Catch the Fever!

Plus 65: that’s the run differential of the supposed best team in baseball, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, the club with more letters in its acronym (5) than starters with On Base Percentages over .340 (4).

Just so everyone is aware of how not impressive that is, five teams in the American League have played stronger baseball so far this season than LAAOA: Boston (+155), Toronto (+97– strongest team in MLB no one is talking about), Chicago (+86), Tampa Bay (+85), and Minnesota (+84). Even in the weakish NL, three teams (Cubs, Mets, and Phils) have played better, and Milwaukee and St. Louis are not far behind LA.

Now I know what everyone is thinking: Run differentials do not equal wins and losses. Wins and losses do. And there, LA has a 1 game lead on Tampa as the best team in baseball (Actually, they’re tied in the loss column). This is faulty logic. Good teams don’t just win. They win big. Those 8-3, 4-0 wins: those are the true indicators of excellence, of beating up on weaker teams and of having talent on both sides of the ball. A team’s record in close games is really more an indication of how fortunate it has been than how skillfully it has played.

Don’t believe an Amherst college senior who hasn’t played baseball in ten years? Well, listen to the experts then. 

This is the real significance of K-Rod’s record tying 57th save. Yes, K-Rod is great. But he is not the greatest closer in history because of this meaningless accomplishment. Nor is LAAOA a “great” team because they have accumulated 57 saves. On the contrary, the Angels are weaker than they seem precisely because their asses have needed so much saving!

Oy. The Angels always get me riled up.

Oh, and ESPN/NY sports media: can we please stop talking about anyone but Albert Pujols as MVP of the NL?

A friend of mine recently brought this recent Olympic qualifying women’s hockey final to my attention:

 http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/news/story?id=3577150

Ouch.

They should let Bulgaria take their frustration out on Mali or something. Or maybe Vatican City. I bet their women’s ice hockey team is pretty terrible.

Well, that was an exciting weekend of football! Between East Carolina and Tom Brady, I’m not quite sure what to talk about. Perhaps I’ll go on a rant about Notre Dame…

Actually, although all the speculation this week will (rightly) be about the Patriots, I think I want to look at yesterday’s most suprising and impressive division: the NFC South.

Atlanta, Carolina, and New Orleans were all impressive in their debuts, and though I don’t think Micheal Turner’s fast start qualifies the Falcons as instant contenders, Sunday made one of the NFL’s weakest divisions suddenly look like one of the strongest.  

In fact, other than Seattle’s complete flop in Buffalo, I thought Week one had the entire NFC looking fairly strong. Dallas and Romo, the team I was most anxious to see perform, looked great; McNabb and the Eagles had the most impressive win by far blowing a terrible St. Louis team out of the water, and the Kyle Orton-led Bears took down the mighty Colts on their home turf. Combine that with Brady’s injury and the Jags suprising lack of offence at Tennessee, and all of a sudden the NFC (minus the putrid NFC West, the NL West of football) isn’t such a land of mediocrity. Hell, the Giants might have to battle for that last Wild Card spot.

The Saints and Panthers really stand out to me. These are two teams that, I believe, played better than their record indicated last year, losing some close games and taking some tough injuries. Reggie Bush looked like he was ready to take a step forward after a sophmore slump and Drew Brees threw the ball extremely well. Jeremey Shockey and Johnathan Vilma, I think, make these guys legitimate NFC South, if not Super Bowl, contenders. After playing a tough schedule last year, I would expect NO to revert to 2006 form– lots of offence, just enough defence. 

Carolina’s win over SD was easily the stunner of the afternoon, with the Cats hanging tough and actually out rushing a team known for its ground game on both sides of the ball. That bodes well for an offensive line that stuggled to give the many Panther QB’s protection last year. With Jake Delhomme healthy and well protected, this team, though perhaps not as strong as NO or TB, can definetly contend for the wild card. Even with the lucky Gates fumble and improbable final grab by Dante Rosario, you’ve gotta be impressed by a stunning come from behind win against one of the top 4 teams in the NFL on the road and without your best player (Steve Smith). If I’m Tampa, I’m worried.

So what does this all mean? Well, for one, it means there is probably going to be some competiton for that NFC Wild Card. The Eagles, Cowboys, Giants, Bucs, Saints, Panthers, and possibly the Redskins and Packers could all be solid teams. I don’t think, other than possibly the Cowboys, any of these teams are truly cream of the league, but if Carolina and New Orleans truly are back, the defending champs could have some issues.

***

Oh, and I guess the Pats go 10-5 without Brady and win the division by two games over the Jets and Bills. Losing one player, no matter how good, does not take a team from best of all time to out of playoff contention. At least in football. In basketball, maybe…

(Hmm.. interesting discussion for next time: what is the most important position in sports? In other words, at what position does having a dominant player make the biggest impact? Is it quarterback? Center? Fly-half? I’m not sure..)

Summer is not usually the best time for sports.  Once the basketball playoffs finally end, baseball (and perhaps golf) is the only thing saving sports fans from total boredom. And though I love baseball as much as anyone, I, along with most of the American sports world, am completely ready for the start of the football season come September—and not just the NFL: did anyone see that UCLA/Tennessee game the other night?

This summer was obviously an exception. The Beijing games were entertaining, from the ridiculous opening ceremonies to the fun events like kayaking and BMX biking. Yeah, and those Bolt and Phelps guys. I think the 4 X 100 freestyle relay may have been the most exciting race of any sort I have ever seen. And Bolt’s performance in the 200 meters was amazing, I don’t care how many times he banged on his chest at the end…

Actually, I think the neatest part of the Olympics came in baseball. Now ordinarily no one, not even myself, pays attention to Olympic baseball. But this year, the IOC added quite the kink—beginning in the eleventh inning, each team starts their half of the inning with men on first and second and nobody out, thereby increasing the likelihood of rampant run scoring dramatically.  The idea is to save pitchers arms—a noble idea, especially in an elimination tournament where players have professional careers to worry about. But I love it just for the drama. Imagine K Rod forced to pitch two stressful innings in the 11^th and 12^th instead of just a smooth ninth with a three run lead. Or in the Mets case, Luis Ayala. It’s definitely got that college football overtime feel.

Alright, maybe it’s not the best idea. The beautiful thing about baseball is the potential for two teams to battle late into the 21^st inning, while Dusty Baker manages to use his entire pitching staff in a vain effort to win one game. Also, relievers might not be too happy with the idea. Still it’s pretty cool.

Speaking of pretty cool, has anyone heard Brett Favre is the Jets QB? Nah, I didn’t think anyone had been talking about that…

Actually, rather than spill more ink on No. 4, why don’t we talk about something that I think has generated surprisingly little buzz: instant replay in baseball.Now, before those of you were hoping for some fun NFL discussion roll your eyes and click away, consider for a moment the groundbreaking nature of MLB’s decision to allow for HR calls to be reviewed. I don’t think either the sports media or the sports world has really appreciated a) what a bold step this is for an institution that is not known for being particularly nimble, and b) what this says about the role of umpiring in baseball in general.

Baseball is the sport most directly influenced by officiating. Most sports can reasonably be played without refs- and often are. Basketball, football, soccer, etc, all require refereeing because they are contact sports where physical players often take advantage of the others in a way that is dangerous or detracts from the quality of play.

Baseball is different. Umps do not throw flags or spot violations (with the exception of balks and ejections, I suppose)—they dictate the way the game is played, both behind the plate, and on the basepaths. Now obviously football refs have to decide if someone caught a pass in bounds, or crossed the plane, or made a ‘football move’ (notice, these are generally the things that instant replay deals with). But in no sport I know of is the impact of this sort of refereeing as deep and constant as in baseball.

So here’s my question: if MLB admits that umps may be fallible in home run calls, why does the same logic not hold true on the basepaths, an arguably more controversial and more frequent decision. Or, even more often, why not for balls and strikes? We have the technology. Quest-tech (sp?) cameras, an entirely impartial and infallible judge of balls and strikes, already monitor each game as a means of grading umpires.

So what exactly are we waiting for? It can’t just be time lost—if MLB wanted to, it could place replay centers at each stadium and have the correct calls in under one minute radioed to the crew chief. Or it could institute a challenge system similar to the NFL. Never mind the time saved from not having Lou Piniella rant.

Or is it a tradition thing? Well, regardless of my disrespect for silly traditions (especially when your tradition is being incorrect), I’m having a tough time understanding the double standard. Why do we stick with the ‘quaint’ umpires with balls and strikes, but not home run calls? Why is the correct call only valued in one particular situation? Also, why is no one talking about this?      

I have to admit, I have not always been the biggest Kevin Garnett fan.

Not that there is anything bad or unlikable about the guy… in fact, what usually annoys me about him is that he seems a bit too perfect. KG has always been the ‘scrappy’ guy; the guy who dives after loose balls, crashes the glass, plays hard on D, all while maintaining a humble unassuming attitude towards the fans and, most importantly, the media.

The press loves those guys. You know: the Tyler Hansbroughs, David Ecksteins, and Derek Jeters of the world (oh and did I mention Derek Jeter? He’s great!).

As usual, I’m skeptical. Yet, after round 1 of the playoffs, I feel compelled to come to the guy’s defense. Recently, there have been a wave of criticism for Garnett’s (and the Celtics’) performance against the 37 win Hawks in the opening round, most of which has criticized KG’s ‘heart,’ his ‘killer instinct,’ and his lack of ‘winning experience.’

Scoop Jackson, for example, has written what has to be one of the most melodramatic sports articles of all time, arguing that ‘we’ (this also has to set all kinds of records for most liberal use of the collective ‘we’ in a single column) can no longer ‘love’ Kevin Garnett b/c it took him 7 games to beat Atlanta. The article also contains the following sentence, which should immediately cause you dismiss anything Scoop Jackson ever says again:

“We want that sense of joy to overcome us that we will not have for any other athlete because we’ve been so wrapped up in his journey for so long and we know that sweat coming out of him on those Gatorade commercials is blood, not electrolytes.” Thank you, Scoop.

And then there’s Gene Wojciechowski (best last name in the industry), who dares drop the A-word: A-Rod. (Woj also hilariously feels the need to mention PJ Brown’s pre games snacks: “14-year veteran P.J. Brown, who spent part of his pregame sitting in front of his locker and eating a homemade peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”) Seriously, people? Are we really at the point where we are bringing in A-Rod?

The ridiculous nature of that comparison aside, I think ‘we’ all need to take a collective breath, and calm down a bit. Kevin Garnett is fine. The Celtics are fine. After all, they outscored the Hawks, on average by 12 points. That would be impressive even if they won 4-0. What we’ve learned from this first round is that a) Boston’s bench might be a little overrated, b) Doc Rivers is not the greatest coach in the world, and most importantly c) basketball is a weird game and strange things can happen in a (relatively) short series.

As John Hollinger points out, the Hawks played one hell of a series at home, perhaps attributed to actually having fans in their arena. If I were a C’s fan, I really wouldn’t lose a lot of sleep over this series. Bottom line, KG is a beast—his adjusted plus minus indicated he has been arguably the best player in the league the past few years (check out 82games.com if you haven’t read about the next big stat, still in the works)—and the Celtics are still ridiculously good. Bold prediction: They’ll dismantle an overrated Cavs team in 5.

Of course, all of this is peanuts compared to the really exciting stuff going on out west.

Namely, Chris Paul, David West, and the Hornets have absolutely dismantled the Spurs in the past two games. Now this seems odd to me. Not because of the whole playoff experience thing, which you know I think is silly—but because this seems like a poor matchup for the Hornets. The Spurs, after all, pride themselves on beating those fast paced teams (i.e. the Suns) by slowing down the pace and then throwing Bowen at the oppositions best player.

Needless to say, this hasn’t worked against NO. The thing is, the Hornets aren’t even doing it by running: they’re beating San Antonio at their own game. They’ve hit 3 pointers (especially during their big Game 2 3^rd quarter), forced turnovers, played even in points in the paint, and racked up fouls on the opposition. That’s supposed to be Popovitch-ball.

Now, I don’t know what will happen in games 3 and 4, but I do know that Bowen cannot guard Paul and Oberto cannot guard West. Timmy D better have something good up his sleeve, because the Spurs do not look explosive enough to deal with the young Hornets.

NFL Draft weekend is easily one of the most interesting, and from a homework standpoint, most unproductive weekends of the year.

Actually, I’ve always found the draft somewhat boring and anticlimactic—you sit there for hours listening to Chris Berman and Mel Kiper Jr. (whose eyes seem to get beadier with each passing year), and then your team picks the guy you thought they would anyway. Nevertheless, as a loyal Jets fan, I feel compelled to watch my team choose its annual draft day bust. Seriously, is there a team with a worse record in draft history in any sport?Although I would have loved to see Glenn Dorsey, certainly the best player coming out this season, fall one more pick to the Jets, I was generally very happy with the results.

Nevertheless, I think the NFL Draft is best left to ESPN’s many scouts for analysis. Quite simply, with over two hundred draft picks, and no really useful statistical metric to stack these guys against one another, there is little way the average fan can really appreciate what is going on until September rolls around— so let’s talk about something I do know…

How about Tampa Bay? No, not the Bucs… No, I’m talking about the Rays.

Don’t know if anyone noticed, but the Tampa Bay Rays (!) just swept the Boston Red Sox (!!) to gain a share of the lead in the AL East, the latest in the season Tampa has ever had even a share of the division lead. Incredibly, they’ve done it without the contributions of Scott Kazmir, their ace left-hander, or Matt Garza, or even a top-notch James Shields, whose apparently been slowed by mechanical issues. The key to their success? Amazingly, it’s the ‘pen, which (at least on Sunday) leads the majors in ERA, a year after posting a mark over 6.

Now, I don’t want to make too much of the Rays’ recent success. Five games is five games, and over the course of the 182 game season, the Sox and Yanks will obviously bury the Rays, as usual. Nevertheless, the Rays shouldn’t be dismissed—contrary to their history, Tampa has ceased simply collecting athletes, and is now fielding players who can actually hit for power, get on base, and strike batters out. With Pena, Crawford, Upton, and newcomer Evan Longoria, the D-Rays might not score like the Yanks, but they won’t exactly be the Royals. In fact, they might have the 3^rd best offense in the division, with Frank Thomas departing from Toronto.And the pitching, though, as Kazmir’s injury has demonstrated, full of question marks, could be fantastic. Shields is no fluke (his K/BB ratio is for real), and Kazmir is still young and has room for growth. Garza has ace-capability, and even though they were battered at times last year, Andy Sonnanstine and Edwin Jackson both showed the ability to miss bats. The days of Mark Hendrickson and Victor Zambrano are over.

So what’s my point? Who really cares about the Rays, really? We all know that the Yanks or Sox will win the East, and probably win it all.

Well, yes. That’s probably the case. The example of the Rays, however, is an interesting case study in what has been a wacky season in baseball, thus far. The team everyone thought would be historically bad, Baltimore, has been sitting atop the East for a week or so now. Chicago, projected by PETCOA to degrade yet again, is winning the Central. Florida is beating the Mets, Braves and Phils. St. Louis is defying the odds and the injuries, and is off to a fast start. Detroit can’t score. Arizona, 14^th in the NL in runs last year, is one of the league’s leading offenses this year, despite adding no outside players.

What the heck is happening?It’s too early to tell, and it will take a few months for win totals to adjust to run differentials, but I maintain a sliver of hope that this season represents a departure from seasons past: maybe, just maybe, MLB has gotten a small dose of parity. Critics noted before the season began that 8 or 9 teams in the NL (Mets, Phils, Braves, Cubs, Brewers, D’backs, Rox, Pods, Dodgers) were virtually neck and neck. Now I’m relatively young, but I can’t remember a season where things looked this wide open from the very start of the season.

I’m not sure why, especially in light of crazy spending in recent years, but it seems the playing field has levelled somewhat in baseball in recent seasons. Some call it mediocrity, but I think parity is wonderful, both for the fans and for the game. Any thoughts on if, why, and whether it’s a good thing that parity might be reaching MLB?

Well, the Isiah Thomas Era is over.

To be honest, as a Knicks fan, I am not sure how to feel about this. Where there should be laughter and rejoicing in my basketball soul, I feel strangely… disappointed. Over the past four and a half seasons, I’ve grown accustomed and oddly attached to rooting against Isiah. Watching the Knicks dig themselves such an enormous hole year after year was very entertaining—just like a classic Stephen Segal movie, you watched just to see how bad it could get.

Now that Zeke’s gone (Almost. He still has a position with the Knicks, but he is barred by his new contract from interacting with the players. You know you’ve done a bad job when you are not only fired, but issued a restraining order from your former team…), I don’t know what I’m supposed to do as a Knicks fan… I kinda thought the whole point was to boo and wear one of those ‘Fire Isiah’ t-shirts..

Actually, as much as much as I’d like to keep talking about the Knicks, there are far more exciting topics in the sports world, and even in the NBA, right now.

The other day, for example, the Sixers just beat the Pistons in Detroit, kicking off what will hopefully be an upset filled postseason. This NBA playoffs promises to be one of the best ever– at least in the West, where eight teams separated by just a few games have generated an almost NCAA tournament-like atmosphere. Playing the NIT to the West’s March Madness, the Eastern Conference Playoffs will likely be low on excitement, but, as the Sixers showed us, there could always be some interesting shakeups. Actually, Philadelphia’s surprise performance got me thinking about an often discussed theme come this time of year: playoff experience.

Given Chris Paul and the young Hornets emergence this season, evaluating the impact of individual’s playoff experience is particularly important right now. As you might guess from last week’s article, I personally find the whole concept of experience kind of silly.

First off, the NBA playoffs are absolutely huge. More teams make it then not, meaning that every year, more than half the league accumulates playoff experience. Secondly, the fact that each series goes seven games would seem to mitigate any ‘shock factor’ the playoffs might have on a young team. Even if an inexperienced player is somehow completely overwhelmed by playoff pressure, which I doubt, it’s probably not going to take more than 1 quarter for him to realize that neither the dimensions of the court nor the rules of the game have changed now that the playoffs have arrived.

The fact is, all of these guys do have so called ‘big game’ experience. They have all played in their respective high school or college playoff’s or tournaments and would probably not have made it to the NBA if they did not perform well in those situations. Recent history, as well as recent data, I think, tends to agree with me. We all saw how much playoff experience meant to LeBron last year, and several other young stars have dominated in the playoffs despite their supposed lack of experience. Last year’s Warriors, Deron Williams, Dwayne Wade, circa 2006, to name a few, come to mind.

To illustrate my point, let’s look at three random examples of ‘star’ players making their playoff debuts. In 2006, LeBron made his first NBA playoff start against the Wizards, whom Cleveland dispatched in 6. In 2 series, LeBron posted a 30.8/8.1/5.8 line, compared with 31.8/7.0/6.6 during the regular season. The previous year, his opponent, Gilbert Arenas averaged 23.6/5.2/6.2 over a similar span after putting up 25.5/4.7/5.1 (the slashes meaning point/rebounds/assists) during the year. Last season, Dwight Howard brought the Magic back to the playoff’s with his 17.6/12.3/1.8 season long effort. In a losing effort to the Pistons, he averaged 15.3/14.8/1.8 in four games.

Now obviously, this is incredibly low level analysis… but the point stands: in recent history, plenty of young NBA stars have done just fine come April, matching or surpassing their basic contributions, all without an iota of ‘playoff experience.’

The lesson is, don’t expect Chris Paul to collapse just because he is young or because the Mavs have been to the Finals before. Now, Dirk and the Mavericks (band name, perhaps?) are good in their own right, but if you are going to pick them, please don’t do it because of their experience…

Hey there—welcome to my sports blog. My name is Doug Eickman, and I’m a junior here at Amherst. This is my first entry here at Amherst Public, so I hope you are enjoying the site, and that you will continue to read my random sports musings as I post every week. This week is a bit of an introduction, but feel free to heckle me (or contribute positively) by posting in response..  

A few things you should know about me before reading my column: first, I am a Mets, Jets, Knicks, Notre Dame Fighting Irish, and St. John’s Red Storm fan. If you can’t tell, I’m used to rooting for losers. Of all the teams I have ever supported, only the Amherst Lord Jeffs have ever won a major championship (St. John’s won the NIT a few years back). I have lived through the Isiah Thomas era, I have survived the worst of Armando Benitez in the 2000 World Series, the best of So Taguchi in the 2006 NLCS, the wobbly throws of Chad Pennington, a 1-17 St. John’s season, and oh yeah, the worst collapse in MLB history. Even my intramural basketball team went 3-9 this year. If I seem like a bitter sports fan, it’s because I am.    

I don’t believe in clutch. It’s possibly the most overrated and meaningless word in sports today. Professional athletes, generally speaking, do not perform any better or worse in so called ‘big time’ situations. Derek Jeter’s career batting average in close and late situations is actually lower than his career batting average. David Ortiz is a great hitter in the 9^th inning because he is a damn good hitter in the other 8. Anyone who thinks a Manning could never win a Super Bowl or that Brady was unbeatable needs a history lesson. Did anyone see Robert Horry hit that buzzer beater a few weeks back? No? Oh yeah, he missed. Curses? Baloney. Experience? Completely overrated (See 2003 Marlins). Momentum? Somewhat important, particularly for individual players, but often overstated (See 2005 Red Sox).

So what do I believe in? Well, apart from the 3-4 (certainly the superior defence), I believe thoroughly in the power of statistics. VORP, BABIP, Adjusted Plus-Minus, they’re all great. I like my opinions to be backed up with fact, and I’d prefer to say that a team is great because they’re point differential is off the chart than because I saw them once on ESPN and I thought they were scrappy. Statistics are a way I can follow every team in the country without spending my life in front of a TV screen. I understand that stats are limited—no, they cannot pick up everything on the court, in the field, or on the pitch. But stats remind us of what is really going on—yes, David Eckstein may have been great in the 2006 World Series, but he is still a .286 career hitter with no power.

That garbage out of the way, I’d like to say thanks for reading, and that I hope you disagree/agree strongly with everything presented thus far. Since this is not just a column but a blog, I would like this to be discussion oriented–there really is nothing better than arguing about sports. There’s plenty going on in the sports world to keep our brains busy, and I hope we can have some good debate on the eternal questions in sports (many of which I’ve already mentioned): does clutch exist? Will the Cubs ever win a World Series? What’s better, the 3-4 or the 4-3? Is golf even a sport? Do sumo wrestlers really need to wear only those thong things? Is Tyler Hansbrough better than Michael Beasley? Who is more evil, the Yankees or Red Sox? Does Ozzie Guillen smoke crack? I don’t claim to be a great sports writer, or even the most knowledgeable fan out there, but I hope my column will provoke some response every week, and I always promise to be opinionated, and probably somewhat controversial.

This has been a little content-light, so let’s dive right in to one of my favorite questions: Kobe or LeBron? This season in particular, I don’t even see how this is really a fair question: LeBron is simply the best player in the league, hands down. No disrespect to what Kobe has done for the last decade, but LeBron’s numbers are silly—the dude is averaging over 30 a game, while pulling down 8 boards and 7 assists daily. That’s Oscar Robertson ridiculous. Kobe is scoring less (albeit on a team with more scoring options) and not even coming close in other categories. The only thing he has on LBJ is steals, and only barely. While I would admit Kobe is probably a marginally better on the ball defender than LeBron, the latter’s size and strength mean he has a more positive impact defensively—more blocks, more misdirected shots, etc.

But Kobe is better late in games and in the playoffs, you say? The playoffs point is both unfair, and as far as we know, untrue. Kobe (like pretty much everybody) plays pretty much the same in the playoffs, posting career playoff scoring totals just below his regular season totals, as well as fairly consistent steal, assists, and rebound totals. LeBron, in just two appearances, has done the same, averaging around 27 a game come playoff time. And if anyone saw that series against Detroit last year, no one carried their team more than LBJ last playoffs. That Cleveland team had no business being anywhere near the finals. And, oh yeah, LeBron absolutely made the right call dishing to Donyell Marshell.