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Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times won the sports column writing category for the third time in four years, highlighting final judging results announced Tuesday in the 2007 Associated Press Sports Editors contest.
Congrats to Bill, who's already salivating over Andre Ethier's 0 for 4 on Opening Day:
The kid's not ready.
The vet's in the corner, eyes full of resolve.
The kid's got nerves.
The vet's in the cages, arms poised to swing.
Kid.
Vet.
K.
V.
Baseball.
Writing.
Torre.
Dodgers.
Nerds.
Scouts.
Young.
Old.
Math.
Eyes.
Plaschke.
"I'm feeling equally honored and humbled," Plaschke said. "I'm also feeling very lucky because every day I read columnists in all circulation categories who are good enough to win this award. Sportswriters are at the forefront of the fight to keep newspapers relevant, and I'm just proud to be one of them."
"I'm coming for you, Torre," Plaschke continued. "You put Pierre back in or else. You saw what I did to Paul DePoStatNerd. I wrote his obituary. One sentence fragment at a time."
It doesn't matter that it was written two and half weeks ago. This column will live on through the ages. They will speak the name of this column and shudder in fear and awe. This is the ur-column.
Pierre and Plaschke, a pairing like prosciutto and melon, like mini-golf and beer, like Travolta and Cage. Behold.
Dodgers' Juan Pierre is right where he belongs
I would argue that Pierre would belong better in the cast of the movie Gosford Park than atop a major league lineup.
VERO BEACH, Fla. -- There's a boxer in the house.
There's a tiresome stylistic contrivance in the house. "Yeah, last year, I got beat up pretty good," says Juan Pierre.
There's defiance in the house.
You see how he brought "in the house" back for another spin? You see that? That's what it takes to play in the writing big leagues, son. Take notes. Repetitive notes. Fragmented notes.
Poetic notes.
"If people really think the reason we lost last year was because my arm wasn't strong enough, or because I didn't get on base enough, hey, that's cool, I'll be the man, I'll take it," says Pierre.
Look, spare me the martyr shit, dude. A guy who loses his house to a tornado is a victim. You ain't no victim. The Dodgers lost for a bunch of reasons. It definitely did not help them that they gave the guy with the second-worst OBP on the team the most ABs.
There's resolve in the house.
"I'm coming into this season with a chip on my shoulder . . . just like every season," says Pierre.
Does that mean we can expect EqAs of .256, .253 and .255 (Pierre's last three chip-shouldered seasons)? Maybe you should try playing happy or somethin'. Mix it up.
No. No no no no no no no. They can. They really can. They did. They are. The fact that you, Bill Plaschke, for some reason believe that Juan Pierre plays an entirely different, incalculable, unknowable, ineffable, ethereal, spiritual, intangible, holy, effervescent, incorporeal, bioluminescent, antioncogenic game that is emphatically not baseball does not make it so.
They have run the numbers, and they are ugly.
Bloggers downright brutalize him.
This is akin to saying "Everyone who has written on a typewriter despises rabbits." Blogging is a medium, nothing more. It is not a religion. It is not a creed. We do not all think in lockstep. This is a motherfucking boring-ass recording.
I like him.
Boom! The Plaschke turn. You thought I was going one way and then I went the other -- Plaschke-style. Let me show you how it's done:
"Most people hate turtle shit. They say it's stinky. They say it's runny. They say it doesn't serve a purpose anymore in today's workaday world.
I like it."
Now that the Dodgers have added Rafael Furcal's health and Andruw Jones' pop, I think Juan Pierre's presence at the top of the lineup will be as oversized as his cap.
Um, is he going to get any better at, you know, hitting and stuff? He's turning 31 this year. He's been very bad, I don't know if you've been watching the Dodger baseball team or anything... Now that the Dodgers have moved him to left field, I think Juan Pierre will fit as easily there as his bat fits on a bunt.
Because if at all possible, you want your left fielder to slug .353.
Now that Joe Torre is installing an aggressive running game, I think Pierre's ability on the basepaths will be as evident as the dirt streaks on his jersey.
Is he really going to steal more than the 64 bases he stole last year? That would be a terrible sign because it would mean he would be eating up like 700 plate appearances. Also: will baseball writers ever tire of mentioning dirt streaks as a proxy for baseball skill? Perhaps when we move to silicon-based fields, as I am proposing we do in 2011.
Now that it can be a complement instead of a cornerstone, I think the idea of Juan Pierre will work.
New euphemism for "shit player": "complement."
"My game is not pretty, it's just not pretty," Pierre says. "You have to be an old-school guy to appreciate it."
Your game is extremely pretty. It's exciting to watch guys take huge leads, play cat and mouse with the pitcher, kick up dirt when they slide. It invigorates the crowd. Kids love it. This is the best thing about your game -- its entertainment value. Casual fans probably love watching you play, and I don't blame them. You're f.u.n.!!!
Yours is a crowd-pleasing style all in all, Mr. Pierre -- so it stands to reason that if the crowd has turned on you, well, things probably aren't going well, are they?
That's one more reason this will be a good year for Juan Pierre.
Torre is one of those old-school guys who appreciates him.
"He does things the right way," Torre says.
If I were implausibly saintly The Wire Season 5 character Baltimore Sun City Editor Augustus "Gus" Haynes, I would slide my wise-person glasses down my wise, wise nose and pithily growl, "Cut that quote." Because it's the billionth time we've read that about the millionth different player, and it doesn't add anything. It detracts.
Contrary to the winter hopes of many Dodgers fans, Torre's lineups have indicated that Pierre will be the starting left fielder ahead of Andre Ethier.
It makes sense.
Sure it makes sense. Andre Ethier is a major-league caliber player who gets on base, hits for some power, plays good defense, has a decent throwing arm, and is currently 25 years old. Juan Pierre is a professional longshoreman who has convinced a baseball team to pay him tens of millions of dollars despite the fact that he cannot get on base, cannot hit for power, runs borderline-insane routes in the outfield, and has an arm so feeble he struggles to open jars of kalamata olive tapenade.
What's the issue here?
Pierre adds an irreplaceable speed component to the top of the Dodgers order. And, in left field, what Pierre lacks in arm, he can overcome with that speed.
That too. What Pierre lacks in OBP (twenty points to Ethier last year), he can overcome with speed. What Pierre lacks in EqA (eighteen points), he can overcome with speed. His zero homers -- well, he's fast. His 32 extra-base hits -- he's speedy. His team worst 75 OPS+ -- guy can motor. "Johnny Damon never had much of an arm, we moved him to left field, it worked out fine," says Torre. "You can offset that kind of arm with your aggressive play. You can get good jumps, get to balls that other guys can't."
Johnny Damon is on the downslide. Johnny Damon is 34 years old. Johnny Damon was never a big power hitter. Johnny Damon has like fifty-nine different injuries. Last year Johnny Damon out-OPSed Juan Pierre by 62 points. It was Johnny's worst season in seven years.
Pierre also brings something that, during last season's doldrums, everyone seemed to forget.
You can find it in a locked box in his Fort Lauderdale home.
It is the severed finger of Angela Lansbury.
He's one of only three Dodgers with a World Series ring.
But the finger -- the finger is what will lead the Dodgers to victory. Well, it'll have about as much impact, anyway.
You know who else has a Florida Marlins 2003 World Series ring? Ugueth Urbina. The evidence is conclusive: World Series experience causes you to travel to Venezuela, pour gasoline on some men and commit attempted murder on them with a machete. Ugie Urbina: he's a winner™! "The young guys know about it, they ask about it sometimes," Pierre says. "But I don't like wearing it. I'd rather lead with my actions."
"I'd rather lead off and finish third, first, second, second and first in outs in the league the last five years."
Those actions were uninspiring early last year, the first of a five-year, $44-million contract that was questioned before the ink was dry.
Trying too hard, he spent much of the early season surrounded by boos for a mediocre batting average, an awful on-base percentage and general ineffectiveness.
There you have it: when Juan Pierre sucks shit, it's because he's trying too hard. When some dickface like Pat Burrell or Adam Dunn posts a low batting average but a high OBP, he's a lazy fuckbutt. Plaschkevision.
"Yeah, I heard everybody," Pierre says. "It was like, 'Pierre, you stink' ... 'Pierre, go away' ... I heard it all."
I don't really advocate yelling insults at players, but hey: sort of perceptive work, there, Dodger Stadium crowd. I'll see you at the ballpark in person several times this year. I'll be the one in the Juan Pierre Laker jersey (Crossovers, trademark dak).
He batted .308 after the All-Star break, three points higher than his average during Florida's 2003 world championship year. He finished with 41 runs batted in, the same as in the championship year.
Batting average has never ever ever ever been Juan Pierre's problem. That's one of the like two and a half baseball things he's good at. The issues are twofold here, though: 1. Batting average is stupid and 2. Batting average is really, really stupid. Actually, I'll make another point here: in the second half of 2006, Juan Pierre improved (presumably from not trying too hard) and hit .311! He had found his stroke! He was bound for a roaring comeback! Sign this man to a $300 million deal!
Then in the first half of 2007, he batting averaged .282 and OBP-ed .311. :(
You can do a lot of fun things with pre- and post-All Star Break splits. Will Juan Pierre settle in and become the Juan Pierre of 2003-2004, when he was a valuable major league player? It's possible. Weird shit happens all the time. But after three execrable offensive years, it's hard to bet on a guy who's permanently out of his twenties. He scored four fewer runs (96), stole one fewer base (64), and, with the exception of a lack of plate discipline amid a lousy offense, he performed just as he did in Florida.
With the exception of getting on base, the most important thing a hitter can do, he was fantastic. Damn Rafael Furcal's lousy year! He's to blame for Juan Pierre's lousy year. Thank god Furcal's ankle is healthy so Pierre's eyes will work again.
In the end, Juan Pierre did exactly what Juan Pierre does.
Embarrass everyone except Bill Plaschke.
While unfairly taking the fall for a team that crumbled around him.
What exactly is unfair about saying a player burned through a ton of at bats and didn't help the team? You know what's unfair? Andre Ethier, a better player in every aspect of the game except baserunning, is being denied playing time because of a bad contract. These are Ethier's prime baseball years. He's not going to be playing as much baseball as he should. He will never get these years back. He is not a kid anymore. He's played in 279 major league games, and he's played well in those games.
Juan Pierre hit zero home runs last year. Mythical fairy creature David Eckstein hit three, for Chrissakes, and he swings a three-inch bat carved out of a candy cane.
The truth is, the idea of Juan Pierre was a good one, and still is.
Plaschke has spoken. This is The Truth. They will carve this column on alabaster tablets and hang them in our most hallowed halls of justice. Wise men will memorize these words and teach them to our young to prepare them for the trials of life. This column is the new Torah.
I can't believe you just gave away my billion dollar crossover jersey idea.
Of course, the proper Pierre jersey is actually a Kings jersey. Both Pierre and the Kings are awul; plus, on first glance Kings/Pierre/9 looks like a French Canadian hockey player.
Regular readers of this blog may be familiar with this post, containing an article written by legendary prose artiste, poet laureate of the Americas, and Congressional Medal of Honor Winner: William Everton Plaschke IX. That piece won Plaschke a Pulitzer, a MacArthur Genius Grant, and a from-beyond-the-grave visit from Dr. Samuel Johnson, who battered Plaschke about the face and neck with a dictionary and told him to stop writing forever, lest he squander every gain made by proponents of the English language over the last 250 years.
I bring this up because the article began with PlaschkeGraphs™ -- the single-sentence contrapuntal paragraphs that made him famous -- thusly:
Around the hotel table sat Dodgers executives discussing trades.
In the corner sat the old scout watching television.
Around the hotel table they were talking about dumping Milton Bradley and wondering whom they should demand from the Oakland A's in return.
In the corner sat the old scout who has never worked with radar gun, computer or even stopwatch. Around the hotel room table, someone mentioned an unknown double-A outfielder named Andre Ethier.
In the corner, the old scout jumped.
Poetry, my friends. Pure, unadulterated, terrible, poetry.
Anyway, I was smurfing the WW Web today and came across this little number, also from Plaschke, which assaulted my retinal arena in a frighteningly similar way.
On one end of the dark wood table sat baseball's ideals -- the swaggering, swarthy starting pitcher.
On the other end of the same table sat baseball's reality -- the slinking, shirking steroid pusher.
On one end of the table, Roger Clemens bragged about tough times and hard work and never taking a shortcut.
On the other end, Brian McNamee talked about syringes and abscesses and bloody pants.
Look. I know it's probably really hard to file 3-5 stories a week, when you're a sportswriter. (Or 0-1/month, if you're Stephen A. Smith.) I know that Plaschke has won awards and gets to be on television and stuff, so there's no real incentive to change anything. But come on.
At the L.A. Times, Plaschke sits at his typewriter.
Here in my mom's basement, I make fun of Plaschke.
At the L.A. Times, Plaschke lazily concocts another identical opening to one of his columns.
Here in my mom's basement, I ask my mom for more Kix.
Also, Matt points out that there is no "Congressional Medal of Honor," per se, but rather just a "Medal of Honor" awarded by the President on behalf of Congress. This sounds very plausible, so instead of looking it up, I'm just typing it here.
I'm going to Buster Olney it up and just link a few stories that I don't have the energy to lay into. Setting a bad precedent? Absolutely. But: easier.
Here's a little ditty entitled "Attitude Can't Just Be a Platitude for Sox," by legendary comic actor Dave van Dyck (The Dave van Dyck Show, Diagnosis: Murder.) The thesis is that what the 2007 Chicago White Sox lacked was not "hitting" or "pitching" or any of those other pesky "tangibles," but rather: a certain je ne sais quoi.
It has been called "swagger" and "a chip on your shoulder," a sort of no-respect, us-against-the-world motivational mentality.
Of course, [Paul] Konerko was around when the White Sox had that intangible benefit of swagger. And he was there when it vanished, perhaps through complacency caused by lack of competition, which led to losing and a lack of confidence.
For those of you keeping your own Intangible Scorecard at home, that was:
Lack of competition ----> Complacency ----> Vanishing of Intangible Benefit of Swagger ----> Losing ----> Lack of Confidence.
Here's another flow chart: Team ERA of 3.61 in 2005 ----> Team ERA of 4.61 in 2006 ----> Team ERA of 4.77 in 2007 ----> Worse Team in 2007 Than in 2005
"The younger guys are hungry, and that adds energy," [Buehrle] said. "And it takes some of the older guys who have been around here to refocus and get that little edge back, knowing that it's more than going out and putting up numbers, that you have to have a purpose on how you're doing it. We have to try to get back to that."
It might be more than going out and putting up numbers. But I would highly recommend: going out and putting up numbers, as like a starting point.
The question is whether swagger comes naturally or takes some team meetings for everyone to believe they should have it.
That's the question? Not: "How do we improve our AL-low .318 team OBP?"
Next up, we have this useless article about how Tom Brady really isn't that good at football, and how Johnny Unitas was better. Take it away, Plaschke.
The first thing you notice about Tom Brady is, well, nothing.
Really? I notice that he is the world's most handsome man. I might also notice his league MVP award, his 3 Super Bowl rings, his 2 Super Bowl MVPs, or the fact that his smoldering eyes and dimpled chin have forced me to take a long hard look at my own sexuality and conclude in like 5 seconds that although I love Mrs. Tremendous with all my heart, I would trade her and our unborn child and everything I own to kiss Tom Brady on the mouth for fifteen seconds, because then I would know what it feels like to melt into perfection.
He doesn't have a nick on his face because today's referees won't allow it.
Also, his offensive line is quite good.
He doesn't have a growl to his voice because today's huddles don't require it.
I just looked at the HTML coding for this sentence, and it reads like this:
{PlaschkeStyle ="nonsense-level: total; meaning: none; point? no; faux-poetry: yes; garbage garbage garbage"}He doesn't have a growl to his voice because today's huddles don't require it.{/Plaschke}
He doesn't have fire in his eyes because today's teams don't need it.
What claptrap. Ugh. You've killed the mood. I don't even want to kiss Brady on the mouth anymore. You ruined it.
Tom Brady is fantastic, but he's formula. He's a champion, but he's a creation. And to anoint him as the best quarterback ever would be to forget that his position was invented, inspired and made famous by those who were neither.
He's a creation who had 50 TD passes this year. He completed 26 of 28 passes in a playoff game. He has led game-winning scoring drives late in the 4th quarter of like 9 Super Bowls. He is 14-2 in the postseason. So, yes, he is a creation...of Football Jesus.
If Brady leads the New England Patriots to a Super Bowl win over the New York Giants next Sunday, everyone will celebrate his four world championships.
They will forget that Otto Graham won seven league championships.
Graham was an incredible athlete and a great winner. But when he played, there were like 12 teams and the average LB was 4'8", 120 and played his college ball at Yale. It's a different game. There are now 32 teams, and the average placekicker can curl 900 lbs. Players sprinkle steroids into their protein shakes, which they pour over bowls of steroids. Free agency, scouting, PhD.-level offensive and defensive coordination schemes, illegal videotaping of other teams' signals...it's a very different game. A harder-to-succeed-in game.
Everyone will marvel at Brady's 15-2 postseason record.
They will forget that Bart Starr was 9-1 in the postseason with a record 104.8 passer rating.
I like that he italicizes 9-1, as if (a) Brady didn't start his postseason career 10-0, and (b) 9-1 is so much more impressive than a theoretical 15-2.
Everyone will wax about how, in two Super Bowls, Brady led his team on late fourth-quarter game-winning field-goal drives.
They will forget that, in one of his four Super Bowl championships, Joe Montana drove his San Francisco team 92 yards for a last-second, game-winning touchdown.
No one will forget that. It's like the most famous thing that has ever happened in football history. Also, Montana needed a TD. Brady did not. Apples and oranges. Or, apples and different-but-equally-delicious apples.
Everyone will applaud Brady for his tough defender's mentality.
They will forget that Slingin' Sammy Baugh actually played defense, picking off 31 passes in his career, which is more than he threw in his last three seasons combined.
Different game, man. You really can't penalize Brady for not playing both ways, a thing that has not happened in decades. And speaking of Brady playing both ways, I would like to kiss him on the mouth.
Yeah, everyone will forget Johnny Unitas.
No, we won't. Swear.
[Unitas] was football's Babe Ruth, and Bart Starr was its Lou Gehrig, and Sammy Baugh was its Ty Cobb, and Joe Montana was its Joe DiMaggio.
Dan Fouts was its George Sisler. Rich Gannon was its Paul Molitor. Rob Johnson was its George Kendrick. Jim Zorn was its Mark Loretta. Al Toon was its Wil Cordero. Marc Edwards was its La Marr Hoyt. Joe DeLamielleure was its Rick Rhoden. And, most obviously of all, Billy Joe DuPree was its Kevin Tapani. That's just a no-brainer.
Tom Brady is football's, well, um, Alex Rodriguez.
...right. He's the best player in the game. Except that Alex Rodriguez, as boneheads like you are fond of pointing out, has never won a championship. So defend this statement, please.
"I hear all these people talking about Tom Brady and I just sort of smirk," said John Unitas Jr., the late quarterback's son. "It's an entirely different game. I'm biased, but what my father did, you can't compare it to anything today."
Tell that to Plaschke. He's devoting an entire column to doing just that.
While Brady is famous for his "decision making," many of those decisions have actually been made for him by his offensive coordinators.
The Patriots' game plan is more homework than instinct, more science than scrabble.
Late in the season finale against the Giants, Brady threw deep to Moss on second down, underthrew him, and Moss dropped the ball. On the next play, 3rd and long, with the Pats losing, their perfect regular season in jeopardy, they ran a play designed to check down to Welker to try to get the first. But Brady, in the 0.8 seconds a QB has to make a decision, saw that the Giants had not rotated safety help over to Moss (perhaps expecting the check-down?), meaning Moss would be single-covered by a CB. So Brady said, calmly, handsomely, to himself: "Fuck this noise," and uncorked a 60-yard pass that dropped into Moss's hands like a day-old helium balloon. Two records fell, the Pats went ahead for good, and all was right with the world.
Please don't say that Tom Brady -- or any modern QB -- doesn't employ "instinct." That's all they have out there, really. Watch how the man preternaturally senses and avoids blind-side pass rushes, and then write Whitman-style poetry about his instinct. Because that's the only logical response to how good his instincts are.
Here's my favorite part:
Brady is playing in an era when the following scenario would never happen:
Playing in overtime for the league championship, having driven his team to his opponent's eight-yard line, a quarterback decides to pass.
That was Unitas, 50 years ago. His Colts were in position to kick a field goal to beat the Giants for the title. Yet he saw a hole in the defense and threw a seven-yard pass to Jim Mutscheller to set up Alan Ameche's one-yard touchdown run.
This is incredibly dumb. Kick the field goal. It's overtime. (Unless NFL rules were different back then and it wasn't sudden-death. Anyone weigh in on this?)
I said I was just going to sample some articles to save time and energy, and now here we are, like two hours later. Oh well. Here's one more, about a man you might have heard of, Eric Walker, who thinks steroids don't really help people that much.
“If power were up, we’d see it in the statistics,” Walker said. “But the boost just isn’t there.” [...]
Apparently, he hasn't noted the extreme end-of-the-bell-curve-probability rise in 50- and 60-HR seasons since the "Steroid Era" began. Smaller parks, maybe. Expansion, maybe. Steroids probably helped, too, though, considering McGwire, Sosa, and a bunch of other Congressionally-invited dudes are on that 50+ list.
Regarding Bonds, for example, they note that, yes, his peak home run rates came at 36 through 39 years old, when most players are in decline. Then again, another slugger three decades before enjoyed almost the same late-30s surge: a fellow named Hank Aaron.
That doesn't seem like a huge "surge." (Though he did play in fewer games at 37-40 than in the previous years, so his HR/AB rate was higher.)
“I’m tired of people saying, ‘This is what happened because I see more home runs,’ ” Walker said. “If you disagree with me, deconstruct the argument; tell me where it’s wrong. If you can, more power to you.”
The argument has already been "deconstructed" [sic], at least w/r/t Bonds. It's here, and it's telling. Basically, it sets the odds of a 37 year-old hitting 73 HR at one in 53 million. That season was so many standard deviations from the mean, the author had to like go searching for a chart that would even calculate it.
And before any of you make fun of me for wanting to make out with Tom Brady...I got nothing. Go ahead. I want to make out with Tom Brady. Do your worst.
I'm pretty sure it was the first game in NFL history that required sudden-death (regular season games just ended in a tie with no OT, I believe).
As far as throwing the ball from the 8 in sudden death, that does seem like pretty horrible strategy, especially when you consider that was before the goal posts were moved to the back of the end zone. I suppose one could argue that place kicking was so brutal back then (pre-soccer style of course) that a field goal from any distance was a risk. (Come to think of it, maybe the 8 was even too close to kick because of the goal post thing.) Also, their kicker Steve Myhra was just 4 of 10 in FGs that year according to Pro Football Reference.
Thanks, Vinnie. Although, I'm pretty sure I could hit a 15-yard FG more than 40% of the time.
before Pete Gogolak popularized soccer-style field goal kicking in the 1960s (that is to say, well after Unitas' and the Colts' victory over the Giants in the 1958 NFL Championship Game, known as "The Greatest Game Ever Played"), field goal kicking was much more of a crapshoot than it is today, to the extent that successfully executing a field goal try from the 8 yard line (or even from the 1 yard line) wasn't really the given that it would be today. (As an illustration, per Wikipedia, Lou Groza, NFL Hall of Famer and namesake of the NCAA's annual award for the best DI-A kicker, made just 58% of his kicks, well below what even an average kicker accomplishes today.)
Additionally, while I can't find any specific information on point, we're talking about a game that was played on natural grass in New York in the winter. Heck, even today field goals at Giants Stadium on FieldTurf can be an adventure. One article I've read says the game featured numerous turnovers and missed field goals. I'm guessing weather probably would've added to the difficulty of a game-winning field goal attempt.
Those things being the case, I'd imagine that continuing to drive for a touchdown was netiher as "incredibly dumb" as you might have thought, nor as heroic as Plaschke portrays it as being.
I will officially back off from the position that going for it was dumb because they should've kicked, though I still think a 15-yarder was makable. However, as Joshua notes, Unitas maybe shouldn't be given a ton of credit for passing, since they kind of had to try to score a TD, and who knows what defensive alignment he was facing (10 in the box?).
Either way, I am definitely sure that I could have been the league's best FG kicker in the 1950s. Maybe even a good RB.
Vladimir Guerrero Is A No Good, Choking, Gutless Wonder
If Bill Plaschke had his way, the Wall Street Journal would've led off with that headline Thursday in Man Walks On Moon-sized font.
For years we've heard the same chorus from sportswriters: it's tough to perform in big media markets. The bright lights of New York City, the simmering cauldron of Boston, the savage beat writers of Milwaukee -- they crush a man's spirit and impair his ability to throw, hit and catch baseballs.
I've never particularly bought into this school of thought, but Plaschke is espousing an interesting, totally contradictory new theory: Vladimir Guerrero doesn't get enough shit for playing poorly in the playoffs, and this lack of blame is ruining his game. Serious.
No one's blaming Vladimir
Important because, as we shall see, pointing fingers and blaming players makes them good at baseball. It's common sense. The superstar has failed to carry the weight of his team, but teammates, his manager and fans give him a pass. Such is not the case for Yankees' Alex Rodriguez.
It's funny. I see that Vlad has a career post-season line of .204/.259/.259 and I think to myself, "Hey, self, you're probably right in thinking that A-Rod is unfairly blamed for performing poorly in a small post-season sample size. Another great hitter, Vlad, whom no one thinks is a choker, is just as terrible if not worse in the playoffs." Plaschke thinks to himself, "You are the handsomest sportswriter in America. You are a poet, and you have a great natural musk. Also, holy shit, let's crucify the team's best player!"
BOSTON -- On one coast, a superstar entered these playoffs with four hits in his last 41 postseason at-bats, and he's never allowed to forget it.
Yes, and it's moronic. We've been through this.
On the other coast, a superstar entered these playoffs with nine hits in his last 50 postseason at-bats, and everyone seems to have forgotten about it.
Reasonable. Let's not forget that many of those at bats were against absolutely unconscious pitchers. Want to hear something trivial and yet amazing? In their last five playoff games, the Angels have met with five consecutive complete games. It's true. Remember that 2005 ALCS with Buehrle, Garland, Garcia and Contreras pitching out of their minds? And then there was Beckett on Wednesday. If Alex Rodriguez is seriously considering leaving the chill of New York for the warmth of the Angels this winter, the most convincing argument would be the treatment of his counterpart, Vladimir Guerrero.
Of course. Sure. Agree with that. People aren't being idiots about a sampling of five or six games. Both men have recently struggled in October, yet only Rodriguez has taken the fall.
Both men have failed to carry the weight of their teams or their contracts, yet only Rodriguez has been held publicly accountable for it.
Rodriguez is chided by his manager, questioned by his teammates and booed by his fans.
And what we've heard repeatedly, had bored into our heads is that this is bad for him. He doesn't like it. Can't handle it. He's weak. And yet you are proposing we do the exact same thing to Vlad.
Guerrero just keeps smiling and swinging and disappearing.
This is just an odd way to talk about a guy who has carried the Angels' offense on his back for so many years now. I mean, come on. I know Plaschke's talking about the playoffs, but honestly: Vlad's EqAs with the Angels over the past few seasons are .327, .318 .335 and .334. He's a yearly MVP candidate. Now you're angry that he smiles too much in the playoffs? You're a pretty dicked up guy, Bill. It happened again in the Angels' 4-0 loss to the Boston Red Sox on Wednesday in the first game of the division series.
Would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that what Josh Beckett did two days ago was one of the best post-season pitching performances by anyone, ever. 19 straight retired. No extra-base hits. No walks. And that doesn't even begin to convey his utter dominance.
Guerrero hacked at 11 of 14 pitches and managed two singles. Even though that was half of his team's output against Josh Beckett, it wasn't enough to make a dent in Guerrero's October angst.
You're criticizing a guy for going 2-4 in the face of one of the all-time great playoff games by a pitcher. Think for just one goddamn second about that. In four seasons since joining the Angels, he has dragged them into three postseasons, but stumbled once they arrived.
In 14 postseason games, he has one extra-base hit. He has driven in runs on exactly three hits. He has twice as many double-play grounders (two) as home runs (one).
He has a career .204 postseason average, more than 100 points lower than the October average of former Angels hero Troy Glaus, whose void he needs to replace for the Angels to return to that glory.
His playoff numbers are atrocious. They also represent 54 at bats. In his other 2313 at bats as an Angel, he has been splendiferous, wonderbarfuelous, and a whole bunch of other made-up words. Which do you trust more? Don't answer that. I know what you're going to say because you are an insane person. He is one gajillion times the player Troy Glaus is (unless we're talking about super-roided up Glaus).
Yet ask the manager, and Mike Scioscia is kind.
"We have to be more than Vlad," he said.
Ask the players, and Chone Figgins is defensive.
"It's not just Vlad, we all have home runs in us," he said.
Fine answers. Level-headed men. No histrionic finger-pointing or funny nicknames incorporating the word "choke" and several hyphens.
Ask Vlad, and he is, well, Vlad.
"I feel really good," he said through an interpreter, smiling under his curls.
That ASSHOLE! Why won't people call out this total dick!
Nobody will say it. Nobody will point fingers. Not here. No way.
It's part of an Angels' culture created by Scioscia and spread by the likes of Troy Percival and Darin Erstad.
Nobody is bigger than the team. Not in victory, and not in defeat. No visible scapegoats. No public doghouse.
Aren't pointing fingers, scapegoating and doghousing usually considered bad things by traditionalists like Plaschke? I'm so confused. How could Darin Erstad be wrong about anything? He played college football once.
But Guerrero is different. He is the quietest of Angels, impervious to peer expectations, available to batting coach Mickey Hatcher only through an interpreter, a childlike hitting savant who may not even own a mirror.
How dare he not speak English as well as Darin Erstad? Also, here's an aside -- is there something vaguely patronizing about calling someone a "childlike savant"? I feel like I hear this all the time about Manny Ramirez too. Isn't it possible that Vlad and Manny worked like crazy to develop their hitting skills instead of magically being gifted with hitting-savantism from the womb?
Would anyone have called Joe DiMaggio a "childlike savant"? Cal Ripken? The Angels have talked to him about being more selective in the postseason, where each at-bat is magnified.
"I always swing hard," he responded to reporters. "I'll continue to swing hard."
I don't know. That quote seems like you're trying to make him sound like a moron, but maybe a guy who has a career OPS+ of 148 over 6076 at bats knows something about how he hits best.
Guerrero should be more relaxed tonight when he leaves the bench as a designated hitter and returns to right field, his sore right elbow having apparently healed.
"I played the outfield for years in the National League, I am more comfortable there," he said.
But maybe he is too comfortable. Maybe, after all those years on all those losing Montreal Expos teams, he has never quite learned that October runs at a different speed.
Ah yes, Expo AIDS. If you've ever played so much as a single inning for the Expos, you immediately contract an incurable strain of E-AIDS. Primary symptom: an inability to understand the "speed" of October baseball. October baseball isn't about hitting or pitching or fielding. It's about hitting start and stop on a stopwatch as fast as you can. My record is 0.04 seconds. Beat it. I dare you.
"We need a different energy this time of year," Hatcher said. "This is when you have to turn it up."
That is the most unhelpful thing I've ever heard a coach say.
Maybe Guerrero has not yet figured out that October is a time for adjustments. Maybe he doesn't look around enough to understand that everyone else is making them.
Bill Plaschke: Vlad, it's October 1st. Don't you think it's about time to make a ton of adjustments to your game?
Vladimir Guerrero: Who are you, sir?
BP: It's me, Bill Plaschke. Sentence fragment paragraph guy.
VG: Oh, right. Or should I say:
Oh.
Right.
Ha ha!
BP: Anyway, why don't you try widening your stance, like Pujols? Or wearing batting gloves? How about a double-flapped Olerud helmet? Or pissing on your hands? How about this: piss on your hands, then batting gloves.
VG: I am a very successful hitter, you know. Have you seen my Baseball Reference page? Don't want to brag, but under Most Similar by Age you see the name Willie Mays eight freaking times.
BP: Have you tried switch-hitting? How about a bat filled with equal parts quicksilver and osprey feathers? What if you wore an eye patch? It's October! Don't you want to win??
VG: (hits six home runs into the parking lot, smiles sweetly) "No, I don't feel any pressure," he said Thursday.
What's a bunch of meta-sports-commentary commentators to do?
Bill Plaschke hasn't written an article in nine days. Wallace Matthews hasn't published since June 26. Woody Paige, apparently, has been neglecting his writing in favor of his on-going propulsion experiments. The White Sox are playing down to their PECOTA predictions, so no one at the Trib or CST can glow about Ozzie. Even this guy -- normally so reliable -- has taken a break to cover Wimbledon.
It's tough days here at FJM.
I post this only to ask you, our loyal readers, to be vigilant. Go about your lives. Go to the movies, have a picnic with your children, do all of the things you normally do. But also, send us links to poorly-conceived and -executed articles in your hometown papers. Because if you don't, then the journalists will have won.
In the last 200 years, California has borne or inspired many wonderful poets and other masters of the English language. Philip Levine hailed from Fresno, I believe. Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Gary Snyder, Michael McClure, and a lot of other Beats spent their formative writing years upstate. Let's not forget Charles Bukowski! Or Wilma Elizabeth McDaniel! Nor should we ignore the prose-poetry of Salinas, CA's own John Steinbeck, or any other of a thousand brilliant wordsmiths whose presence in our great state reminds us of the beauty and power of language.
With a couple of minutes left in Schottenheimer's Last Stand, high in the chilly winds and darkening skies, the scoreboard at Qualcomm Stadium showed an old video of Marty Schottenheimer screaming some inspiration.
Right away, Plaschke starts dropping some poetry o'er our ears and hearts. O Chilly winds! O Darkening Skies! O Scoreboard!
Down below, with wide eyes and blank face, the real Marty was speechless.
Up above, he was wildly gesturing in a single direction.
Down below, the real Marty wandered around as if lost.
Up above, he bowed his head and stuck out his chest.
Down below, the real Marty cringed.
In the case of People of America v. Plaschke, LA Times, et. al., I submit to the court People's Exhibit 61. If I may briefly quote from said exhibit...
Around the hotel table sat Dodgers executives discussing trades.
In the corner sat the old scout watching television.
Around the hotel table they were talking about dumping Milton Bradley and wondering whom they should demand from the Oakland A's in return.
In the corner sat the old scout who has never worked with radar gun, computer or even stopwatch.
Around the hotel room table, someone mentioned an unknown double-A outfielder named Andre Ethier.
In the corner, the old scout jumped.
Does anything seem familiar, here, your honor? Let me distill these two articles:
August 2006:
Around the hotel...
In the corner...
Around the hotel table...
In the corner...
Around the hotel room table...
In the corner...
Aaaaaaand...January, 2007:
Down below...
Up above...
Down below...
Up above...
Down below...
It was a tough code, Plaschke's writing style, but I think I've broken it:
A = (physical location) B = (different physical location)
A B A B A B A B
With the San Diego Chargers trying to hold off the New England Patriots in the final moments of the AFC divisional playoff game Sunday, the fans wildly cheered the televised Marty.
When the Chargers eventually blew a lead and lost, 24-21, on a last-minute field goal, those same fans quietly and pitifully stared at the real one.
Call me crazy, but I don't think all 68,000 fans were staring at Marty. Maybe some of them were staring at one of the WR who dropped key passes. Or perhaps they were glaring at Marlon McCree, who, had he merely knocked the ball down, or merely fallen down, or merely run out of bounds, or merely not allowed a 5'2" 50 year-old man to strip the ball from his arms, would have probably won the game for the Bolts. Or mayhap they were staring at Eric Parker, who muffed the punt, or Vincent Jackson, who didn't drag his feet, or Drayton Florence, who headbutted Daniel Graham and gave the Pats a free first down. Or whichever dunderhead got flagged for the dead-ball penalty that forced the Chargers to kick off from their own 15. I mean, you could argue that some of these mistakes were the result of poor coaching, but if this is a badly coached team, how did they have an NFL-low like 15 turnovers this season? I mean, I really don't think that everyone in the entire stadium was staring at, and blaming, Marty.
What's that? They were all staring at and blaming Marty? All this shit was his fault? Okay. You're the poet.
He had botched a fourth-down call, bungled two timeout calls and stood idly on the cold grass while watching his team disintegrate into serial stupidity that led to the surrendering of 11 points in the final five minutes.
He stood idly by. Perhaps he should have suited up? The CBS dudes did show that funny picture of him playing for the Boston Patriots back in the day...
Seriously, what should he have done? The timeouts were dumb, and the 4th-and-11 was inexplicable -- but that was in the first quarter. What should he have done?
"I don't know if I can put it into words," said Charger LaDainian Tomlinson quietly.
I can. Three words.
January. Marty. Again.
This seems shortsighted.
Twenty-one years, 18 playoff games, and just five playoff victories.
Twenty-one years, 200 overall victories and zero Super Bowl appearances.
Schottenheimer left in front of one player, tackle Shane Olivea, who was so distraught he tore off his jersey and shoulder pads and attempted to throw the entire contraption 10 feet high into the stands.
Schottenheimer also left in front of a file of Chargers cheerleaders who were loudly weeping and complaining, "This ruins our trip to Miami!" It's their Marty, and they'll cry if they want to.
I'm not sure what to make of this. Metaphor? Poetic license? Or is Plaschke actually claiming that he heard this, or that this happened? The cheerleaders were weeping? Pro football cherleaders? And they were complaining, and what they were saying was: "This ruins our trip to Miami?" When they wouldn't even have been going for three weeks -- assuming they won their next game?
I really don't understand what is happening at this point in the poem. I need Helen Vendler.
"Right now," said Schottenheimer, "the only thing I'm interested in is making sure that this group of young men in that locker room and that coach staff understand that we — while it didn't go anywhere in the playoffs — had a damn good football season."
Once again, he's Marty Shot-Himself-in-the-Foot-Heimer.
This is a poetic device called: the ham-fisted joke. Plaschke is a modern master.
Because, in today's NFL climate, if you have your conference's best record and are eliminated in your first game of the playoffs, you might as well be reprobates, or the Raiders.
This is sort of true -- because in 2000, the Raiders were the #1 seed and lost at home to the Ravens. The Steelers have been the #1 seed twice in the last few years and lost at home. The #1 seeded Eagles lost to the Panthers in 2002. The Colts lost to the 6-seed Steelers last year. In fact, I believe that this is the 8th out of the last 10 years that the team with the best record in football will not win the Superbowl (the 14-2 Pats of 2003 and the 12-4 Bucs, who tied for best record, being the exceptions.)
The point being, the NFL is insane, and everybody can beat everybody else. Especially Billy Belichick, who is 5-1 against #1 seeds in the playoffs. And 13-2 overall in the playoffs. If you blame Marty, blame Dungy and Reid and Cowher and every other good coach.
"We knew going into it what we were playing for," said Patriots linebacker Tedy Bruschi.
But did the Chargers? Under Schottenheimer's leadership, it was difficult to tell, beginning with a fourth-and-11 play from the Patriots' 30-yard line at the end of the first quarter.
This being a scoreless game, wouldn't it be time for Pro Bowl kicker Nate Kaeding to try a 47-yard field goal?
Instead, Schottenheimer called for a Philip Rivers pass that became a sack that gave the ball to the Patriots, who then drove and kicked their field goal.
Dumb decision. Dumb dumb dumb.
Schottenheimer, renowned for being too conservative in big games, was clearly and quickly trying to change his reputation. It cost his team the lead and momentum and who knows what else?
What else could it have cost them?
"The intention was to be very aggressive," he admitted.
His players took him literally, and it cost them more.
They should have taken him figuratively? They should not actually have been aggressive, but rather...what?
In the third quarter, Eric Parker muffed a punt, then attempted to run with the loose ball, fumbling it again and giving it to the Patriots.
In the ensuing drive, the Chargers defense pushed the Patriots out of field-goal range with a third-down sack, but after the play, cornerback Drayton Florence was flagged for the needs-his-head-examined act of head-butting.
The penalty moved the Patriots right back into field-goal range, from where Stephen Gostkowski connected to close the gap to 14-13.
All of this is Marty Schottenheimer's fault.
"How do you go 14-2 and fire the coach?" asked defensive end Luis Castillo. "The responsibility for this is all on the players."
Those players kept acting more irresponsible when safety Marion McCree seemed to have the game in his hands after grabbing Tom Brady's pass on fourth down with 6:25 remaining.
But instead of batting the ball down because it was fourth down, or instead of simply falling down, McCree tried to run.
"I thought I could score," he said.
From the middle of the field deep in Chargers territory?
That is so dumb of you, Marty Schottenheimer! I mean, Marlon McCree!
Troy Brown stripped the ball --
-- from Marty Schottenheimer's arms, I assume? --
-- the Patriots regained possession, and five plays later scored a touchdown and the tying, two-point conversion.
Despite replays clearly indicating it was a good call, Schottenheimer cost himself a timeout with a challenge, then called another timeout on the ensuing drive although the players had just been standing around for several minutes while an injured Patriot was examined.
"I don't think they were material to the outcome," said Schottenheimer of the timeouts.
This is dumb. Of course they were. But was Schottenheimer to blame? Don't teams have a guy in the replay booth who watch the plays and radio down to the head coach about whether or not he should throw the flag? Maybe the Bolts do not, or maybe Marty made this call on his own, but I haven't heard anyone definitively say that Marty made that call himself. (If anyone has such evidence, email me, please.)
Oh yeah? Well, if the Chargers had two timeouts, the NFL's most powerful fourth-quarter home offense would have had time to give Kaeding better than a 54-yard field goal attempt at the end of the game.
Ahhhh, yes. The fallacy of the pre-determined outcome.
If the Chargers had two TO left, the Pats might have played their drive differently, too. They might have gone for it on 3rd and 5 from the 15, and perhaps they would have made it, and run down the clock even further. The play calls would have been different on both sides. The whole last 7 minutes might have unfolded differently. Obviously, the Bolts would rather have had TO than not, but to say that the game would have unfolded exactly the same way...it's just plain silly.
"Hopefully he'll be back," said Charger Shawne Merriman of his head coach, shrugging. "If not, well, it's a business."
A business that Marty Schottenheimer again built into a giddy fall power before running into the cold January ground.
O Giddy Fall Power! O Cold Ground! O Plaschke, my Plaschke!
I believe it was Plato, or was it Arquimedez, who said: "Poets utter great and wise things which they do not themselves understand." Perhaps that is the problem here. Plaschke is so brilliant he is just channeling God, and even if he himself is just babbling nonsense, we must trust that he is great and wise.
A few thoughts from the Mind Grapes of our readers:
Re: Marty throwing the flag himself or some other coach doing it, the aptly-named reader Read writes:
...That's one of the big (and as this incident showed, maybe fair) criticisms of Schottenheimer- he doesn't even wear a [profanity edited -- ed.] headset. Maybe if he had had a headset on, he would've heard someone shouting in his ear "DON'T THROW THE [more profanity edited; perhaps Read is a Bolts fan? --ed.] FLAG." If he wasn't the one that actually made that call then, heck, maybe it is his fault anyways for putting a complete idiot in charge of challenges.
Possibly. Although, consider this report from James:
I was watching Patriots 5th quarter after the game on one of those local channels, and one of the guys reporting said something to the effect of:
"It was Rivers' decision to throw that flag. He was looking up at the replay board, and he ran over to Schottenheimer and started yelling at him and pointing to the board, and Schottenheimer got out the flag and threw it, trusting his quarterback."
Now, this wasn't shown on TV, so I don't have any proof that it happened, but it seems unlikely that this guy, who was at the game, would make it up.
Interesting.
In any case, many of you have already written in to point out that Martin Q. Football, alias "Martyball," doesn't wear a headset -- I did see him with a good ol' Motorola around his neck at least a few times in the game, and I have to believe that before throwing that flag he either got some bad advice from a player, or else from a coach up in the replay booth.
It should be noted, as we discussed during the game itself, that although Marty himself was not wearing a headset during most of the game, that weird piece of chocolate / cold sore below his lip was wearing a tiny headset of its own.
The "argument" Plaschke makes is that the Dodgers should be psyched that J.D. Drew triggered an option in his contact -- to leave the team and become a free agent -- because he was bad news and had a bad attitude and no one remembers his RsBI. So, good riddance.
Fine, whatever, you're entitled to your opinion, Bill. But then towards the end, as Junior notes, he writes this:
In the end, there's no reason for anger by anyone. Drew was just exercising his rights. Boras is just doing his job. The Dodgers eventually will get what they want. None of this was illegal or unethical.
If you want to be upset, be upset at former general manager Paul DePodesta for giving Drew such a misguided quit clause in the first place.
Junior correctly notes how insane it is that he blames this on DeP. But it goes beyond that, I think. If Plaschke feels this way about Drew, shouldn't he be happy that DePo gave him the out clause? Why would you be upset about this, Billy? Your irrational hatred of Paul "The Computer" DePodesta is so overwhelming, you are now taking shots at DePo even when DePo did something that you are arguing helps the Dodgers.
How do you not see that contradiction, Bill?
Hello?
Bill?
He hung up on me. Oh well. I'm sure he'll read this post. He's a big fan of ours.
I think Plaschke's logic is this: J.D. Drew is a shitty, lazy player that makes your team lose. Paul DePodesta signed J.D. Drew, so that's strike number one. Strike number two is that Paul DePodesta is so stupid and incompetent that he let J.D. Drew sign a deal that lets him leave halfway through his contract, so even if he played well by some fluke, the Dodgers would be screwed. Strike three is that he is a nerd who wears glasses.
From our friend Bill Plaschke, explaining why the Dodgers should be glad to be rid of J.D. Drew: Sure, he led the team with 100 runs batted in last season, but do you remember more than a handful of them?
We'll call it RBIR, for RBIs Remembered. Drew only had 5 (!) last year. What a lousy player. Jeff Francoeur led the league with 249 RBIR. (People remembered a lot of his RBIs two or three times.)
If you want to be upset, be upset at former general manager Paul DePodesta for giving Drew such a misguided quit clause in the first place.
We get it. You hate Paul DePodesta. Everything bad that's ever happened to the Dodgers is unequivocally the fault of Paul DePodesta.
The Dodgers have finally rid themselves of … what's his name again?
Drew. His name is J.D. Drew. You live in Los Angeles and cover their baseball team. Last year, J.D. Drew led that baseball team in actual RBI, OBP, and home runs. But maybe since you didn't remember that, it didn't happen. Yeah, that's probably it.
Because if they get eliminated, maybe, just maybe, Bill Plaschke will stop gushing purple prose?
I mean, seriously, does anyone like this nonsense?
SAN FRANCISCO — And so the gift has finally been unwrapped, torn open by a steely eyed team that could wait no longer, the wrappings of six months ripped apart to reveal something Los Angeles never expected.
Something in the most perfect shade of blue.
Dear L.A. Times sports section editor,
One of your opinion columns in the October 1st issue was mistakenly replaced by an embarrassing eighth grade short story.
Give me my dollar back, Junior Something that beats, and beats, and beats.
Goddammit. You are not a good writer. Listen, all you aspiring sportswriters out there: you can't just write a sentence fragment for every paragraph and expect that to create drama and impact for you. It's the oldest trick in the book. Bill Plashcke does it in every column, so you know it's bad. Less than a year after collapsing under the weight of their own incompetence, the Dodgers are whole again.
A team that 11 months ago had no general manager, no manager and the third-worst record in its league has made the playoffs.
Kudos, BP. Those are complete sentences. From national jokers to wild-card qualifier. From a winter of chaos to a summer of character.
AAARGH NO
Something tells me no one would be writing about what great guys the Dodgers are if they weren't also very good at playing baseball. A collection of quiet veterans, anonymous role players and unknown rookies gathered as a single faceless force to shower their city with something cool and bubbly and totally unexpected.
Quiet veterans like notorious mustachioed asshole Jeff Kent. Anonymous role players like Gatorade pitchman and Hamm-boner Nomar Garciaparra. Unknown rookies like Andre Ethier, whom a long-dead Dodgers scout discovered while driving his phantom pickup truck in the afterworld.
"This hasn't just taken 25 guys, it has taken more than 25 guys, and we've known it, and we've won because of it," said pitcher Derek Lowe. "The best thing about this team is, it's a team."
Trust me, Derek: it was the guys playing. Maybe a few more than 25 because of AAA callups and such. But the reason you're in the playoffs is because the pitchers and hitters wearing your uniform performed well.
I like to take things literally.
Also, I'm nominating "The best thing about this team is, it's a team" for the Meaningless Tautological Cliche Hall of Fame. That was the plan back when McCourt cleaned house last fall, firing former general manager Paul DePodesta just weeks after DePodesta fired former manager Jim Tracy.
In only his second full season as owner, McCourt realized he had blown it in some of his original hires DEPODESTA, and he wasn't afraid to DEPODESTA become nationally scorned by admitting it DEPODESTA.
I added the DEPODESTAs so you would get what Plaschke is talking about.
"I am not afraid to fail DEPODESTA in order to succeed," McCourt said Saturday.
That one was in the original article, I swear. Standing a few feet away was another unmistakable presence, wearing a wet Dodger T-shirt and a starry stare.
And a galactic grin and a supernova-y stance and these awesome snakeskin boots that I might have written about before and did I mention how wet and sexy his T-shirt was? His name is Ned and I think we're friends. I hope (fingers crossed)!
The actual construction began with him, the man McCourt hired to fix things, the rookie general manager who was given a losing team and unwieldy contracts and little chance.
As a lifetime baseball man, he understood only one thing: that you win not with numbers but with humans.
Let's get serious here for a second. Of course you win with humans. You win with humans with numbers. Those numbers are nothing but a written record of what humans have done while playing baseball. Why is this so hard to understand? What's really up for debate here is how much character and intangibles matter when evaluating players. If Plaschke had a gun put to his head and had to put a percentage on it, what do you think he would say? 10%? 50%? 100%? The correct answer: he would weasel out and say "you can't put a number on things like heart and hustle" except he would phrase it in a sentence fragment paragraph. And although the Dodgers may not have the best statistics among this year's playoff teams, they certainly lead the league in relentless humans.
The Dodgers are fourth in the NL in runs scored and fourth in ERA. That's why they're in the playoffs. The only team ranked above them in both categories are the Mets, who are third in each. In sum: the Dodgers are very close to having the "best statistics" in the National League because they are very close to being the best team. Statistics measure baseball performance. This is an irritating, repetitive recording that will not stop.
The Dodgers are not going to the playoffs because Brett Tomko is a more relentless human being than Jamie Moyer. "You have to believe in the heart of the individual, you have to listen to that heart, that's all I've done here," he said. "I knew I had my hands full. But I also knew it was possible to find that heart."
Does Ned Colletti really believe this shit?
What a dumb question. Of course he does.
But Maddux' best number is this: The Dodgers are 37-19 since he joined them.
"The minute he walked into my office after I traded for him, I had this sense of calmness that I haven't lost since," Colletti said.
To me, that's Maddux' real best number. Number of minutes Ned Colletti hasn't been calm since Maddux walked into his office: zero. It is a calmness that, finally, was cemented in the stone sculpture that is Grady Little's glare.
What? WHAT?! Is anyone else reading this? What? It is a calmness that, finally, was cemented in the stone sculpture that is Grady Little's glare.
I had to see it again to make sure it was real.
I am so sick of Bill Plaschke's faux-etry. Bill Plaschke is Tim McCarver with a keyboard. Bill Plaschke is that annoying girl at the party who's somehow both dumb and pretentious and keeps complaining that "the mainstream media is too surface-y." Bill Plaschke sucks at metaphors. Otherwise, I think he's okay.
I honestly don't. Bill Plaschke has absolutely outdone himself. I mean, for God's sake, the article is called
There's Trust in His Eyes
And it is pure (read: terrible) poetry.
Around the hotel table sat Dodgers executives discussing trades.
In the corner sat the old scout watching television.
Around the hotel table they were talking about dumping Milton Bradley and wondering whom they should demand from the Oakland A's in return.
In the corner sat the old scout who has never worked with radar gun, computer or even stopwatch.
Just like good scouts do. Good scouts never use scouting tools. They trust their goddamn eyes, and their guts, and their spleens. Why?
Because Old Hoss Radbourn was not discovered with a computer, dargbloomit! He was discovered because 130 year-old Petey "Garbageface" Krunkston, who had been a rookie league manager for 142 years and had seen a goddamn ballgame or two in his day, woke up one morning with a wart shaped like a flame on his left arm, and he turned to his wife of 186 years Edna Mae and he said, "The flame mole's back, darlin.' I's a gone and what been done and moseyed to the ballpark -- there's sure to be a great future prospect a-lurkin' about, iffin' the flame mole done appeared-a-mafied on m'arm!" And he did go down there t' ol' Brasston Park, and sure 'nuff, a 4 year-old Hoss Radbourn was thar, an' he was a-throwin' and a-hittin somethin' fierce! And bloogburrmit if Garbageface didn't sign that 4 year-old right then and there! And he became a Hall-of-Famer!!!!!
Around the hotel room table, someone mentioned an unknown double-A outfielder named Andre Ethier.
In the corner, the old scout jumped.
Is Plaschke the most overblown prose artiste in the business, or what? In the corner...around the hotel table...in the corner... I swear, I think Plaschke believes he is the walking embodiment of James Earl Jones's character in "Field of Dreams." People will come, Bill. People will read. People will vomit.
"Wait a minute!" shouted Al LaMacchia. "I know Andre Ethier!"
In a gait slowed by years of climbing bleachers, LaMacchia walked over from the television to the table.
With Dodgers executives staring at him in amazement, the old scout began to sell.
Were they really staring at him "in amazement?" Were you there, Plaschke? I find it hard to believe that in an organizational meeting to discuss prospects the team might want to acquire, that when a scout started talking about a AA prospect, the rest of the organization "stared at him in amazement."
GM: We need some good minor leaguers.
Scout: Hey! I know some minor leaguers!
GM: (falls off chair in dismay) Ga-ga-ga-ga-ga goink!!! This is our lucky day!!!!!!!
He was on the phone, and it sounded as if he was crying.
"You're writing something about an old fella like me?" said Al LaMacchia.
He's 85, and he's been scouting for 51 years, and he can't believe anybody still cares.
I tell him I am writing the story because the Dodgers still care.
For the first time since Fred Claire was their last world championship general manager, the Dodgers are listening to their older scouts again.
They are reading reports scrawled in aging penmanship. They are evaluating players based on dusted-off instincts.
Ned Colletti's new administration is still using computers, but they also value guys who have no idea how to turn one on.
"I trust my eyes," LaMacchia said. "Been good enough so far."
Colletti trusted LaMacchia's recommendation at last year's winter meetings in Dallas, and the Dodgers are in first place in August, and that is no coincidence.
I'm sorry. I can't stop snortling derisively. Hang on. ... Okay. There.
The Dodgers are 64-57. They have the worst record of any first-place team. Let's not go bragging about any aspect of their brilliant system just yet. A month ago they lost like 40 games in a row, and in most other divisions they'd be basically nowheresville.
"You cannot microwave experience," Colletti said. "The only way to get it is to live it. I want guys who have lived it."
Colletti has hired two scouts/advisors since joining the Dodgers last winter in moves typical of him but totally uncharacteristic of any other CEO anywhere.
Both of the new guys were over 70.
Get ready. Here's my favorite part.
The scout, Phil Rizzo, lives in Chicago and does nothing but attend Cubs and White Sox games.
"The guy who watched a bunch of Maddux starts and filed the reports on him?" Colletti asked. "That was him."
I am going to hit return ten times, leaving a wide open white space on this blog, so we can all reflect on how unbelievably stupid that is. Ready? Begin reflecting. Then read the rest of this post, because Plaschke has a lot more to say.
You are telling me that you needed to hire someone to tell you that Greg Maddux might be a good pitcher? I mean, the guy is old, but...he's Greg Maddux. You play in Dodger Stadium, which is pretty friendly to pitchers, generally. He's Greg Maddux. You needed a 70 year-old scout, with all of his accumulated baseball knowledge, to tell you that Greg Maddux might help your team? He's Greg Maddux.
The advisor is Bill Lajoie, a longtime baseball executive who helped engineer the trade with one of his former employers, Atlanta, for Wilson Betemit.
Everyone in the universe knew Betemit was a good young player. He was a 25 year-old SS with a .784 OPS. What are you saying?
"Scouts are my lifeblood, they see players, they know players, they can tell you things that you can't get anywhere else,"' said Colletti.
LaMacchia knew Ethier.
It required thousands of miles on his old Ford, and pages of scribbling in his little black date book.
It required a brief break for congestive heart failure — "He told me it was just a little thing, he'd be back in a week" said Colletti — and it took him all of last summer.
Okay.
I just typed "Andre Ethier" into Google. The first hit I got was from thebaseballcube.com. I clicked on it, and I learned:
in 2005, for the Midland, TX Oakland A's AA team, Andre Ethier:
I also learned that at ASU, a big-time program, Ethier crushed the ball, putting up a 1.061 OPS with a 52/30 BB/K ratio, and was a 2-time Pac-10 All-Star OF.
I also learned that in 2005 he was the MVP of the Texas League, as well as the Oakland A's Minor League Player of the Fucking Year (emphasis and cussing mine).
You're telling me it took a million miles of driving and a heart attack and 368 years of baseball experience to tell that the 2005 OAKLAND A'S MINOR LEAGUE PLAYER OF THE FUCKING YEAR might be a guy who might interest you? Whatever, man. I learned it in twelve seconds with a computer.
My leg does itch a little though -- I think I have dry skin. Does that medical ailment mean my opinion counts more?
But LaMacchia made it his business to know Ethier.
"I guess that's what I do," he said. "I try to know players."
Most scouts do. Even the ones who use technology.
Working as a national scout from his home in San Antonio, where he lives with his wife of 62 years, Annie, LaMacchia would watch Ethier as he played for Oakland's double-A Midland team.
He saw him play in San Antonio, and Corpus Christi, and Frisco. He saw him taking early batting practice on 100-degree days, and running out ground balls at the end of blowout losses.
He didn't need a stopwatch to judge his hustle. He didn't need a computer to feel his swing. And when LaMacchia ever needs a radar gun reading, well, he just asks one of the scouts sitting next to him.
Luckily, one of the scouts has a radar gun. Because otherwise, LaMacchia would have no idea how fast the guy's throwing.
"The younger fellas look at me like I'm strange," he said. "But it's all in my heart and my head."
In Ethier, he saw so much potential, one day he couldn't help himself.
He walked down to the dugout railing and started giving him instructions.
Said LaMacchia: "I wanted to help the young kid, tell him not to try to pull everything, tell him to take what they gave him."
Said Ethier: "I thought he was just some crazy old man yelling at me from the stands."
I don't blame you, Andre.
A couple of old-timers quickly set the kid straight.
LaMacchia was a right-handed pitcher who won a couple of big-league games for St. Louis and Washington in the mid-1940s then became a legendary talent evaluator.
He played the game! Hey Joe Morgan -- rest easy, man, this guy played the game! You can listen to his opinions. They are valid!
I can't help it anymore. The rest of my comments will be in super-angry all-caps.
...When Ethier's name came up at the winter meetings, LaMacchia perked up as if they were talking about his son.
Logan White, the Dodgers scouting director, also had knowledge of Ethier. But it was LaMacchia's enthusiasm and information that sealed the deal.
"No question, I give Al full credit for this one," said Colletti. "He knew the guy. He loved the guy. We listened to him."
Colletti immediately asked the A's for Ethier. And, initially, he was turned down.
BECAUSE HE WAS THEIR 2005 MINOR LEAGUE PLAYER OF THE YEAR. I DON'T KNOW HOW MANY TIMES I CAN EMPHASIZE THIS.
"But I kept thinking about what Al said, and I kept asking," Colletti said.
DID YOU KEEP THINKING ABOUT HOW HE WAS THEIR 2005 MINOR LEAGUE PLAYER OF THE YEAR?
When the A's wanted the Dodgers to add infielder Antonio Perez to the trade, LaMacchia again pushed Ethier, telling Colletti that the kid had a chance to be better than Bradley or Perez.
"The A's finally gave in, and we got what we wanted," said Colletti.
Did they ever. While the A's received two serviceable players who have probably reached their peak, the Dodgers received a possible rookie of the year.
A PREDICTION ONE MIGHT HAVE ARRIVED AT, KNOWING HIS MINOR LEAGUE STATS, AS WELL AS HIS FIRST-PLACE FINISH IN THE RACE TO BE THE OAKLAND A'S 2005 MINOR LEAGUE PLAYER OF THE YEAR.
Before Tuesday, Ethier led all National League rookies in batting average (.333), on-base percentage (.390) and slugging percentage (.557).
He also has an old buddy who still occasionally calls him on the cellphone and reminds him to take what they give him.
From his San Antonio home this week, LaMacchia sighed.
"I am so grateful somebody still listens to me," he said.
From the Dodgers' clubhouse Tuesday, Ethier smiled.
"Everyone thinks they do all these analyses before they make a trade, but, in the end, I'm a Dodger because of that crazy old man," he said. "I can't thank him enough."
YOU WOULD HAVE BEEN AN OAKLAND A IF HE HADN'T TRADED FOR YOU, AND YOUR TEAM WOULD HAVE A BETTER RECORD.
Once and for all:
I don't think -- NO ONE THINKS -- that scouts are worthless. EVERYONE who watches baseball and knows about baseball knows the value of scouting. It has value. Okay? It has value. It can tell you things about a player's constitution, and hustle, and all that stuff, which is definitely important.
But what has as much, if not more, value -- in nearly every single fucking possible scenario -- is the analysis of statistical information.
If you seek to invalidate the use of statistical analysis...if you denigrate it, mock it, or look down your nose at it...if you write terrible mock-poetry articles declaring the objective superiority of gut instinct and old-fashioned "stare tests" over numbers-based research...then you are a far bigger snob, a far bigger ignoramus, and a far more provincial person than those whom you target with tripe like this.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to drive 1600 miles on a pack mule to St. Louis so I can give Albert Pujols a little look-see. Want to be able to speak up tomorrow when the Boss Man asks me if we should try to trade for 'im.
1. Very special thanks to reader Bryan for the tip. 2. The title of this post, if you're curious, refers to Plaschke's article, and not my feelings about my own writing. 3. My feelings abot my own writing are nearly always: "...eh."
Before people get all hot and bothered about Greg Maddux, let's consider sample size. So far with the Dodgers, this is what Maddux has done in three starts:
20 IP, 2 ER, 9 K, 4 BB
Pretty damn good. But wait. Let's take a look at Maddux' first four starts this season with the Cubs:
27.1 IP, 3 ER, 18 K, 5 BB
Remember, dude was 5-0 with a 1.35 ERA in April. This year. Then the wheels totally fell off, with ERAs of 5.94, 6.25, and 5.21 in the next three months.
