Wednesday, June 25, 2014

How MLB.tv and stat signs turned me into a pessimist

I used to follow baseball with optimism, but lately, I am just one big negative Nelly. Why did it change? How did I become a pessimist?

Read all about it at It's About the Money, Stupid.

6 comments:

forged said...

I wonder if being able to see every play is part of the problem. For me, I mostly skate by the same way I followed baseball as a kid -- I read the recaps and boxscores. I watch the highlights (or lowlights) of some the games that seem particularly interesting.

And if I'm really lucky, I might see a game or two during the season live (and maybe a couple more on tv/radio if I can put up with the announcers and commercials).

So far the game I saw this year stunk it up pretty good. http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/COL/COL201405210.shtml

At any rate, it's a very long season, which for me makes me less incline to sweat over individual games (no matter how frustrating).

The best teams in baseball are lucky if their win rates are approaching 60%. Most are middle of the pack which means approaching 80 (or more) losses.

The Yankees appear to be slightly below middle of the pack -- but in the thick of it for the division, which is what the team was built for.

The Rockies (the other team I follow) are only remotely near the middle of the pack because when their offense decides to show up, it really shows up. The rest of the time they are a complete disaster.

Considering they seem to be a marginal candidate for chasing a wildcard spot, that seems about right for the Rockies. Shrug helplessly.

My question to you, since I have been mostly talking about my own opinion is how much of your pessimism is because the Yankees aren't playing great baseball right now versus how much of it is just oversaturated by seeing every game?

William J. Tasker said...

I think it is a combination of both. Seeing it all and seeing a bunch of frustrating circumstances leads to the ennui.

I do not see the Rockies making the playoffs, wild card or otherwise.

forged said...

Oh, you are correct about the Rockies. And that was my expectation going into the season. (And they have done nothing to change it.)

My comment about them and the wildcard was largely due to that it seems to be ownership's belief that they can do just enough to field a competitive team for the wildcard race.

They haven't done anything in years to suggest that they are seriously going in for an attempt at being in competition for the division race.

forged said...

Way off topic. Just saw an article on espn that the A's have agreed to a 10 year lease to stay at the Coliseum.

I wonder how Oakland pulled that off.

William J. Tasker said...

I wonder if the problem in Colorado is the ownership or the front office he has hired. When an assistant GM has an office in the clubhouse, something is seriously hosed.

The ten year lease from Oakland is bad for baseball...

forged said...

I always felt that the Rockies woes stemmed from ownership, but in their case the front office is so close to that it is really hard to separate the two to really tell.

My best insight into it is that the ownership just wants to do good enough that they can keep raking in the money via media deals and rely on the fact that the ballpark is beautiful enough that people will come to games despite the on-field product.

I might be overly cynical on it.

I agree with you that the development with the Oakland and the A's is bad for baseball (and the A's as well), but oddly, it is kind of refreshing to see a city not get screwed by a sports team.