Sunday, September 21, 2008

When Idiotic Baseball Broadcasters Attack

Buck Martinez and Chip Caray wax idiotic on the perils of taking pitches. Is it a requirement of an "old school" guy like Martinez to dump on Moneyball during every broadcast? It must be in their contracts. "Moneyball bad...taking pitches bad...must be aggressive...I am a zombie..." Of course, he has probably never the read the book. At least he didn't say Billy Beane wrote it (like Joe Morgan). Alas, the reason for Toronto's turnaround this year? The hitters are being aggressive, therefore their batting averages have gone up. "Right here you don't want Lyle Overbay to walk because he can't steal a base, you want him to hit a double." Er, Buck, can't we say that about any hitter? Isn't a runner on 2nd ALWAYS better than a runner on 1st? Oh, i forgot, a player with speed ALWAYS steals 2nd base, so i guess it's okay if those guys walk. What if a pitcher isn't throwing strikes like Matsuzaka today? You still swing at pitches out of the strike zone, like Rolen and Snider did to end the inning with runners on 1st and 3rd.

Chip's brilliant interjection: the winner of the game isn't the team with the higher on base percentage, it's the team that scores the most runs. Thanks Chip...and you are A MORON. The poster child for nepotism (though still following in his MORONIC relatives' footsteps). Let's see, yes, there is no correlation between base runners and runs scored. That's what these two idiots are saying. It's all about CLUTCH-HITTING! Well, let's look at the runs leaders in the AL. Texas and Boston. You know what category they also lead the league in? On base percentage (2nd and 1st). They also rank 3rd and 1st in walks, respectively. What team is last in the AL in runs and OBP? The Moneyball team itself, Oakland! (Maybe Billy Beane should re-read the book he wrote.) I'm going to go way out on a limb here: teams with more base runners score more runs. Go ahead, call me crazy. I also believe in evolution and global warming.

Perhaps Toronto's W-L record under Gaston is more related to allowing the fewest runs in the league and not being "aggressive at the plate."
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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

You just don't get it do you?

Smiff said...

No, I guess I don't.

Sarge said...

Man, so you're trying to say that allowing fewer runs can also lead to victories?

Even if you don't score a lot? Because you don't clutch hit enough?

I mean, the team that scores more wins. So pitching is important and all I guess in that if a pitcher can bulldog his way through for a complete game you can save your bullpen...but really, I think you have to score more. And that means hitting behind the runner and being aggressive.