well, I wasn't quite as eloquent as I anticipated in the last post. throw some cheap liquor in front of a disgruntled royals fan and sit him down in front of a computer...and that's what you get.
anyway, my basic point was, well, a few things:

1) sabermetrics are not the end-all be-all. I was interested in seeing what they were all about before all the furor exploded over the last couple of years, but as I looked into it, it just seemed that some of these guys are trying too hard and laying claim to too much. sure, there are benefits to looking at more than just the basic stats like batting average, RBIs, wins, etc – but that's obvious. intelligent baseball fans have known that for many, many years. the fact that there are people making decisions for major league squads that don't seem particularly adept at making good decisions shouldn't be surprising. look around at the place you work – how many people above you do you think make great decisions all the time? the fact is, people can rank very high in command and still not be qualified to hold that position. much has been made of the saber-GMs making their way into the ranks in a few MLB franchises, and it's been proclaimed that these sabermetric ideas are just now really "catching on" in major league baseball. but it's pretty silly if you think about it: the most basic ones – getting on base, getting a lot of extra base hits, don't get thrown out stealing a lot, strike out a lot of guys – come on people, these are revelations? a lot of the stats are so convoluted and context-dependant that they go against themselves from year to year. royals stadium moved the fences in some parts of the park back TEN FEET, and suddenly the park goes from one of the highest scoring parks to one of the toughest to score runs in? oriole park at camden yards changes nothing and completely reverses roles? how can you draw any meaningful inferences from the park factors the last couple of years? seriously? it's easy to sum up numbers and provide analysis of who kicked ass and who sucked in the past. the problem is baseball teams have to project it into the future, guarantee millions, and hope when all the baseball geeks sit around at the end of the next few seasons, they're not looking at that team's players and saying, "wow, what an idiot, they totally blew it signing this guy. this team is being run into the ground."

2) baseball decisions aren't made through a cold, hard look at numbers. if so, wouldn't the royals still have an outfield of ibanez / beltran / dye (not including johnny damon cause I hate him...I hate dye, too, but I think he'd still be here) right now instead of brown / dejesus / mateo? don't you think the minnesota twins would have rather had a couple years of mark prior already than an injury-plagued season of joe mauer? and don't tell me the twins wouldn't have taken prior if they could have. the thing is, it's pretty easy to look at some guys and accurately predict they're gonna kick ass. and, for every guy you can do that for, the royals rank somewhere in the 30's in "order of preference" for that player. unless it's mike sweeney, which a lot of royals fans feel good about hating. it's easier for fans of other teams to chide a team like the royals for not spending as much money as them than it is for fans of those teams to admit that it's just not fair to expect that. they'll bring up the A's and the Twins and the Marlins. what do those teams have in common? they caught lightning in a bottle, with a lot of young players all turning in good seasons at the same time. they didn't just get solid seasons from a couple of key players and mediocre performances from the rest – they got it from enough players to make it count. it's really a pretty fine line from poor team to decent contender, and a couple of players truly can make a difference. the royals haven't found that at the same time the past few years. remember, back in 1990, KC had the HIGHEST payroll in the major leagues – yep, $23,873,745. the next year, Oakland had the highest paid team. now they're considered the bottom suckers, though oakland not so much so anymore. but it's completely out of fuckin control, and the fact that a couple of teams have managed to be good for a couple of years due to their players being too young to be making the amount of money comparable to their production speaks much more to luck than to a particular strategy's success. like I said last time, imagine oakland had drafted kyle snyder instead of barry zito in 1999, or the twins picking dee brown instead of jacque jones in 1996. sometimes players work out, and sometimes they don't. but a lot of times it's not fair to fault the decisions after you already know the conclusion. likewise, deifying people after they're successful is a heck of a lot easier than knowing they've done well at the time the decisions were made. rob neyer completely chastised allard baird for letting raul ibanez put on a royals uniform at all – I'd say that worked out pretty well. almost everybody at baseballprospectus considered carlos pena a can't-miss, oakland-superstar in-the-bag guy, yet oakland later shipped him off to detroit, where he's been quietly average. what – the magical A's couldn't groom him into a superstar? what happened? erubiel durazo was another favorite. he's having a pretty good season for oakland at age 29. according to a lot of sabermetric guys, he's over the hump and going downhill. he makes $2,100,000 this year. that would make him the 5th highest paid player on the royals -- behind sweeney (good), gonzalez (prick), randa (gone after this year), anderson (bust), and santiago (not very useful). will he make more next season? yes. though, current "wisdom" says he's "undervalued" in the saber-market. as soon as he makes more: he's overvalued. he'll he'll be 3 years past 27 next year! it get stupid. he'll be useful, but as a mostly immobile first-baseman / DH, his contribution will be REPLACEABLE at best. pretty much every player is replaceable in saber-world. if a baseball analyst makes prediction after prediction, they'll fail, they'll succeed, and they'll get a couple draws. it doesn't matter. if a baseball GM does that, it'll cost 'em millions, their team – which has a small shot of winning anyway – most likely won't make one of the 8 playoff spots, it'll be a "total failure", and every decision they made that didn't turn out awesome will be pointed to as proof of incompetence. stats guys – maybe you should keep a running total of your failed predictions, too...we'll judge your numbers at the end of the season, maybe cut you for a rookie making the minimum, and laugh at anybody willing to take you on, since you're obviously "replaceable" for cheap.

3) don't any of these stat guys care about anything except offense? I know, there are defensive metrics out there, but they're not given near enough weight. and, yes, I know "THE OAKLAND A'S ARE DEVELOPING NEW DEFENSIVE METRICS." I don't know that you'll ever be able to judge defense by numbers. you just have to watch guys. that's the only way to know. and, honestly, I think a brilliant defensive guy like rey sanchez at least used to be is worth more than he's given credit for. his contract demand after leaving the royals was silly, but playing sparkling defense and hitting an "empty" .280 contributes more than current thinking would lead you to believe.

4) the most undervalued player trait: intelligence. unfortunately, the most athletically gifted guys are usually some of the dumbest, and EVERY TEAM IN BASEBALL values athletic gifts over intelligence. so it is..

* * * * * *

I went to the royals game on Friday night, watching them lose to cleveland 7-6 in 11 innings. it was an unexpected experience – first of all, 32,000 people were there when it was all said and done, about 20,000 more than was there at first pitch. we moved from the hy-vee view level to the old G.A. seats, and were fortunate enough to pick two seats pretty far back that happened not to be taken, as just about every other seat around us filled in. the game was bleak at first, as brian anderson was announced as the starting pitcher. and then he pitched. down 5-0 early, the royals battled back, tying the game, before giving up a run in the 8th. then came the 9th... with dejesus on second and two out, we cheered. a wild pitch sent him to third and, as we secretly wished for another, randa walked...and then (and then...ah ah!) sweeney ripped a double down the left field line on the first pitch. unfortunately, joe randa had an extra helping of gravy in the clubhouse before the game, which slowed him down and took an "OH MY GOD, WE JUST WON IT!!" excitement down to a "how in the world did he get thrown out?!? oh yeah, it's joe randa..." feeling within a couple seconds. they absolutely should have sent him, but they also could have maybe possibly thought about pinch-running for him – since desi relaford (who had pinch-hit earlier in the inning) came in to play defense for him in the 10th anyway. then the royals almost coughed up a run on a wild pitch in the 10th, as the ball bounced off buck and sailed HIGH in the air – only to see him run it down, flip to cerda, and record an out in one breathtaking moment. breathtaking because we had all already used it cussing up a storm as the ball floated high in the air towards the backstop. I was VERY surprised at the way the royals fans in attendance stayed *loud* and into the game. they were very excited. I mean, it was buck night and fireworks night, but everyone was into the game. and then the royals lost, and we nodded our heads with expectedness.

Saturday, I went to a t-bones game. this was the first t-bones game I'd ever been to, and, honestly, I can't say I was too impressed. this was definitely minor league, from the game to the "entertainment" to the crowd. the only thing not minor league is the prices – these guys realize they're nobodies and they suck, right? the tickets were only a little lower than the royals, and the merchandise was just as much. not a chance I'm buying that shit. the game was full of sloppy offense and miserable defense and, seriously, pitchers *I* could hit. I happened to get a seat in the second row directly behind home plate – and thank god for nylon nets, or else I would have taken a line drive directly in the face – but I was able to read the pitches in plenty of time to know where they were going. I thought it was really neat to be able to sit in that spot and so close to the game, since I will never, ever get that opportunity at a royals game, but I wasn't impressed with the pitching. the highest anyone got was 86 (very rarely), and most pitches topped out at about 82 on a fastball. not to mention that half of the pitchers were sidearmers, and that almost every hitter bats about .235. the t-bones have one big boy, eddie pearson, who most definitely won't play for them next year, as he can certainly hit. not sure about his fielding since he was a DH Saturday, though I'm sure he's a first baseman. but, as long as he can actually catch a ball, he's got a leg up on most of the guys. what do these guys do when baseball season is over? they have to have shitty jobs, as playing for the t-bones surely couldn't pay the bills all year, and what job's gonna give you every summer off to play minor-minor league baseball? they have to know there's absolutely no future in pro baseball for any of 'em, right? watching this game was like watching one of my softball games – most teams don't go out and win the game so much as they wait for the other team to screw up. this was no different. anyway, the t-bones eventually won 9-4, the between-innings "entertainment" was horrifically awful, not only were the fireworks lame but they left the freakin' ballpark lights on for the grounds crew, everything cost just as much as a royals game, and "free parking" means you park in an unmowed field.

so, it's back to the K for me..