MLB Pseudo-Season 2020: Roger, Dodgers

Stats are always a good means of evaluation, but it's just gone too far. If you need an entire department of Sabremetrics nerds, it's too far. And I say that as a Cubs fan. It's not their only problem by far, but it's up there.

 

Today I heard two more sports talk people (1 Brit, 1 American) bitch about VAR/replay. Both wanted to get rid of replay entirely. I'm not a fan of replay, not the concept which is fine, but the way it is used. If they would adhere to the concept of correcting "clear and obvious errors" it would be fine. In other words, like about 90% of the replays used in baseball, a few seconds look should establish whether or not an error was committed by an official. If it takes too long and many looks at the replay then, by definition, it is neither clear nor obvious. Don't dump replay - just use it correctly.

 

Every time the Astros go on the road, I'd like to see fans in every park bring and bang trash can lids. That would be awesome. Of course, it would never happen because I don't think they'd let people in the park carrying trash can lids but it would be funny as hell if they did

 

These days you can just use your phone to play the sound of trash can lids being hit together and make the same sound.


Jason

 

I have a real question for all you SABRmetricians. I was arguing with a buddy about the careers of Mike Schmidt (my choice as all-time 3B) and Chipper Jones ( his choice). I was amazed to find in Baseball-Reference that, except for HR, In every statistic, OBA, RBI, hits, OPS, slugging avg, fielding avg, regular and post-season, literally every stat except HR Chipper is ahead of Schmidt. And yet, Schmidt has a 20-win higher career WAR. Can someone un-confuse me?

 

I think part of it is era-dependent. Essentially, Schmidt that much better player than the other players in his era. Once again, I'm someone on the outside looking in, with limited experience with analytics. Jones also played in more of a hitters era than Schmidt did.

 

Nowhere near as loud as the real thing, you'd need the PA guy's help.

Maybe when the Astros go on the road, the home park can play that for their walk-up music?

 

So that "weighted" thing?

 

I would think. But I'm no expert. If third basemen of his era weren't as overall productive, it would make Schmidt's WAR that much more impressive.

 

So the Astros have a black eye now. We kept the Yankees out of the world series twice in the last three years, I would think there'd be some small amount of appreciation for that. LOL

And I'm pretty blase about the whole cheating thing. Yes, it was wrong, and yes they should have punished some of the players, and yes the Astros organization should have probably taken a bigger hit. But whatever.

I'm old, senile, stoned most of the time, and don't have time for guilt. I hope the Astros kick all yalls teams asses this year. With or without garbage cans.

 

David Ross, new Cubs manager, made an interesting point this morning on Golic & Wingo. He is for taking away the 2017 World Championship from the Astros. He cites the Olympic games where cheaters are stripped of their medals and banned. I'm not sure whether I agree with him or not. Where do you draw the line? What level does cheating have to reach before you start taking away trophies and titles. Interesting thought by Ross, though.

 

I'd say when you're conspiring to cheat at an organizational level (players, coaches, front office), then I tend to think that the trophy should be taken away. Crane should have also been banned for a year for lack of organizational control. If he didn't know it was going on, that's on him for not being more involved. If he did know it was going on, well, then he should be handed a stiff punishment.

 

Watched Northeastern U take on the Red Sox today. Heavy sigh. I've really missed the games.

 

Well, at least you're honest.

 

Mike Fiers says he has received death threats after exposing the Astros.

 

Interesting. The defensive butcher, Jones, had a higher fielding avg. at 3B than Schmidt. Jones committed 243 errors in 19 seasons (5595 chances) and Schmidt committed 328 errors in 18 seasons (8357 chances) and he played a lot on artificial turf as opposed to Jones playing a lot on a multi-purpose grass field. 243 error in 19 seasons equates to an average of 13 errors per season. I'll take that for any infield position.

 

Yeah, but it's still awful. At least Fiers isn't letting it get to him.