Does It Get Any Better Than This?

Steve Phillips is now a part of the "Sunday Night Baseball" broadcast team, alongside Joe Morgan and Jon Miller. This, without a doubt, is the best news of the young season. I've watched half an inning of the Cubs/Phillies game and already we have a gem from our good friend, Joey M. (I like to rhyme). For a few minutes, Joe went on about how the Cubs manager, Lou Piniella, splits up his righties and lefties in the batting order and how it isn't smart to give your best hitter, Aramis Ramirez (presumably), fewer at-bats because it really doesn't make much of a difference to have consecutive righties or lefties. Okay, sounds reasonable enough, right? Ah, but wait, this is Mr. Morgan we're talking about, we should know by now that he just can't leave it at that. So he proceeds to say this:

**Paraphrase**
"You see, in Philadelphia their three best hitters--Rollins, Utley, and Howard-- are left-handed, but they bat them all in a row. That's the difference between Manuel (Phillies Manager) and Lou."

He goes on to cite this quite a few times as he chastises Piniella for batting Ramirez fifth in the lineup as opposed to having his best hitters in their deserving spots regardless of whether they bat right or left. There's only one thing wrong with this comparison that Joe keeps pointing to: THE PHILLIES HAVE NOT ONCE HAD A ROLLINS/UTLEY/HOWARD BATTING ORDER THIS SEASON. In fact, the only time Manuel did that during the entire '08 season was that strange two week stretch where he had Utley batting second, followed by Rollins and Howard (not a horrible idea, btw, just strange in the sense that he never did it again).

I don't understand how Joe Morgan can consistently be allowed to consistently say stupid shit on a consistent basis despite his consistent idiotic remarks week in and week out.

Yes, it's now been nearly five months since FJM disbanded, and I am sad.

Fuck The Heck 101

Yeah, that's right, an FJM reference. Get used to it. The denial of them shutting down is not likely to cease in the near future. Anyways, this is somewhat old news, but I thought I'd point it out nonetheless. The results for the Hank Aaron Awards and the Silver Sluggers were recently announced this past month. Here's a quick look at how a few of them turned out. (Disclaimer: If you're a fan of reasoning, I suggest you refrain from reading the rest of the post). Enjoy.

Your 2008 AL Hank Award Winner











Your 2008 AL First Baseman
Silver Slugger Award Winner













Your 2008 NL Hank Aaron Award Winner
















Your 2008 NL Third Baseman
Silver Slugger Award Winner














So... Kevin Youkilis was deemed to be the best offensive player in the American League, but not the best offensive player at his position. Aramis Ramirez was deemed to be the best offensive player in the National League, but not the best offensive player at his position.

Phil Sheridan would've had a legitimate case if he did his bitching about this process. The Hank Aaron Award is seriously fucked up.

Henry Aaron Rolls in His Grave (WITHOUT EVEN DYING FIRST!)

The MLB announcement of the Hank Aaron Award includes a very blatant lie:

The Hank Aaron Award officially recognizes the most outstanding offensive performer in the American and National Leagues.

This is not just a blatant lie, it's a vicious lie. I know because this man won it. And he was not, by any stretch of the imagination, the best offensive performer in the National League.

The other winner was none other than Euclis, the Greek God of Walks himself. I have trouble seeing him ahead of Milton Bradley in terms of quality, or Grady Sizemore in terms of quantity, or Alex Rodriguez in terms of both, but he was third in wOBA, so whatever. Weird, but it's fine.

Ramirez, though, was 19th in EqA and 20th in EqR. THAT is the best offensive player in the NL?

Want to limit it just to hitting and not offense, as the award claims? Fine, he 15th in wOBA, 15th in Runs Created, 20th in GPA, and his numbers like a 128 OPS+, 7.2 RC/27, .581 OWP and 2.4 Batting Wins don't even register on the Baseball Reference leader board.

Look, that's a good season, but it's not even top 10, let alone anywhere near the best. Especially when Albert Pujols was worth two Kevin Youkilises (yes, that includes defense, get over it). Pujols was worth, like, fifty more runs than Ramirez. His Baseball Reference page looks like something out of a video game.

How does this sort of crap happen?

Fans cast 230,000 votes at MLB.com, the official Web site of Major League Baseball, in this, the sixth consecutive year that fans have had a voice in selecting the award winners in this fashion.

Oh.

But still, according to Baseball Almanac, the fans are only 30% of the ballot. So where does the rest come from? Wikipedia?

Fan's votes accounted for 30% of the points, with broadcaster's and analyst's votes accounting for the other 70%.

So there you go. The brilliant minds of fans and announcers deciding who is about the 15th or so best hitter in the league and giving him an award named after one of the greatest, classiest and most significant players in baseball history.


This bothers me to a large degree because, if this award was treated with any sort of dignity and seriousness, it would be a great answer to the idiotic "the pitchers have their own award so the MVP should just be for hitters!!!" brigade.