the highest on-base percentage players should be stacked at the top. Instead, he favors the more traditional approach of getting the runner on, moving him along and getting a "big" hit.
How's that working out for you, Jimmy?
"Isn't that what makes teams good?" Tracy said when asked about his value of clutch. "It's what separates you from the pack, your ability to take the big at-bat. You don't expect somebody to hit 1.000 with runners in scoring position, but you have to get your share of hits in those situations. Look at the upper echelon of clubs, and that's what you look for. And if we can get to that point, we've got a chance to become a pretty decent team."
Amazing. Just amazing. I don't know where to begin.
What makes teams good, offensively, is not making outs. And of course you have to "get your share of hits" in any situation. But what in the world would prevent you from putting your high OBP guys at the top of the line-up? Baseball Prospectus has proved that line-up order doesn't really matter that much, but the higher in the order you are, the more AB you get. And the higher your OBP, the fewer outs you make, so -- given those extra AB -- you will increase your chance of winning baseball games. This is not black magic, people. This is straightforward logic. Delivered in a exaggeratedly strident tones over a blog.
It could not hurt. The National League's highest average with runners in scoring position last season was the .286 of the Los Angeles Dodgers, and they were one of the four playoff teams. The other three also ranked above the league average.
But then, so did ... the Pirates? Their .266 mark ranked seventh, even though they finished with the fewest runs and were nowhere near the playoffs.
So what does that teach us? It teaches us that it's not that crucial a stat, relatively speaking, because if the team isn't getting anyone on base, you can hit .300 with RISP and you won't score as many runs as other teams with lower BA and SLG with RISP. See?
The statistic that correlates most closely with scoring runs is on-base percentage ---- how many times a batter reaches base safely, whether by hit, walk or hit batsman -- and this is backed by every spreadsheet back to the late 19th century.
Where were you a paragraph earlier, man? I just typed all that shit for nothing?
Last year, the Pirates' on-base percentage was .327, third lowest in the league. This year, it is .303, second lowest.
Huh. So, Tracy is a bonehead?
But then ... so is their .190 average with runners in scoring position, which might bolster Tracy's case.
If their team OBP is .327, they can hit .500 with RISP and they still won't win anything. Tracy's "case" is that they need a high BA with RISP, and that OBP doesn't matter so much. That's like saying that the important part of the alley-oop is the slam dunk, and it doesn't matter so much whether anyone bothered to lob you the ball.
So, in the end, I guess I made fun of Jim Tracy. Dejan Kovacevic gets a check-plus, because I think if you read between the lines he is on the side of Facts and Truth. Freddy Sanchez and Jason Bay get gold stars. Ronny Paulino and everyone else who would rather pitch to Albert Pujols than to David Eckstein get a punch in the face and an exhortation to seek counseling.
I think we can all agree that this team of chokers could never make it out of the first round.
* runs created (R+RBI-HR) ** Jeter also had a pretty crappy 98ALDS-98WS ... 13 G, .235/.328/.294, 7 R, 0 HR, 3 RBI, 0.77 RC/G *** OK, Ted only had 1 postseason series, but I figured in the spirit of judging players off of small sample sizes, I'd include him
I have no idea if these numbers are accurate because I haven't checked them. But if they are, well done. This is the kind of cold, hard data that warms my silicon-aluminum robot heart.
The day after a sports team loses in the playoffs, people suddenly have a lot of (typically intangible) insights as to why that team was always destined to fail in the first place. It's a combination of hindsight and psychology that I am deciding to call hindpsychology, because I am a fan of sports portmanteaus (or as I call them, sportmanteaus).
Mudville Teams of Mighty Caseys usually strike out
I wonder what team this is going to be about. Here's one to chew on: What would have happened if the Red Sox had succeeded in acquiring Alex Rodriguez before the 2004 season?
My guess is your guess is they would have lost. Something about how A-Rod never would have fit in with the scruffy, dirt-eating, pine-tar-smeared "Idiot" culture that was at least in part a media creation.
Numbers aside, the more crucial question is whether A-Rod would have fit in with the scruffy, dirt-eating, pine-tar-smeared "Idiot" culture that enabled the Red Sox to weather intense pressure and pull off an unprecedented comeback against their most bitter rivals.
Would he have come through as the less-heralded Bill Mueller did by driving in Dave Roberts with the tying run in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 4 with the crushing weight of the Curse, an 0-3 deficit and Mariano Rivera bearing down on him?
Hmm, I don't know. I do know Bill Mueller's batting line for that seven-game series, though:
.267/.333/.300, 4 R, 1 RBI, 0 HR, 1 2B
I bet A-Rod could've done that. In fact, I know what he actually did in that same series:
.278/.378/.516, 8 R, 5 RBI, 2 HR, 2 2B
A-Rod lined out to short with the go-ahead run on second and one out in the top of the 11th -- his first clutch at-bat for the Yankees after their ship began to take on foaming brine in that game. The rest, as they say, is history -- 1-for-12 for the rest of the series history.
So you're going to throw out the fact that he was 7/19 with a ton of extra-base hits in the same series before that point because his at bats didn't become "clutch" until the Red Sox won a game in the series? Remember, no one suspected that the Sox would even threaten to come back -- it hadn't ever been done before. So A-Rod pre-emptively knew to tense up even though the Yankees were still up 3-1? How about the Minnesota series just days earlier? None of those at bats were clutch? (A-Rod's ALDS: .421/.476/.737.)
Finally, the only reason the Yankees were up 4-3 to begin with in Game 4 was because A-Rod had already hit a two-run home run. But since that happened in the third inning, it's pretty meaningless and definitely not clutch. I don't think runs scored before the seventh even get put on the board, come to think of it. My gut feeling is no on all counts, a sentiment echoed by the devout Red Sox partisans I've spoken to.
Red Sox fans and John Rolfe agree: in a hypothetical world where A-Rod hypothetically plays for Boston in 2004, hypothetical Red Sox A-Rod chokes in the hypothetical ALCS. What a hypothetical loser! I'm getting angry just hypothetically remembering it.
I'm tired from all this hypothesizing. What were talking about again?
Can you see prim, gleaming A-Rod with a mug full of scruff and some cornrows or dreds, hangin' with Manny and Papi? Can you picture him in Jason Varitek's gritty, bristle-headed contingent?
I think you just reworded a sentence you wrote two paragraphs ago. Yeah, there it is. Except this time, instead of "scruffy," "dirt-eating," and "pine-tar-smeared," the dudes are "full of scruff," "gritty," and "bristle-headed." What about all the dirt they ate? What about the dirt, John Rolfe? The bottom line is that it takes an ironclad mentality to succeed in places like Boston and New York when the heat is on, and quite often that ability is found in lesser lights like Mark Bellhorn (game-winning three-run homer in Game 6 of that ALCS), whose presence doesn't often stir the coals of avid partisans (Bellhorn hit .192 for the series). Yankee fans surely recall cocky Jim Leyritz, who hit .264 with 7 home runs during the 1996 regular season, but delivered a World Series-turning blow against the Braves.
Man, this shit bothers me to no end. You genuinely think there's something special about Mark Bellhorn and Jim Leyritz? That they have a more "ironclad" mentality than Alex Rodriguez? How about Hideki Matsui, who's won jack shit in the major leagues but by all accounts is a calm, non-chokey, hard-working pure professional? Rolfe's trying to limit this to Boston and New York, but really, this type of halo is awarded to anybody -- anybody who does anything good in the postseason. Just last night, Alexis Gomez went 2-4 with a two-run jack and 4 RBI to pretty much win the game for the Tigers. Alexis Gomez. Guy had one home run in his 158-AB career. How many times do we have to say it? (deep breath) SMALL SAMPLE SIZE.
Actually, screw that. I'm going on record right now. You heard it here first: Alexis Gomez has an ironclad mentality. He's scruffy, full of scruff, dirt-eating, gritty, pine-tar-smeared, and bristle-headed. And I would rather have him on my team than Alex Rodriguez, because he's proven he can get it done when it counts.
Of course, it's ridiculous to blame the Yankees' last three postseason flops on A-Rod.
Well done. Agree with you totally there.
Yet there's no doubt he could have turned the team's fortunes toward the better by elevating his play.
Boy, that is an awkward, weird sentence. Whatever. Don't disagree. If he plays better, sure, the team benefits. I cite A-Rod because he's become such a lightning rod and his numbers alone are so often taken as an indicator of success. His presence on the Yankees gives lie to the adages that you can't have enough of a good thing, or can never be too rich or too thin (just check out their pitching staff the past three years).
Okay, wait. Hold on. Now, John Rolfe is saying that the problem with the Yankees is that they're too rich. That's it. They're also too good at baseball. That's it, goddammit! I'm a genius!
My pet theory is that All-Star-laden teams don't sweat enough to be motivated by the fear of failure or even righteous anger when they find themselves on the edge of disaster.
Here we go -- hindpsychology! I promised you! Teams need to be motivated by "fear of failure" or, barring that, "righteous anger." Um, so the Yankees weren't afraid of failing after five ... straight ... years ... of failing ... and with an absolutely batshit crazy owner at the helm. Yeah, that must be it. Plus, they didn't "sweat" enough. That's the problem. In hindsight, it's all very clear. The overabundance of talent makes it too easy for players to assume that someone will come through and pick them up.
That is totally insane, and yet I've heard this same theory bandied about on TV several times in the last few days. In John Rolfe's brain, there's a graph with talent on the vertical axis, and when you cross a certain point on that axis, you get into the "overabundance of talent" zone, where adding more talent hurts you. It hurts you because every guy stepping to the plate thinks to himself, "I'll let Sheff or Hideki or whoever the f get these guys in, we have too much talent in this lineup and I am an idiot who wants to fail because of that."
There's not enough incentive to prove yourself worthy, as the Tigers are intent on doing only one year removed from a 91-loss season.
Your 2006 Yankees: Sorry, New York, We Didn't Have Enough Incentive to Prove Ourselves Worthy.
Check it out -- it's on the Franklin Mint commemorative plate for this season.
And to think: we never would have known the Yankees had all these terrible mental problems without them losing three out of four games to a team that was basically as good as they were! (The Tigers, meanwhile, had lost six games in a row (including three in a row against the Royals) before winning three against the Yankees. But since those six losses came at a very slightly different time in the calendar year, they're totally mentally sound! Hurray Tigers!)
Watching the Yankees go down in flames in Detroit, I thought I'd seen more life on the ice at the Fulton Fish Market.
At least he's super funny.
It seemed that when Hideki Matsui and Gary Sheffield came back from the DL, the fire and resolve that rookie Melky Cabrera and the other fill-ins gave the team during the long summer went out.
Jesus fucking Christ. Let's say we want to get that fire and resolve back. Let's plug all these guys into the 2007 lineup (I'm going to helpfully add their career EqAs, just in case you want to know anything at all about their baseball abilities outside of fieryness and resolve):
Melky Cabrera (.266) Andy Phillips (.228) Nick Green (.239) Aaron Guiel (.253) Miguel Cairo (.244)
New York: outside of possibly Melky, you do not want these men getting at bats for your two hundred million dollar team.
A-Rod, meanwhile, looked like he was wound tighter than the proverbial funeral drum.
Does anyone know what proverb he's talking about? I'm serious. I've heard "tight as a drum," but where does the funeral enter into it? A search for "tight funeral drum" (no quotes) on Google just gives you lyrics to that Pink Floyd song about how dry a funeral drum is and how tight a tourniquet is.
In this age of glorified offense, the lure of an A-Rod is irresistible.
Yes, it is because of "this age" that people are interested in A-Rod. The only age I can think of in which people would not be interested in a baseball player as good as A-Rod is the age before baseball was invented. He would have had to become a blacksmith or something. (But don't put him under any pressure to make your horseshoes, or they'll come out square! He's the least clutch blacksmith in all the land! Ha ha! Burned, Blacksmith A-Rod!)
Yet A-Rod-esque numbers can be illusory. If you can fail seven times out of 10 and still be considered great, it's awfully easy to have those seven times pop up in crucial postseason situations when the best arms in baseball are on the hill.
Okay, you're referencing that Ted Williams quote. Weird way to use it, but whatever. Then Rolfe brings up a sort of valid point -- there could exist a hitter who is better against average and below-average pitching than other hitters are and worse (again, compared to other hitters) against top-notch pitching. What evidence do we have that A-Rod is such a hitter? Um, that's the end of the paragraph.
It's also not clear that this hypothetical hitter would do far worse in the playoffs. Yes, many good pitching staffs earn their way in, but right now we're also looking at an entire LCS filled with names like Trachsel, Suppan, Weaver (the bad one), and Maine, not to mention the likelihood of an epic Oliver Perez-Anthony Reyes tilt on Sunday. Our imaginary ShittyPitcherHitter is going to be a playoff hero this year!
The moves that result in a championship team often are subtle, not immediately apparent or particularly exciting when they happen.
Sure, I'm with you. Maybe "result" is a little strong. "Help build," though, no argument. It's also a mistake to give short shrift to character and chemistry and the value of having unsung scrappers in your lineup when it's time to get dirty in the postseason trenches.
Oooh. Ugh. I'll be honest. I don't think you should ignore character entirely. If a guy is T.O.-level crazy, that's a factor. I defy you to tell me in any reasonable terms what defines a scrapper, though. And getting dirty in the postseason isn't at the top of my list. I'll take guys who can pitch and hit and field well.
And let's not forget the underappreciated and often feared joy and fun.
GM John Rolfe's Baseball Personnel Rubric
1. Character 2. Chemistry 3. Scrappitude 4. Joy 5. Fun 6. Speed 7. Can they catch the ball? 8. Pitching (wins championships!) . . . 100. VORP (nerdy)
Levity may too often be seen as a lack of intensity or commitment, but it's hard to play well when you're so tight a tractor can't pull a pin out of your posterior.
Again, hard to argue with the guy's comedy.
So adding A-Rod was obviously unnecessary for the 2004 Red Sox, who were already a potent offensive team, just as the addition and resurgence of Jim Thome did not ensure a second Series title for the White Sox, who had just enough offense to go with their strong pitching and defense in 2005.
Obviously unnecessary! We've proved that with the awesome thought experiment I did with a couple of my buddies who are Red Sox fans! And what a mistake it was to add Jim "Zero Championships" Thome to the White Sox, who already had just enough offense -- I mean, they already proved that. You know what? I'll bet it was Jim "Clubhouse Cancer" Thome's fault that Mark Buehrle, Freddy Garcia, Jose Contreras, Jon Garland, Javier Vazquez, Bobby Jenks, Neal Cotts, Cliff Politte, and Brandon McCarthy all pitched worse than they did last year. Add one Thome and all those guys go down. Coincidence? I don't think so.
Look at the rosters of the last five World Series champions, or any of the ones in the four major team sports. You won't find an array of all-stars at every position, but stars in a few key spots surrounded by a cohesive mix of veterans, talented and hungry kids, productive role players and the occasional firebrand.
Great, but there's one problem. The Yankees are unique in having as many all-stars as they do. There simply isn't another baseball team like them. So you can't say "see, no other total all-star squad has won a championship, so the Yankees won't, either" because the Yankees are the only team built like that. It's a nonsense argument.
You can forget about an NFL team having "all-stars at every position." The only other recent sports team I can think of that's even close to the star-studded Yankees are the 2003-2004 Shaq-Kobe-Malone-Payton Lakers. But basketball is a sport where you have to pass the ball to each other and work together as a team on offense and defense. (And that team didn't lose until the Finals, anyway, which is pretty good.)
It's an imprecise formula, a feel thing, and desire them as you might, there are no guarantees no matter what you do, as George Steinbrenner is surely learning. The talk now is that the Yankees must trade A-Rod. They'll obviously survive and likely thrive without him as they have offense to burn, and there will be teams eager to have him, but any team that does take him had best carefully take stock of what it already has before inadvertently spoiling a good thing.
Do you hear me, Angels/Astros/Cubs/Dodgers/Phillies/Padres/Giants? A-Rod is a clubhouse bogeyman with zero character, negative scrappiness, no pine tar on his helmet, a horrendous joy-fun quotient, and he refuses to eat dirt. He cannot join a team with too much talent because he will put them over the Overabundance of Talent Barrier and guys will just stop trying. He will certainly lower your team's sweatiness and you can forget about your all-important fear of failure. He might ruin your pitching like Jim Thome did with the White Sox. Be careful. Trust your gut. Whatever you do, do not trade two grinders and a firebrand for him. This has been John Rolfe, Expert Hindpsychologist.
And would make you an excellent sportmanteautempolepositionplayer. It would certainly get you into the prestigious sportmanteautempolepositionplayersclub.
That said, I heard that Nietzsche is working on a theory about the "overman" who works at the establishment for people who have gotten a head start on the construction on large obelisk-like structures, in an effort to let people know about the endless possiblities of sports words built by conflating two pre-existing words together.
That's right. The "sportmanteautempolepositionplayersclubermensch."
And A-Rod's probably not going to be traded. But let's look at Justice's latest post, anyway. For fun. You're wrong about A-Rod (and you're bald, too)
Who called him bald? That's just mean and unimaginative. Don't do that. Friends, I come to you today with a heavy heart. No use hiding my feelings. You've hurt me too much already. I understand that sometimes we disagree on things. That's one of the reasons blogs exist. The other reason they exist is there are a lot of fat, unemployed right-wingers with computers, but let's not go there.
Caught us. Between the three of us, dak, KT and I weigh approximately 1,100 pounds. Also, "Murbles" is Paul Wolfowitz.
I'm hurt because some of you disagree with me about A-Rod. You don't just disagree. You think I'm an idiot for not wanting to bring him to the Astros. And you're not afraid to say I'm an idiot.
Yes, I disagree with the anti-A-Rod arguments you presented, some of which included:
the guy is walking, talking distraction
If the Astros get A-Rod, they ought to go get Terrell Owens
Players like that don't win. They split locker rooms.
A-Rod would see Houston as a trip back to Double-A ball.
He'd separate himself from the other players.
He'd let everyone know he was different.
He'd care nothing about his teammates.
when the game is on the line, when it really counts, he's the last guy on earth you want on the plate.
There still has to be a feeling of oneness, a feeling that we're all in this together.
if Derek Jeter doesn't like you--and Derek Jeter has embraced a lot of different guys over the years--there's a problem.
I think some of those arguments are unfounded speculation. Some are demonstrably false. I don't think any of them overwhelm the potential on-field contributions A-Rod could make.
Being opened-minded and all, let's look at some of the posts...
Opened-minded? Blogging without an editor is hard.
My question to you Richard is why you have now completly changed your opinion about A-Rod....
Yes, I have. Last summer, I believe he was worth a gamble. That was a half-season ago. He has said too much since then, failed too many times.
In that half-season, A-Rod posted a .939 OPS. In the month of September: 1.157. But again: let's look at four games and damn him forever as a guy who can't win.
I'm more convinced than ever than he's not the guy you'd want on a winning team. And his problems of hitting in the clutch can't be ignored.
In four games between September 19 and September 24, A-Rod went 0-12. Was this because he couldn't handle the mid-September pressure of performing with a double-digit division lead? Was it because he wilted in the crucible of New York pressure? Was it because he wasn't one with his team?
In the next five games, he went 9-15 with a homer, three doubles, six runs and five RBI. What happened? All of these games were equally meaningless, like all regular-season games, right? He shouldn't have been affected by his insane anti-clutchness. The issue isn't if he's better than Adam Everett. It's much simpler. Do you want A-Rod with the Astros?
I don't personally care about the Astros at all. I think A-Rod might help their offense, sure. And I think if you're a GM and you're looking to trade for somebody, you have to look at where they're going to play and whom they're going to replace. That's common sense. It helps you a lot more to replace Adam Everett than it does to replace, say, Lance Berkman. A valid point you could've brought up against A-Rod is to question whether he could ever move back to shortstop or whether he's now committed to third base because of extra weight he's put on.
Roll these numbers around before you answer:
• He's hitless in 15 consecutive postseason at-bats with runners in scoring position. That streak extends back to a 2004 series against the Twins.
Oops, I already answered. But I'll answer again. Hey, funny you should mention the 2004 ALDS against the Twins. Let's take a trip to A-Rod's Baseball Reference page and see how he did in that series. Here we go: .421/.476/.737, 1 HR, 3 2B, 3 R, 3 RBI. What you're implying is that since then, A-Rod has irrevocably transformed into a player who is unlikely to ever do that again. Do you honestly believe this because of a 15-AB sample stretched over three years and four different playoff series? • He got the ball out of the infield twice in 15 at-bats in those 15 at-bats. He struck out six times.
Twice in 15 at-bats in those 15 at-bats? Blogging without an editor is really hard.
Please Richard Justice, explain to me why Adam Everett is a better shortstop than A-Rod. In 1500 words or less. Please?
That's not the issue. A-Rod is a better player than Adam Everett. It's a simpler issue than even that. Do you want A-Rod in your clubhouse? No, you don't.
Let me explain what Richard Justice seems to be saying here:
Negative effect of A-Rod in clubhouse >> Positive effect of A-Rod actually playing baseball and doing baseball things baseball-wise on a baseball field
Okay. If that's your opinion, you're entitled to it.
You've got to do better than this. SportsJustice, as the subtitle helpfully tells us, is "a sports blog with Richard Justice." It would have been weird if that were the name of Jason Whitlock's blog or something. Here are Richard's latest JusticeThoughts:
A-Rod to the Astros? Absolutely not.
Please, elaborate. You seem emotionally invested in this.
I'm getting e-mails about bringing Alex Rodriguez to the Astros.
Sure you are. The Astros were sixth-worst in baseball in runs scored, worse than the Royals and the Nationals. Your starting shortstop, Adam Everett, played in 150 games and posted a line of .239/.290/.352 for an OPS of .642. He hit six home runs in 514 at bats. This is no fluke. Last year his OPS was .654. Of all of the men who played American major league baseball this year and recorded 500 or more at bats, exactly one man had a lower OPS than Adam Everett. Ronny Cedeno.
(His EqA was .225. .2 2 5.)
To those of you who have written, let me ask you a simple question: Are you nuts?
No. They are probably interested in replacing one of the very worst offensive players in baseball with one of the very best. That is, at least in my opinion, not nuts at all.
Why in the world would you want to take another team's problem?
Because that problem, in a down year, went .290/.392/.523 with an EqA of .315. That problem hit 29 more home runs than a man you presumably deem not to be a problem, Adam Everett. Last year, that problem was the goddamn freakin' AL MVP. That is why.
If the Yankees want to trade Derek Jeter or Hideki Matsui, let's do business.
Really? Hideki Matsui is coming off a wrist injury that leaves his future at least somewhat uncertain, and in his very very best year as an MLB player, he basically did what Problem-Rod did this year. Also, the Yankees are paying Derek Jeter way more than they're paying Alex Rodriguez, when he's really never been as valuable a player until this season. Weird, huh?
A-Rod? Absolutely not.
Okay, right. That was your title again, pretty much. First of all, the guy is walking, talking distraction. If the Astros get A-Rod, they ought to go get Terrell Owens, too.
Of course. A-Rod is T.O. How could we not have seen this? Who could forget the time A-Rod pulled out a Sharpie and signed home plate as he crossed it after a home run? Or the time he showed up the Red Sox by kneeling on their logo? How about that interview with Playboy where he insinuated Jay Buhner was gay? The shirtless pushups in his driveway? The suicide attempt? The time he raped Nicolette Sheridan?
By all means, I do actually think the Astros should sign Terrell Owens.
Players like that don't win. They split locker rooms. They have their own agendas. They're all about themselves.
Alex Rodriguez has been on five 90-win teams. I know he's never won a World Series and we're supposed to think that he's some sort of jinx or bad luck charm, but I don't really believe in jinxes. I also think that a 162-game sample is a more valid indicator of whether a team is good, or if you insist, a "winner," than going 1-3 against the Tigers over the course of a few days.
Second of all, A-Rod would see Houston as a trip back to Double-A ball. He'd separate himself from the other players. He'd let everyone know he was different. He'd care nothing about his teammates.
Wow. You know a lot about this guy.
Third of all, his salary means he's the type player you build a team around. Problem is, he's not capable of doing that. He's a great player. He puts up great numbers. But when the game is on the line, when it really counts, he's the last guy on earth you want on the plate.
As opposed to the first guy on Earth you want at the plate, Adam Everett.
I can't imagine he'd agree to a trade even though he's clearly miserable in New York, and the Yankees have to be miserable with him. Next time they trade for a guy, they ought to do their homework.
We're talking about whether the Astros should maybe call the Yankees and see if they're interested in an A-Rod trade. If they say, "No, we're not interested" or "No, Alex doesn't want to be traded," fine. You hang up the phone. Why would you pre-emptively speculate that A-Rod has no interest and convince yourself never to call at all? I don't get it. Maybe I just don't understand sportsjustice.
Baseball is a game of numbers to a large extent,
Huh?
but the pieces still have to fit.
Oh. Pieces ... fitting. I get it. Like, for instance, the Adam Everett piece fitting into the .225 EqA hitter slot. And hey, let's just keep pencilling Brad Ausmus into the lineup. He's OPS-ing .593 and EqA-ing .215, but dammit he is a fitting piece. There still has to be a feeling of oneness, a feeling that we're all in this together.
A feeling that we can, as a team, finish second to last in major league baseball in slugging percentage. We'll suck, but we'll suck as a team, and we'll feel warm and fuzzy and one-y while we're doing it.
(Have I even mentioned that Minute Maid is a hitters' park and we're still seeing these kinds of numbers?) (Some of you friendly posters have compared A-Rod to Jeff Kent and Carlos Beltran. Don't go there. Kent was an ornery guy who didn't say much. He also did wonderul work with young players, and when he messed up, he'd come back to the dugout and apologize to everyone around.
You read it right here. Richard Justice thinks Jeff Kent is a better guy than Alex Rodriguez. Because when he messes up, he apologizes, and he's "wonderul" with the kids.
A-Rod comes off as a phony. He supposedly once asked Cal Ripken the best way to shake hands.
And there you have it. Because A-Rod asked Cal Ripken how to shake hands once, your professional baseball team should absolutely never trade for him, ever. Basically, because he's a sort of lame guy who's "phony."
Listen, if Derek Jeter doesn't like you--and Derek Jeter has embraced a lot of different guys over the years--there's a problem.)
Or you're Ken Huckaby.
Joe Sheehan wrote a piece in Baseball Prospectus today that I liked a lot. I'm going to copy and paste a portion of it right here. I hope no one minds. At just about any point along the way, one of the two most visible Yankees—Joe Torre or Derek Jeter—could have come forward and said what should be obvious: Alex Rodriguez is a great, great player, and in the worst season of his career he’s a star. Defining his season by his lowest points is doing him a disservice, and the constant focus on his play is an insult to the other members of the team. Whatever Rodriguez’s performance issues, such as they were, his overall contributions were valuable. Beyond that, he’s one of the game’s model citizens, with barely a controversy to his name in a time when so many others have been tainted.
That statement, completely true, would have done more to alleviate the pressure on Rodriguez than anything else. They didn’t do so, instead allowing petty nonsense like his desire to please people (heaven forfend) and his performance is varied subsets (in Boston, in the playoffs, against a small handful of pitchers, in 20 at-bats in July) to substitute for real information. They didn’t defend their teammate, and by allowing, even stoking, the situation, they absolved themselves and every other Yankee of blame for their fortunes. If they lost, it would be Rodriguez’s fault, no matter how the rest of them played.
Thank you, Joe Sheehan. Better than I could've ever put it. Back to SportsJustice: He's not worth it, either in terms of salary (the team that acquires him will owe him $64 million over the next four years) or chemistry. A-Rod may be the kind of guy Tim Purpura would want, but I'm guessing the best GMs--Billy Beane, Gerry Hunsicker, Pat Gillick, etc.--wouldn't touch him.
First of all, you'd probably try to get the Yankees to kick in some of his salary. Second, in a world where A.J. Burnett gets $55 million for five years (and people are now saying that guys like Alfonso Soriano and Carlos Lee could be asking for $70-80 million deals), four and sixty-four isn't that bad for someone who could have been (and still could be) the greatest shortstop of all time. I mean, honestly, he was headed there. His accomplishments on the field have been staggering, no matter how many Post back pages he's been on.
If you can get A-Rod for a reasonable price -- catch Steinbrenner in an emotional moment, perhaps -- I think you look into it. What you don't do is say "absolutely not" because his negative clubhouse chemistry quotient somehow overrides his baseball-playing ability.
My whipping boy in this post, Adam Everett, is absolutely adored by the fielding evaluation system Baseball Prospectus uses. Or at least he is this year -- he's credited with 24 FRAA, helping him to a 5.6 WARP3 despite his abysmal hitting. It seems like this is an anomaly, though, since his last three FRAA years look like this: 3, 2, 1.
A-Rod crashed and burned fielding-wise, with a disastrous -20 FRAA. As a Yankee, he's been average to bad, with -6 and 6 the last two years. However, with Texas and Seattle (and at shortstop), he was regularly in the double digits (positively). And hey, since he was such a miserable third baseman, his WARP3 this year got knocked down to 6.9, only 1.3 higher than Everett's!
So there's your one piece of ammo, Richard Justice. Why trade for a headcase who only earned about a win and a half better than the guy you've got?
Of course, in 2005 A-Rod had a WARP3 of 12.5. Everett? 3.8.
Some questions from reader John Damon. I think that's his real name.
I am astoundingly curious how it is that Richard Justice is justifying Alex Rodriguez as being a 'clubhouse cancer' as the term may go. Does he know A-Rod? Has he interacted with him? A few key points:
Does A-Rod sit out half a season before deciding which team to play for?
Does A-Rod get special permission from Team Management to skip road trips he won't pitch in, and get special rooming accomodations?
Does A-Rod get accused of being a 'roid junkie by other 'roid junkies?
Does A-Rod blame the others on the Yankee offense for him not producing offensively and losing games?
(loud, audible whisper) -- I THINK HE'S TALKING ABOUT ROGER CLEMENS.
I have to say, HatGuy has incredible timing. July 25, he posts (or updates, at least) an article called "A-Rod is finished as a New York Yankee." July 26, A-Rod homers in an 8-7 ballgame.
Oh, also the article is terrible.
You look at Alex Rodriguez after another failure to produce sitting in the dugout like an exhibit in Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum, and you don’t see the best player in baseball. You see Ed Whitson.
So he's sitting in the dugout ... inanimately? Waxily? He's sitting still, so he can't play baseball anymore? Another one of HatGuy's patented Nonsensical Similes (tm). It's one thing if he pointed out that A-Rod were pouting like Nomar circa 2004, but he's not. He's saying he's a wax figure. Whatever that means. It’s time to unload him, because once a player gets the Ed Whitson Look, he’s never going to recover.
I love -- love love love -- that A-Rod homered the very next day. If that sounds drastic, it’s not.
It is. You know what else it is? Let's make a checklist. Knee-jerk? Check. A complete overreaction? Check. Based on nothing but HatGuy's intuition from the two or three times he's seen Alex Rodriguez make a face HatGuy didn't like? Check. Regurgitated? Unoriginal? Stale? Check. Check. Check.
A-Rod isn’t just in a slump. He’s shot. The boos and the headlines and the endless abuse on the talk shows have gotten into his head and set up permanent housekeeping. Naturally a man who wants to please everyone in the worst way, he’s pressing so hard to make it all better he can barely swing the bat.
A-Rod, July of 2006, the month that "isn't just a slump": 6 HR, OPS .932
If that's an A-Rod who "can barely swing the bat," they better hold on to him to see what he can do when he's okay. Unless a middle-aged sportswriter with a penchant for haberdashery has a gut feeling otherwise. If that's the case, trade him for some Single-A prospects.
He’s shot. Toast.
Cf. Hatguy one paragraph ago: "A-Rod isn’t just in a slump. He’s shot." We get it.
Finished as a Yankee, and there’s no sense pretending he can come back and be the man he was advertised to be. He could be that somewhere else, but not in Yankee Stadium, not half a base path across the infield from Derek Jeter, who reminds A-Rod every day simply by taking in oxygen everything he is not, not two bags away from Jason Giambi, who staggered, stumbled, fell, but never stopped being loved because he never lost the knack for getting big hits.
First of all, since when has Jason Giambi ever been loved by Yankee fans? He's certainly not in my Official True Yankee Handbook. They haven't won a championship since he's gotten there, so by definition he's a worse baseball player than Scott Brosius and Joe Girardi.
And secondly:
A-Rod, July 2006 (during the incredible slump that will inevitably force the Yankees to trade him): OPS .932 Derek Jeter, July 2006: OPS .934 Jason Giambi, July 2006: OPS .727
Wanna talk big hits? Let's use FJM's favorite, extremely accurate, infallible statistic, RsBI:
A-Rod, July 2006 (during the summer that will heretofore known as "The Summer A-Rod Was Absolutely, Stunningly Shot"): 18 RsBI Derek Jeter, July 2006: 13 RsBI Jason Giambi, July 2006: 17 RsBI
HatGuy goes on to talk about Ed Whitson, and then offers this jaw-dropping paragraph.
Country music fans know what the Ed Whitson Look is. It’s the face of a man whose dog got run over by the Prius-driving liberal who stole his wife, she being the same woman who broke his fishing poles, knocked a hole in the bottom of his bass boat, and took a baseball bat to his truck. It’s the face of that same man sitting at a bar that has just run out of Budweiser and Jack and has nothing left to drink but wine spritzers. And the juke box won’t play anything but hip hop.
There's so much to parse here my brain is about to explode. Keep in mind, HatGuy is now describing the look on the face of a hypothetical person country music fans would be familiar with because it's similar to the look of a mid-80's pitcher who was never that good beause he thinks this pitcher is comparable to Alex Rodriguez, one of the best position players of his generation. Plus he's trading in so many stereotypes it's mind-boggling. A quick rundown: Liberals Drive Priuses (those sissies) Country Music Fans Like fishing Really like bass fishing (haw haw!) Get drunk in bars Specifically, by drinking Budweiser and Jack Daniels Hate wine spritzers (haw!) Can't stand hip-hop (because you know what kind of people make that music!)
By the way: Ed Whitson, career ERA+: 97. The two years before he played for the Yankees, he was on the Padres. Here's what his ERA+s looked like:
81, 110
Then he went to the Yankees, where of course, this country boy was crushed by the bright lights of the big city. His ERA+ looked like this:
83
Then, the next year he was traded back to his home in the "country," San Diego. He was awful in both cities. But during the following year, his first full season in San Diego after the trade, assuaged by the kind, gentle, peace-loving southern Californian crowds, he posted an ERA+ of
84
And that's why Ed Whitson is like A-Rod. Because there's still no proof that they stopped being able to play baseball because they moved to a city with a larger population or more newspapers or anything like that. Ed Whitson had a fairly typical Ed Whitson year his first year in New York. And A-Rod, in his second year as Yankee, had a typical A-Rod year. He was the MVP of the league.
Longtime reader Jeff makes a good point. HatGuy wrote:
If he [A-Rod] were making $10 million or even $15 million, the fans wouldn’t care. For the Yankees, that’s just a bit over the average paycheck. But he’s making $25 million, and if he’s going to make $7 million a year more than Jeter, he better be $7 million better than the most popular Yankee since Don Mattingly.
Jeff responds:
"The Yankees are paying Jeter $4 million a year, on average, more than A-Rod. A-Rod is actually a decent deal for the Yankees."
That sounds about right to me. The Rangers covered 67 million of the 179 million dollars left on A-Rod's deal, leaving the Yankees to pay 112 million over 7 years. That comes out to an average annual value of 16 million. Jeter, meanwhile, signed a ludicrous 189 million dollar, 10 year deal in 2001. But the deal increases in value each year, so right about now he's making 20 million or so a year.
Vladimir Guerrero is really struggling at the plate this postseason, particularly against the White Sox. He's 1-16 in the ALCS; in the playoffs overall, he's 7-34 with zero extra-base hits and 1 RBI. His OPS so far this October: .476.
Stories are starting to trickle in about Vlad's woes at the plate, which makes sense because he's basically all the Angels have on offense. But there's a decided difference in the way sportswriters are handling Vladdy as opposed to the dressing down A-Rod got just a few days ago.
In short, no one's calling Vlad a choker. No one's questioning his heart, his desire, his mental makeup. No one's crying out for him to earn his enormous contract. No one's screaming that Arte Moreno acquired him FOR THESE GAMES AND THESE GAMES ONLY.
Instead, writers are -- quite fairly, I think -- saying that without Vlad, the Angels don't stand a chance, and it's too bad he happens to be slumping at the wrong time. Which would also be a very plausible explanation for what A-Rod did in the ALDS. But no one was offering that excuse for him.
Is he hurt? Even in the best of times Guerrero looks as if he woke up after a rough night on a bad mattress. The guy walks and jogs as if his spikes are too tight. But then he'll burst from first to third on a bloop --- the way he did against the Yankees in the ALDS -- in a show of sprinter's speed. So who knows?
"He's not getting treatment that I know of," one Angels staff member said. "If he was hurt he wouldn't say anything, but there's nothing wrong as far as we know."
So when Guerrero performs poorly in the playoffs, he's just a little off, or he's banged up and is valiantly playing through the pain. When A-Rod stinks it up, he's an overpaid superstar who will never come through in big moments.
Possible reasons people do this:
1. A-Rod is not a likeable guy. He seems fake, and he's too polished to offer interesting quotes to the media.
2. There are higher expectations of A-Rod because of his contract.
3. There is increased scrutiny of A-Rod because he's a Yankee.
None of these are good reasons. As of right now, Vladimir Guerrero has never had a good postseason series, and I'm glad to report that no one is labeling him a choker just yet. They shouldn't. Given enough time, I think he'll come through, just as Barry Bonds did and A-Rod likely will.
Why can't people accept that good players, even great players, can have lousy postseason series? It happens! In a five game divisional series, a hitter gets 20-25 plate appearances. It's tough to judge anybody's ability in that small a sample size, much less their character.
It's certainly not enough to call someone a head case, an underachiever, lazy, self-conscious, tight, or a choker. Tim Keown comes close to applying all of these words to Alex Rodriguez in this column.
Tim Keown, let's see what your evidence is.
The only thing harder to figure than Joe West's strike zone in the deciding game of the AL Division Series between the Yankees and Angels on Monday night was Alex Rodriguez.
Fine. Explain yourself.
The curious case of the world's most talented head case continued through another shortened postseason for the Yankees. While 22-year-old Ervin Santana was creating a little slice of legend by burying 94-mph fastballs under the hands of some of baseball's best hitters, A-Rod was carving out a chapter of zero-RBI underachievement.
Oh boy. Okay, so you're coming out firing. A-Rod is "the world's most talented head case"? Your first reason: he had zero RBI. You classify this as an "underachievement." Perhaps. Let's take a look at the achievements of one Mr. Reginald Martinez Jackson, a man many consider to be the greatest postseason performer of all time.
Am I cherry-picking Reggie's worst RBI playoff series? Yes, that is exactly what I'm doing. But Tim Keown is cherry-picking the worst playoff series in A-Rod's career to nail him to the cross. In his last three series, Rodriguez has totalled 5, 3, and 5 RBI. That underachiever.
Up until Sunday afternoon, there wasn't much to recommend any of this year's divisional series.
You're going to write that two days after what people were calling the greatest baseball game ever played happened in the divisional series? After a six-hour, 18-inning epic where the greatest pitcher of our generation comes in to pitch three scoreless innings of relief to earn the win? After a game with two grand slams and something like four hundred players used?
Head case.
At least this year the divisional series got a sliver of salvation with Sunday's 18-inning epic in Houston and Monday night's game in Anaheim.
That's like saying "Idi Amin wasn't much of an evil dictator. Well, except for the constant murderous rampages of his death squads."
And if the best thing for baseball -- according to the wisdom of the television networks, anyway -- is a Yankees win, the next best thing is a Yankees loss. Any Yankees loss is viewed publicly as their failure first, somebody else's success second. And once again, nobody's failure will be scrutinized more than A-Rod's.
I don't disagree with most of that. Notice how Keown implies that the scrutiny directed at A-Rod is inevitable, like it's the tide coming in. Who's scrutinizing him? Tim Keown.
The Yankees had a chance in the top of the ninth, down two against Frankie Rodriguez. Derek Jeter -- the anti-A-Rod -- led off with a fierce single to left, and up came A-Rod as the tying run.
It turns out when you don't just look at 20 AB, A-Rod is a better player. Even in the cauldron of the playoffs.
And as he strolled to the plate, I know I'm not the only one who had this crazy thought: Make him bunt. Ridiculous, maybe, but there was absolutely no reason to think he could get the job done.
Note the word choice: "strolled" to the plate. As if A-Rod hadn't a care in the world. Why couldn't he be more fierce up there?!
Let the record also reflect that if Tim Keown were managing the Yankees last night, he would have had Alex Rodriguez bunt, one of the stupidest things I've ever heard someone admit.
He hit into a double play, effectively ending the Yankees' season.
No. Jason Giambi followed with a hit. Gary Sheffield followed with a hit. The winning run came to the plate after A-Rod's GIDP. How in the world did his double play "effectively" end the Yankees' season? I'll tell you what effectively ended their year: Hideki Matsui grounding out to Darin Erstad to make the third out in the ninth. After that play, they were done.
Matsui, by the way, a guy nobody is writing "head case" articles about (or ever will, I'll venture), had one RBI and batted .200 during the ALDS.
Jeter had three hits in front of him Sunday night. Jason Giambi and Gary Sheffield each had three hits behind him. A-Rod had two hits in five games, both in the Yankees' 11-7 loss in Game 3.
Yes, those are all good players.
In the 1998 ALDS against Texas, Jeter only had one hit in three games. In the 2001 ALCS against Seattle, Jeter had two hits in five games.
But please, continue maligning Alex Rodriguez' character.
It's a fascinating case study. During the regular season, the man is as consistently spectacular as any player of his generation. But when everybody's watching, A-Rod plays with a self-consciousness that's rare in a great athlete.
Again, A-Rod's career playoff OPS before this year: .973. OPS isn't perfect, but certainly it's more substantial than Tim Keown's gut feeling.
He had some moments last year in the postseason -- three homers and eight RBI in 11 games -- but they were mostly hollow, especially against the Red Sox.
That sounds like a pretty good couple of series.
And in five games against the Angels, he was a guy watching himself, and watching everybody else watch him. He can feel the eyes of every fan who ever questioned his contract, every reporter who ever asked him about his lack of playoff production, every ex-teammate who ever intimated his team improved when A-Rod went elsewhere. You know George Steinbrenner's lurking in the background of A-Rod's mind, as well, like a man tapping his fingers on a desk waiting for the big hit that justifies his investment.
Okay, this just gets creepy. Read that first sentence again. What the hell is he talking about? Jesus. Read the whole paragraph again. You're making this judgment after 20 bad at-bats? You have this incredible insight into the human psyche? Get out of sportswriting, Keown, and get into soothsayery.
And don't tell me A-Rod has a history of coming up small in the playoffs. That's simply not true.
Tim McCarver ventured as close to the "choke" word as he could when he said the Yankees have been surprised at how many good pitches A-Rod took during the Angels series.
Tim McCarver is an idiot. A-Rod walked six times in the five games. He had a bad series, but at least he had an OBP of .435. As far as I know, OBP is the single most important aspect of hitting: not making an out. He should have slugged better, but there will be five game stretches when even the best players don't perform that well.
That didn't happen during the 162 games leading up to the series, but everything changes when you're the big-money guy on the big-money team and losing is not considered an option.
What? Last year, when he was the big-money guy on the big-money team, A-Rod hit .320 in the playoffs and had eight RBI. His affliction isn't limited to the batter's box, either. His lazy throw to first in the sixth, a fraction too late to get Juan Rivera, was another example of his lack of fluidity when everybody's watching.
That lazy throw came after he showed pretty decent range to snag a hard hit ball and then stumbled.
He's a good defensive third baseman who OPSes 1.000! And he should be playing shortstop!
But you're right, he's not "fluid" enough.
It's as though he forgets who he is and starts thinking about his contract, his status, his rep as a big-time player who comes up small when it counts. It was hard to watch, no matter what you think of the guy. When the moment got big, he got tight -- even tighter than West's strike zone.
I don't like A-Rod and I think you're completely wrong.
I'd also like to point out that all this choker/underachiever/head case nonsense was applied to Barry Bonds (another once-or-twice-in-a-generation player) for years. Then, in 2002, he hit eight home runs and had 16 RBI in the playoffs. He also posted a .700 OBP and a 1.294 SLG in the World Series that year.
He had some moments last year in the postseason -- three homers and eight RBI in 11 games -- but they were mostly hollow, especially against the Red Sox.
This is a horribly dishonest argument that will compel me to speak out in favor of this guy, who I het. If a guy has a line of 3 for 5 with 3 RBI and 5 runs scored, as he did in game 3 of the 2004 CS, it's hollow because his team won by 11. When a guy hits a ball that lands in Copley off of an inexplicably sharp Derek Lowe to put his team up two, as he did in game 4, it's hollow because his team eventually lost the game in the most dramatic fashion possible.
I've said it before, but the only way A-Rod will ever shed the label of playoff head case is by riding Scott Brosius's coattails to multiple rings.
Because everyone knows strikeouts are bad, right? They're bad! They make you look silly! Everyone knows that! Everyone!
Rodriguez is having a great season, a most valuable player season, one of the best of his 11-year career, but he is striking out more than ever. Not only has he struck out a career-high number of times, but he has struck out more frequently in the last 10 weeks than he had previously. But - and here's the weird part(emphasis mine) - as his strikeout ratio has risen, he has hit better and more productively than before.
The italicized part is where Murray Chass falls down. Chass assumes that strikeouts are so intrinsically damaging that it's inconceivable that a hitter's productivity could increase when his strikeout rate does the same.
But even a cursory examination of the league leaders in strikeouts puts that assumption into serious doubt.
Here are the top ten leaders in strikeouts in the American League:
Richie Sexson Alex Rodriguez Brandon Inge Hank Blalock Grady Sizemore Eric Chavez Jhonny Peralta Alfonso Soriano Mark Teixeira David Ortiz
And as a bonus, here's number eleven:
Travis Hafner
Notice anything about these guys? They're all pretty decent hitters. In fact, ten of the eleven have 22 or
