There's a saying in the financial markets, "It's not the news, it's the reaction." You gauge the market's reaction by direction, price change, and volume.
The last place Red Sox have decided it's not the team it's the announcer. Strong organizations have a consistent theme, product, financial stability, and market. Weak organizations chase the latest fads, find new financial models and CFOs, and lose their market. Now they've decided you can't fire all the players, fire the announcer.
The Red Sox have opted to go cheap (got extraordinarily lucky in 2013, which a lot of us said) and won a Championship. They believed their own press clippings, analytics uber all, and that you could but a dollar's worth of goods for twenty-five cents. Yes, Jonny Gomes, Shane Victorino, David Ross and others overachieved. But they still had Lester, Lackey, and extraordinary good fortune with an unpredictable non-Gaussian performance by Koji Uehara as closer.
Management seems constantly to shift directions...run prevention, run creation at the expense of pitching, go with the local guy (Sam Kennedy), jettison the local guy (Theo, Cherington, Orsillo), the bizarre fealty to Larry Lucchino (Bobby Valentine), get high priced hitters with known warts (Sandoval conditioning, Hanley intensity) and so on.
At the end of the day, the Fan Experience isn't walking up the concourse to see the bright lights and the green grass. It's about seeing quality baseball...guys who play the game the right way night after night. Do more of what's working and less of what's not. We understand that quality people, e.g. Justin Masterson, sometimes won't work out. We recognize that injuries (Pedroia, Vasquez) impact the defense.
Whatever the problem with the Fan Experience, the mercurial management themes and nonsensical decisions show poor judgement by management. That isn't excusing the bad baseball (miscounting outs, shoddy baserunning, swinging at bad pitches) or bad managing (e.g. burying Xander Bogaerts last season and sticking with Hanley Ramirez in left this year).
Making Don Orsillo walk the plank just alienates the fans one more time. When is enough enough?
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
Monday, June 15, 2015
An Ounce of Compassion
Red Sox fans haven't abandoned the locals. It feels like it's happened the other way around. The Smartest Guys in the Room constructed a team short on pitching and add in general underperformance offensively and defensively and another last place finish becomes distinctly possible.
Rather than calling for John Farrell's head, I feel sorry for him. There's no circling the wagons, no Band of Brothers, barely a heartbeat. Somehow, in less than two years, the slogan at America's Most Beloved Ballpark has gone from "Fear the Beard" to "Baseball Weird."
The games ARE shorter which makes for a poor consolation prize.
Leadership doesn't find problems, it solves them. Of course, baseball's momentum only lasts as long as tomorrow's starting pitcher, and there's the rub. The closest approximation to an ace may be a 22 year-old kid and the rest of the rotation hasn't found a way to take advantage of a PED-free league with expanded strike zones.
The Red Sox don't necessarily need a better lineup; they need the professionals in their lineup to play better. The leaders don't need to plead character, they need to produce. Blaming the media might be popular, but that's not a solution.
Maybe mean reversion will help coffee and sugar prices, and the commodity that represents the Boston Red Sox. "You're never as good as you look when you win or as bad as you look when you lose." The Sox are playing tight, trying not to lose, having forgotten or lost the joy of a child's game. When the game becomes just a paycheck, everybody loses.
Rather than calling for John Farrell's head, I feel sorry for him. There's no circling the wagons, no Band of Brothers, barely a heartbeat. Somehow, in less than two years, the slogan at America's Most Beloved Ballpark has gone from "Fear the Beard" to "Baseball Weird."
The games ARE shorter which makes for a poor consolation prize.
Leadership doesn't find problems, it solves them. Of course, baseball's momentum only lasts as long as tomorrow's starting pitcher, and there's the rub. The closest approximation to an ace may be a 22 year-old kid and the rest of the rotation hasn't found a way to take advantage of a PED-free league with expanded strike zones.
The Red Sox don't necessarily need a better lineup; they need the professionals in their lineup to play better. The leaders don't need to plead character, they need to produce. Blaming the media might be popular, but that's not a solution.
Maybe mean reversion will help coffee and sugar prices, and the commodity that represents the Boston Red Sox. "You're never as good as you look when you win or as bad as you look when you lose." The Sox are playing tight, trying not to lose, having forgotten or lost the joy of a child's game. When the game becomes just a paycheck, everybody loses.
Thursday, May 28, 2015
Quarter Pounder
The Red Sox passed the quarter pole mark of the 2015 marathon, and the results haven't been pretty. You don't need a Ph.D. in baseball to recognize mediocrity and the Red Sox haven't quite met that metric.
John Farrell's extension came as a cruel joke to Red Sox fans, and Farrell's 2013 championship may show up in a redo of Malcolm Gladwell's "Outliers". The chapter might be called, "10,000 Years" instead of "10,000 Hours" as it may take the Sox a hundred centuries to win another championship with "John Wayne" Farrell.
The "Five Aces" pitching staff hasn't been Five Arces, but overall the rotation has disappointed even fans of 'average'. Recently, Rick Porcello's performance make Whitey Bulger look like Mother Teresa as far as grand theft goes, Clay Buchholz remains an enigma, and the Cardinals' wise exile of Joe Kelly looks even better this season. Wade Miley has turned around his initial woes and maybe Triple A promotions Steven Wright and Eduardo Rodriguez can reshuffle the deck.
The only way a Red Sox position player makes the All-Star team is via a "Lifetime Achievement" award. David Ortiz needs a trip to the Fountain of Youth and steady Dustin Pedroia hasn't outperformed Jason Kipnis or Jose Altuve. He has surpassed the surprising decline of Robinson Cano and Stephen Drew has proven the past couple of years of failure wasn't a fluke.
The good news for Red Sox fans is what? Fans of younger players can watch the struggles of Bogaerts and Betts, the efforts of sparkplug Brock Holt, and hope the offense can 'mean revert' to competence after an indifferent first quarter. Eleventh (of fifteen) in runs scored and fourteenth in ERA converges with the Sox' last place standing in the AL East.
What's even worse is that Sox for the most part have played boring baseball. When lifelong baseball fans watch the NBA playoffs every night and sitcom reruns instead of the locals, baseball has to examine more than the length of games.
John Farrell's extension came as a cruel joke to Red Sox fans, and Farrell's 2013 championship may show up in a redo of Malcolm Gladwell's "Outliers". The chapter might be called, "10,000 Years" instead of "10,000 Hours" as it may take the Sox a hundred centuries to win another championship with "John Wayne" Farrell.
The "Five Aces" pitching staff hasn't been Five Arces, but overall the rotation has disappointed even fans of 'average'. Recently, Rick Porcello's performance make Whitey Bulger look like Mother Teresa as far as grand theft goes, Clay Buchholz remains an enigma, and the Cardinals' wise exile of Joe Kelly looks even better this season. Wade Miley has turned around his initial woes and maybe Triple A promotions Steven Wright and Eduardo Rodriguez can reshuffle the deck.
The only way a Red Sox position player makes the All-Star team is via a "Lifetime Achievement" award. David Ortiz needs a trip to the Fountain of Youth and steady Dustin Pedroia hasn't outperformed Jason Kipnis or Jose Altuve. He has surpassed the surprising decline of Robinson Cano and Stephen Drew has proven the past couple of years of failure wasn't a fluke.
The good news for Red Sox fans is what? Fans of younger players can watch the struggles of Bogaerts and Betts, the efforts of sparkplug Brock Holt, and hope the offense can 'mean revert' to competence after an indifferent first quarter. Eleventh (of fifteen) in runs scored and fourteenth in ERA converges with the Sox' last place standing in the AL East.
What's even worse is that Sox for the most part have played boring baseball. When lifelong baseball fans watch the NBA playoffs every night and sitcom reruns instead of the locals, baseball has to examine more than the length of games.
Sunday, May 10, 2015
Death by a Thousand Cuts, Self-Inflicted Demise of the Boston Red Sox
"The lady doth protest too much, methinks." - Hamlet
Everyone "loses their fastball", figuratively if not literally. We know from watching baseball for fifty plus years that greatness is borne of balance not excess. Yes, there are exceptions (the pitching rich 1969 Mets stand as prime example), but teams constructed to be offensive juggernauts (Air Coryell fans speak up here) don't wind up holding the trophy.
Of course we're talking about team sports, not individual contests where a handful of individuals - Usain Bolt, Michael Phelps, Secretariat - put up 'silly' numbers.
All of which brings us to the Boston Red Sox, on the fast track to go last, champion, last, and last. Just as on Sesame Street, "one of these things doesn't belong." The Sox had incredibly good fortune, clutch hitting, and statistically aberrant performance from closer Koji Uehara to seal the deal in 2013. You have to wonder if somebody made a deal with the devil to deliver that championship.
Version 2015 of the Bosox looks freakishly like last year's disaster, with the team routinely trailing early, lacking energy, and becoming unwatchable. It's like having a portfolio of stocks that reports bad earnings, CFOs quitting, and changing their product line every quarter.
To make matters worse, management looks short of a few gorilla suits, signing Ben Cherington and John Farrell to extensions, saddled with long-term deals for guys unproven in the American League (Allen Craig, Wade Miley), and developing pitchers at the rate of improvements in Microsoft Windows.
The Commodity Genius, John Henry, looks the Commodity Tool as the fungible pieces on the Red Sox look neither fun nor able. The Sox feel destined to have to sell low on Daniel Nava and likely have to ship both Craig and starter Joe Kelly to the minors to resurrect their careers. The decline of Clay Buchholz is no less a mystery, an athlete whose zenith came early in his career and whose flashes of brilliance come with declining frequency and diminishing passion.
“There is no greater sorrow then to recall our times of joy in wretchedness.” - Dante Alighieri
You need neither books nor numbers to witness the struggles of former Redbirds on the Red Sox, as Edward Mujica is gone, and Craig and Kelly have sunk to Dante's lowest level of baseball hell. Even Daniel Bard must feel sorry for the Red Sox now.
Teams hate to part ways with two realities, unproductive players and their 'sunk costs'. Better to make excuses for the Stephen Drews of the world than to accept the 'eye test' of a player's declining arc. Few organizations adopt the Macchiavellian posture of 'better a year early than a year late' that the Patriots do, willing to jettison a Lawyer Milloy, Drew Bledsoe, or Vince Wilfork before Father Time or Aunt Jemima catch up with them.
A player or two won't salvage the Red Sox now, a team overwrought by their self-importance ("The Nation") and their home ("America's Most Beloved Ballpark"). Maybe it's the curse of Jon Lester.
Yes, the baseball season is a marathon not a sprint. You don't have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great.
Everyone "loses their fastball", figuratively if not literally. We know from watching baseball for fifty plus years that greatness is borne of balance not excess. Yes, there are exceptions (the pitching rich 1969 Mets stand as prime example), but teams constructed to be offensive juggernauts (Air Coryell fans speak up here) don't wind up holding the trophy.
Of course we're talking about team sports, not individual contests where a handful of individuals - Usain Bolt, Michael Phelps, Secretariat - put up 'silly' numbers.
All of which brings us to the Boston Red Sox, on the fast track to go last, champion, last, and last. Just as on Sesame Street, "one of these things doesn't belong." The Sox had incredibly good fortune, clutch hitting, and statistically aberrant performance from closer Koji Uehara to seal the deal in 2013. You have to wonder if somebody made a deal with the devil to deliver that championship.
Version 2015 of the Bosox looks freakishly like last year's disaster, with the team routinely trailing early, lacking energy, and becoming unwatchable. It's like having a portfolio of stocks that reports bad earnings, CFOs quitting, and changing their product line every quarter.
To make matters worse, management looks short of a few gorilla suits, signing Ben Cherington and John Farrell to extensions, saddled with long-term deals for guys unproven in the American League (Allen Craig, Wade Miley), and developing pitchers at the rate of improvements in Microsoft Windows.
The Commodity Genius, John Henry, looks the Commodity Tool as the fungible pieces on the Red Sox look neither fun nor able. The Sox feel destined to have to sell low on Daniel Nava and likely have to ship both Craig and starter Joe Kelly to the minors to resurrect their careers. The decline of Clay Buchholz is no less a mystery, an athlete whose zenith came early in his career and whose flashes of brilliance come with declining frequency and diminishing passion.
“There is no greater sorrow then to recall our times of joy in wretchedness.” - Dante Alighieri
You need neither books nor numbers to witness the struggles of former Redbirds on the Red Sox, as Edward Mujica is gone, and Craig and Kelly have sunk to Dante's lowest level of baseball hell. Even Daniel Bard must feel sorry for the Red Sox now.
Teams hate to part ways with two realities, unproductive players and their 'sunk costs'. Better to make excuses for the Stephen Drews of the world than to accept the 'eye test' of a player's declining arc. Few organizations adopt the Macchiavellian posture of 'better a year early than a year late' that the Patriots do, willing to jettison a Lawyer Milloy, Drew Bledsoe, or Vince Wilfork before Father Time or Aunt Jemima catch up with them.
A player or two won't salvage the Red Sox now, a team overwrought by their self-importance ("The Nation") and their home ("America's Most Beloved Ballpark"). Maybe it's the curse of Jon Lester.
Yes, the baseball season is a marathon not a sprint. You don't have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great.
Thursday, April 30, 2015
Feeling the Draft
Jameis Winston is going to the Bucs. Winston has an exceptional understanding of defenses, strong arm, and has won big in college. As for rape allegations, shoplifting, boorishness, and rumors of gambling issues - it's the NFL (see the expose' "Pros and Cons").
The posturing continues regarding the Mariota comings and goings. Tennessee apparently wants three number ones. Mariota is the consolation prize that the Eagles, Jets, and possibly Rams want. He makes touchdowns and controls interceptions, although fumbling has been an issue for him. With a few hours left before the draft, I'll predict that Tennessee moves the pick.
Character issues bit the Browns last year, and rumor of a Manziel renaissance seem at odds with their efforts to move up for the Oregon signal-caller. Then there's the drug test problems for Randy Gregory and Shane Ray, and who knows what with La'el Collins and his relationship to a murdered 29 year-old expectant mother. Before we get sanctimonious, two words, Aaron Hernandez.
The subplots of Mariota and the dumb as dirt guys who fail KNOWN drug tests will keep the non-Patriots parts of the draft interesting. That, plus the strategies chosen by AFC East rivals. Could the Jets take Todd Gurley at six? Will the Dolphins go after receivers to help Ryan Tannehill? Will Rex Ryan take a flyer (a foothold?) on the marijuana crowd?
As for the Patriots, anything is possible. I just finished Michael Holley's "War Room", which focused on the behind the scenes actions of the Pats, Pioli and the Chiefs, and Tom Dimitroff's Falcons. I expect the Patriots to either trade down (wouldn't another 2, 3, 4, and 7 be swell) or take the best player available. The problem with drafting receivers is they don't always meet (don't usually meet) Tom Brady's expectations. No trust, no throws.
The Globe reviews the advantages (extra year of team control) of the first round, ultimately meaning seven years of team control (including franchise tags) and potentially major savings as a result. That has to appeal to the green eyeshades in the Kraft counting house.
By the way, "War Room" totally reviews the Laurence Maroney and Chad Jackson fiasco and Belichick's overruling the scouts who questioned the work ethic of both. Why an elite athlete whose future depends on his work would be a dog totally baffles me. But we see it all the time.
Jon Gruden has a fascinating piece on ESPN about the risk choices in the first round, and there's a great chance the Patriots could get one of these question marks. After the Hernandez experience, I'd expect Collins to be off the board, but you never know.
Well, at least they'll have more fans in the seats in Chicago than at Camden Yards.
The posturing continues regarding the Mariota comings and goings. Tennessee apparently wants three number ones. Mariota is the consolation prize that the Eagles, Jets, and possibly Rams want. He makes touchdowns and controls interceptions, although fumbling has been an issue for him. With a few hours left before the draft, I'll predict that Tennessee moves the pick.
Character issues bit the Browns last year, and rumor of a Manziel renaissance seem at odds with their efforts to move up for the Oregon signal-caller. Then there's the drug test problems for Randy Gregory and Shane Ray, and who knows what with La'el Collins and his relationship to a murdered 29 year-old expectant mother. Before we get sanctimonious, two words, Aaron Hernandez.
The subplots of Mariota and the dumb as dirt guys who fail KNOWN drug tests will keep the non-Patriots parts of the draft interesting. That, plus the strategies chosen by AFC East rivals. Could the Jets take Todd Gurley at six? Will the Dolphins go after receivers to help Ryan Tannehill? Will Rex Ryan take a flyer (a foothold?) on the marijuana crowd?
As for the Patriots, anything is possible. I just finished Michael Holley's "War Room", which focused on the behind the scenes actions of the Pats, Pioli and the Chiefs, and Tom Dimitroff's Falcons. I expect the Patriots to either trade down (wouldn't another 2, 3, 4, and 7 be swell) or take the best player available. The problem with drafting receivers is they don't always meet (don't usually meet) Tom Brady's expectations. No trust, no throws.
The Globe reviews the advantages (extra year of team control) of the first round, ultimately meaning seven years of team control (including franchise tags) and potentially major savings as a result. That has to appeal to the green eyeshades in the Kraft counting house.
By the way, "War Room" totally reviews the Laurence Maroney and Chad Jackson fiasco and Belichick's overruling the scouts who questioned the work ethic of both. Why an elite athlete whose future depends on his work would be a dog totally baffles me. But we see it all the time.
Jon Gruden has a fascinating piece on ESPN about the risk choices in the first round, and there's a great chance the Patriots could get one of these question marks. After the Hernandez experience, I'd expect Collins to be off the board, but you never know.
Well, at least they'll have more fans in the seats in Chicago than at Camden Yards.
Monday, April 20, 2015
Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?
Everyone thinks they know baseball. We grew up playing baseball, watching baseball, or maybe reading about baseball. We had the "eyeball" test when looking at young players and had our own version of Sabermetrics (RBIs plus runs scored minus home runs).
The Boston Red Sox came into the 2015 season with a highly touted lineup, thanks to the addition of Hanley Ramirez, Pablo Sandoval, a healthy Dustin Pedroia, a revived Mike Napoli after sleep apnea surgery, and youngsters Mookie Betts and Xander Bogaerts. What could possibly go wrong?
At best, the Red Sox rotation was comprised of a melange of number three starters, and that was being charitable. News flash, "how's that working out for you?" Paying guys a lot of money doesn't make them better only richer. John Farrell's confidence boosting aside "we have five number ones", doesn't make it so.
In the post-steroid era, the Red Sox early season ERA is over 2 runs a game below the league leader. To be fair, the strikeout to walk ratio portends better results, as this is a better predictor of ERA than ERA itself.
But going inside the numbers, i.e. starting pitching, the Red Sox look every bit as suspect as the "know-nothing" fans thought they would, with an ERA almost FOUR runs worth than league leaders, and nothing encouraging on the horizon.
Yes, it's a marathon, not a sprint, and the Sox have won three series out of four. There's no cause for pushing the panic button, but the Pollyannas pushing the 'Easy' button had better get their collective heads out of the darkness.
If you thought the Red Sox pitching was good enough to win a championship, then you're not smarter than a fifth grader. "I award you no points and may God have mercy on your soul."
The Boston Red Sox came into the 2015 season with a highly touted lineup, thanks to the addition of Hanley Ramirez, Pablo Sandoval, a healthy Dustin Pedroia, a revived Mike Napoli after sleep apnea surgery, and youngsters Mookie Betts and Xander Bogaerts. What could possibly go wrong?
At best, the Red Sox rotation was comprised of a melange of number three starters, and that was being charitable. News flash, "how's that working out for you?" Paying guys a lot of money doesn't make them better only richer. John Farrell's confidence boosting aside "we have five number ones", doesn't make it so.
Yes, it's a marathon, not a sprint, and the Sox have won three series out of four. There's no cause for pushing the panic button, but the Pollyannas pushing the 'Easy' button had better get their collective heads out of the darkness.
If you thought the Red Sox pitching was good enough to win a championship, then you're not smarter than a fifth grader. "I award you no points and may God have mercy on your soul."
Monday, April 6, 2015
Looking Out for Number One
You can't blame John Farrell for claiming that the Red Sox have five number one starters. Inspiring confidence is one of every manager's tasks. Unfortunately, inspiring skepticism comes more easily for baseball fans.
Is pitching getting better, supporting Farrell's claim or is hitting worsening? We know that strikeouts as a percentage of outs has risen and that runs scored is falling. Is pitching dominance the cause or the decline associated with random drug testing for PEDs.
Run scoring, via SportingCharts.com
Strikeouts, from the Society of American Baseball Research
Certainly, we can wonder if the changing use of relief pitchers (see Kansas City Royals and this year's New York Yankees) is and will be the most important factor, but we have to wonder to what extent it is the dominant cause.
What can't be in dispute is that compared with watching "continuous action sports" like basketball and hockey or gladiatorial spectacle (the National Football League), baseball has become tedious. Maybe our concern shouldn't be whether the Red Sox have a number one, but whether watching baseball has much merit at all.
Is pitching getting better, supporting Farrell's claim or is hitting worsening? We know that strikeouts as a percentage of outs has risen and that runs scored is falling. Is pitching dominance the cause or the decline associated with random drug testing for PEDs.
Certainly, we can wonder if the changing use of relief pitchers (see Kansas City Royals and this year's New York Yankees) is and will be the most important factor, but we have to wonder to what extent it is the dominant cause.
What can't be in dispute is that compared with watching "continuous action sports" like basketball and hockey or gladiatorial spectacle (the National Football League), baseball has become tedious. Maybe our concern shouldn't be whether the Red Sox have a number one, but whether watching baseball has much merit at all.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)