April 19, 2008

FJM Sentence Of The Day

Junior:
[E]very time Derek Jeter high fives a teammate, an orphan gets a tube of Rolos.
Bonus:
When I was a kid, people only cared about wins and losses. Now everyone is a nerd who loves weird stats and hates baseball. Please, all of you who have this thought, listen to me. Please. Here we go.

There have always been statistics in baseball. Always. Statistics like WHIP and VORP and OPS are better than the old statistics, because they give you more actual pertinent information. This is not up for debate. If you don't like these stats, don't use them. But don't tell me that they aren't interesting or good.

I just don't get it, man. No one ever said: "When I was a kid, if we were going to cut off your leg we'd give you a shot of whiskey and a rope to bite down on, and we'd just take a dirty hacksaw and just hack away, outside, on the ground. Why do all these nerds keep talking about 'anaesthesia' and 'sterilization?!'"

5 comments:

andy said...

Holy F.

Last night should go down as a Timlin Save. Yes normally saves are 2-3 runs but sometimes that 2-3 runs for a normal pitcher is worth 8 Timlin runs.

andy said...

After the grand slam I imagined the youngsters all hanging from Papi's arms like children playing with their uncle.

andy said...

From the article they referenced about DIPS:

But -- other than some knuckleballers -- they don’t seem to be able to control with any consistency how many hits they give up when the ball is put into play.

allan said...

But -- other than some knuckleballers -- they don't seem to be able to control with any consistency how many hits they give up when the ball is put into play.

Right, no consistency to BABIP (batting average on balls in play) which is why strikeouts (and K:BB ratio too) are important.

One big reason why Dumbo will regress this year -- his BABIP was really high last year. Very lucky hitting which will most likely not be sustained.

allan said...

At the other end of the luck scale we've got Ortiz.

His BABIP this year is only .135.

In the past:
2003 - .292
2004 - .322
2005 - .303
2006 - .270
2007 - .355
Career - .305

The hits should start falling for Flo, if only due to good old random chance.