Every year, the geeks, nerds and losers at Baseball Prospectus take a break from playing Dungeons and Dragons, and decide to make asinine predictions about the upcoming baseball season. These predictions are based on several sets of sabermetric algorithms that are meant to predict a player's performance, therefore eliminating everything that makes baseball, BASEBALL.

Oh no! How can you label what a mathematical genius does as asinine? With great ease, actually.

My fellow fans, I'll let you in on a little secret: PECOTA doesn't stand for what the title of this blog post says it does. Though my title is an accurate description of what it is, PECOTA really stands for: Player Empirical Comparison and Optimization Test Algorithm.

Yeah. How about I tell you nerds what to do with your PECOTA?

Apparently, while I was sleeping, Major League Baseball became a sport played by computers and not by humans. It must be so if the entire sport runs on a bunch of algorithms.

Ladies and gentlemen, tonight's batting lineup:

SS - BlackBerry

DH - iPhone

1B - iPod Touch

3B  - Motorola Droid

C   - MacBook Pro

CF - Toshiba

RF - Nintendo Wii

2B - XBOX 360

LF - iPad

Actually, I think I'll bat the XBOX after the Droid. The MacBook isn't providing sufficient protection anymore.

 

Stat Zombies in general piss me off (and a lot of them are probably reading this blog right now - I'm so scared! Please don't come after me with your TI-83's and pocket protectors!).

 Everything, just everything, is about statistics to them. Players aren't human, they're numerical models. They're walking, talking, eating, sleeping, and breathing numbers. Athletes are incapable of having career years, hot or cold streaks, or even mental problems. Players are incapable of choking under pressure, or even being clutch. Every single statistic or number these players put up shapes who they are, and how they will be in the future.

Where do I even begin to tackle this stupidity?

 If you haven't seen them yet, click HERE to check out the Baseball Prospectus PECOTA Depth Charts.

 

Do I even need to point out how ridiculous these predictions are? Until these dorks put down their calculators and pick up a bat or glove, I refuse to take anything they have to say seriously. Do these zombies really think that their predictions hold any degree of truth and accuracy? Let me tell you, any match between PECOTA and reality is purely coincidental.

I'm not sure what pisses me off more: the fact that the Stat Zombies keep believing these predictions will come true, or the fact that they probably don't watch any baseball because they're too busy tweaking algorithms. They must not watch any baseball, because they don't seem to realize that their accuracy percentage among predictions is worse than Johnny Damon's fielding percentage among left fielders. Much worse.

Furthermore, these Stat-Monkeys seem to have the memory span of goldfish. A player could have a horrible career then have one career year and suddenly he's the second-coming of Babe Ruth. Have these nerds not expanded their memory chips? Are they incapable of remembering these guys in a game dating back to over a year ago? I'm not just talking about the Baseball Prospectus losers behind PECOTA, I'm also talking about the idiots who actually believe in these statistics.

While real baseball fans live and die by every pitch and every hit, Stat Zombies live and die by every statistic and every numerical trend. If baseball was truly run by algorithms, don't you think that Japan would have better baseball leagues than America? No one creates better algorithms than the Japanese. I'm not being racist, I'm just stating facts. If baseball ran on algorithms, then Kei Igawa would have been the second-coming of Cy Young.

Give me a break.

You may think that I'm only ranting about this because PECOTA Depth Charts show the Yankees in third place in the AL East. That's not true. The actual predictions are irrelevant. I'd be ranting and raving even if these idiots predicted that the Yankees' record in 2010 would be 162-0.

The predictions make no difference to me whatsoever. First of all, I don't take any prediction made before spring training seriously. Secondly, I don't care how good they are in the world of Mathematics, these Stat Zombies are idiots when it comes to baseball. When you remove the most important factor about an athlete, the human factor, you are an idiot. If players weren't human then there would be no need for the Disabled List. There would be no point in even watching a game, because we would all know the outcome. Betting on a game wouldn't be gambling, and we'd all be able to make a lot of money and live happily ever after. I'm not angry about the actual predictions. I simply don't care about them. My beef is with these people degrading the sport of baseball, and lowering it to the level of mere numbers. That is what I have a problem with.

Another thing I have a problem with is that Stat Zombies are feeding the baseball-ignorance that exists among fans today. Not only the zombies at Baseball Prospectus, but also several "analysts" who seem to base everything they say on statistics, rather than thinking for themselves. These so-called analysts feed information to the public and brainwash the masses into thinking that baseball is all about numbers. While numbers in baseball do play a significant role, it is completely idiotic to think that they play the most vital role. That is why predictions like the ones on the PECOTA Depth Charts annoy me. Not because of the projections, but because of their effects on the minds of ignorant fans.

The morons behind PECOTA have a deep understanding of statistics and mathematical models, but their understanding of baseball as a sport is as shallow as the water in a puddle on a flat surface. Guess what, Stat Zombies, there's more to baseball than numerical trends. Sorry for the rude awakening, but maybe you should put your calculators down and step away from Google for a few minutes, and realize that statistics do not make the player. Numbers do not make the team.

 

So, what do I think of PECOTA? Baseball Prospectus can go choke on one.

 

• • • You can also find my blog post on 161st-and-river.com • • •

 

Well, my fellow Yankees fans, I think it's safe to put the tombstone on Johnny Damon's Yankee Years.

 

At the beginning of the off-season, I wanted Johnny Damon back. I wanted him back for his hitting, his base-running, and for his generally nice attitude. Then, as the winter rolled by, Johnny started to get a little greedy. Honestly, I didn't expect anything less from a Scott Boras client.

 

While all the Damon-lovers out there would like to blame this on Boras, Johnny is pretty much the one at fault here. At the end of the day, if he wanted to come back to the Yankees for the price at which he is worth to the Yankees, he would have told Boras to put a sock in it. We seem to forget that sports agents work for the players; the players do not work for the sports agents.

 

I'm not exactly a huge fan of Scott Boras, but I must admit that he's good at his job. He's an intelligent, business-minded man, who usually gets his clients as much money as possible. He's a successful sports agent. This leads me to whole-heartedly believe that Johnny Damon only has himself to blame here.

 

I highly doubt that Boras is behind this. I can't seem to imagine that anyone who went to business school (or even took a business course) would screw up this much. 

 

At the beginning of this offseason, it was clear to me that the Yankees were looking to bring back Andy Pettitte and Johnny Damon, while letting go of Hideki Matsui (I blogged about it in November). So, they brought Andy back and let Godzilla walk.

 

From then on, all eyes were on Johnny Damon.

 

So what did Damon and Boras do? They began with their demands. First, they demanded a multi-year contract. Second, they demanded that there be no pay-cut. Third, they were basically told to f*** off.

 

The Yankees reportedly made an offer of 2 years and $14-million. Damon/Boras declined it. I knew that they would soon regret saying no. Let's think about it for a minute: the key to successful business negotiations is knowing what your product is worth, be it physical worth or otherwise. Damon, to the Yankees, was not worth more than $7-million a year. At the time, the Yankees clearly had the upper hand in the negotiations, as there were still plenty of outfielders on the market.

 

When Johnny declined this offer, the Yankees went on to trade for Curtis Granderson. This was the first nail in Damon's coffin.

 

Negotiations with Johnny Damon were still going on after the Granderson deal. Obviously, with the Grand Acquisition (sorry for the cheesy pun) Damon's value to the Yankees went down. They now could survive without Damon in left field, because they had enough outfielders. I don't know if any new offers were made, but I'm assuming Johnny and, in turn, Scott stood their ground.

 

Smart. Real smart.

 

So, what did the Yankees do? They acquired Nick Johnson. That was the second nail in Johnny's coffin.

 

After securing an outfielder, they acquired a hitter with an amazing OBP. Why did they do that? To secure a top-of-the-order hitter, eliminating the need for Johnny Damon. Although the 'need' was eliminated, I suspected that the 'want' was still there. The 'want', however, was on Yankee terms. 

 

Things were quiet on the Damon front for a while. We had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, and still, nothing. Holliday went off the market, Bay went off the market, outfielders were getting signed left and right. Still, nothing for Johnny. With every day that passed, things weren't looking too good for Damon.

 

Suddenly, we started hearing rumors about the A's being interested in Johnny. That, of course, started a panic wave among a lot of Yankees fans. I'm not sure why, I've been saying for a while (since we signed Nick Johnson) that Johnny Damon wasn't coming back, anyone I work with or anyone who follows me on Twitter will attest to that. I believe I even sang it in my Christmas song to Brian Cashman: "One think I really do need, in left field, a player who can throw a ball". I obviously wasn't talking about Johnny Damon. 

 

People didn't believe me. They kept saying that the Yankees will back down and bring Damon back. It's strictly business, people. Strictly, business. Like I said in my post about Wang, you can't run an organization on nostalgia.

 

So, Brian Cashman put his foot down and didn't give in to Damon's demands. Damon put his foot down, and looks pretty damn foolish right now. 

 

The third and final nail in Johnny Damon's coffin? The Yankees signed Randy Winn to a 1-year $2-million contract yesterday. Set. Match. Game. Johnny go bye-bye.

 

I will blog about Randy Winn some other time, but what I have to say about it right now is: A low-risk high-reward investment.

 

Back to Johnny.

 

I work in sales and marketing. I'm a Business School college graduate with a Marketing degree, so I know a thing or two about business negotiations and making deals. I sell oil for a living, I don't sell athletes, but the basic principles are the same across the business world. You always let the market set the price for your product. You target a specific segment of the market (in Damon's case, the Yankees) and you set your price according to what this segment sees your product being worth. Basically, you set your price along the lines of the maximum of what they're willing pay. You add a little to it since it will come down in negotiations.

 

Anyone who's picked up an Economics textbook knows that the price is set by the market's demand curve. The Yankees set their price based on their own demand for Johnny Damon, and Johnny Damon decided to set his price based on his own demand for himself. I honestly don't know what Damon based his price on. My guess is that it was a mixture of greed and egomania: two emotions that are found in abundance in the world of professional sports. Either way, once you mix emotions with business, you're doomed to fail.

 

It's not personal, dear. It's strictly business. So now, Johnny go bye-bye.

Melky Cabrera, Aroldis Vizcaino and Michael Dunn were traded to the Atlanta Braves for Javier Vazquez and Boone Logan. Hmmm... I like the name Boone. I tip my hat to Cashmoney for getting this done. In my opinion, this was one Brian Cashman's best trades of his career. No doubt about it in my mind. 

Who loves Wang? 

Keeps the Doc away.

No, I'm not talking about that hot doctor I met at the emergency room today. If anything, I'd stop eating apples all together for that guy. Long story, let's not go there.

 I'm talking about Roy "Doc" Halladay. The Toronto Blue Jays have already made it known that they're willing to trade him, but obviously they want a pretty good offer for him. Rightfully so, after all, we are talking about The Doc.

Let's look at the numbers, shall we?

In 2009, Roy Halladay won 17 games, had an ERA of 2.79, pitched 9 complete games, 239 innings, and had a career high of 208 strikeouts. If those numbers don't make your mouth water, then you need to get that checked out. I have the perfect doctor to recommend to you.

It's no wonder that the Blue Jays are asking for a lot in return for Doc. Any team would. If they weren't in desperate need of players to fill the holes they have in their roster, and if they didn't have a horrible farm system, they wouldn't trade him. They do have holes in their roster, they do have a horrifyingly bad farm system, so they are definitely looking to trade him. Why wouldn't they? They're going to lose him next year anyway.

The Blue Jays are looking for quality, not quantity. One Blue Jays official said "We would rather have one above-average impact guy than eight ordinary guys", when asked what they will be asking for in return for Roy Halladay.

So, what does this mean for the Yankees? The same thing it always means when an excellent players is suddenly available: should we go after him? If so, what kind of offer are we bringing to the table?

Let's start out by weighing out the positives of getting Roy Halladay.

First of all, it's always good to add a solid pitcher to our starting rotation. Sure, we won the World Series with our current 3-man rotation, but there is no doubt that a 4th solid starter would have made life a little easier. Secondly, just close your eyes and imagine a rotation of (in no particular order, and assuming Pettitte and Wang come back) Sabathia, Halladay, Wang, Pettitte and Burnett. If that doesn't cause a party in your pants, I don't know what will.

Also, we don't know that Pettitte is coming back, so in the case of an Andy Pettitte retirement, Roy Halladay makes all the more sense. Not to mention that he's been pretty much unhittable within our division. No other pitcher is as successful facing AL East opponents as Roy Halladay. That is always a major added bonus. Furthermore, signing him would mean keeping him out of Boston, and it is never a good thing to see a great pitcher go to your strongest division rivals.

Now, let's look at what the Blue Jays want in return for Roy Halladay. To the Yankees, these are the negatives:

Halladay will be eligible for free agency after the 2010 season. He's already made it known that he will not be signing a contract extension with the Toronto Blue Jays. So, by letting the Doc walk away after 2010, the Blue Jays will get two draft picks. Therefore, in order to trade him now, they will definitely be asking for some top prospects as they will be losing those two picks. Keeping in mind that they can't ask for too much, because John Lackey is still available, they'll still be asking for some quality players to add to their roster and weak farm.

So, to get Roy Halladay we'll probably have to give up either Joba Chamberlain or Phil Hughes, and a top prospect. The names Cervelli, Montero, Romine, Betances, and Jackson come to mind as possibilities. I'm not a "Hot Stove" expert, but if I were a GM, that would be the bare minimum I'd ask for.

The Blue Jays' farm system is pretty thin, so you know they'll be asking for prospects. Another player they may be asking for is David Robertson. While Robertson is a Major League pitcher and they're probably looking for prospects, he has the potential to be a dominant closer in the future. Any team would love to have him on board.

Now, here's the part a lot of you may not agree with...

I don't think we should go after Roy Halladay. If he was a free agent this off-season, then I'd be all for it, but we've worked too hard on our prospects to send them away. Our top prospects are vital for our future, and trading them away for someone we don't really need would be sickening to me. Honestly, it would be a George Steinbrenner thing to do.

Chien-Ming Wang (if he returns) will be in the rotation next year. Will he be 19-Win Wang? Doubtful. He will more likely give us around 14 wins and an ERA of around 4 (+/- a few). To me, with our current rotation (with Andy), that's good enough. So we really have no need for Halladay.

Also, we'd most definitely have to give up either Hughes or Joba for him. Really? Now that they're finally starting to get into the groove of things, we should send one of them up to Toronto?

Forget about his postseason performance, Phil Hughes' regular season domination in the setup role is precisely why we should hold onto him. Joba Chamberlain? Well, he's Joba Chamberlain. We saw him return to excellence as a reliever. Hopefully our management have removed their heads from their rectums, and have learned to stop screwing around with Joba's future. He is obviously best fit to be an amazing reliever, and I hope to see plenty more from him in that role.  

Folks, I don't want to go back to the George Steinbrenner days of giving up our young, home-grown talent for the big stars of the moment. Free agency? Sure, why not? I wouldn't mind seeing us go after Lackey. In true Yankee fashion, I'm going to say: it's just money. If money can get us a good pitcher (arguably overrated, but would be better than our other options if Joba remains in the bullpen), then why the Hell not? Especially if Pettitte chooses to retire.

Trades? Right now, not so much.

With who we currently have on the roster, trading for Halladay will simply be a glamor acquisition. Kind of like trading your Aston Martin in for a Lamborghini, when you already have a Ferrari, Bentley, Porsche and Hummer in your garage.

So, right now, during this off-season, I say we should keep eating that apple a day.

Remember the awesome Nike ad I posted up in this blog around a week ago?

In case you forgot, click here.

Well here is something that is absolutely hilarious. While this (obviously) isn't a Nike advertisement, I think it's pretty sweet.

Enjoy:

Joe Torre, I love you for what you've done with us, but you've taken things too far. Seriously, stop it.

We get that you felt insulted by the Yankees. We understand that. I can see how their final offer to you was a slap in the face. Personally, I agree that it was time for a change. Obviously you disagree. That's fine, you're entitled to your own opinions.

You're also entitled to choose one of several routes to take, two of which being "classy" and "classless". So far, despite irrelevant comments here and there, you've been relatively classy about it. You said you were happy to see the Yankees win the World Series. That was classy. Yes, your book caused a little controversy, but because we love you, we brushed it off as your co-writer taking cheap shots at the Yankees to make a quick buck. However, your recent comments in an article cannot be brushed off so easily.

Really, Joe Torre? Really? You're comparing George Steinbrenner to your scumbag abusive father? I know that Papa George is a tough cookie. He was definitely not easy to work with, but the man was tough for a reason: he wanted and expected the best. Why wouldn't he? He spent a lot on the Yankees, and expects to see the best results.

Welcome to the business world, Joe. I'm sorry George Steinbrenner didn't hug you enough and tell you he loved you, but to compare him to a wife-beating a**hole is out of line. When you're a businessman, you have to be ruthless. I don't see why you don't understand this, since you're being pretty ruthless in your little blast about the him to gain publicity.

I can't even begin to describe how disappointed I am in you, Joe. I expected you to carry yourself with a little more class. Call me crazy, but I also expected your wife to carry herself with a little more class rather than adding fuel to the fire.

George never told you he was proud of you? How about in the speeches he gave after we won championships? I distinctly remember him saying how proud he was of you and the team. Or did you choose to block that out of your memory, Joe, so you'd cause a little controversy and gain a little publicity? Of course he's not going to be proud of you when the team underachieves. He's not your dad, Mrs. Steinbrenner didn't give birth to you, he's not required to love you and be proud of you unconditionally.

I can't seem to understand what you expected George Steinbrenner to do when the team, under your management, kept losing in the playoffs. Did you expect him to morph into a proud father of a Little League player and say "It's OK, son, all that matters is that you did your best"? What are we, a Disney movie? Get with the program, Clueless Joe. This is Major League Baseball, and we're the New York Yankees, anything less than the best is not something to be proud of.

Even the fans weren't proud of you when the Yankees were losing to teams they should have easily beat. We weren't proud of you when you kept throwing Scott Proctor into every game, and kept throwing in "Lefty Specialists" who couldn't strike any lefties out. Who would be proud of that? Not to mention some of us blame you for the lack of chemistry in the clubhouse. We stood behind you and supported you because you brought us victory after years of misery, but we weren't proud of how you managed this decade. If you're going to compare George Steinbrenner to an abusive father, then you should compare us all.

I'm starting to think that you saw the "Who's your daddy?" publicity in the World Series and decided to get a piece of the action. We ain't yo' daddy, Joe, so stop comparing us to him.
 

Once again, I've been hit hard by the reality of living in a baseball-less country. Just when I start to forget, the fact that people here know nothing about baseball slaps me in the face. It's not a regular slap, it's a B*tch-slap. You know, the kind of slap that hurts your ego more than it hurts your face. Kind of like the slap that the Yankees handed to the crack-induced-self-proclaimed-psychic Jimmy Rollins. Yes, I'm still going there.



I've managed to surround myself with a close group of American friends who follow American sports. Baseball, of course, is our main common interest. Four of us are Yankees fans, three are Mets fans, two are Angels fans, one is a Braves fan, one is a Dodgers fan, and the last of the group is a Cardinals fan. I have friends from other baseball backgrounds, but these people are the ones I hang out with every day.

Surrounding myself with fellow baseball enthusiasts makes me feel like I'm back home. It makes me forget that I live in a place where no one knows the beauty of a first pitch, or the passion that keeps us going through 9 innings. What happened today reminded me.

I was sitting in a coffee shop at the Mall Of The Emirates yesterday (that mall is mind-blowing) with a colleague of mine from work. He's a fellow American who is just as passionate about baseball as I am. He's a Mets fan, so we were exchanging banter. It was mostly me making fun of the Mets, after all, he can't help but tip his hat to the World Champions. We moved on to discussing Hot Stove issues. Where players will be next year, what different teams should be aiming for; you know, the regular November topics of conversation.

A middle-aged man sitting at the table next to us decided to interrupt our discussion. "Sorry to interrupt," he said, as though an apology would make it any less annoying, "but I couldn't help overhearing you discussing sports. I'm a huge sports fan". His heavy Australian accent didn't sound too promising. "What sport are you talking about?" he continued to ask. I told him we were discussing baseball, to which he responded with the three-word sentence I absolutely despise: "Cricket is better".

At this point, it took every ounce of strength in me to hold myself back from throwing my BlackBerry at his head. How dare he tell me that cricket is better than baseball? This man must be insane, or smoking crack. Or maybe he's just Australian. Who understands those Australians anyway?

I stared at him blankly for a few seconds. You know, that blank stare that the cast of The Office give to the camera.