Bleacher Report - Articles by Joe Regan

Keith Law and the NL Cy Young Vote

Joe Regan — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 21:03:18 -0500

So in case you had not heard, the fellow nerds of baseball prospectus, beyond the box score, fangraphs, and the like really lost their ability to complain about their annual insane individual award vote.

Greinke won the AL Cy Young over Sabathia (in fact, Sabathia wasn't even No. 2), Mauer won the AL MVP over Teixeira, and all was right in the world.

Lincecum, the NL leader in Strikeouts per nine innings and FIP, won the NL Cy Young vote as well. This was a close vote, where Lincecum barely edged out the one-two punch of aces of the Cardinals, Chris Carpenter, and Adam Wainwright.

Was this the right choice? Well, that's up to you. The independent pitching statistics favored Mr. Lincecum (FIP, tRA, K/BB, but this was a slight edge). Carpenter led in ERA, had a better walk rate, didn't give up the long ball, and had a lower WHIP. It really comes down to how much being a ground ball pitcher with a SS of Brendan Ryan's quality really matters to you (it was obviously a help).

No, what this article is about is a partly humorous, partly annoying reversal of roles. Suddenly, we see the "old guard" up in arms over a vote they find illogical. The vote came from Keith Law. Law, if you are unaware, was a former employee of the Toronto Blue Jays, before resigning in 2006 to work for ESPN.

As a highly critical former outside of the BBWAA, he already had a contentious relationship with many within the ranks, and was indeed denied admission to the BBWAA his first time trying, in 2007. The next year, he was voted in, and this was his first season on the ballot.

So he voted Lincecum first. Why is he getting special attention? Well, the reason is his second and third place votes, Javier Vasquez and Dan Haren. Vasquez quietly had an awesome season in Atlanta, finally seeming to put his peripherals together. Haren slipped in the second half, but still finished with a extraordinary K/BB rate and all the signs of a quality pitcher for years. They also pitched more innings than Mr. Carpenter.

This reasoning was not enough to appease the critics, and while most of the BBWAA has either no commented, or applauded Law's rational, yet unconventional, thinking, many fans, radio hosts, and the like have had their way on the man, whose seemingly become the new Billy Beane for many.

However, there are many reasons that this hatred and backlash at Law is ridiculous. Here is why:

Carpenter loses anyway. Say instead of Law's real ballot, he went for the less contentious Lincecum-Carpenter-Wainwright order. Carpenter ends up with 97 points, and Wainwright 91. Tim Lincecum wins anyway. And for anyone who lashed out at Law by saying the statistics did not back up what he was saying...

Justin Verlander got a first place vote in the American League. Yes he did. Make no mistake, Verlander was great in 2009. He struck guys out and almost was able to keep his team's head above water as the offense faltered. However, Vasquez had a 2.87 ERA, and Haren a 3.14. People screamed foul over them finishing ahead of Carpenter (2.24 ERA) on the NL Ballot. Well, Verlander had a 3.45 ERA. Yes, Verlander did not win, but Kornacki affected the Cy Young vote as much as Law did in the end (which was, not much at all). If we are going to be up in arms over one guy voting with minimal regard to ERA, why not be uniform?

A typical "old guard" ballot. Nine-of-10 players were on playoff teams (including Matt Holliday, who accumulated less than half the WAR in his time in St. Louis as total ballot omissions Ryan Zimmerman, Prince Fielder, and Adrian Gonzalez).

Chase Utley in ninth, despite being second in the NL in WAR (and that does not include non-stolen base baserunning, which almost pulls Utley even to Pujols), Ethier and his 2.5 WAR in fourth (albeit his terrible UZR screams aberration more than an eroding skill set in the field), and my personal favorite, having the audacity to call Ryan Howard "underrated". Ryan Howard, the man who won the 2006 NL MVP for nothing but home runs.

Pujols lead in OBP, SLG, had about the same RE24, and Pujols is a better fielder. Yes these were all close, but Pujols' team made the playoffs, so it is not even like the voters voted based off that.

Ryan Howard, the man who slept through half of 2008 and almost won the MVP despite being nowhere near the most valuable on his own team (Utley's OPS in April was higher than Howard's in September, where's his team carrying credit?). Ryan Howard's good, but if you are a GM, and you want to build a team, do you take Utley or Howard first? If you take Howard, you may be criminally insane

Voters have historically made terrible votes. Of course, the difference here is, Law used reason, logic, facts, and baseball research, to back up his point, whether it was right or not. On the other hand, let us view the NL MVP Ballot of Jon Heyman (though I am unsure if this is an official ballot or not):

NL MVP

1. Albert Pujols, Cardinals: Near-Triple Crown winner had it locked up by June.

2. Troy Tulowitzki, Rockies: Spectacular talent could have won Comeback Player. Playoff failures don't count.

3. Ryan Howard, Phillies: May actually be underrated.

4. Andre Ethier, Dodgers: Six walk-off hits led league.

5. Hanley Ramirez, Marlins: Big-time talent earned wrath of teammate Dan Uggla for not playing through pain.

6. Matt Kemp, Dodgers: Starting to become the superstar that folks predicted he'd be.

7. Chris Carpenter, Cardinals: Nearly untouchable when healthy.

8. Adam Wainwright, Cardinals: League's leading winner starting to get appreciation he deserves.

9. Chase Utley, Phillies: Perfect 23-for-23 in steals to go with everything else. Teammate Jayson Werth also a consideration.

10. Matt Holliday, Cardinals: As soon as he got to St. Louis, the Cards took off.

The insults are ridiculous. The threats are ridiculous. Whether Law was correct or not, is not the point. The fact is, Law has a background in MLB front offices. He is well aware of how baseball teams evaluate pitching talent, and believes that journalists should evaluate them in the same way. While it would be foolish to take what he says and give no critical thought, is it not reasonable to believe Keith Law knows what he is doing?

My Fictional 2010 Hall of Fame Ballot

Joe Regan — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:54:56 -0500

The baseball season is over. The hot stove season begins.

The highlight of the offseason for most baseball fans, however, is the annual narcissism festival of the BBWAA, which is telling us, the fans, who the best players in baseball history are.

The logic of men like Jim Rice being enshrined over men like Ron Santo is another topic for another day, however. This is about 2010, and the eligibles.

This year, only 11 players return from the 2009 ballot: Andre Dawson, Bert Blyleven, Lee Smith, Jack Morris, Tim Raines, Mark McGwire, Alan Trammell, Dave Parker, Don Mattingly, Dale Murphy, and Harold Baines.

Also on the ballot are newcomers: Robbie Alomar, Edgar Martinez, Fred McGriff, Barry Larkin, Ellis Burks, and Ray Lankford are among them.

So among this ballot comes the inevitable question, who deserves to enter the Hall of Fame? Well, this is my ballot.

The past years picks:

1) Bert Blyleven. Quick, how many Hall of Fame eligible pitchers in the top 10 all time in Strikeouts are in the Hall? Answer, all of them, except Bert. The argument against Blyleven, from what I can gather, is that he didn't have the "big game impact" of men like Jack Morris. A quick look at his 5-1, 2.47 ERA, 4.50 K/BB playoff statistics dispelled that idea for me. For a career, his K/BB was 2.80, he won 287 games, is 5th all time in strikeouts, and has the same ERA+ in his career as Tom Glavine.

2) Tim Raines. The current king of unfair treatment from the voters. Whether he's been held to Rickey Henderson's unfairly high standard, being lumped into the Willie Wilson / Gary Pettis / Vince Colemans of the world, or simply having his skills ignored, he's seen it all while awaiting his deserved enshrinement. In his career, Raines had a .385 OBP, he was successful in 84.7% of his stolen base attempts, hit for decent power (170 career HR, .425 SLG), and was a very good defensive player. Lou Brock, in comparison, had a career line of .293/.343/.410, hit less HR's (149), and while he did steal a lot of bases (938), his career success rate of 75.3% is far less shiny than the more selective, intelligent base runner in Raines. Lou Brock, by the way, was a first ballot Hall of Famer.

3) Andre Dawson. What, a Bill James reading geek thinks Dawson is a Hall of Famer? Shocking. This time last year, though, I would have said no. Then I put some perspective on it all. Dawson, as obviously flawed as his offense was, still cranked 438 Home Runs in his career, on top of 314 stolen bases (74.2% success rate). He was also a very good defensive center fielder in his heyday (+4 runs / 100 defensive games according to baseball prospectus). His 70.2 career WARP-3 puts him right on that line of borderline players. There's a character clause in there, and by all accounts, Dawson is a class act. Seems like the kind of person MLB should want to represent them throughout history.

4) Lee Smith. Was he dominant enough? Well, let's compare Smith's performance metrics to another Hall of Fame reliever, Goose Gossage.

Innings: Gossage 1809 1/3, Smith 1289 1/3
K/BB rate: Gossage 2.05, Smith 2.57
WHIP: Gossage 1.232, Smith 1.256
ERA+: Gossage 126, Smith 131
OPS against: Gossage: .638, Smith: 647

Seems pretty comparible to me. Comes down to, did you agree with Gossage's selection? I did. I think Smith should follow.

5) Alan Trammell. His teammate, Lou Whitaker, got screwed out of the Hall of Fame, and Trammell looks well on his way to being in the same boat. While not the offensive player someone like Jeter is (career .274 EqA for Trammell vs. a .294 for Jeter), he was more than useful, with 185 HR, 1,231 career runs scored, and a .767 OPS. Defense? Baseball Prospectus has him at 110 FRAA, at Shortstop. His 66.8 WAR on baseball projection puts him ahead of Hall of Famers Eddie Murray, Pee Wee Reese, and Willie McCovey.

The New Guys:

6) Robbie Alomar. Likely a first ballot, Alomar was an outstanding defensive 2B who also attained a .814 OPS, while hitting 210 HR, stealing bases at a good rate, and accumulating 10,400 career plate appearances. As shown on baseball projection, Alomar compares well with Ryne Sandberg, who of course is also in the Hall of Fame.

7) Barry Larkin. Cincinatti's Derek Jeter (or their Cal Ripken, whoever you like). Most people would agree Jeter is a first ballot Hall of Famer, correct? Well, Derek Jeter's WARP-3 on baseball prospectus is "only" a 67.5 (still Hall of Fame worthy once he finishes up). Jeter has a slight offensive edge (121 OPS+ for Jeter, 116 OPS+ for Larkin), but defensively, this is not a battle. While defense is tough to measure, the +60 FRAA of Larkin vs. the -170 FRAA of Jeter is a very sizeable gap. Despite all this, Jeter will still end his career as one of the great shortstops of all time. But it's clear, Larkin belongs in that group, too.

8) Edgar Martinez. "But he was just a Designated Hitter." The favorite argument, well, really the only argument, used to discredit Martinez as a Hall of Famer. A Hall of Fame that has already made room for horrifying defensive players like Ralph Kiner, Ernie Lombardi, and Orlando Cepeda. Implication: Martinez should be punished for playing in a period that allowed for a player to be designated to hit for the pitcher, and being on the same team in much of his best seasons as Tino Martinez and John Olerud. The fct of the matter is, Martinez has a WARP-3 (factoring in the fact that he did not play defense) of 79.6. His career OBP of .418 and SLG of .515 are both very impressive, and his career OPS+ of 147 puts him ahead of players like Mike Schmidt, Hack Wilson, and Harmon Killebrew. If Edgar Martinez should be penalized for being a specialist, should Mariano Rivera be treated the same way when his time comes?

9) Robin Ventura. Really? Okay, Robin Ventura versus, let's say, Brooks Robinson:

OBP: Robinson, .322: Ventura, .362
SLG: Robinson, .401: Ventura, 444
EqA (era adjusted statistic): Robinson, .262: Ventura, .281

So Ventura was a better hitter, but what about defense? Well, Robinson had a much better FRAA, with a 286 runs above average number. However, Ventura was a 154.

Overall: Robinson, 74.1 WARP-3: Ventura, 71.2 WARP-3.

Will all these men end up in the Hall of Fame? More than likely, no. I feel these 9 men displayed the skill and talent needed to deserve their place in baseball history. Whether the men who vote will agree with me or not, only the future knows.

The War Against Strikeouts

Joe Regan — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 02:57:56 -0400

Ask any little leaguer what's the worst result of an at bat, and they will most likely tell you the same thing: "strikeout".

For as long as we have been fans of the game, we have, in some way, thought of the strikeout as a badge of shame. We have used strikeouts to bash players like Adam Dunn and Carlos Pena, and lack of strikeouts to applaud Juan Pierre and Placido Polanco. It is still, to many, the worst thing a batter can do.

Which brings us to the new single season strikeout king, Mark Reynolds. Entering tonight (9/25), Reynolds has already set the bar at 208, with nine team games still to go. Nice fact, right? So, what's the issue?

This is.

ESPN has made an issue of it. Many analysts on ESPN are now in the process of painting Reynolds as an all-or-nothing, Dave Kingman type. Unfortunately, half of ESPN's audience apparently agree with this assessment, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Obviously the thought process is, strikeouts are bad, lots of strikeouts are very bad, Reynolds is bad. That is just not a true statement, however.

On the topic of out making, Reynolds has an OBP of .357. The league average, adjusted to his park factor, is .348. He's above average in not making outs. More significantly, however, is his .560 slugging percentage, a mark that is good for sixth in the National League, a mere one point behind fellow strikeout guru Ryan Howard, and ahead of the highly regarded Adrian Gonzalez.

At .294, he has the third best ISO in the National League. Overall, good for a 131 OPS+. Compare this to Dave Kingman, who had a career .302 OBP in an adjusted average climate of .329. Kingman, like Reynolds, was a big Iso power guy, but his career mark of .242 is below Reynolds for the season.

Only once did Kingman have an ISO higher than Reynolds' currently has, his highly flukey 1979 season where his BABIP was almost 40 points higher than his career mark. Overall, Kingman had a very SLG-heavy OPS+ of 115. Kingman was also a terrible defender, while Reynolds is at least serviceable with a -4.6 UZR/150 career mark at Third Base.

This brings me back to the case of striking out; it's a non-issue. What many media types love to say is strikeouts are somehow a "team killer" and a "rally killer", that good hitters always try to put the ball in play. What they forget to tell the audience is this fact:

Babe Ruth led the American League in strikeouts 5 times. With 795 total strikeouts, he struck out more in the 1920's than any other player. I think Babe Ruth was an okay hitter.

Flashing back to the modern day, look at the major league leader board in whiffs:
1) Reynolds, 208
2) Howard, 179
3) Cust, 175
4) Dunn, 167
5) Pena, 163
t6) Bay, 155
t6) Inge, 155
8) Branyan, 149
9) B.J. Upton, 148
10) Werth, 147

There is your top 10. Five of those guys (Reynolds, Howard, Dunn, Pena, Bay) are very good hitters / cleanup hitters. Jack Cust has seen his strikeout rate shrink in 2009, but in turn has also seen his OBP, SLG, and ISO drop.

Branyan and Werth are also arguably in the first group, as both sport OPS's well above .850. The other two, Upton and Inge, have had mediocre seasons, but are defensive wizards and entitled to the field.

So really, what is the problem with Reynolds strikeouts? Every hitter is going to make outs. Not every hitter is going to blast 43 Home Runs while doing it. If a man can hit, and has all the numbers that say so, who cares how he makes his outs when he does?

Why is the strikeout so dreaded? A simple, 20 second look at a linear weight chart, like the one Tom Tango developed here, shows the difference between a strikeout and a plain old out in the field is: not much.

Baseball players have progressed their thought processes. Baseball front offices have as well. Maybe it is time for the media and 50% of America to catch up.

Statistical Report on Run Scoring In Baseball

Joe Regan — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 02:21:23 -0400

Without perspective, baseball statistics are meaningless. But with, even the most basic of statistics can provide a wealth of information on the sport.

With the help of http://www.baseballprospectus.com's wealth of statistical information, and a whole lot of Excel usage, I bring my analysis of run scored in baseball.

In this study, I observed the team totals of every season, initially just from 2004 to 2008, but eventually expanded to include the seasons from 1967 to 2008, excluding the strike shortened years of 1981 and 1994. Overall, I worked with 1,064 team seasons of data in this study.

The statistics used in this research were all the basic count statistics: Outs, Walks, Singles, Doubles, Triples, Home Runs, Hit By Pitch, Stolen Base, and Caught Stealing. These numbers were regressed on the one statistic that really matters for an offense in the end: runs.

Before actually beginning my research, I decided to split up the outs and walks category into more specialized data points. Walks were split into two: unintentional (UBB) and intentional (IBB).

Outs took some more digging, however. I eventually broke up outs into 4 categories: strikeouts (SO), sacrifice hits (SH), sacrifice flies (SF), and Non-sacrifice outs on balls in play (NSOBIP), which encompasses outs on in play balls.

Initially only interested in researching the recent history of run production, I took the last 150 team-seasons of MLB. Using the Excel function LINEST (with explanation and output found here), I was able to derive this regression.

CS	SB	SO	SH	SF	HBP	IBB	UBB	HR	3B	2B	1B	NSOBIP	b
-0.0450	0.0282	-0.1928	-0.2895	0.1626	0.4010	0.2609	0.2938	1.4726	1.5924	0.7325	0.5186	-0.1838	313.8798
0.2355	0.0726	0.0479	0.1084	0.2632	0.1349	0.1412	0.0339	0.0632	0.2125	0.0793	0.0355	0.0491	211.3092
0.9166	21.3023
114.9234	136
677961.5	61715.2

My r-squared value for this regression was .916565.

Translated, this means that 91.66% of run output could be explained through these basic count statistics for each team. However, problems exist in this data. For one, four different count statistics' absolute value of their t-score (The 1st row of this output divided by the 2nd) of under 2 (CS, SB, SF, IBB), meaning that the data lacked proof to suggest that any of these statistics have a real correlation with the data.

For the more casual reader of this information, the real nonsense comes from the coefficient of triples being higher than the coefficient of Home Runs. Are triples really more valuable than Home Runs? Of course not. You do not need to be a math major or a baseball guru to know this.

Because of this, I realized the need to expand my data. And as I improved my model by continually adding team-seasons, I continued to realize a need to move back further. Eventually, I stopped in 1967, after compiling 1,064 team seasons of data. Using these numbers, I came up with this result.

CS	SB	SO	SH	SF	HBP	IBB	UBB	HR	3B	2B	1B	NSOBIP	b
-0.1334	0.1603	-0.0974	-0.0063	0.6773	0.2990	0.2216	0.3256	1.4479	1.1813	0.6054	0.4977	-0.1043	2.0437
0.0581	0.0226	0.0084	0.0390	0.0899	0.0543	0.0479	0.0109	0.0240	0.0728	0.0233	0.0125	0.0072	28.0662
0.9509	21.2318
1565.527	1050
9174373	473327.4

My regression is much improved from before. Not only are my basic hit and out coefficients more expected, and a b coefficient close to 0, but almost all of my data has been proven statistically significant. Also, 95.1% of runs scored over the last 41 years can be explained using my regression model, a very high amount. However, odd figures still jump out at me.

One striking figure is how suddenly, sacrifice hits have a coefficient of nearly 0, and no statistical significance. This could be a result of the difference in times from now and 40 years ago, when low scoring games and small ball was much more common and efficient than in modern times.

The more pressing issue, however, continued to be my stolen base category. While both SB and CS show statistical significance (absolute value of their t scores are both over 2), the ratio of the two coefficients are odd. Overall, the coefficients seem to suggest that a 45% stolen base ratio helps a team in the long run.

Needing answers to this issue, I ran a 3-variable regression, with nothing but stolen bases, caught stealings, and runs. My output was this:

CS	SB	b
-2.5007	0.795302	760.0481
0.2174	0.087976	8.967319
0.113476	89.78411
67.90456	1061
1094783	8552918

After this, I ran another regression, counting all of the previously used variables except for Stolen bases and caught stealing.

SO	SH	SF	HBP	IBB	UBB	HR	3B	2B	1B	NSOBIP	b
-0.09185	-0.00336	0.795618	0.273924	0.252963	0.331472	1.418573	1.249614	0.623657	0.504617	-0.10928	3.287156
0.008586	0.039801	0.090933	0.055237	0.048629	0.011202	0.024173	0.073827	0.023661	0.012833	0.007369	28.66922
0.948136	21.80908
1748.345	1052
9147332	500369

These two sets of data seem to suggest a very low relationship between stolen base statistics and runs scored, if any.

While both Caught Stealing and Stolen Bases are statistically significant in the first regression model, and suggest a much more logical successful stolen base ratio (about 76%), the b value of the data is extremely high, and the r-squared value is extremely low, suggesting a very low correlation from those numbers and runs scored.

In turn, the second regression is the same data that was used in the original 1967-2008 regression, minus SB and CS. The r-squared value dropped very slightly, from about .951 to about .948, meaning SB and CS only added 0.3% of understanding to the model. In turn, the standard error of runs only increased from 21.23 to 21.81.

Statistically speaking, using the original model, we would be able to find approximately 97.5% of teams within 2 standard errors of their expected runs using the coefficients and variables we have available.

Given that teams averaged 716.2 runs a season in this time period, I believe that these statistics have provided a strong model moving forward in being able to understand what wins baseball games offensively (extra base hits, walking) and what just does not matter as much (strikeouts vs. in play outs, steals, sacrifice hits).

NBA Analysis Volume One: Possessions Per Game Vs. Wins

Joe Regan — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 18:00:00 -0500

We hear it all the time when it comes to the NBA: Champions play a half-court game. Thanks to the recent success of teams like the Spurs, and the Celtics' six game victory over the much quicker Lakers in the 2008 NBA Finals, the results show that teams that play slow, win.

Or do they?

That was the question that I asked myself when looking over statistics from the 2007-2008 NBA season. Because of this, I bring you the first edition of my NBA Statistical research: Do possessions per game have an effect on a team's performance?

I came into this study with the hypothesis that slower paced teams did attain more success in terms of wins than faster paced teams. Originally, the data seemed to support this finding.

Team	Wins	Pace
DEN	50	99.7
GSW	48	98.8
IND	36	97.7
PHO	55	96.7
SEA	20	96.3
LAL	57	95.6
MEM	22	95.3
SAC	38	94.7
ORL	52	93.4
UTA	54	93.2
CHI	33	93.0
LAC	23	92.1
MIN	22	91.9
CHA	32	91.8
NYK	23	91.6
NJN	34	91.5
MIL	26	91.3
ATL	37	91.1
BOS	66	90.9
HOU	55	90.4
PHI	40	90.4
DAL	51	90.2
CLE	45	90.2
TOR	41	90.2
MIA	15	90.2
NOH	56	89.9
WAS	43	89.5
SAS	56	88.8
POR	41	87.9
DET	59	87.3

Eleven of the bottom 13 teams on this chart made the playoffs in 2007-08, and three of the four conference finalists (Boston, Detroit, San Antonio) were in the bottom 12 of the league in pace. Out of those bottom 13, only Miami had a losing record. In turn, four of the top 10 in pace had sub .500 records.

So my original hypothesis is correct? Not so fast.

Finding the means of both the wins column (41) and the pace column (92.3866...), I used this information to help me find the covariance. In the next table, x is Wins - Mean Wins, y is Pace - Mean Pace, and xy is the product of the two columns.

Team	x	y	xy
DEN	9	7.313	65.820
GSW	7	6.413	44.893
IND	-5	5.313	-26.567
PHO	14	4.313	60.387
SEA	-21	3.913	-82.180
LAL	16	3.213	51.413
MEM	-19	2.913	-55.353
SAC	-3	2.313	-6.940
ORL	11	1.013	11.147
UTA	13	0.813	10.573
CHI	-8	0.613	-4.907
LAC	-18	-0.287	5.160
MIN	-19	-0.487	9.247
CHA	-9	-0.587	5.280
NYK	-18	-0.787	14.160
NJN	-7	-0.887	6.207
MIL	-15	-1.087	16.300
ATL	-4	-1.287	5.147
BOS	25	-1.487	-37.167
HOU	14	-1.987	-27.813
PHI	-1	-1.987	1.987
DAL	10	-2.187	-21.867
CLE	4	-2.187	-8.747
TOR	0	-2.187	0.000
MIA	-26	-2.187	56.853
NOH	15	-2.487	-37.300
WAS	2	-2.887	-5.773
SAS	15	-3.587	-53.800
POR	0	-4.487	0.000
DET	18	-5.087	-91.560

The sum of the xy column divided by 30 gives us the covariance of the sample, which is -3.18. This number by itself does not tell us much about the sample, however, by finding the variance of the x and y column, we can find the coefficient of correlation between the data.

The variance of wins can be found by finding the sum of squares in the x column and dividing by 30; the same can be found in the pace column. The variance of wins is 184.8, and the variance for pace is 9.684.

The coefficient of correlation is a number between 0 and 1, where 0 shows no relation between the data and 1 being perfect (i.e. a straight line). To find this number, take the square of the covariance and divide it by the product of the two variances. Doing the math (-3.18)(-3.18)/[(184.8)(9.684)] gives us a coefficient of correlation of 0.00565.

This is surprising, as the low number indicates very little, if any, correlation between the data. This is supported after an inspection of the data in graphical format.

The previously mentioned coefficient of correlation can be found in the equation on the top left hand corner.

This research was very surprising for me, and brought me to a new conclusion in basketball: style of play is irrelevant as long as it is the style your team is most adept to using.

As this is the first of many articles I will write on this series of basketball statistics, I welcome any suggestions for further research, especially weighed against the only real statistic that matters in the NBA; wins and losses.

Next Analysis: Offense vs. Defense.

My Email to Murray Chass

Joe Regan — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 00:07:40 -0500

The old guard of baseball writing has found the Internet. Unfortunately, the old guard still wants nothing to do with any real analysis.

While almost a month late in reading, this post on Murray Chass' blog set my "Pujols for MVP" blood back boiling. This article had everything, from blatant disregard to the first five months of the season, to this mystical notion that one player can "carry" a team (how did the Rangers do while A-Rod was tearing the cover off the ball for three years? Oh. Right.).

While Chass has been a favorite target of all those in bloggerland, most notably Fire Joe Morgan (RIP), this article, combined with the easily accessible email address provided at the bottom of the article, compelled me to write Mr. Chass an email regarding his work.

Dear Mr. Chass,

While scrolling through your Web site early this morning, I came across your article on why Ryan Howard should have been N.L. MVP. While I am aware that Ryan Howard had a big September, I am also aware of your death-hold on traditionalism and general refusal to look at measurable info in baseball, preferring to use your gut instinct on situations. For you, I share these concerns with your information:

- Albert Pujols had a grand total of 10.1 percent of his team's Plate Appearances, Ryan Howard had 11.2 percent. Baseball is not a sport where one player can "carry" a team, they need help. Howard received his help in the form of Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley, Pat Burrell, Shane Victorino, etc. The Cardinals were a mediocre hitting team outside of Pujols and Ryan Ludwick.

- The Phillies could not have done what they did without Howard? Really? If you replace Howard's production with Pujols', Mark Teixeira's, Kevin Youkilis', Lance Berkman's, Adrian Gonzales', Prince Fielder's, etc, for the whole season, you don't have a championship quality team?

A win in June counts the same as a win in September, and had Howard been producing near the .900 OPS level all season (which isn't as good of a statistic as you love to point out because it overstates slugging), the Phillies probably lead the division heading into September, and we have no need for Howard's "heroics".

He missed out on the All-Star game for a reason: Other players were better and more deserving, as they were for MVP.

- Back to the point of "carrying." While I've already stated that no player wins or loses games on his own, that the No. 9 hitter will contribute just one plate appearance less than the No. 1 hitter a game, and that this basketball "take over the game" mentality is bogus, than where is the praise for other members of the Phillies?

Pat Burrell was a monster throughout the first half of the season, Jayson Werth OPS'd 1.071 in August (Howard OPS'd .791 in August). While Howard's Home Run production is a very good thing and very valuable, he was also a dud for three out of the six months in the season, a subpar defender even in a position filled with subpar defenders, and struggled with on base.

Essentially, the very basis of your argument is that the Phillies do not win the N.L. East without Howard's production in September. That is a true statement. However, this also encompasses the notion that baseball is a team game in the same sense that basketball and football are, which is untrue.

In basketball, for example, outside factors significantly affect your own production. Take Ray Allen, for example. 2006-'07 in Seattle, he averaged 26.4 Points per game, and in 2007-'08 with Boston, just 17.4. But despite playing worse "on paper", he went from a bad Seattle team to a main contributor to a Celtics title.

Why? Because his own individual workload changed when going from a team where he was the offense to a team with three stars and a nice group of role players who could also take on a good chunk of the offensive load.

In baseball, a star player, no matter where he plays, will get his 600-700 plate appearances in a season.

In other words, statistics in other sports are just as reflective of your team's performance as your own in a sport like basketball, but in baseball, statistics mainly measure your own performance, independent to your team's performance (notable exceptions are RBI, runs, W-L record, saves).

There is no denying that Pujols was a more feared hitter by National League pitchers than Ryan Howard, and had Howard produced earlier in the season the way he had in September, there may have been no N.L. East comeback needed.

So Mr. Chass, before using your writing as a base of attack towards those in the SABRmetric community, or even those who value stats like OBP more than AVG, please just do your homework. Not all stat nerds like myself believe baseball is nothing but numbers and probabilities, we see the human element of sports just as much as you.

However, we took our love of the game that we grew up with, and looked to expand our own understanding and intellectual curiosity on the matter, and found research that improved our understanding. Howard is a good player, and no one denies that, however, to say he's MVP for carrying his team out of a hole his lack of output earlier helped to cause is just a poor train of thought.

You don't have to use numbers like VORP, EqA, FRAR, or even Runs Created if you do not want, but it's not a good train of thought to immediately dismiss new ideas without giving them so much as a chance. The chance the Red Sox took in 2003 of giving Bill James a senior advisory job seemed to work out just fine for them.

Sincerely,
Joe Regan

It is easy to understand why older men like Murray Chass cling onto these mentalities that somehow a team's performance makes one .270/.340/.500 better than another .270/.340/.500; they grew up in a time where men played whole careers for one team, where the business side of baseball was nowhere near as present as it is now, and when real dynasties existed.

Now, however, we have the means, and the need, to inspect a player's overall contribution to the success, or failure, of his team, and for whatever reason, men like Mr.Chass dismiss this notion.

Whether it be the notion that stats are being used in lieu of watching baseball (which is completely false), the loss of the human element (once again, untrue, stats have even been formed to adjust for those "clutch" situations), or that users of these numbers are simply nerds, they all have their excuse.

The irony of these arguments are that if Mr. Chass watched a game between Apr. 1 and Aug. 31, he may have seen the contributions that men like Chase Utley, Jimmy Rollins, and Pat Burrell provided the Phillies while Howard plodded along. If Howard was on the Padres, his name would have been laughed at in by MVP voters; instead he finished second in a tight race.

Unfortunately, pandering, emotional articles are still the norm among most noteworthy sports writers, and it will probably be years before my generation of fans come along and bring SABR's research more mainstream attention.

New England Patriots Facing Uphill Battle in the Postseason

Joe Regan — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 22:59:56 -0500

Nice win yesterday afternoon, boys. The schedule does not look half bad, either, with a bad Oakland, an Arizona team that is historically poor on the East Coast and 3-4 in 2008 on the road, and a free-falling Buffalo.

Only problem is, the Jets and Dolphins are not exactly facing a world-beater schedule, either.

In the last three games, the Jets, while losers of two in a row, face the same slumping Bills at home, a road game against the same enigmatic Seahawks the Patriots barely got through, and a home game versus Miami.

The Dolphins should not have too much resistance in the next two weeks, either, with San Francisco at home and a road game versus Kansas City.

The biggest issue of this all is that the Patriots do not control their own destiny in the AFC East; running the table will not be enough to win the division. If the Patriots and Dolphins both win their next three games, the Dolphins win the division based on conference record. If the Patriots and Jets win out, the Jets win based on divisional record.

A wild card would not be out of the question, either, but that presents yet another problem for the Patriots: the Ravens.

At 9-4 and 7-3 in conference, the Ravens essentially have a two-game edge on New England at 8-5, 5-5 in conference. The Ravens did have a tough schedule, with Washington, Pittsburgh, and Dallas, but passed through Washington easily.

The next two games will pose a challenge for Baltimore, but they will need to lose both for the Patriots to overtake them in the standings.

Health issues have plagued New England all season as well, and Sunday's game did not help matters much. Seeing Le Kevin Smith and Mike Wright on the D-Line at the end of the game is not the most comforting sight in history.

I do think the Patriots can finish 11-5. A lot of me even believes they will. Whether or not it will even matter, however, remains to be seen.

Witnessing the Celtics Rebuild As a Young Bostonian

Joe Regan — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 20:36:55 -0500

The year was 1994. I was not even 8 yet at the time. The Boston Garden was still a proud home of athletes, and the city still drove through expressways that were not built underground or underwater. But a memory from then still reigns supreme for me.

It was my first time seeing the Celtics live.

The contradictions of the scene were apparent to me from the moment I arrived, all the way until the final horn. Ever since I began watching sports, I had been a Celtics fan, but my childhood as one was far different than the ones other generations of fans had. Larry Bird was on his way out right around the time I began tuning in. Kevin McHale also was in the process of ending his career, and Robert Parish, nothing in comparison to the "Big 3" version of him, was just a vet who was sticking around in my young mind.

The Celtics, instead of the banner-raising team my family grew up watching, was a collection of role players and borderline starters, like Dee Brown, Dino Radja, and Sherman Douglas. That 1993-94 season, the Celtics struggled to a 32-50 record, and missed the playoffs for the first time since 1978-79.

One could say that it was all downhill right from birth in 1986. The Celtics, riding high off a 16th world championship, also had the privilege of drafting second in the 1986 draft, and seemed ready to add yet another key cog into a team destined for yet another title run. Infamously, the Celtics picked Len Bias, who died of a cocaine overdose just hours after his name was read on draft night.

1986-87 came, without Len Bias in the mix, and helped set the stage for the upcoming two decades of disappointment for the Celtics. Despite having won eight of nine Finals series versus what many in Boston viewed as the cultural antithesis of their own city, Magic Johnson was able to burn the image of his series-winning skyhook into the minds of all Celtics fans. The slide continued, with the Celtics being eliminated in the next two seasons by the "Bad Boys" in Detroit.

Around this time, though, a promising young player, my first "Favorite Player", Reggie Lewis, started to make a name for himself. His local ties as a Northeastern University Husky also fostered this appreciation, and he helped keep the Celtics competitive despite an aging roster; eventually he would take over the team captaincy from Larry Bird.

Then came the 1993 1st round series versus the Charlotte Hornets. Reggie had averaged nearly 21 points a game in the regular season, and with home court, I was anxious to see if the Celtics would make a run. Then he collapsed in the first game, and the Hornets went on to win in four. Little did I know at the time how severe the cause was, and 3 months later, I found out just how bad it was when Lewis died of Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy during an off season practice.

With a second death in less than a decade of a young Celtics player, this time of their team captain, the Celtics struggled for the next four seasons, ending with a dismal, last place 15-67 record in the team's 1996-97 campaign.

But with that record came hope—a 36 percent chance of gaining the first pick in the draft and landing Wake Forest star Tim Duncan. Yet, instead of winning this lottery, the second of the primary antagonists for the Celtics of my generation appeared in the form of a Spurs team who tripped into the first pick—a pick they never would have received had David Robinson not missed the season.

Under the leadership of Tim Duncan, the Spurs would go on to win four titles in the time frame of 1999 to 2007. The Celtics, on the other hand, continued to struggle as an organization. The Celtics gained a little fortune in the 1998 draft, when possible top-three pick Paul Pierce dropped all the way to No. 10 for the Celtics to select.

1999 to 2007 proved to be a period of time impossible for any Celtic fan to escape, as the aforementioned tormentors, Los Angeles and San Antonio, would go on to win 7 of 9 NBA Championships. Every image of a bandwagon celebrity at a Laker game made me cringe, and every title Tim Duncan held high made me wonder what could have been. The Celtics, on the other hand, continued to provide a mere shell of their past incarnations. Even with this success in this time frame of the New England Patriots and Boston Red Sox, I still looked on every winter in disappointment as the Celtics register another first round exit in the playoffs, at best.

The 2006-07 season was my most miserable season to date as a Celtics fan. While happy that I could go to multiple games, it was more than obvious that the team was going nowhere. Paul Pierce was lost for much of the season due to injury, and the roster of young players and journeymen were only able to register a 24-58 record, the second worst in the NBA; the Celtics only finished ahead of the hapless Memphis Grizzlies. But with this disappointment brought on a similar situation to 1997. This time around in the lottery, the Celtics stood a solid shot of gaining one of the top two draft picks, and with Greg Oden and Kevin Durant available, it was all I wanted.

The draft lottery literally became to me what the NBA Finals were to the San Antonio Spurs. I watched eagerly in the hope of receiving a top-two draft pick, only to feel as dejected as sports had ever made me, outside of the 2003 ALCS, when I saw the Celtics draw the fifth overall selection. To myself and all Bostonians, it felt like yet another decade long death sentence for the team that defined our city's sports scene for 40 years.

Then came draft night 2007. Unexpectedly to me, the Celtics had no intention of keeping their draft pick. This pick, Jeff Green, became involved in a trade package with Wally Szczerbiak and Delonte West for sharpshooter Ray Allen and their second-round pick, Glen Davis. Originally skeptical of the trade, I appreciated the effort by the front office, and that maybe the Celtics would have a base to build on for the short term.

Then the short term happened in a flash. Kevin Garnett, disgruntled by the climate in Minnesota, became the key part of one of the single best purges of all time, when he was sent to Boston in exchange for Al Jefferson, five journeyman players, and the Celtics' two first-round picks in 2009 (one of which was originally Minnesota's). With that, there was a base for something special, and for the first time ever, I felt the Celtics had a legitimate chance at being something special.

This "New Big Three" struck gold immediately, completely turning the franchise around in 1 year. By the end of the 2007-08 season, the Celtics had registered 66 wins, including winning records versus Detroit and Los Angeles, and seemed poised to run for the title.

While the young Hawks almost spoiled the season, the Celtics were able to get through it to meet the LeBron James-led Cleveland Cavaliers in the Eastern Conference semis. Like the first series versus Atlanta, the Celtics and Cavs went back and forth, winning at home and losing on the road, leading up to a Game Seven in Boston.

With this game came the first, as Celtics radio personality Sean Grande put it, "moment for my generation" as the Celtics, despite a phenomenal game by James, were able to hang on in a nail biter victory, and meet the Pistons in the Eastern Conference Finals.

During the Eastern Conference Finals, I went on a graduation trip to Florida, and made use of limited time to see as much of the Celtics as I could. From a random bar on Route 92 in Tampa, to an airport restaurant in Charlotte during a flight layover, I manufactured my viewing of the series. With it came the realization that Celtics fans all over, old and young, shared the same sense of excitement as I did as the Celtics steamed through the Pistons in six, setting up the media dream battle of a LA-Boston NBA Finals.

The Celtics, despite beating LA both times in the regular season and winning 66 games, seemed to be the underdog wherever I looked. From sports message boards suddenly filled with Laker fans, to ESPN.com polls, to the 9 of 10 NBA analysts who picked the Lakers to win the series, everyone seemed out to talk about how a team full of offensive talent like Los Angeles would overwhelm the often times unspectacular Celtics.

Game 1 started with immediate drama as Paul Pierce, early in the second half, went down in a heap. The thought of having to spend yet another offseason listening to arrogant Laker fans went through my mind as Pierce was put in a wheelchair and rushed into the locker room. Fortunately, this all proved to be an overreaction, as Pierce hopped out of the tunnel and took over, leading the Celtics to a comfortable Game One victory over the Lakers.

Game Four proved to be my favorite game of basketball ever played. Despite a 2-1 series lead, the Celtics looked overwhelmed and in trouble in Los Angeles. Pierce and Garnett had struggled in Game 3, and more importantly, the Lakers boasted an 18-point lead and looked destined to tie the series up.

Coming home from rugby practice tired out, I debated if the game was worth even turning on, and eventually decided that it was. What I saw after was a second half I will remember vividly for the rest of my life.

With the game seemingly lost by the third quarter, the Celtics went off on a 21-3 run that stunned the Laker crowd and turned the game into a 2 point nail biter by the end of the 3rd quarter. After playing the Lakers to a stalemate through most of the fourth, Eddie House made the hero shot with 4:07 left to give the Celtics an 84-83 lead. Suddenly, the inevitable loss turned into an air of inevitability in the Celtics favor, and the Celtics went on to a 97-91 victory.

Suddenly, my thought process changed from two decades of disappointment to the thought that I finally knew what it was like for prior generations of Celtics die-hards growing up.

Despite the Lakers being able to return the series to Boston in Game 5, the inevitable feeling of victory remained, and became a reality in a 131-92 Game 6 rout, giving the Celtics their first title since I was three months old. I finally saw the greatest franchise in basketball history back on top.

More importantly, I was finally able to look up at the rafters and see a banner for a team I witnessed. After two decades of disappointment and wondering, it felt fantastic.

Mercifully Not MVP: 2008's Most Overrated MLB Players

Joe Regan — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 14:41:42 -0500

MVP voting has come and gone. And for the first time ever, I am happy about both MVP selections.

Hell, I am happy about both Cy Young award winners.

But unfortunately, the voters once again showed their inability to let go of archaic numbers that provide nothing but talking points towards a players worth. So for all you fans of "big Septembers", "RBI", "grit", and other crappy reasons for arguing a player's worth, this list is for you.

Ryan Braun, LF, Brewers: MVP of the Brewers' lineup? Definitely. But despite being outside of the top 15 in the NL in VORP and trailing such elite players as Russell Branyan and Denard Span of the Twins in EqA, managed to find himself third in MVP voting.

To be fair to Braun, he adjusted well to left field, but his sub-average OBP was worth third? Knowing players like Hanley Ramirez and Chipper Jones could not even break the top 10, I am not buying it.

Ryan Howard, 1B, Phillies: Yes, he was a key player in September. Yes, he had a big World Series.

But make no mistake, this was not the .313/.425/.659 monster of 2006. Factoring out September, his numbers were very average, and even factoring in September, his .339 OBP was below the league average.

Howard was 29th in NL VORP, and while his home runs were very valuable, the fact that 12 of 32 voters determined that a team would be better off with Howard (6.4 runs created/game) than Pujols (11.8 RC/g) is an absolute joke.

Francisco Rodriguez, CL, Angels: Someone needs to tell MVP and Cy Young voters that a standard MLB save is pitching one inning and giving up no more than one less run than the lead your team had before you entered.

K-Rod just happened to be on a team that provided him with many one to three run leads to convert into yet another save. He finished sixth in MVP voting, and third in Cy Young voting, despite having a not-so-stellar 3.09 defensive independent component ERA (DICE).

In turn, Cliff Lee had a 2.70, and Roy Halladay had a 2.90, as starters, and finished behind K-Rod in MVP voting. And K-Rod gave up 3.72 more walks per nine innings than Mariano Rivera, who had a DICE of 1.90. K-Rod had a first place MVP vote. Rivera, in turn, did not receive a single MVP vote.

Justin Morneau, 1B, Twins: Came dangerously close, again, to swiping the MVP. Despite finishing outside the top 10 in AL VORP, again, he finished second in AL MVP voting.

Ahead of Kevin Youkilis, who had a higher OBP, SLG, OPS+, EqA, VORP, etc, both playing first base. And more outrageously, ahead of teammate Joe Mauer, who, just like he did in 2006, finished far ahead of Morneau in VORP.

First base and catcher are on opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of offensive expectation, yet they both had 137 OPS+'s. Yes, Morneau is a good player and plays good defense, but you could get the same good defense from both Youkilis and Mark Teixiera. With better offensive numbers.

Is there any catcher in MLB that can routinely get on base over 40% of the time? Victor Martinez, Brian McCann, and Russell Martin are yet to approach Mauer's 2006 or 2008 OBP production.

Will The Real Wallabies Please Stand Up?

Joe Regan — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 10:06:38 -0400

53-8
Who would have guessed that would happen before Saturday's test match?
Who would have guessed Jongi Nokwe would have the honor of being the first Springbok ever to score four tries in a test match?

Most importantly, who would have guessed a team competing for a Tri-Nations title could look that bad?

With little more to play for than a little additional positioning leading to their September 13th matchup with New Zealand, Australia laid out the biggest clunker of a performance from an international power in a long time.

Why did Nokwe have such a big game? Because Australia's defense was crowding around the breakdown whenever South Africa neared the line, leaving massive overloads that any decent team could exploit.

Why did South Africa dominate possession and territory? Two big reasons were Australia's inability to recycle good balls, whether it be from South African counter rucking, or from simply running away from support.

The other reason was the abysmal match played by Adam Ashley-Cooper, who not only constantly kicked away possession rather than attempt a counter attack, he also constantly kicked it to players like Butch James and Conrad Jantjes, who in turn would burn the Wallabies with their own feet.

Australia looked like one gigantic mess out there. Whether it was a case of an experimental starting 15, poor preperation, or simple apathy among the ranks, the Wallabies got embarrased in Johannesburg. The same Wallabies who just one week ago looked relatively dominant in a victory against these very same Springboks.

And the same Wallabies side who defeated the All Blacks one week, only to get run off the pitch the next week by the same All Blacks.

The Wallabies have been one of the most enigmatic sides I have seen in a long time in rugby. And now, depending on what side shows up in Brisbane on the 13th, the Wallabies could hold the distinction of being the first team to win a Tri Nations title with a negative points differential. It all depends on what team comes to play for Australia, though.

If it is the team that controlled the second half of Bledisloe Cup Match One versus New Zealand, then Australia will be crowned champions.

If it is even remotely close to the team that showed up to play South Africa this weekend, New Zealand will be adding a fourth consecutive title to their collection.

Tri-Nations Destined To Be Decided In Brisbane

Joe Regan — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 20:35:14 -0400

I have learned a very simple rule in 2008 in regards to rugby:

Never count out the All Blacks in the Tri-Nations.

After being beaten in Dunedin by the Springboks in July, and then going on to be easily handled 34-19 in their next test match versus Australia, they looked all but done in the 2008 Tri-Nations. 1-2 with five points entering a home match versus Australia, followed by two matches on the road to close out, and things looked bleak for the men in black.

Then things changed.

The All Blacks responded in about as good of a way as a team coming off two losses could do, easily handling the Aussies in Auckland, 39-10, led by fantastic efforts by Dan Carter, Ma'a Nonu, and Tony Woodcock.

More importantly, the All Blacks avenged their previous loss to South Africa in Cape Town, oppressing the Boks all game long to the tune of a 19-0 shutout. Now, with one test remaining for the All Blacks on the schedule, they hold a five point edge over Australia.

Australia also looks poised to capture their first Tri-Nations victory since 2001. However, they have the unenviable task of attempting to defeat South Africa at least once on the road to give themselves a reasonable chance of capturing both the Bledisloe and Tri-Nations championship on September 13th.

With Habana out, and South Africa already hard pressed to put points on the board with him present (47 points, three tries in four games), it is reasonable to believe Australia will get the better of South Africa in one of these matches, which will lead to a situation rivaled only by the World Cup final in the Test Rugby world:

Australia vs. New Zealand for the Tri-Nations and Bledisloe Cup, to be determined by a matchup on the field.

The All Black defense has been stifling in the past two matches, giving up only 10 points and one try to Adam Ashley-Cooper.

The All Blacks will also have a full month to prepare for the biggest match of their 2008, while Australia has two tough matches on the road versus South Africa before even the thought of the Haka can enter their mind.

However, Australia will have the home field, an advantage that has paid dividends to both teams in their previous two matchups.

My prediction for the final three matchups of the Tri Nations:

—Australia wins one match in South Africa and obtains a loss bonus in the other.

—Australia wins a close match in Brisbane, claiming the Tri-Nations and Bledisloe Cup.

Australia: 4-2 18 points
New Zealand: 3-3 15 points
South Africa: 2-4 9 points

Top 10 Easiest Athletes To Make Fun Of

Joe Regan — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 19:02:22 -0400

Many of us dream about it as little kids: becoming a professional athlete. Getting paid millions of dollars to play a game, the fame, the sheer fact that it looks a whole lot better than the 9 to 5, come home, drink a beer, read the paper life of your parents.

But of course, for the vast majority of us, this dream never comes true. For the men on this list, not only did the dream come true, but they reached a platform few will ever attain.

Then again, I doubt too many will want to attain this level:

The most mockable athletes of our time.

After grueling research, which involved such difficult tasks as asking friends to name some guys, and "googling" and "youtube'ing" various items, I bring to you my list of the top 10 easiest athletes to make fun of.

10) Alex Rodriguez: Outside of things like him leaving his wife for this, Rodriguez has yet to do that much in his personal life to end up on this list. However, the sheer level of jokes that have come out of Rodriguez's existance warrants him at least an appearance on the list. Besides, how can you leave off the man who is featured in this gem.

9) Kobe Bryant: How can Kobe Bryant be ahead of Alex Rodriguez? Kobe has 3 titles, Rodriguez has 0. Kobe is probably about to win the gold medal in the Olympics after pounding whoever Team USA's loaded roster happens to meet in the final by about 35. Kobe Bryant's wife hasn't opted to dump him and dance around in rainfalls of alimony dollars, yet at least. So why is Kobe Bryant ahead of Alex Rodriguez?

Two words: White Chicks.

8) John Rocker: Throughout life, I have noticed two distinctly different groups of rednecks. The Jon Papelbon, dumb and likeable type. And the John Rocker, dumb racist moron type.

John Rocker shot out onto the scene like a cannon in his career, and recorded an impressive 38 saves in 1999. Then he decided he was good enough to run his mouth, and provided the January 2000 edition of SI with, "It's the most hectic, nerve-racking city. Imagine having to take the 7 train to the ballpark, looking like you're riding through Beirut next to some kid with purple hair, next to some queer with AIDS, right next to some dude who just got out of jail for the fourth time, right next to some 20-year-old mom with four kids. It's depressing". Apparently Randall Simon is a fat monkey, too.

Now I could basically run the gauntlet of redneck jokes or karma is a bitch jokes (everyone point and laugh at the blown up arm), but why list a whole bunch off, when a picture is worth 1,000 words?

Yep, the jokes never stop with this guy.

7) Lance Armstrong: Yes, he won seven Tour de France titles, and yes, he helped assist America in our love of laughing at France for years. He's far better than most of us will ever be.

But one nut jokes are always in play. Nicknames like half-pack, one-nut, or nine behind Chuck Norris, among others, are all valid nicknames for Lance Armstrong.

6) Barry Bonds: Ah, yes, the steroid king. You can list so many records and honors he has attained in his career:

Single season HR record
Career HR record
40-40 club by attaining 42 HR's and 40 SB's in 1996
Single season head size growth record
Single season balls size shrinkage record
Was able to make a reality show that somehow outsucked all other reality shows out there and got cancelled.

I hope he has become good friends with Pete Rose, I sense they will be sharing a common bond in the near future.

5) Roger Clemens: Minus the reality show crap, Clemens has taken self-embarassment to a whole new level. Rather than just fess up and admit he used performance enhancers, Clemens decided to fight it. What did Clemens get out of it?

An even further damaged reputation, and the revelation of a pedophilac affair. Now, any joke about how underaged girls are the only thing small enough for his shrunk junk are fully in play in any discussion about Roger Clemens.

To think he could have just done with buddy boy Andy Pettitte did and fessed up, faded away for a bit, and came back with everyone loving him again.

4) Jeff Garcia: I know what you are thinking. Jeff Garcia...ahead of Bonds and Clemens? How? Why? Jeff Garcia is perfectly good people, true, but...here's a good reason why.

From his Cindy on the Brady Bunch voice, to his obviously poor choices of words, to things like...oh jeeze.

Many a joke is in play for this guy. Things like what a "locker room presense" he is, how he sure loves reaching under the center for the ball, sending him $5 Cher albums via fan mail that you find at the local Best Buy, and many more can be used for a good laugh.

3) Rafael Palmeiro: He advertised Viagra. He was the first big name Major Leaguer to be busted on the magic juice.

You do the math.

2) Mike Tyson: The comedy never stops with this guy. Let us take a small sample of the fun actvities Mr. Tyson has engaged in while in the public eye.

1989: Given an Honorary Doctorate by Central State University in Ohio. This should pretty much sum up this school to the rest of the world.

1992: Convicted of rape, spent 3 years in the cooler. Nice Honorary Doctorate, CSU.

1997: Became the first boxer ever to attempt to eat his opponent in the match. Failed.

2000: Practiced his cannibalism again when he threatened to eat Lennox Lewis' children. Apparently Mr. Tyson is a fan of British cuisine.

2002: Lost to Lennox Lewis in a laugher.

2003: Filed for Bankruptcy. Immediately became the top candidate to fill Enron's Chief Financial Officer position.

2005: Ran off to his house in Paradise Valley to watch his pigeons. I cannot make this stuff up.

2006: Busted for DUI and Possession of drugs. So much for that missionary idea.

I know for a fact that this is one reality show I would just love to see. What else could be more entertaining than a real life episode of Jerry Springer with the prospect of baby eating?

1) OJ Simpson: I think we all know why this man is No.1. We should all eventually follow in his footsteps and try to find the real murderer.

He once set a record for most rushing yards in a season. He now has the record for most money lost in a wrongful death lawsuit for a double homicide he was found "not guilty" of. By not guilty, I mean they caught a cop using the n-word a few too many times.

Apparently he felt like he owed the legal system one, because he decided to go get himself arrested on real fun time charges. Hey, maybe he will find the real killer while in jail for 60 years.

Honorable mentions (to name a few in no order): Manny Ramirez, Brett Favre, Curt Schilling, Sammy Sosa, Joakim Noah, Eddie Griffin, Jose Canseco, Tim Hardaway, Shawn Bradley, Mike Vick, Dennis Rodman, Maurice Clarett, Sam Cassell, Tony Romo

Manny Ramirez Trade Rumors, Year Number Eight

Joe Regan — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 20:04:08 -0400

July 31st. It might as well become a holiday in the city of Boston, along with Evacuation Day, Boston's way of citing the Revolutionary War as an excuse to skip work and celebrate St. Patrick's Day, and Patriots' Day, Massachusetts' excuse to skip work and watch the Boston Marathon. It is Manny Ramirez "will he be traded" day.

This year's holiday, though, might have meaning. This one might stick.

Ramirez is in the last year of the eight year contract given to him by the Red Sox, albeit with two club option years at an additional $20,000,000 per season. The Red Sox, however, may choose to not exercise these options, effectively making Ramirez a free agent at the end of this season.

This, compounded with the statements he made to ESPNdeportes.com, leads many a Red Sox fan into brainstorm mode.

We have the baseball team that can win now, but we more than likely do not if we trade away Ramirez in a purely "future" deal. Therefore, it is hard to say what kind of trade would even make sense for the Red Sox here.

Ramirez to Detroit for Magglio Ordonez? Not really sure how this would really improve either club, especially on Detroit's end. It would likely upset fan bases in both cities as well. The Red Sox could possibly push this deal by citing Ramirez's near .900 career playoff OPS, but this would be more than likely a dead end deal that would only happen on MLB2K8.

Ramirez to Cincinnati for Adam Dunn? Once again, makes no sense. Cinci would want building blocks with many years left in their contracts if they give up Dunn, and Ramirez sure is not that. Besides, Dunn's contract is up after the season, too, and that would leave no guarantee that Boston keeps him.

But then, of course, the Red Sox can just do what they always do to celebrate this holiday. Keep him.

I was thinking about possible trades during down times today leading right up to the Yankees - Red Sox night cap on ESPN. Then of course, Manny had to go do what Manny does: 3 for 5, 2 doubles, 2 RBI.

Simply put, how can a team in a World Series hunt rationalize trading a future Hall of Fame hitter with a 2008 OPS of .931 at the trade deadline? If the Red Sox were to even think of pulling the trigger on a deal like this, it'd have to be a heavily Red Sox-favored deal of getting a guy with relatively the same current production that is locked in for another 2+ years, which could be a hard find for these Red Sox.

At the end of the holiday, the Red Sox should, and will probably, do what they always do to celebrate the festivities. Hang onto Manny, let Manny be Manny, and ride the Ortiz-Ramirez lineup combo into the postseason.

I am just happy I am not Theo Epstein on this holiday.

Rugby: ELVs Coming to a Pitch Near You

Joe Regan — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 16:46:14 -0400

Today, I found out via email of a change coming for me in the Fall.

The Stellenbosch Laws, aka the experimental law variations (ELVs) are coming to the New England Rugby Football Union, my governing union.

The ELVs were designed after the low scoring, try-less 2007 IRB World Cup Final between South Africa and England, where RSA came out the 15-6 victor. The ELV's main goal is to create a more try scoring-friendly style of play. Among the major changes to the old laws are:

Only offsides and forms of foul play (ex: diving over the ruck) are given long arm, traditional penalties. Most other penalties have been downgraded to short arm penalties/free kicks.

Playing a ball while engaged in the ruck is okay assuming no other infractions are being committed (this could end up a short arm penalty).

Defensive backs other than the No. 9 must be five meters behind the back foot of the No. 8 in scrums.

No defensive matching in lineouts—a team can have as many or as few as they want in the lineout. In turn, the opposing hooker does not have to stand between the five meter and touch line.

A ball kicked directly into touch that was passed behind the 22 meter line results in no field position gain and is treated like a kick directly into touch from in front of the 22.

Quick lineout throws can go straight or back towards the goal line of the team performing the quick lineout.

Neutralized mauls can be collapsed.

While I am excited to try out these new laws myself and see if it makes the game better, there is definitely one thing that I will really enjoy seeing with these new laws:

College-level rugby.

After spending four years in the college rugby level, I know one thing is for sure—there are many players at the college level who just cannot grasp the laws and gameplay of rugby.

If a player cannot grasp the concept of the offsides line in a kicking situation, there is nothing to make me think they will grasp these. Also, now that the touch judges can act as assistants to the referee, these players will probably be caught at an even greater frequency.

I would love to keep a running tally of how many times a team gains 30+ meters with ease because a wing got caught napping on a ball into touch.

I would love to see the faces of fly-halves who boot the ball into touch only to give the opposing team a lineout 15 meters from the line.

The pushing back of the defense in scrums will also benefit teams with tactically sound back lines.

Essentially, I would just love to see the guys who play rugby for the free beer and status of it get smoked by the guys who invest the time in becoming as good and smart a player as they can.

In football, if you couldn't grasp a rule like holding, you sit on the bench. In basketball, if you travel all of the time, you sit on the bench. In baseball, if you constantly ran out of the basepaths, you sit on the bench. Yet I see way too many players playing rugby without the slightest idea how to actually play other than "catch ball, run forward".

The ELVs will more than likely provide a more offensive-friendly game, but it can also provide great humor for those who actually take the time to invest themselves in the sport.

A real rugby player would assess the rule changes, determine how it will affect them as a player, and adjust. Those that do this will see the benefits against the ones that do not.

Yes, anyone who plays with the ELVs long enough can learn how to adapt to them, and the quick learners will come down to earth after awhile. Once again, though, if they cannot grasp the concept of offsides, imagine them Forrest Gump'ing their way through rule changes.

Rule changes they probably will not even be aware of until game one.

Richie Sexson Released, but Bavasi's Legacy Lives On

Joe Regan — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 16:42:31 -0400

The Mariners are a joke.

There is really no other way to describe it.

Everything from a lineup that would make any good SABRmetric disciple cry, to terrible trades and signings, the Mariners have been a front-office disaster in the era of Bill Bavasi.

The most enduring image of Bavasi's reign, Richie Sexson, was released two days ago by Seattle as a part of their quest to fix every flub that has occurred in the past four years.

While the 2004 MLB free-agent class at first base was not a particularly strong class, the ridiculous sum of $50,000,000 over four years given to Sexson after a season-ending injury in Arizona was absolutely confounding.

Rather than taking a smarter route with a short-term deal, like the Brewers current failed gamble, Eric Gagne, the Mariners offered Sexson a long-term deal, which crippled their payroll for four years. While Sexson performed in the first year of his deal (.263/.369/.541), his numbers took sharp declines in the next two seasons, and his .694 OPS in 2007 was a grand total of .010 higher than legendarily poor power-hitter Juan Pierre.

Finally, after more of the same this season, the Mariners cut him free.

However, Sexson merely skims the surface of the disaster that was the Bill Bavasi era.

Through four years, Bavasi was known as a trade machine, and often found himself on the wrong end of the trade. A brief sampling of his trades include:

Carlos Guillen to Detroit for Ramon Santiago and Juan Gonzalez.
- Neither player did a thing for the Mariners, and ironically Santiago ended up back in Detroit just two seasons later. Guillen has an .866 OPS and two All-Star games in his time with Detroit.
Freddy Garcia and Ben Davis to Chicago for Jeremy Reed, Miguel Olivo, and Mike Morse.
- Only Reed is still with Seattle, and for the life of me I do not know why. Garcia went on to go 3-0 with a 2.14 ERA in three postseason starts in 2005.
Asdrubal Cabrera to Cleveland for Eduardo Perez.
- Perez played in 43 games for Seattle before being done in the majors. You can currently see him on Baseball Tonight. While Cabrera is back in AAA, he is still only 22 and will probably pan out to be a good major leaguer with time.
Rafael Soriano to Atlanta for Horacio Ramirez.
- Soriano has pitched well for Atlanta. Ramirez is currently in mop-up duty for the Royals.
Randy Winn to San Francisco for Yorvit Torrealba and Jesse Foppert.
- Torrealba was just kind of there for 42 games with Seattle, and Foppert has never played a game for Seattle. Winn has been a solid starter in San Francisco.
Adam Jones and George Sherrill to Baltimore for Erik Bedard.
- While Bedard has been decent, he is nowhere near the form that netted him a top five in 2007 Cy Young voting. Two years of Bedard for a cellar-dweller franchise is nowhere near worth a guy who currently has 28 saves for Baltimore, and a top-tier prospect that will probably be a staple of the Orioles franchise for years.

What is left of the Bavasi era is a team with a long road ahead. Out of all the regulars, Adrian Beltre leads the team with a .442 SLG (which would make a player like Dustin Pedroia, with a .456 SLG, the power hitter of the roster).

Ichiro is also the only starter with an OBP over .350, at .363. Even more pathetically, out of all the players on the Mariners roster with over 100 PAs, the team leader in on-base percentage is...

wait for it

WILLIE BLOOMQUIST

Yep, with 124 PA's, Bloomquist has somehow managed an OBP of .368, exceeding everyone else on the team. When this career .642 OPS guy is your team's on-base leader, you know you have problems.

To think just a few years ago, this was a team contending for the AL West title. Now, despite having a top-10 payroll in MLB, they are left with a roster full of filler, outside a few good young players like Hernandez and Morrow. The Mariners, with the firing of McLaren, and finally, Bavasi, look to turn the corner and rebuild.

It would be a whole lot easier to rebuild with guys like Adam Jones around, though.

Final All-Star Vote Is Proving the Casual Fans' Lack of Knowledge

Joe Regan — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 20:13:34 -0400

I was browsing MLB.com during my late-night Tour de France viewing when I came across something that provided some interest for me: The final vote ballot for the MLB All-Star Game.

The last chance for a few guys who probably got screwed by the previous rounds of popularity contests to beat out some other current victims.

This year's ballot on the AL is:

Evan Longoria, TB
Jason Giambi, NYY
Jermaine Dye, CHW
Brian Roberts, BAL
Jose Guillen, KC

For the NL, the list is:

Pat Burrell, PHI
Corey Hart, MIL
David Wright, NYM
Aaron Rowand, SF
Carlos Lee, HOU

Now that the results are almost over, I decided to investigate what the fans are voting and who is still in contention.

In the AL, it is a three-man race between Longoria, Giambi, and Dye. This, I have no issue with. Guillen is slugging well, but a corner outfielder/DH with a .299 OBP is not exactly All-Star caliber.

Roberts probably has a claim, though, given his OPS is just a few points below current leader Evan Longoria. Out of the three in contention, their numbers are as follows:

Longoria: .280/.350/.529
Dye: .302/.357/.545
Giambi: .256/.393/.537

Truthfully, who deserves it between these three is a tough call. I would have to agree with the masses as of right now and go with Longoria. While he has the weakest hitting stats of the three, he also plays good defense at an important position.

Dye does as well, though, making them tough to distinguish. In this case, I would just go with arguably the best player on the best team going into the break.

The NL, on the other hand, I am having an issue with. According to this article on MLB.com, Corey Hart is leading. However, despite the ability of Hart, the fact that he is ahead of both Burrell AND Wright is stunning. Going back to the slash stats of these men, we get:

Hart: .296/.336/.510
Burrell: .281/.413/.590
Wright: .288/.383/..510

While Hart being ahead of both of these guys is surprising, I am almost disgusted that at this stage, Pat Burrell will be left off the All-Star roster. Despite being 13th in MLB in VORP, Burrell was not voted in by the fans or included as a reserve.

While the NL is chuck-full of talent in the outfield (Matt Holliday, Nate McLouth, and Ryan Ludwick all enter the game as reserves), Burrell represents the epitome of the popularity-contest victim, losing out on an All-Star spot to men like Kosuke Fukudome (.809 OPS, 98th in MLB VORP), Ryan Braun (.872 OPS, 41st in MLB VORP), and Alfonso Soriano, who even before his injury was nowhere near the statistical production of Pat Burrell.

Now that Burrell looks destined to miss out on his last chance, it is just another opportunity to chalk another guy up as an All-Star snub.

Fan voting is a great way to make the fans feel like an All-Star Game is for them, but the principle of it has been ruined. Fans vote for the name they know or like, rather than vote for the man who deserves it.

So instead of rewarding Pat Burrell for the borderline-MVP season he is putting together, we reward Kosuke Fukudome and Alfonso Soriano for wearing a Cubs jersey.

The same can be said in the AL for anyone who wears a Red Sox or Yankees jersey (and I say this as a Red Sox fan). Fan voting is great in principle, but sometimes I would like to see a fan do some research before checking off the name on their online ballot.

Open Mic: Rugby—The Best Sport No One Watches

Joe Regan — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 17:19:39 -0400

July 4th is a short time away, and we all know what that means...

It is almost time for the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest on Coney Island.

The day of the year that men like Kobayashi and Joey Chestnut become household names. The day that men who specialize in undertaking the most non-athletic form of competition possible (yes I know Kobayashi benches 405 or something ridiculous) get to be prominently featured on ESPN.

Good thing ESPN could pencil it in between the Spelling Bee, Billiards, Bowling, and re-airing number 1000 of the 2006 World Series of Poker.

To think what this time could be used for by ESPN. Like, possibly assisting the growth of rugby, one of the most popular sports in the world, in the USA.

The Rugby World Cup (held every four years, the next one in New Zealand in 2011) is constantly one of the most popular sporting events in the world, only trailing the World Cup and the Olympics in international appeal.

Men like Dan Carter of New Zealand and Jonny Wilkinson of England are heroes in their native countries, and the sport has boasted impressive athletes like Jonah Lomu (6'5", 260 lbs, 10.89 100 meters).

Yet Rugby has spent years getting the extreme version of the hockey treatment from ESPN—if they don't own the rights to it, it doesn't exist.

Embarrassingly, the Rugby World Cup came and went in America without so much as the majority of people being aware of its existence. Too bad, we missed out on things like this and this. Feel free to notice the viewing statistic in the second video as well.

The debate has raged on whether shows like eating competitions, poker, and other grey-area sports should be featured on ESPN. I would take no issue with having them on as well, except for the short stick that other, much better sports get as a result.

I speak as a man who has actively played rugby for four years, and I know that rugby is challenging and often times confusing to the average viewer. However, it is a sport that has everything the average American sports fan has been drawn to from other sports.

It has brilliant skill plays, brilliant athletic plays, tough power plays, and hard hits. One could argue that its close similarity to football is a hindrance to the sport in the USA, yet Rugby Union and Rugby League do more than fine in Australia, despite the huge popularity of Aussie Rules football as the No. 1 contact sport in the country.

America cannot even field a national side made up of solely professional players most of the time, and only a few from the 2007 RWC roster play in a country's highest level professional league:

Mike MacDonald - Leeds: Guinness Premiership, England
Paul Emerick - Newport-Gwent: Magners League, Ireland, Scotland, Wales
Zee Ngwenya - Biarritz: Top 14, France

While no one could say that Rugby will ever ascend to the same stature as football, baseball, basketball, hockey, or even soccer, in the United States, one has to assume that additional exposure would be beneficial to the sport.

However, for some God-awful reason, ESPN seems to not want to give Rugby this exposure, electing instead to air the occasional match on ESPN U (essentially ESPN 3), and electing to put on useless programming instead.

Yet, hope is not lost among the rugby fanatics of America. Youth participation in the sport is increasing annually, and new clubs are springing up on a regular basis.

As a New Englander, it is hard to find a place in New England that is not within an hour of a men's-level rugby club to participate for, and the Boston area has nine teams to play on.

College rugby is experiencing a boom in participation, and more and more people are starting to discover the sport. Maybe one day, Rugby will catch on and attract a more mainstream crowd. But for now, it looks like the rugger needs to take a backseat to the guy going all in on a 9-6 off-suit.

Edgar Martinez Should Be a Surefire Hall of Famer

Joe Regan — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 17:25:49 -0400

The big news in Red Sox nation as of late has been Curt Schilling. The man with an 11-2 lifetime playoff record (including a 6-1 record with a 3.28 ERA for the Red Sox) and 3,116 strikeouts is most likely done with baseball.

Naturally, this has begged the question of whether or not No. 38 belongs in the Hall of Fame. But, in my mind, it is a question that does not even make sense. A man who was instrumental in three World titles, along with the numbers he put up as a pitcher (including an impressive career 127 ERA+) absolutely deserves the honor.

But this question did serve one real purpose for me. It reminded me of another man who will appear on the ballot in less than a year. His name: Edgar Martinez.

It is near tragic, I think, that there are people who follow baseball that claim he does not belong in the Hall of Fame for various reasons. Of course, there are two that always pop up in these discussions about Edgar:

He did not have the Hall of Fame caliber career stats

While this is true, to an extent, people tend to forget that Martinez did not have the time to amass his numbers compared to many other Hall of Fame players.

Let's compare Martinez to a fairly recent Hall of Fame inductee, Gary Carter:

HR: Carter: 324, Martinez: 309
Hits: Carter: 2092, Martinez: 2247
AVG: Carter: .262, Martinez: .312
OBP: Carter: .335, Martinez: .418
SLG: Carter: .439, Martinez: .515
OPS+: Carter: 115, Martinez: 147 (43rd of all time)

Outside of home runs (Martinez being a great gap hitter more so than a great HR hitter) his plate numbers trump that of Carter's.

And back to the issue of age, Carter was receiving regular playing time at age 21, while Martinez did not receive this until age 27. (In retrospect, this was one of the biggest managerial crimes of the past 20 years.)

However, Carter was also a great catcher. This brings us to the second common argument not to induct Martinez:

He was primarily a career DH

Yes, Martinez played over 70 percent of his games as a Designated Hitter, and also spent all but 33 games from 1995 on in the lineup as a DH. In reality, though, does it matter?

If a person were given a copy of his hitting stats and told to make a judgment on whether or not he is Hall caliber, unaware of who the player was, would they approve or not?

I know for a fact I would, and apparently so would baseball-reference.com. (Their Hall of Fame Monitor equation has Edgar listed as a 131.5, above the "virtual cinch" standard of 130.) Yet, so many people insist that a Designated Hitter does not belong in the Hall of Fame, which of course led me to look at other Hall of Famers to investigate.

The first name that popped into my head was a certain Reggie Jackson. As a career hitter, he was dominated by Martinez in average and on-base, and even in slugging.

Jackson only played a portion of his career as a Designated Hitter, however the time he spent in the field was not anything to write home about. He was a career .967 outfielder—well below the league average during his career of .980.

Essentially, when a person says that Jackson belongs in the Hall of Fame, but Martinez does not, they are saying that a crappy defense is better than not playing defense.

So if Seattle had let Martinez butcher at first instead of taking advantage of the DH and not used guys like Tino Martinez or John Olerud (because what team would want those levels of production in their lineup on a nightly basis?), Edgar Martinez would be a Hall of Famer. This is essentially the argument many a baseball "expert" is making.

Yet we let Goose Gossage into the Hall of Fame, a man who only pitched 1.8 innings per outing, and in terms of the league average, still did not even have all that impressive an ERA (a 127 ERA+ as primarily a career reliever, and showed evident flaws as a starter).

I am not going to sit here and say I will never watch baseball again if Martinez is not a first ballot Hall of Famer. What I will say is that if Martinez does not find himself induced among the greats of the game as he deserves to be, for something as stupid as some people's anti-DH stance, then the Hall of Fame selection committee can consider itself a joke.

Top 10 Biggest NBA Draft Busts of the Last 10 Years

Joe Regan — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 03:36:51 -0400

Well, folks, it is the day we have all been waiting for (especially if "we" are the fans of the Chicago Bulls and Miami Heat). The NBA Draft. The make or break moment for franchises.

While many teams have been able to re-establish themselves, or even become Champions (Spurs) as a result of the draft, many teams will also doom themselves to years of mediocrity and regret.

Before I can really begin this article, I must define my view of a "draft bust." For me, the primary factors are:

•Overall contribution to original team

•Overall career productivity (or productivity up to this point)

•Strength of the draft class (Who could a team have had instead, in particular at a certain position?)

•Long-term impact on the team (Is the franchise still reeling from this?)

With this, I bring you the top 10 biggest draft busts of the last 10 draft years (1998-2007).

10) Marcus Fizer—Fourth Pick, 2000 (Bulls)

While the whole draft class of 2000 was horrible, the fact that the Bulls made this pick and moved Elton Brand as a result of it was the perfect summary of Chicago's futility after Michael Jordan.

Had one decent season in 2001-02, but overall never came close to becoming the player he looked like he could become in college.

9) Jonathan Bender—Fifth Pick, 1999 (Raptors, Traded to Pacers)

Indiana thought it was a brilliant idea to trade away role player Antonio Davis to snag Bender. While Bender struggled through seven seasons in Indiana (only playing in 237 games and starting in 27), Davis became an instant contributor to the Raptors, and remained one for a good four seasons.

Bender retired in 2006 due to chronic knee pain, averaging only five PPG for his career. Wally Szczerbiak, Shawn Marion, and Ron Artest are some of the forwards passed up for Bender.

8) Rafael Araujo—Eighth Pick, 2004 (Raptors)

You know it's bad when I go to nba.com to check his "career" stats and it says "We apologize for the inconvenience, but the page you are looking for might have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable."

Araujo is the biggest reason why Rob Babcock is currently the Assistant GM of the Timberwolves (who obviously aren't the sharpest pencils in the box, either). He played two disappointing years in Toronto, and then another disappointing year in Utah, ane packed up and signed a contract to play in Russia.

Would be higher, but it wasn't like any world beaters were drafted behind him. Toronto could've had the very serviceable Al Jefferson, though.

7) Robert "Tractor" Traylor—Sixth Pick, 1998 (Mavericks, Traded to Bucks)

Traylor was an overweight, shorter than desired PF/C who really could do nothing but rebound. This pick would've been bad enough, but the Mavericks were able to convert this to little known (at the time) Dirk Nowitzki, leaving the dishonor on the Bucks.

After two seasons in Milwaukee of under 4.5 PPG basketball, he was bounced around from team to team before washing up with the Santurce Crabbers of the Puerto Rican league.

Also, they could've had Paul Pierce instead.

6) Darco Milicic—Second Pick, 2003 (Pistons)

It's one of few major errors the Pistons have made in recent memory, but it was a big one. The Pistons were off a 50-32 season and had the opportunity to add a huge name with the second pick of the 2003 draft.

Instead of adding Carmelo Anthony, Chris Bosh, Dwyane Wade, Chris Kaman, or Kirk Hinrich, the Pistons went with heralded but relatively unknown Milicic. He was a bust right as the season started, and only averaged 5.8 MPG and 1.6 PPG in his first two-and-a-half seasons in Detroit—before being unheraldedly dumped to the Magic.

Going through the laundry list of quality play from the five men that went after him would take all day. The Pistons won an NBA title the season after this pick anyway, but one could only imagine what may have been with a player like Chris Bosh on their roster.

5) Steve Francis—Second Pick, 1999 (Grizzlies, Traded to Rockets)

If there is any point in time at which one can really identify why the Grizzlies failed in Vancouver, it would be the drafting of Steve Francis. Francis went on to play well in his career, winning co-rookie of the year and making three All-Star rosters. Unfortunately, none of this was for Vancouver.

Francis made it known that he did not want to play in Vancouver, but the Grizzlies picked him anyway. Francis went on to cry his way into a trade, where he became a valuable member of the Rockets. The Grizzlies never recovered from this misstep, and eventually had to pack up and move to Memphis.

To think all this drama could have been avoided if they had just picked Baron Davis or Richard Hamilton.

4) Fran Vasquez—11th pick, 2005 (Magic)

While this could change as he might eventually leave Europe to play in the NBA, for now one can only call a pick that has not even been on the roster for three years a bust.

Vasquez was expected to sign with the Magic to make a formidable frontcourt duo of himself and Dwight Howard. Only problem was, Vasquez decided to stay in Spain for at least another season. Three years later, he is still over in Europe, and it could be a fourth if FC Barcelona does not let him out of his contract.

A residual effect of this was the huge contract they ended up paying Rashard Lewis, a move that could hamper the Magic's ability to sign free agents for years.

3) Nikoloz Tskitishvili—Fifth Pick, 2002 (Nuggets)

I did not even remember this guy until I started researching to write this article, but the only thing he can be credited for is setting back European big men about 30 years.

He played at a mediocre level for 81 games and 16 starts in 2002-03, and proceeded only to decline from there. Tskitishvili finished his career with 172 games, 11.3 MPG, and 2.9 PPG.

Ironically, he washed up for a while on the Suns, the team of Amare Stoudemire—the man who went four picks after Tskitishvili in the 2002 draft.

2) Michael Olowokandi—First Pick, 1998 (Clippers)

The prime cut sirloin steak of busts and second guessed picks in the 1998 draft. He was taken ahead of Mike Bibby, Vince Carter, Antawn Jamison, Dirk Nowitzki, and Paul Pierce.

In his time in Los Angeles, Olowokandi never shot for a good field goal percentage, was a bottom tier free throw shooter, a horrible passer who only averaged .7 APG in his career, and nowhere near the rebounder you would expect a seven-footer to be.

The Clippers have only made the playoff once since this terrible pick.

1) Kwame Brown—First Pick, 2001 (Wizards)

Sadly, the defining moment of Michael Jordan's GM'ing career.

Passing up on Tyson Chandler and Pau Gasol, the Wizards elected to select this high school star with the first pick. It was the first time a high schooler had ever been selected first in the NBA Draft.

His career in Washington was plagued by immaturity and inability to handle the pressure from the media, and especially MJ.

Brown went on to have all of one decent season in Washington, and the only real value he ever served the Wizards was attracting a trade from Los Angeles that sent Caron Butler to Washington. In turn, the only real value he ever served Los Angeles was as an expiring contract to trade for the previously mentioned Pau Gasol.

He will probably sign a one-year, relatively small money contract this offseason.

Dishonorable Mentions

Raef LaFrentz, Larry Hughes, DeSagana Diop, Jay Williams, Chris Wilcox, Sebastian Telfair, Marvin Williams, Adam Morrison, Shelden Williams, Randy Foye, Kedrick Brown, Robert Swift, Patrick O'Bryant

J.P. Riccardi Buried the Hatchet, but Problem with Blue Jays Is Evident

Joe Regan — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 19:13:13 -0400

Apparently there is a direct correlation between batting average and passion for the game. At least, that's what Blue Jays general manager J.P. Riccardi thinks, according to his statements about Adam Dunn. When a fan brought up the value a power bat like Dunn's would have for a team like Toronto, Riccardi responded with this gem:

"He's a lifetime .230-.240 hitter that strikes out a ton and hits home runs. Did you know the guy doesn't really like baseball that much? Did you know the guy doesn't have a passion to play the game that much? I don't think you'd be very happy if we brought Adam Dunn here...We've done our homework on guys like Adam Dunn and there's a reason why we don't want Adam Dunn."

Yep, everyone, batting average: the ultimate metric to define a hitter. Career .256-hitter Harmon Killebrew must have been a failure who played less games in MLB than Crash Davis. Wait, he's a Hall of Famer?

For all the readers who'd rather see numbers provided then do their own research, here are some career batting averages, along with career OPS+:

Harmon Killebrew: .256, 143 OPS+

Royce Clayton: .258, 77 OPS+

Neifi Perez: .267, 64 OPS+

So, obviously, batting average means a lot to these Blue Jays. Until you look at some league statistics. The team batting average of Toronto is a paltry .257, or 10th out of 14 AL ballclubs. The real nightmare, however, is the .376 team slugging percentage of Toronto, a nice 13th of 14 in the AL.

The only team behind the Jays? The Seattle Mariners (you know, the ones who thought Richie Sexson was worth a massive contract, and that Erik Bedard was worth a top-flight prospect and a very good reliever, that Jeremy Reed and Willie Bloomquist belong in the majors and not some random independent league in Western Canada, etc.). Yet Adam Dunn is not a passionate ballplayer because he "strikes out a lot" and "hits for a bad average."

Now, let's look at some other statistics about Adam Dunn:

OBP: .384

SLG: .491

Yes, we know Dunn strikes out a lot, but can someone tell me the difference between a strikeout and a weak grounder to the second baseman? Me neither.

How about the difference between a walk and a single? In retrospect, not very much.

However, the Blue Jays cling to their old-fashioned batting metrics. They trade Troy Glaus (120 OPS+ in 2007) for Scott Rolen (89 OPS+ in 2007) straight up (and yes, I am aware that Rolen has played well in Toronto, but coming into this season, this looked like a one-way deal). They let Frank Thomas walk (OPS-ing .933 with Oakland this season) while having guys like Shannon Stewart (.628 OPS) and Brad Wilkerson (.680 OPS) platoon left field, rather then put Stairs in left and Thomas as the designated hitter.

And now, despite having stockpiles of pitching talent, they refuse to address the very reason why they are cellar-dwellers of the AL East.

I am not sitting here saying that Dunn will turn the Blue Jays into postseason contenders overnight, but there is no doubt that having him in the No. 4 hole (hear that Dusty? No. 4 hole, with Phillips batting behind him) would improve the Blue Jays offense, with decent on-base guys like Eckstein and Rolen batting ahead of him.

However, now that the Blue Jays are in a division with four teams that know how to put a baseball club together better than they do, they could be doomed to mediocrity for years, unless they update their thought process and learn the value of the slugger in modern baseball.