Monday, January 26, 2009

On the Science of General Managing

I was talking to a friend during lunch, and the topic of baseball management came up (actually, this is a fairly common topic, so I wouldn't say it just "came up"). He said that, were he a GM, he would only sign pitchers to two or three year deals. This lead to a discussion on what the best strategy, generally, for a franchise would be.

So I've been thinking about this for the past few hours, and here's what I'd do.

1) If given the option to build a new stadium, or to renovate my current one, I would prefer a pitcher-favored design. The Astrodome was the perfect example of this. This does two things: first, it allows me to hire and develop pitchers who may not be very good in a more hitter-friendly environment, but whose fly-ball pitching excels in a pitcher-friendly park. This means that I can exploit something of a market inefficiency by favoring a special kind of (otherwise poor) pitcher. Second, it kills power numbers. I neutralize my power-hitting rivals' main advantage. Of course, this also hurts me. But that brings me to point two:

2) In the draft, as well as in free agency, I would favor non-power hitters. In general, I want hitters who get on base by walking and hitting singles and doubles. I want Tony Gwynn, Wade Boggs, and Craig Biggio types. My opponents might not hit very well in my park, but my hitters will. Power hitters are great (and I'm not saying one should neglect power hitting totally), but batting average and on-base-percentage is even better. The goal here is not speed (speed's great, but only a plus) but an ability to punch the ball into the outfield and get on base. It's a sadly dying breed of hitting, and I think there would certainly be a value in selecting for those players who can do that.

3) I would construct a defense-oriented team. There was an interesting article at THT a few weeks ago, and one of its claims (backed up by statistical analysis) was that the price for a marginal Run Saved is nearly half that of a marginal Run Scored.

Now, you might point out (as I did) that this doesn't make any sense because a run scored and a run saved do the same thing. But - and here's the extra-interesting part - a run scored is worth less than a run saved (this, of course, makes intuitive sense, but it's something that I've found many people don't realize).

So I think that a primary focus of the club should be defense. I'm not saying that I'd want eight Adam Everetts out there, but good defense would be a major goal. This would help to bail out my cheaper pitching staff.

Anyways, that's my view of good baseball organizational goals. They exploit major market inefficiences and create comparative advantages for the club, and I think any team would be wise to adopt such a position.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

We've got a new president, everybody!

So the CBS commentators (why do we need commentators for the inauguration?) drew this parrallel between Obama/Biden and Kennedy/Johnson. I find the whole idea idiotic, myself. The only analogy one can draw there is between Obama and LBJ. I also liked how they talked about Johnson being a "political" choice (those of us in the South don't cotton to Yankees, you see), which is true, but it fails to point out that one of the many reasons Kennedy didn't want Johnson as VP was because of the Texan's rabid support for civil rights legislation. LBJ was awesome and Kennedy was a spoiled fuck.

Anyways, I can't really get into this whole Obama-hysteria that swept the American "left" over the past two years. Obama will probably be a good president, but that will depend upon his responses to the coming problems in the world (hopefully he can do it better than his recital of the oath of office).

Obama is going to be faced with an increasingly belligerant (and well-armed) Iran, numerous human-rights crises throughout Africa and the Middle East, and an imperialistic Russia willing to use its oil supplies to secure its interests in Europe. Ultimately, Obama must be judged (as all presidents should be judged) by his ability to spread America's causes (human rights, democracy, human welfare) overseas.

It strikes me as odd that Obama talks about how it is his goal to see the ideal of "all are created equal" accomplished. It seems to me that the left has, over the past few decades, totally abandoned this cause. The cause of universal human rights seems to be lost to both the American and international left. Human rights are advanced within the first-world, but the cause is abandoned whenever it impacts a pet cause. This was displayed fragrantly throughout the Iraq affair (human rights are great for prisoners in Guantanomo, but the Kurds and Shia in Iraq can go to hell).

Maybe it was the association with Bush that did Iraq's human rights cause in. Maybe an association with Obama will make liberal internationalism a renewed cause. But I doubt it.

I don't think Obama's talk of a "new political age" is true at all. The political rules ("Whatever the other side does is automatically wrong") that governed the past two-hundred years still hold.

I suppose that is what is most concerning about Obama's coming term. I worry that he talks about liberal causes, but that he's not willing to back it up with force. I worry that he'll abandon the Kurds to the Turks or the Afghanis to the religious fanatics. Still, I hope that he's willing to fight for those causes, rather than simply talk about it.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Eat shit, you inbred, moonshine-drinking, cousin-touching, franchise-stealing fucks.


Choke on a dick, Bud.

I'm rooting for the Chargers tomorrow. Two reasons: first, the Steelers and their asshole fans make me want to kill myself. Second, I really want an epic "Battle of the Shits" between San Diego and Arizona. I want an 8-8 team to win the fucking championship. Epic.

Fun with bullshit

So I'm leaving this afternoon for New Orleans. Good times.

Fanhouse has always been a source for hilarious commenters (not in the Deadspin sense - in the "Kids say the darndest things" sense), and it has gotten really great now that Mariotti has started "writing" for them (yeah, you left a "dying medium" for AOL. Great job there, Jay), so it's a great place to go if you have crippling self-esteem issues. Nothing cheers me up quite like a retard on the internet.

From the latest made-up crap on Andy Pettitte (we're not going to sign him, folks... Not for the money he wants. For that matter, I really doubt anybody but the Yankees can/will pay him the amount of money he wants.), we get "Rich LaCava":

As a big time Yankee fan, I say good riddance to Andy and don't let the locker room door hit you in the ass on the way out. You are a so so pitcher who has always had so so seasons on both the Yankees and Astros and probably will not even get into the Hall of Fame.
Yeah! That bum! He probably won't even get into Cooperstown!

How skewed must your worldview be if you think that, in order for someone to not qualify for "sucks" status, he has to be among the ten or so best players/plumbers/pandas of his generation?

Anyways, he has something of a point (stated in the most idiotic, asinine way possible). Andy Pettitte is an overrated pitcher. Now, I think that "overrated" tends to get tossed around quite a bit, and it's used generally as a way to say "sucks" without any evidence, but the man really is overvalued as a pitcher.

In the seasons during which he received Cy Young votes (1996, '97, 2000, '03, '05), only Pettitte's 2005 season is really "legendary" (and he only placed 5th that year! I've talked about this before, I think, but mostly about how Clemens had a good case for winning another CYA that season. Pettitte arguably had a better year in 2005 than either of his higher-placing teammates. Oswalt put up the highest ERA and WHIP of the Clemens-Pettitte-Oswalt tandem, but placed 4th in CY voting. Clemens, of course, led the league in ERA and was behind only Martinez in WHIP [though he was #1 in H/9IP], but he pitched 11 fewer innings that Andy. Anyways, the point is that, if you look at Pettitte's year, it was fucking fantastic). All his other seasons were either "merely" great (1997 was a great year: 155 ERA+) or pretty average-to-good.

But people place a large value on "wins," so Pettitte is rated fairly highly.

Pettitte will probably make the hall of fame, particularly if he pitches decently over the next few seasons, but it will mostly be on the strength of his championships, occasional greatness, and being a Yankee.

Still, it's total bullshit that a Yankees "fan" hates on the guy like that. He wants way too much money to be an average pitcher next year, but he'll get the job done. Fanhouse (with the exception of Texans blogger Stephaney Stradley) can go eat a dick.

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Somebody figures it out

Congratulations, Solomon, you are (once again) the Chronicle's resident non-retard. You're right about McGrady, Utah, and the Longhorns (USC, too).

Monday, January 5, 2009

Christ, people, get a grip...

It's amazing to me that so many Rockets fans have apparently lost all hold on reality after the Toronto loss. McGrady quits on one possession and he suddenly becomes the team cancer. Rafer says that they need T-Mac and Artest to get healthy and Adelman has lost all control of the team. A few days after the loss, "nothing management has done has worked." Jesus.

Get over it, y'all. The Rockets will be alright. Sometimes it's best not to take it "one game at a time," and to remember that it's a long season. T-Mac sucks right now. He won't a month from now.

Saturday, January 3, 2009

Comparative Advantage, Mike Leach, and Duane Brown

Duane Brown is getting better. He's becoming more and more adept at the Texans' offensive-line system, and that is becoming more and more evident in his play.

At the time of the draft, many thought Brown was a bit of a stretch for the Texans. But, as was noted by at least one writer at the time, Alex Gibbs values a different type of lineman than do other teams. He wants more athletic linemen - those best suited to his zone-blocking scheme - rather than larger, more powerful players. So valuing Brown more highly than other teams allowed the Texans to trade down.

Tom Kirkendall has criticized Mike Leach for not being quite as awesome as the media seem to think he is. I think he makes an excellent point - Leach really hasn't accomplished much, and it seems stupid to say that Leach's offensive system is the magic everyone believes it to be.

Perhaps there is a misunderstanding (amongst both the media and coaches) about what the spread offense can accomplish, as well as what it is designed to do.

I don't think that we can reasonably say the spread offense gives a substantial advantage over the best defenses in either the NCAA or NFL. Good defenses will do well against any offense, regardless of how many five receiver plays you bring out.

But what the spread offense does is level the playing field somewhat. It allows college recruiters to value speed and skill over size and power (particularly in running backs), while the even more unconventional spread option offenses of Rich Rodriguez and his ilk allows coaches to use glorified running backs under center. The top recruits are still going to go to schools like USC, OSU, UT, etc., but spread offenses allowed schools like Tulane to briefly compete.

The key was not that spread offenses offered a spectacular advantage on the field - they offered a spectacular advantage in recruiting, because one could select athletes who could run the "system," rather than the blue-chip recruits out of high school who were destined to go to one of the powerhouses.

Of course, now that spread offenses have been run by the largest schools in every conference (the SEC seems to be made up mostly of such offenses), there isn't such an advantage anymore. At least not for Tech.But look at how Tulsa and Rice dominated Conference USA this past year. Bob Toledo can't possibly hope to recruit the type of athletes he needs to run his standard, West-Coast offense and win (Matt Forte was a fluke created by LSU's recruiting priorities and family history). Those athletes are going to go elsewhere. Meanwhile, Rice, Tulsa, and Southern Miss will kick his ass again and again.

So this brings me back to Duane Brown. The Texans don't have to worry about recruiting. The NFL has the draft, so they get to select essentially whomever they want to play on their offensive line.

But the zone-blocking system (shared only by the Redskins, Panthers, Packers, and - of course - the Broncos) allows the Texans to select smaller linemen, exploiting the same type of market inefficiency that the spread offense was designed to exploit: find undersized but agile players and put them to work. That system turned the much-maligned Texans offensive line into a very good set of blockers, and made the tiny Steve Slaton into the league's leading rookie halfback.

This was what "Moneyball" supposedly did (and does). You look for players who can do something very well but who have been, for whatever reason, overlooked by other scouts and organizations. Billy Beane looked for players who could work the count. Mike Shanahan looked for running backs who could make a quick cut and get downfield.

The intersting thing to me is whether or not the spread offense would give any advantage in the NFL. As I said, I doubt it will be any better at picking apart defenses than the West-Coast or conventional offense. At the same time, however, I don't think (like so many pundits) that such a system would fall apart in the NFL from turnovers. Like any offensive system, it requires a quarterback that makes good decisions and can recognize what his coach and coordinator tells him to recognize from the defense.

So what if a team adopted the spread this offseason? I have no idea which teams would be best suited to such a system, but that's not really the point.

In the first round, they really should obey the same principles as everyone else: build your offensive and defensive lines first, then work outwards. The situation doesn't become interesting until about the third round, when you start to see guys like Pat White or Tebow present.

Now, I'm no NFL scout, so I have no idea if Tebow or White can really make decent NFL quarterbacks, even in a spread attack. But both are probably going to enter the draft as something other than QB (TE and WR, respectively). That means you can get them at a good price, and (provided they can work in the NFL) you have someone who can run the new system.

Maybe the same can apply to wide receivers. Tom Brady and the Patriots made use of much worse WRs than Welker and Moss for years, and I think the same types can be used in a full spread attack.

Again, the point isn't to destroy defenses - it can't do that. But the spread offense would confer the same type of advantage that it does for smaller NCAA programs: find guys nobody else wants and use them in your system.

Besides, if nothing else, the run-and-shoot was awesome back in the day. Shame nobody uses its succesor in the NFL.

Don't point the finger

Okay, that's enough stewing over the issues. Let's get down to some (weak) analysis.

I hope that, when I get a real job, my entire tenure with an organization is not evaluated based upon one day's work. I hope that my coworkers, supervisors, and anybody who's looking can look at the body of work I've put together.

I think that (probably) T-Mac's superiors and teammates do that. Yao, Battier, Artest, and the rest all know that McGrady is one of the league's best. He's having a bad year, but he proved that he's a real competitor a long time ago. Morey and Adelman will look at all of his performances.

But Houston's shitty media isn't doing that. They are jumping on one bad night - and one particularly awful possession - and announcing that T-Mac is killing the Rockets.

Yeah, McGrady has had an awful season. There's no getting around that. But his failures this year have been brought on - largely, anyways - by poor health, not poor effort.

So we have the three amigos - Dick Justice, Jonathon Feigen (whom I can tolerate), and Fran Blinebury (whom I still believe is responsible for that tacky "T-Mac injury counter" featured prominently on the Chronicle's site) - all weighing in.

Blinebury is the most idiotic of the bunch, to tell the truth. He's had it in for T-Mac before, and this is the perfect opportunity to crucify the guy who carried the team last year. Let's fisk this shit:

The official play-by-play sheet simply says: Jamario Moon slam dunk.

Anybody who was watching at the Air Canada Centre or on TV knows it was the precise moment that Tracy McGrady quit on the Rockets.

Well, it was certainly a moment in which T-Mac just let Moon through. But, at this point, you're just asserting that McGrady "quit" (on the season and the Rockets as a whole). I doubt Blinebury has that sort of insight into T-Mac's head.

Yao Ming knows it. You could read it all over his scowling face as he sat on the bench through the final embarrassing minutes of horrid game.

Yao looked like he always does. He was a little extra frustrated, but he sucked last night, too. So maybe he was just generally pissed.

Rick Adelman knows it. You could read it between the lines of his post-game comments when he said he would not talk about any individual performances.

Adelman was pissed about everything and everyone. To quote from his comments last night about offensive execution: "there wasn't any." I doubt Adelman thought T-Mac's performance was any more shitty than anyone else.

Ron Artest knows it. You could tell that a week ago when Artest dragged his sore and ballooning right ankle onto the court to gut out an overtime win against the Jazz when McGrady made himself a late scratch during the post parade.

Okay. Here's the thing: Rockets fans and writers don't know what they fucking want from Tracy. We want him to rest his knee, but then we get all pissed off when he actually does so. What Artest did was great, and I hope he can shake McGrady out of his funk, but maybe Blinebury should MAKE UP HIS FUCKING MIND about what he wants McGrady to do before criticizing his every action regarding injury.

One could hope that Dikembe Mutombo was back in Houston watching and will arrive in Atlanta with his leadership in the form of a big stick.

Truth be told, it wouldn't make a difference, wouldn't matter. It would only elicit a few more whimpering excuses from McGrady and more disappointment down the line.

Jesus, Blinebury, tell us how you really feel. Look, if you're dissapointed with T-Mac's stay in Houston, you haven't been paying attention. Remember last year? When Yao went out? When, in the final game of the Jazz series, he scored 40 points but still couldn't get the Rockets past the first round? Fuck you, Blinebury. This is like complaining about how Bagwell couldn't play in most of 2005. Only nobody would do that, because Bags is white.

As I said, he's in a shooting slump and he's battling injury. But y'all complain when he scratches himself from the lineup and complain when he doesn't. Get over it.

Oh, it was so much more than just 2-for-9 shooting and 4 points in 27 minutes. It was aimless shuffling around the court on offense and defense. It was standing five feet behind the 3-point line, feet rooted to one spot, and simply playing pitch and catch with the ball.

That was ONE FREAKING POSSESSION! Fucking Christ, what the fuck?

Just say this: He is an extraordinary talent - T-Mac - who is capable of taking your breath away. Yet as a competitor - Tiny Tim-mac - he can be blown away in a gentle breeze.

Ack! Utah! 40 points! McGrady over Shawn Bradley! Winning streak! Goddammit you fucks, pay attention! He's a competitor, and anyone who says differently isn't watching.

This is not the first time that McGrady has revealed himself, having bailed out on the Raptors as an up-and-coming phenom and quit - flat-out admitting publicly that he didn't try - on the Magic to get himself traded out of Orlando.

Yeah, Orlando sucked. I'd want to get out of that team, too. And what are you saying, that he wants out of Houston? Because this is probably his best chance to win anything, and he knows it.

If McGrady wants to rehab his sore left knee or run off to a retreat and get his chakras back in balance, let him. If he wants to return to the club somewhere down the road in a few weeks or few months and contribute a few - or a few dozen - big buckets in a playoff game, well, they'll be appreciated. But they won't be expected.

And if he did that, you'd bitch about that, too. Fuck you.

I don't have time to go through all of this shit. Justice's post is more of the same (including the ridiculous idea that Luther Head plays better when T-Mac is out; even if that's true, he still sucks). However, he comes off as downright reasonable at the end - this isn't the end of the world, and McGrady can still get healthy.

Feigen's column at least has this tidbit:

He said later that he grew frustrated that he did not get enough shots to get in a rhythm. He said the spacing was bad. He said there was poor execution.

I think that this is probably closer to the truth. McGrady, frustrated by the fact that EVERYONE on the team was getting owned, gave up. That's not excusable, but it's understandable. It would be an example of the "If y'all aren't going to do your jobs, I'm not going to do mine" attitude, which can motivate if used correctly.

One last thing: a response from Feigen's post.

I really wish they had blown it up and started over around Yao.
The team is built around Yao already. T-Mac and Yao continue to have good chemistry, and no one else on the team is quite as good as McGrady at getting the ball to Yao in the post. Yao is the machine around which the Rockets are built; everything else is ancillary. Yao is the Rockets' most important possession - on the court, as well as in getting crucial deals in China. Everybody else is in place to either do things Yao can't do or to get the ball to him. T-Mac, when healthy, does both.

We'll see what happens in coming weeks. My bet: T-Mac gets better and comes back strong.

We're like a fucking Hyperbola

Midway through the first quarter, when the Texans were down 10-0 and it looked like (once again) the Texans were headed for a losing season, I had to leave. That wasn't from disgust - I was going on a trip with some friends for a few days. I didn't find out that the Texans had won (and by a relatively large margin, too!) until that evening. Given the kind of shit talking done by the resident Cubs fans on Fark, I was very, very pleased. Chicago fans are some of the biggest dickbags around, and (despite the presence of Matt Forte) I'm glad the Texans were able to show them what for. Welcome to Clutch City, bitches.

An even greater present was Indy's shutout of the Titans. If the shitfuckers' second-string is that awful, they're going to have some major problems going into the playoffs. Here's to seeing them get blown the fuck out a week from now. But the crowning jewel of the games was the Cowboys' 44-6 asshanding from Philly. Goddamn that was beautiful.

But the greatest news of all wouldn't come for a few days. Richard Smith was finally put out of his misery, as were the Texans' defensive line and backs coaches. Fan-fucking-tastic, and it only came a full year after it was painfully obvious to every Texan fan with a fucking brain that Houston's defensive playcalling was absolutely putrid.

So things are looking up, I suppose. Dunta and Owen Daniels are up for free agency, and Slaton will likely hold out for a new contract (and rightly so). He's the NFL's leading rookie rusher, and he (get this) leads EVERYONE IN THE FREAKING NFL in yardage from scrimmage. He deserves a new contract.

The Rockets continue to bewilder me. I saw the awesome Jazz game, where Yao (this isn't news) got murdered by the refs and Ron Artest put the team on his back in overtime. Artest showed a lot of (gah I hate to say it) heart out there, and it was impressive to see someone give that much effort when the shots weren't falling and the refs had been killing his team. Heat of a champion stuff from Artest that night.

But then I watched the Toronto game (we were 21-12 going in; someone call Neil Peart) and saw T-Mac just GIVE THE FUCK UP in the 3rd quarter. He stood at midcourt, lazily passing the ball to someone else as soon as he touched it.

Now, we can't see into Tracy's head. Maybe that was him sending a message to everyone else, but everyone else on the court and on the team - Yao, Artest, and Scola, especially - seemed to be trying. The shots didn't fall, but they were still going for the rebound and the steal and attempting to get something started.

I don't like to criticize T-Mac. The dude is awesome most of the time. But that was a pitiful effort, and it was made to look all the worse when Von Wafer stepped into the game and played his heart out. That's probably because he knew that was his opportunity to get more playing time, replacing Luther Head as back-up, but it was still impressive. He was the Rockets' leading scorer for the game, despite only playing a quarter.

I'll probably have more thoughts on this later, but last night's performance was just too ridiculously awful to comprehend right away. On the bright side, Deke rejoins the Rockets tonight in Atlanta.