Bill Plaschke

[busuncle]

This will ruffle some feathers, since Plaschke is a board favorite, but this blog (BLOGS!) has very skillfully picked apart an especially overwrought column.

http://firejoemorgan.blogspot.com/

 

[dooley_womack1]

Yawn, the sabermetricians' Anti-Christ is targeted. The column was supposed to be a slice of life thing about a couple of old scouts doing their job in a world hostile to them. It wasn't intended to damn figures and stat analysis. Someone needs to calm down.

And I don't care if Ethier was the A'S ****ING MINOR LEAGUE PLAYER OF THE YEARS IN 2005 (the BLOGGER'S caps). Minor league stats are fairly meaningless. Issues of athleticism, personality and hustle, among other things, are things that you kinda hafta watch and bring your experience to bear on analyzing it. Plenty of people who have thrown 100 mph who couldn't cut it.

And at Maddux's age and recent performance level, it couldn't be assumed that he'd help. Some eyes on the ground would give you an idea.

I daresay that I don't think anything was particularly picked apart.

 

[ECrawford]

I'll only say, there's a hell of a big difference between Googling someone and knowing them.

The story wasn't written to be a scouting manual. Calm down, indeed. Dooley's right on.

 

[Alma]

Reading that blog makes me happy other sports have not been exposed to such statistical analysis paralysis.

 

[Smasher_Sloan]

Wasn't Brad Komminsk the Braves' minor league player of every year for a while?

 

[ServeItUp]

I heard that David Clyde guy was pretty well-regarded, too.

 

[busuncle]

Wasn't Brad Komminsk the Braves' minor league player of every year for a while?

Only because the Braves, like every other team in the 1980s, were relying on detailed computer analysis and not the advice of grizzled, 93-year-old scouts.

 

[Pringle]

I'm curious about why so many sports fans have something against Plaschke - I never think of him in the Mariotti mold. I understand why fans don't like the Mariottis of the world who tell them what they don't want to hear about their teams. But I've never understood the animosity toward Plaschke, who seems more like a feature/tear-jerker/human interest columnist.

 

[BYH]

...is not dead.

 

[Trey Beamon]

Love him as a columnist, hate him on ATH.

 

[Smasher_Sloan]

Wasn't Brad Komminsk the Braves' minor league player of every year for a while?

Only because the Braves, like every other team in the 1980s, were relying on detailed computer analysis and not the advice of grizzled, 93-year-old scouts.

Point being that being named Minor League Player of the Year in and of itself isn't quite the big deal it might seem to be.

Could be that the organization is filled with lousy players, could be that the player honored is one of those guys who hits his peak at AA or AAA.

 

[Montezuma's Revenge]

Pretty hilarioius dissection of the column.

 

[Fenian_Bastard]

Snark is not intellect.
Sarcasm is not an argument.
People should remember that.

 

[busuncle]

Snark is not intellect.
Sarcasm is not an argument.
People should remember that.

Sentimental pablum makes for an awful column.
People should also remember that.

 

[Van Lingle Mungo]

Plaschke writes a good feature, but he had some sort of massive agenda against MacCourt and DePodesta, calling the latter "Google Boy" and "computer nerd," and slamming him because he went to Harvard and used a laptop. Even when Steve Finley, Adrian Beltre and Jose Lima tanked in 2005, Plaschke ripped DePodesta for not re-signing them, even it it would've been a financial quagmire. If the Dodgers won the World Series in 2004, Plaschke probably would've faulted him for not keeping Paul Lo Duca around, because without him, a championship is meaningless.

When Coletti got the job, Plaschke praised him because he wore snake-skin boots. Snake-skin boots > laptop.

 

[Montezuma's Revenge]

Snark is not intellect.
Sarcasm is not an argument.
People should remember that.

Perhaps, but show me any intelligence in what Plaschke wrote.

He was just trying to push a bunch of touchy-feely buttons about an old scout. As if the scout had discovered Andre Ethier playing barefoot on a deserted island. People can scoff at minor-league numbers all they want, but he was a prominent draft pick and prospect who had been the A's minor-league player of the year. So it didn't take Hugh Alexander to discover him.

 

[21]

Snark is not intellect.
Sarcasm is not an argument.
People should remember that.

I am not going to tell you again, it's 5-7-5. You have to practice.

 

[Smasher_Sloan]

I have a lot of regard for Plaschke, but he's really overdoing the hatred for DePodesta, especially now that he's gone. What's the point?

He comes down on the Ringolsby side of the scouting/stathead issue and likely overestimates the old man's contribution in this acquisition. But there is an element of this where scouting comes into play, in believing that a player will be able to handle the pressure of a higher level and being able to sell the organization on that belief.

 

[CaliforniaRed]

Sorry, but the fact he excluded that this kid was named the Minor League Player of the Year, reaks of ignoring facts because it gets in the way of a good story. This is the kind of story that goes a long way with the casual fan but drives the die-hards nuts - and is why most of my friends that are serious sports fans can't stand Plaschke.

 

[leo1]

this web site is brutal. any yutz with a blog can tear apart anyone else's crap. big deal.