Bogarting the Wild Card

Hippies. Among other things, hippies are about sharing, and open possibilities.

Clinching a postseason berth is very anti-hippy. It's not sharing, its grabbing and holding, clinching tight. It's staking a claim, planting a flag, putting up a fence and asserting 'its mine.' Clinching closes off possibilities, stomps on all the different ways the future might be, confines them to the path must taken. No sunny optimism this, the future is determined, its been staked out in advance, the bidding is over. We claim this space, and this time, for ourselves, for our conquest.

This time of year, sharing is for losers; the yankees can share 4th place and golf clubs if they want. And 'wait till next year' too, the refrain of open possibilities; that's the wedge between the determined, excluding territory of the here and soon, what's clinched and held tight as ours, and an open ended vague hopeful tomorrow to share with anyone who can dream.

It's hippie stuff for the Yankees.

Mattingly, shave those sideburns.

Small Ball Doesn't Work; Sox Swept in Anaheim, 5-3

Losing to the Angels is like losing to a guy who spins his foosball players; you concede they hit the ball, and that they scored more, but you're just not sure how much credit they should get.

Much is made of the Angels' aggressive small ball style, but I don't like it. They swing at everything, and so I don't know that it isn't random when they do hit the ball. They look to me like a team with a lower on-base percentage than batting average.

The Sox are disciplined; patience, which suggests passivity, isn't the right word. The Angels, though talented, are wild and uncontrolled. They are Nuke LaLoosh to the Sox's Crash.

It's obvious that the organizations have different values. The Angels have only 1 player with an OBP above .350 (Chone Figgins at .379), and only 3 qualifiers above .310. Egregiously, they have 7 players with at least 90 AB's below .315 in OBP, including qualifiers Mathews Jr and Anderson, and Jeff Mathis way down at .288.

Compare the Sox, with 8 players above .350 in OBP, including Casey (129 AB's) at.418, and qualifiers Drew .410, Ramirez .396, and Youkilis .382. The Sox have just 3 players with at least 90 AB's below .315 in OBP, and two are catchers.

National media types are inclined to call the Sox a "moneyball team", and Beane is famously cited as saying his shit doesn't work in the playoffs. But the Sox have trounced the Angels, 6 games to 0, over the last two A.L. Division Series (in '04 and '07. You should know this.) It's the Angels' shit that doesn't work in the postseason, because they are the far inferior offensive team- the Sox have outscored the Angels by 74 runs this season- and they're only even in pitching (with the Sox staff ERA at 3.84, the starters 3.77, and the Angels staff at 3.81, the starters 3.74)

The Angels win with pitching, not with small ball. And perhaps with Luck; the Angels' run differential is a mere +33, to the Sox' +87.

The philosopher Dan Dennett talks of "elbow room" for free will in a deterministic universe. Maybe, just maybe, says the ghost of Joe Morgan past, small ball creates some "elbow room" in the deterministic universe of wins as a function of random run distribution (i.e. the expected record based on +/-.)

Maybe. But a team with such a low OBP playing to the score only works with great pitching, and those goddam foosball spinners are f'ing lucky and should learn to play the real way.

Cont'd: Free trade: money and competition

From the Archive: 10/27/07
[continuation of http://soxlosophy.blogspot.com/2008/06/free-trade-money-and-competition.html]

I don't think anyone is going to dispute that few other teams could have made Theo’s mistakes, or that payroll can be statistically correlated (though causation is a whole other issue) with regular season victories. Unfortunately, this is all irrelevant.

The relevant issue is whether the causes of this scenario- payroll discrepancies- are such that they render the scenario unethical. That is to say, the issue is whether this situation has come about in such a manner that we should, in good conscience, not follow/patronize/enjoy the game; the issue is not that there are payroll discrepancies, but who bears responsibility for the payroll discrepancies.

I deny that the only object of blame is 'the system'. My basic point in the last email was that the individual franchises are to an important degree responsible because they are in fact rich, and by 'rich' I mean 'able to spend lots and lots of money on things.'

One might be inclined to make the following claims: a) that payroll is a function of a team's revenue stream, b) there are 'small market' teams that have less revenue, and so can't afford the same payroll, and c) that a team doesn't bear any responsibility for that revenue stream (and by extension, doesn't bear responsibility for its payroll, because of a)- that payroll is a function of revenue.)

But a), b), and c) are false.

Firstly, teams make a profit. That means they have more money then they're spending. Therefore, they could choose to spend more. Secondly, all teams are owned by companies or people with stakes in other companies, and so have revenue streams outside of their baseball franchises. A megacorporation like Coors, which owns the Rockies, could choose to use profits from any of its subsidiaries to invest in players if it wanted to. But it doesn't. So a) is false. That’s not my fault, nor The System's, nor Bud Selig's, that's theirs.

Is it bad business to do this? Maybe. But the point of the examples of Toronto and Cleveland is that fans everywhere, no matter the market, will pay to see winning baseball- there's no such thing as a small market when the team is winning. If a team puts a World Series caliber team on the field, guess what: the revenue will increase. If a team chooses to invest in its team, and it wins, it'll make money. A team can also choose to spend less money, and thereby make less money. In other words, a team does bear some responsibility for its revenue stream- c) is false.

But spending money isn't a sure thing- (the statistical correlation of payroll with wins is not causation; payroll does not determine with physical necessity the outcome of games.) the point about the Rockies in particular is they tried this strategy with Hampton and Neagle and it failed. They spent the money, it didn't work, and so they decided to not spend money anymore and be satisfied with a team with a lower payroll. (Granted, it was a different ownership group, so 'they' is a bit vague.) But Colorado had the money, just like Baltimore, or Toronto, or whomever, regardless of whether they are in a 'small market,' have money, and choose not to spend it. So b) is false.

Again, and generally speaking, if the team invested money in a winning team, they'd get more fans, more national attention, more advertising, etc.- they'd make more money, and then they could have a higher payroll. The System does not stop anyone or everyone from doing this, they way the system in the real world does require unemployment and low wages and such. All teams are rich enough to do this if they chose to take the risk. But some teams are run poorly, or cheaply. They either don't invest, or they invest poorly. Why do you assume its fault of the system that the pirates and royals don’t' succeed? What evidence do you have for this? They fail every year because they are poorly managed. The A's are well managed, and compete every year despite a comparability low payroll. Every year some or a few small market teams make the playoffs. The reason Pittsburgh and KC aren't on this list is because they suck and spend money on Gil Meche.

Look, the overall issue here is one of culpability. Teams bear some amount of responsibility for their payroll, their revenue, their choices in free agents or draft picks, in which case one need not boycott the whole thing. The system is not necessarily unjust. It can be lopsided at times, and yes, there do exist inequities. And by all means, as I’ve said before, I am in favor of various balancing measures. But just like the players on the field are responsible for their performances, so are the suits. But I don't pay to see the suits play, and when they choose poorly, I’m not going to not watch my boys on the field play well.

And Josh Fogg still sucks.

Free trade?: Money and competition

From the Archive: 10/25/07

[a friend wrote:]
Shame on all of you. Look at payroll discrepancy! Where would the Indians be if they had made the same trades Theo did over the last 3 years??

[my response]

If you're waiting for socialism before you let yourself have a good time, well, I’m not quite sure what to say to that.

I’m all in favor of luxury taxes and income re-distribution in the name of competitive balance. However, current inequities do not diminish my interest in nor my enjoyment of the game.

And I don't think they should.

I don't think they should for one simple reason. Baseball teams are not like poor people. The main reason for this is that poor people are poor, whereas baseball teams are rich. (They are also not people; of course. this is especially true of the Yankees.)

The idea that there are 'haves' and 'have nots' in baseball is simply not apt. Everyone who owns a baseball team is rich beyond our wildest dreams. The Rockies are owned by Coors. They don't have money? They couldn't choose to spend more on payroll if they wanted to?

There’s a manipulative capitalism way of saying people are free to choose, and a real way. Its wrong to say that people who are slowly starving to death 'choose' to work for 2 cents an hour because the alternative they're not 'choosing' is quickly starving to death at 0 cents an hour. This isn't a real choice, and it isn't right. But baseball teams are rich rich rich. And they really do choose not to spend on payroll.

Boston and Denver, and New England and the rocky mountain region, have comparable populations. If the Red Sox are a 'bigger market' team than the Rockies, and so have more money, then that's because people in new England care more about baseball than their rocky mountain counterparts. Good for us! And if people care more, and are willing to pay more, then they are more deserving of a better team. Why should the sox be penalized for having passionate fans?

This is not analogous to saying 'why should tycoons be penalized for their initiative and entrepreneurial spirit by paying taxes or a fair wage?' Tycoons have more power than their workers, and so workers can't negotiate fairly, and so need institutionalized assistance (like labor laws and unions). And corporations use and depend on government infrastructure and human resources and public education for future employees, for which they owe money. The Red Sox do not have more power than the Rockies- the Red Sox can't fire the Rockies or ship them off to China. And the Red Sox do in fact pay a heavy luxury tax, which is distributed among the other teams. They incur this penalty as a result of choosing to pay a lot of money for their team on the field. Good for them. That’s their choice.

If the Rockies spent more money, more fans would care and show up. Toronto sold out Skydome every day when they were great in the early 90's. Cleveland sold out every day when they were great in the mid and late 90's. These are 'small market' teams. Fans everywhere care, and show up and pay money, when their teams win. And when teams win, they make lots of money. And if teams bothered to spend that money on players, then they'd win more, and they'd get a return on their investment. But Pete Coors and the Coors brewing company would rather pocket the money, instead of reinvesting it and giving the fans a better team. or, when they tried that, they wasted it on mike Hampton and Denny Neagle, and decided it was safer to pocket the money than risk it on free agents.

I don't see why the jerks who run teams should be rewarded for being stingy.

So sure, luxury tax and such. But life is short, and in the meantime, I am going to enjoy a perfect game, played somewhat imperfectly, and in an imperfect world.

2007 ALCS: Physics and Luck vs. Character

From the Archive: October 17, 2007
[ALCS vs. Cleveland, Sox down 3-1]

I HATE LOSING!!!!!!!!! I HATE IT SO MUCH!!!!!!!!!

Tonight was unpleasant. I teach a class at 730, and I raced home afterwards. It was still 0-0. First pitch I saw, Blake homers. And then the floodgates. Ugh.

When watching the playoffs, I vacillate between the perception of the game as moral, as a manifestation of will and courage and tenacity- in a word, as a battle of character, on the one hand, and the perception of the game as physics and chance, void of meaning- an inch here, a bad call there.

It’s easier to see pitching as moral. In two postseason games, Beckett's gone 15 innings, with 15 K's and no walks. That’s aggression. Dominance. The imposition of will. Beckett is the champion, the ace, the man who will triumph.

Sabathia, in his two postseason starts, doesn't have it. In the regular season, he walked 37 in 240 innings. In the postseason, he's walked 10 or 11 in as many innings (give or take.) he's lost his nerve. He’s afraid of contact. He stops throwing the fastball. He has no killer instinct (watch him get ahead 0-2 and then walk the hitter.) he's weak.

So game 1 was a battle of morality and character, of meaning.

Since then, I’m not so sure. In game 3, a couple of terrible strike calls- for instance a 3-0 ball a foot off the plate inside on crisp turned a walk into an out, and killed an inning. Papi rips a ball to the right side for a dp, and lines out to right on a ball that took 1/3 second to get there. Nixon bloops the game winning hit off Lopez.

and game 4, Buck and McCarver were actually right to emphasize that had that ball either been caught by Wakefield for an out, or he missed entirely, Pedroia easily would have turned 2, inning over, only 1 run in. instead it trickled for an infield hit. and 6 more runs.

the Sox keep hitting sharply into double plays, the Indians hit grounders too softly to turn two. crisp and Pedroia both lined out in key spots late in game 4.

this is all physics and chance. No character. no morality. Hitting is about luck- Papi is imposing his will, but liners get caught. Bloopers fall in. but pitching is about morality. Beckett dominates. Sabathia's a pussy. but Wakefield and his knuckleball- with no pitch selection- is about physics and chance, and so we get beat by a trickler.

look. We got Beckett in Game 5. Quite possible to win that game. Then we're down 3-2. Someone's gotta be 3-2 after 5 games. no big deal. And then its two games at Fenway. Schilling acts like Schilling, and then its game 7, and anything can happen.

Physics and luck.

a-head

From the Archive: August 14, 2006

Inside A-Rod's head? Here’s what I think, in a paragraph or so.

I think a lot of people work with an implicit distinction, however ill gotten or tenuous, between what is 'God given' and what is had by one's own will power. People may admire what is God given, but they don't necessarily respect it.

A-Rod has plenty of God given talent, one might think. But what has 'he', the person, that bundle of will power and psychic forces, done with it? People love David Eckstein more than A-rod. It is because of Eckstein's drive and will in the face of less god given ability that he earn respect. Jeter and Tom Brady are a lot alike (yes) and are very easy to hate as pretty boy superstars who can get whatever they want. But instead they are admired and respected because of their poise and command and apparent inner strength; instead of wilting in the spotlight, they can impose their will at just the right moment, even over people with perhaps more God-given talent. People don't think A-rod can impose his will. He has god given talent, but who is he, really, independently of what god gave him, they ask? He’s weak, he's soft, he can't get it done. All those fans out there have the will, but they don't have the talent. How can they not resent someone with the talent but without that ability to impose it? God gives you the cards, but you have to play the hand. A-rod folds with 4 aces.

The Shroud of Schilling

From the Archive:

November 5, 2004

Last week we deified Curt Schilling for his miraculous and heroic performances against the Yankees and Cardinals. This week Curt was deifying the deity and stumping on his tattered ankle for Bush. Curt fears no hitter, but he fears god. Good for him?
Curt is quick to point to his finding god (yet he supports for pres. a man who couldn't find...) as a turning point in his career, a source of energy and motivation for his transcending his earthly constraints. Thanking the doctors seemed an afterthought, despite their having invented a new procedure in order for him to pitch.

Is our joy tarnished by Curt's beliefs? Can we no longer root for a religious Bush-supporting nut?

I really haven't had favorite players since I was a kid. This is one of the reasons why. As soon as one looks at a player as anything other than the sum of his past statistics, and as a disposition for future ones, we're screwed. What if he's a wife beater? What if he doesn't believe in dinosaurs? What if he's an anti-Semite? What if he wouldn't sign my ball? What if he honked his car horn at me and gave me the finger?

What we have to keep in mind is that these people, as ballplayers, are not people. They are baseball automatons. They are probably all jerks, they all picked on you in high school, they stole your girl because they were jocks, they spit on your loyalty and adoration for a few extra bucks that they will never need.

This does not lessen my joy. I learned long ago to think of the players as cogs, exactly as valuable as they facilitate the functioning of the machine, the team.

I've said before that 'most of the philosophers I like are dead. All of the baseball players I like are on the same team.'

You see, I use different criteria for the two. Not only are they all on the same team, but once they're not on the team, they can go fuck themselves (although for some reason I think I’ll always be fond of daubach.)

Viewing it this way makes one less inclined for hero-worship, and perhaps takes some of the fun out of pride and vicarious living. But I know I don't want to hang out with these players. I don't even want their memorabilia- manny's bat, the jock shilling wore at his first communion, or the condom for which Nomar thanked beautiful.

Athletes sometimes take it personally when fans boo. They sometimes don't get it that just because they were cheered before, they should always be. But of course we don't cheer them, we cheer their performance. Nomar was never able to distinguish Nomar the person from Nomar the player, and so was irrevocably hurt when he was deemed replaceable. A disposition for future statistics is replaceable.

Why are athletes republicans? Simple. They believe that hard work equals success. They don’t see why if they could do it, why can’t everyone? Everyone can’t because everyone is not equally talented. Some people have no talent, and some people have talent but can’t succeed because larger forces are too overwhelming, such that no amount of work can garner success. Josh Gibson had all the talent in the world, but that larger force of segregation prevented him from succeeding. It is very easy for the athlete to forget how special they are, and that ‘special’ only makes sense in contrast to those who are not. Liberals, quite simply, believe the government should help out the less fortunate, not hang them out to dry like a bloody sock.

As has been often mentioned, why don’t athletes who praise and thank god when they win, blame god when they lose? ‘That bitch ass Jesus made me drop that popup.’ Perhaps Bill Buckner’s a Satan worshipper. As I’ve noted before, God’s all time winning percentage seems to be .500

On the other hand, athletes do seem to realize their luck- their skills are ‘god given.’ It’s just very easy for them to translate that into a god given preference for them, that they are divinely special. And for those that are not, it is because God has seen fit for them to be mediocre and poor. And why should a government step in and try to reverse god’s plan?

Blasphemy!

2004 ALDS Game 1: On Human Freedom

From the Archive:

(Upon reading this again, I can't say I stand behind many of the statements. Though I would stand behind them if they'd hide me from the embarassment they cause. Oh, the ironing.)

October 6, 2004:

Thoughts inspired by Game 1, ALDS; Sox v. Angels, Sox up 1-0

If the process doesn't matter, the result doesn't matter. With whether this is a cliché, truism, or motivational aphorism, I am not concerned. The truth of it, however, is quite relevant to our current situation with those monkey-humpers in California.

Would it be satisfactory to learn, upon waking from a coma three weeks from now, that the Red Sox had won the World Series? Or would you rather have been there all along, absorbed in every pitch? Frankly, I'd rather have been so absorbed and have the Sox lose, than to awake three weeks from now to see that they'd won.

What people don't realize is that probabilities are determinate. It is usually thought that if something is only probable, and not certain, that it is indeterminate. Not so. You see, if something is going to happen, say, 60 % of the time, it is a determinate fact of the matter that it will happen 60 % of the time. To accept a formula that predicts such a value is to be committed to the determinacy of the formula- what it says will happen will happen.

When we watch baseball over the course of a season, we are well aware of the determinacy of probabilities. For instance, back in March, I (and Dave and Marc) picked the Sox to win 98 games this year. They won 98 games. When a computer simulation of such scenarios are run, the various numbers act as causal determinants, and hence determine an outcome, the variances of which are also quantifiably known.

Contingency, on the other hand, is the essence of life. The emotional force of the philosophical conflict between free will and determinism is the one between fate and chance, law and freedom, predictability and spontaneity. Imagining what could have been, or what could be, is essential to our concepts of ourselves, and our place in our minds, society, and the universe at large.

No one wants to be a statistic. Corporations, cognizant of such a fact about their demographic audience, peddle their elixirs with individualist labels, conveniently offering the public an opportunity to express their true selves by associating themselves with a particular cola. They know that a certain percentage of people will feel that way.

Insurance companies know that x number of people will have certain kinds of accidents. This formula is deterministic. If it weren't, they wouldn't profit. Same with Vegas, same with everything.

Probabilities are determinate because the various underlying causal factors all cancel out. They can be ignored. But they are still there, and we mustn’t forget that.

So the trick to transcending such determinacy is actually embracing the underlying causal factors. This sounds counterintuitive, because we think freedom is opposed to causality, which is associated with determinism.

But where a vast number of opposing dynamic causal forces are intertwined, these vast numbers of random fluctuations left out of statistical formulations, is just where our most important concept emerges- contingency.

You see, causality is the basis of contingency. Statistical determinism works just because it ignores the contingencies of the actual causal factors- why anyone actually has an accident, or why any one person rather than another feels like obeying his thirst or just doing it.

It is by embracing the multitude of conflicting causal forces, by being awash in the pushes and pulls of millions of directions, that creates contingency, and from there, freedom. It is the only kind of freedom we may have.

Which brings us back to the playoffs. We could run the numbers and probably get the outcome that the sox beat the angels. But here I will embrace a cliché, a truism; games are not played on paper. Should they be? Of course not. Because what this truism really means is that we are ready and willing and wanting to embrace the contingencies that are left out of the determinate formula which will tell us ahead of time who will win.

And when that formula is determining, the result is determined. But how we get there- the process- is exactly that nexus of contingent factors, those which are ignored by the formula, which are the very events of our lives, the events that could have gone either way, the wishes and regrets and triumphs that we strive for, the accidents we might or might not have had, the poker we might or might not have won, the accepting and challenging of deterministic forces along the way as it suits our demeanors and interests, corporate or otherwise.

So when I watch a playoff game, I see the beautiful contingencies of human life all encapsulated in the wonderfully asymmetrical expanse of the outfield, roughly circumscribing the symmetrical order of the infield. I do not talk about next year’s free agents. I do not talk about my life. For in my life, I will never experience such freedom, the freedom from the determining forces of universe. A half-centimeter on the bat, one burst seam on a ball, a fleeting glare from a compact mirror in the stands, a split second on the bases, such infinitesimal discrepancies in initial conditions solidify and branch off into an infinity of diverse futures. Each event in baseball does this; each event is recorded and contributes irrevocably to these diverse futures.

If a mediocre player gets lucky and performs above his ability, we must not say that he couldn’t do that again if given the chance, because it is just the point- that he did it here, did it now. There is no such thing as luck in this context. Luck is relative to a deterministic formula. In the context of the playoffs where statistical determinism falters and shows its true colors, there is no such basis for comparison. To want to see if he could do it again is just to ask whether he could be more of a robot, designed to automatically respond identically each time, to be more controlled by deterministic mechanism. But he is a human. It is a new day, they say. Throw the statistics out the window, they say. And with good cause. There is no past determining now. There is a totally indeterminate, open future, in the strongest sense.

Remember, determinism only makes sense when a given past state necessarily yields a future one. We thus have freedom only to the extent that we are absorbed in the contingencies of the present moment, a point of view from which the past is immaterial, and hence plays no role and exerts no influence, and where we entertain no thoughts of any future that constrains the limitless possibilities from where we stand.

Sure, we could find out the result. Just go in a coma and then read the paper. But the only reason we should care about the result is in the process, the how we get there. To experience the process, and really, truly feel the freedom of contingency against the overarching and domineering background of determinacy that we feel all the time, I take no calls, and I chit no chat, during a playoff game. I want to watch every pitch, pick up every little chance fluctuation that leaves its indelible mark on the game, and on the future. I don’t want to just read the box score. I don’t want to just glance around and catch a few moments of the game while I chat, as if it was just more stylish hipster scenery. If Damon's chopper had the slightest difference in its spin, does Figgins double pump and throw wildly home, leading to 5 unearned runs? Does Schilling's having a large lead as a result alter his pitch sequences to Anaheim hitters, so that he can save his real good, tricky stuff for when he might need a surprise in a potential game 5? This is what I want to know. This, more importantly, is what I want to feel. I want to feel the infinite contingencies, each resulting from the myriad of opposing causal forces that can usually be ignored for the sake of living a life of order, predictability, and profit. I want to totally suspend disbelief, and believe instead that life could be so open, so full of possibility. The game is a beautiful abstraction in this respect. To think about the future, or the past, or anything else is to totally destroy the illusion, and for me, the primary reason for caring at all. Why should I care who wins if I am not personally involved, through my aesthetic loss of self and my identification with not just the people, or even the players, but rather the dynamic interaction of the events themselves? I mean, its just sports, right? Who cares? And why should we care about next year’s free agents? If we don't care about right now, the very present moment, without another thought in the world, why would we care who's on the team next year? We should be living for this, and living through this. If I were at the ballpark I could ignore the commercials, and watch the players roll grounders between innings. Does someone’s arm hurt? Is there some animosity between teammates? Every little bit of information I can glean becomes immensely important, these wonderful little contingencies that matter just now, in this little closed system of bare dynamics, where human freedom is expressed most truly, as against the grain of the oppressive determinism of law, morality, finances and biological function.

As the hippies like to say, live in the now, man. That's right, gentle hippies. For it is only now, and not before, and not later, that we are free.
Be that as it may, we mustn’t forget values. Value is what directs our looking forward, the division between being acting and being acted on, and what gives us purpose rather than a mark for attendance at the scene. So when I embrace this present, I do so with the hope that indeed it is structured in certain ways, and not in others; the ways that I value. And the value of a Red Sox World Series is, as the corporations have learned by intensive market research, priceless.