This is a post to show the active players who rank in the top 100 at their individual position, except for pitchers, as their rankings take too long to update and fix. This is inspired from a Fangraphs post that was looking to see which active players have a chance at the Hall of Fame.
Catcher:
Jason Kendall (22)
Brian McCann (44)
Jorge Posada (16)
Jason Varitek (60)
Joe Mauer (11)
Yadier Molina (80)
A.J. Pryzinski (89)
Russell Martin (63)
Victor Martinez (34)
Ramon Hernandez (56)
Mike Napoli (65)
Ivan Rodriguez (5)
First Base:
Albert Pujols (3)
Todd Helton (15)
Jim Thome (17)
Derrek Lee (62)
Jason Giambi (19)
Ryan Howard (84)
Prince Fielder (80)
Mark Teixeira (37)
Miguel Cabrera (31)
Adrian Gonzalez (49)
Kevin Youkilis (57)
Travis Hafner (91)
Lance Berkman (22)
Adam Dunn (88)
Joey Votto (65)
Second Base:
Luis Castillo (65)
Robinson Cano (43)
Dustin Pedroia (42)
Chase Utley (14)
Michael Young (60)
Orlando Hudson (73)
Rickie Weeks (91)
Brandon Phillips (81)
Brian Roberts (58)
Dan Uggla (70)
Kelly Johnson (80)
Ian Kinsler (46)
Aaron Hill (92)
Shortstop:
Alex Rodriguez (2)
Derek Jeter (10)
Omar Vizquel (53)
Jimmy Rollins (40)
Miguel Tejada (33)
Troy Tulowitzki (54)
Edgar Renteria (61)
Jose Reyes (45)
Hanley Ramirez (32)
Carlos Guillen (73)
Jhonny Peralta (94)
Third Base:
Chipper Jones (6)
Adrian Beltre (21)
David Wright (28)
Ryan Zimmerman (67)
Evan Longoria (33)
Aramis Ramirez (79)
Chone Figgins (89)
Pablo Sandoval (100)
Scott Rolen (9)
Eric Chavez (38)
Left Field:
Jose Bautista (89)
Jacoby Ellsbury (94)
Jason Bay (85)
Matt Kemp (66)
Alfonso Soriano (62)
Carl Crawford (53)
Bobby Abreu (16)
Center Field:
Aaron Rowand (98)
Curtis Granderson (86)
Vernon Wells (89)
Jayson Werth (96)
Josh Hamilton (78)
Mike Cameron (34)
Grady Sizemore (47)
Carlos Beltran (13)
Andruw Jones (9)
Johnny Damon (48)
Torii Hunter (76)
Right Field:
Nick Markakis (94)
Matt Holliday (55)
Ryan Braun (100)
Shin-Soo Choo (98)
Ichiro (20)
Vladimir Guererro (17)
J.D. Drew (35)
Magglio Ordonez (59)
Manny Ramirez (16)
Friday, December 30, 2011
Monday, December 26, 2011
Happy Holidays!
From us at Ron Coomer is an All Star, happy holidays!
We'll be back at full force soon with some of the following posts:
Movie Review: Sherlock Holmes
Movie Review: Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows
Hall of Fame Case: Barry Larkin
Hall of Fame Case: Brad Radke
Hall of Fame Case: Lee Smith
Hall of Fame Case: Bernie Williams
(We'll note already that when we write these Hall of Famce cases, we don't necessarily think that each of the players is a Hall of Famer).
Playoff Predictions: NFL Edition
Thoughts on Basketball
What people mean when they talk about the weather
Have a great rest of 2011, if we're not back by then.
We'll be back at full force soon with some of the following posts:
Movie Review: Sherlock Holmes
Movie Review: Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows
Hall of Fame Case: Barry Larkin
Hall of Fame Case: Brad Radke
Hall of Fame Case: Lee Smith
Hall of Fame Case: Bernie Williams
(We'll note already that when we write these Hall of Famce cases, we don't necessarily think that each of the players is a Hall of Famer).
Playoff Predictions: NFL Edition
Thoughts on Basketball
What people mean when they talk about the weather
Have a great rest of 2011, if we're not back by then.
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
The Obligatory Jack Morris Post
It's Hall of Fame voting season, again. This means that you will be subjected to countless writers who are writing about who they think is worthy of the Hall of Fame. One of the players a lot of these writers will mention is Jack Morris. Obviously, since I'm writing on the internet, I do not support Jack Morris' Hall of Fame qualifications. I actually believe that when people argue about Jack Morris and the Hall of Fame, they are actually arguing about two completely different views on the Hall of Fame, which I'll touch on later. However, since people still want to write things like Jack Morris is a very worthy candidate for the Hall of Fame. We are here to poke holes in the argument.
The first argument for Jack Morris is that he was the ace of three World Championship teams. What does that really mean? Usually, when people talk about being an ace that means that they are a) the best pitcher on the team and b) the one the teammates look to to beat losing streaks or otherwise be the most important pitcher on the team. This argument doesn't mean that much to me, if you look at the supposed aces of different World Championship teams. You would have a list of good but not great pitchers or pitchers who are great for one season. This is not even addressing the idea that it takes more than one pitcher to win the World Series. In fact, it takes 25 players, maybe more.
But I digress. In 1984, the Detroit Tigers won 104 games and the World Series. There has been talk of Jack Morris being the ace of that great team. It is important to note that that the writers of that time didn't consider Morris the best pitcher on the team. This is important to bring up because often these same voters who argue about Morris' greatness will say something to the effect of everyone who watched him play knew how great he was. Anyways, Willie Hernandez was voted by the writers as the winner of both the American League Cy Young Award and the MVP award. There have been claims by writers, nowadays, that only revisionist history has shown Morris not to be the ace of this team. However, we can clearly see that the writers during that time didn't consider Morris to be the best pitcher on his team, much less the league. If we decide, then, that relief pitchers are not worthy of being the ace of the team or that Morris was clearly the best starting pitcher on that team, then we must look at the statistics of the different pitchers. We can see that there is another pitcher who might be worthy of the ace role.
Jack Morris: 19-11 3.60 ERA 240.1 IP 148 K 87 BB 109 ERA+ 1.282 WHIP
Dan Petry: 18-8 3.24 ERA 233.1 IP 144 K 66 BB 121 ERA+ 1.275 WHIP
Even without going to far into advanced statistics, it looks like Petry is ahead of Morris. In fact, with rWAR Petry is at 3.2 and Morris at 2.3. It certainly would appear that Petry had a better season than Morris for that season thus being more deserving of the "ace" status. Morris did have a particularly good postseason so I suppose you could give him extra points for having a good postseason but it would certainly seem that Morris was not the ace of that particular team.
In 1991, the Minnesota Twins won 94 games and won the World Series in seven games over the Atlanta Braves. Was Morris the ace of that team?
Jack Morris: 18-12 3.43 ERA 246.2 IP 163 K 92 BB 125 ERA+ 1.289 WHIP 4.1 rWAR
Kevin Tapani: 16-9 2.99 ERA 244.0 IP 135 K 40 BB 143 ERA+ 1.086 WHIP 6.0 rWAR
Scott Erickson: 20-8 3.18 ERA 204 IP 108 K 71 BB 135 ERA+ 1.278 WHIP 4.2 rWAR.
Either way you look at, through traditional stats of wins and ERA or with advanced statistics, Morris is not the ace. If you're more inclined to look at the tradtional stats, you would be inclined to say Erickson was the ace. With advanced statistics, you would probably say that Tapani is the ace. Of course this was the season where Morris pitched so brilliantly in the postseason and had his virtuoso Game 7 appearance.
In 1992, the Toronto Blue Jays became the first team not located in the United States to win the World Series. Morris is now being considered the ace of this team, as well.
Jack Morris: 21-6 4.04 ERA 240.2 IP 132 K 80 BB 102 ERA+ 1.255 WHIP 2.8 rWAR
Jimmy Key: 13-13 3.53 ERA 216.2 IP 117 K 59 BB 117 ERA+ 1.218 WHIP 3.6 rWAR
Juan Guzman: 16-5 2.64 ERA 180.2 IP 165 K 72 BB 156 ERA+ 1.146 WHIP 5.2 rWAR
Duane Ward: 7-4 1.95 ERA 101.2 IP 103 K 39 BB 211 ERA+ 1.135 WHIP 3.2 rWAR
While Morris won 20 games during this season, he had an extremely high ERA and it looks unlikely that Morris was any more than an average pitcher throughout the season. Morris had a terrible postseason, this year, so if you give him extra points for his postseason performances you would have to discount it here because of the terrible postseason.
It's important to note that the 1993 Toronto Blue Jays won the World Series. However, Morris 7-12 6.19 ERA and did not pitch in the postseason, at all.
In my ruling, even if the claim that Morris was the ace of three World Series chamionship teams meant anything, which I assert it doesn't, it does not even appear that Morris was the ace of those teams. The only one that an argument could really be made that he was the ace is 1991 and that's if you gave him lots of extra points for his postseason performance. Even if he was the ace of that team, history is filled with World Series champion teams who had good pitchers on their team but nowhere near Hall of Fame quality.
The next argument that is typically made is that Morris won 254 games, most pitchers who won 250+ games are in the Hall of Fame. If we ignore the obvious problem, which is that pitcher wins are essentially useless. As Keith Law has stated that if a pitcher has won 20 games, all it says is that the pitcher appeared in 20 games. Pitcher wins are among the most useless stats in the history of baseball.
However, if we ignore this, we can focus on a different line of reasoning. There is no benchmark for the Hall of Fame in terms of wins. Although most pitchers who have won 250+ games are in the Hall of Fame, it does not mean that this is a benchmark. It is only ther until pitchers stop getting elected at that number, which might be happening already.
If you claim that Morris is worthy because of his 250 wins, then you must also recognize that other pitchers who have won 250+ games belong in the Hall of Fame. If that is the case, then they must have supported Blyleven (to give one example) which for the most part they did not. Other pitchers who have won 250+ games not in Hall of Fame that this reasoning would say is worthy of the Hall of Fame. Gus Weyhing (264), Jim McCormick (265), Jamie Moyer (267 and counting), Mike Mussina (270, although I think Mussina is a Hall of Famer), Jim Kaat (283), Tony Mullane (284), Tommy John (288), and Bobby Mathews (297). Since most would argue that at the very least Kaat and John are not Hall of Famers and they are close enough to contemporaries to Morris, that it appears that this reasoning is also wrong.
The third argument is that Morris was such a terrific postseason pitcher that he belongs in the Hall of Fame. This argument goes hand in hand with the fourth argument which is the Game 7 argument. This is the final line for Morris' postseason performances:
7-4 3.80 ERA 64 K's 32 BB's 1.245 WHIP.
Morris had some great post-season performances. We'll break it down year-by-year.
1984 ALCS: Morris had one start, 7 innings, 5 hits, 1 Earned run 4 K's 1 BB's.
1984 World Series: 2-0 2.00 18 IP 0.889 WHIP
1987 ALCS: Morris pitched in one game which was game 2. He pitched 8 innings and had 6 earned runs. He lost the game.
1991 ALCS: 2-0 4.05 ERA 13.1 IP 7 K's 1 BB
1991 World Series: 2-0 1.17 ERA 23 IP 1.174 WHIP
1992 ALCS: 0-1 6.57 ERA 12.1 IP (It would have been two losses but the Blue Jays scored 5 runs in the last two innings to send the game into extra innings, which thy won).
1992 World Series: 0-2 8.44 ERA 1.781 WHIP. He lost the only two games that the Blue Jays lost in that World Series.
Morris had two great post seasons and two awful post-seasons. It's hard to see how that it's a good argument for Morris being such a great post-season pitcher.
The other argument focuses on Game 7 of the 1991 World Series. The argument basically states that since Morris pitched arguably the greatest game in post-season history, he should be in the Hall of Fame. Well, then Don Larsen should be in the Hall of Fame because he pitched a perfect game in the World Series. Johnny Podres had a very similar post-season in 1955 that Morris had in 1991, Podres also pitched a great game 7, which led the Brooklyn Dodgers to their first World Series victory during that time. After Game 7 of the 1975 World Series, Sparky Anderson said that Don Gullet would go to the Hall of Fame. Livan Hernandez had a great post-season performance in 1997. Josh Becket had a great World Series performance in 2003 over the Yankees. There are a lot of players who had great post-seasons but are not good enough to be in the Hall of Fame. It's hard to see how great post-season performances are good enough to get you into the Hall of Fame.
The next argument is that Morris had a stunning moustache. There is no argument here.
The final arguments are that Morris' statistics don't capture him because he pitched to the score and that he was such a great pitcher that statistics do not necessarily capture him accurately. This is a risky argument because you are effectively discrediting any evidence against your argument and only accepting the evidence which proves your argument. In doing so, you leave others to be able to discredit your argument by claiming that it is weak. If you accept that certain records do not encapsulate a player fully but other records do, you are leaving the historical record up for debate. These are the same claims conspiracy theorists make when they talk about the assasination of John F. Kennedy, the Roswell incidents, etc. In these cases, people accept only aspects of the historical record that prove their argument or that do not show up in the official historical record but in their own revisionist or unofficial records.
If Jack Morris was able to pitch to the score, there should be records of that somewhere. While Morris had high innings total relative to the rest of the league and finished routinely in the top 10, it is not enough evidence that pitching to the score even exists. If that is all the evidence that you need, then pitchers who finish in the top 10 in innings pitched each year routinely pitch to the score.
Pitching to the score implies that a pitcher will save his best stuff for when he really needs it. This also implies that his best stuff will only be used during that time. If the best stuff will be saved during this time and a pitcher can routinely turn it on and off, it would seem that a pitcher would have a higher winning percentage and a lower ERA because he would use better stuff to allow less runners to score.
Pitching to the score is a dangerous argument because in theory if a pitcher who had a higher ERA because he pitched to the score, it would imply that he is giving up runs when he does not need to. If this is the case, there is a higher chance that a higher leveraged situation will come up with a lesser pitcher because of the whole pitching to the score. For example, if Morris' team was up 5-0 in the 7th inning, he pitches in the 7th and gives up 3 runs because he is taking stuff off of his pitches. It is now 5-3 in the 8th or in the 9th. Do you really think the manager is going to let Morris finish out the game or is he going to bring in the closer? Wouldn't it have been better if Morris kept pitching hard at 5-0.
The last argument against pitching to the score is Occam's razor. When presented with two competing theses, you should choose the simpler one. In this situation, Morris has a high ERA because he is simply not an outstanding pitcher. If you believe in pitching to the score, it is because he is giving up runs because he is pitching to the score and he is actually a pitcher who can turn it on and off consistently. Occam's razor states that we should accept the simpler thesis. The simpler thesis is that Morris is not an outstanding pitcher.
All in all, I don't think Morris is a Hall of Famer. I hope this post will help you in case you run into someone who thinks Morris is a Hall of Famer and uses one of these arguments. There are other arguments that people use to try and convince you that Morris is a Hall of Famer but they run along the same lines that we've focused on, already.
The first argument for Jack Morris is that he was the ace of three World Championship teams. What does that really mean? Usually, when people talk about being an ace that means that they are a) the best pitcher on the team and b) the one the teammates look to to beat losing streaks or otherwise be the most important pitcher on the team. This argument doesn't mean that much to me, if you look at the supposed aces of different World Championship teams. You would have a list of good but not great pitchers or pitchers who are great for one season. This is not even addressing the idea that it takes more than one pitcher to win the World Series. In fact, it takes 25 players, maybe more.
But I digress. In 1984, the Detroit Tigers won 104 games and the World Series. There has been talk of Jack Morris being the ace of that great team. It is important to note that that the writers of that time didn't consider Morris the best pitcher on the team. This is important to bring up because often these same voters who argue about Morris' greatness will say something to the effect of everyone who watched him play knew how great he was. Anyways, Willie Hernandez was voted by the writers as the winner of both the American League Cy Young Award and the MVP award. There have been claims by writers, nowadays, that only revisionist history has shown Morris not to be the ace of this team. However, we can clearly see that the writers during that time didn't consider Morris to be the best pitcher on his team, much less the league. If we decide, then, that relief pitchers are not worthy of being the ace of the team or that Morris was clearly the best starting pitcher on that team, then we must look at the statistics of the different pitchers. We can see that there is another pitcher who might be worthy of the ace role.
Jack Morris: 19-11 3.60 ERA 240.1 IP 148 K 87 BB 109 ERA+ 1.282 WHIP
Dan Petry: 18-8 3.24 ERA 233.1 IP 144 K 66 BB 121 ERA+ 1.275 WHIP
Even without going to far into advanced statistics, it looks like Petry is ahead of Morris. In fact, with rWAR Petry is at 3.2 and Morris at 2.3. It certainly would appear that Petry had a better season than Morris for that season thus being more deserving of the "ace" status. Morris did have a particularly good postseason so I suppose you could give him extra points for having a good postseason but it would certainly seem that Morris was not the ace of that particular team.
In 1991, the Minnesota Twins won 94 games and won the World Series in seven games over the Atlanta Braves. Was Morris the ace of that team?
Jack Morris: 18-12 3.43 ERA 246.2 IP 163 K 92 BB 125 ERA+ 1.289 WHIP 4.1 rWAR
Kevin Tapani: 16-9 2.99 ERA 244.0 IP 135 K 40 BB 143 ERA+ 1.086 WHIP 6.0 rWAR
Scott Erickson: 20-8 3.18 ERA 204 IP 108 K 71 BB 135 ERA+ 1.278 WHIP 4.2 rWAR.
Either way you look at, through traditional stats of wins and ERA or with advanced statistics, Morris is not the ace. If you're more inclined to look at the tradtional stats, you would be inclined to say Erickson was the ace. With advanced statistics, you would probably say that Tapani is the ace. Of course this was the season where Morris pitched so brilliantly in the postseason and had his virtuoso Game 7 appearance.
In 1992, the Toronto Blue Jays became the first team not located in the United States to win the World Series. Morris is now being considered the ace of this team, as well.
Jack Morris: 21-6 4.04 ERA 240.2 IP 132 K 80 BB 102 ERA+ 1.255 WHIP 2.8 rWAR
Jimmy Key: 13-13 3.53 ERA 216.2 IP 117 K 59 BB 117 ERA+ 1.218 WHIP 3.6 rWAR
Juan Guzman: 16-5 2.64 ERA 180.2 IP 165 K 72 BB 156 ERA+ 1.146 WHIP 5.2 rWAR
Duane Ward: 7-4 1.95 ERA 101.2 IP 103 K 39 BB 211 ERA+ 1.135 WHIP 3.2 rWAR
While Morris won 20 games during this season, he had an extremely high ERA and it looks unlikely that Morris was any more than an average pitcher throughout the season. Morris had a terrible postseason, this year, so if you give him extra points for his postseason performances you would have to discount it here because of the terrible postseason.
It's important to note that the 1993 Toronto Blue Jays won the World Series. However, Morris 7-12 6.19 ERA and did not pitch in the postseason, at all.
In my ruling, even if the claim that Morris was the ace of three World Series chamionship teams meant anything, which I assert it doesn't, it does not even appear that Morris was the ace of those teams. The only one that an argument could really be made that he was the ace is 1991 and that's if you gave him lots of extra points for his postseason performance. Even if he was the ace of that team, history is filled with World Series champion teams who had good pitchers on their team but nowhere near Hall of Fame quality.
The next argument that is typically made is that Morris won 254 games, most pitchers who won 250+ games are in the Hall of Fame. If we ignore the obvious problem, which is that pitcher wins are essentially useless. As Keith Law has stated that if a pitcher has won 20 games, all it says is that the pitcher appeared in 20 games. Pitcher wins are among the most useless stats in the history of baseball.
However, if we ignore this, we can focus on a different line of reasoning. There is no benchmark for the Hall of Fame in terms of wins. Although most pitchers who have won 250+ games are in the Hall of Fame, it does not mean that this is a benchmark. It is only ther until pitchers stop getting elected at that number, which might be happening already.
If you claim that Morris is worthy because of his 250 wins, then you must also recognize that other pitchers who have won 250+ games belong in the Hall of Fame. If that is the case, then they must have supported Blyleven (to give one example) which for the most part they did not. Other pitchers who have won 250+ games not in Hall of Fame that this reasoning would say is worthy of the Hall of Fame. Gus Weyhing (264), Jim McCormick (265), Jamie Moyer (267 and counting), Mike Mussina (270, although I think Mussina is a Hall of Famer), Jim Kaat (283), Tony Mullane (284), Tommy John (288), and Bobby Mathews (297). Since most would argue that at the very least Kaat and John are not Hall of Famers and they are close enough to contemporaries to Morris, that it appears that this reasoning is also wrong.
The third argument is that Morris was such a terrific postseason pitcher that he belongs in the Hall of Fame. This argument goes hand in hand with the fourth argument which is the Game 7 argument. This is the final line for Morris' postseason performances:
7-4 3.80 ERA 64 K's 32 BB's 1.245 WHIP.
Morris had some great post-season performances. We'll break it down year-by-year.
1984 ALCS: Morris had one start, 7 innings, 5 hits, 1 Earned run 4 K's 1 BB's.
1984 World Series: 2-0 2.00 18 IP 0.889 WHIP
1987 ALCS: Morris pitched in one game which was game 2. He pitched 8 innings and had 6 earned runs. He lost the game.
1991 ALCS: 2-0 4.05 ERA 13.1 IP 7 K's 1 BB
1991 World Series: 2-0 1.17 ERA 23 IP 1.174 WHIP
1992 ALCS: 0-1 6.57 ERA 12.1 IP (It would have been two losses but the Blue Jays scored 5 runs in the last two innings to send the game into extra innings, which thy won).
1992 World Series: 0-2 8.44 ERA 1.781 WHIP. He lost the only two games that the Blue Jays lost in that World Series.
Morris had two great post seasons and two awful post-seasons. It's hard to see how that it's a good argument for Morris being such a great post-season pitcher.
The other argument focuses on Game 7 of the 1991 World Series. The argument basically states that since Morris pitched arguably the greatest game in post-season history, he should be in the Hall of Fame. Well, then Don Larsen should be in the Hall of Fame because he pitched a perfect game in the World Series. Johnny Podres had a very similar post-season in 1955 that Morris had in 1991, Podres also pitched a great game 7, which led the Brooklyn Dodgers to their first World Series victory during that time. After Game 7 of the 1975 World Series, Sparky Anderson said that Don Gullet would go to the Hall of Fame. Livan Hernandez had a great post-season performance in 1997. Josh Becket had a great World Series performance in 2003 over the Yankees. There are a lot of players who had great post-seasons but are not good enough to be in the Hall of Fame. It's hard to see how great post-season performances are good enough to get you into the Hall of Fame.
The next argument is that Morris had a stunning moustache. There is no argument here.
The final arguments are that Morris' statistics don't capture him because he pitched to the score and that he was such a great pitcher that statistics do not necessarily capture him accurately. This is a risky argument because you are effectively discrediting any evidence against your argument and only accepting the evidence which proves your argument. In doing so, you leave others to be able to discredit your argument by claiming that it is weak. If you accept that certain records do not encapsulate a player fully but other records do, you are leaving the historical record up for debate. These are the same claims conspiracy theorists make when they talk about the assasination of John F. Kennedy, the Roswell incidents, etc. In these cases, people accept only aspects of the historical record that prove their argument or that do not show up in the official historical record but in their own revisionist or unofficial records.
If Jack Morris was able to pitch to the score, there should be records of that somewhere. While Morris had high innings total relative to the rest of the league and finished routinely in the top 10, it is not enough evidence that pitching to the score even exists. If that is all the evidence that you need, then pitchers who finish in the top 10 in innings pitched each year routinely pitch to the score.
Pitching to the score implies that a pitcher will save his best stuff for when he really needs it. This also implies that his best stuff will only be used during that time. If the best stuff will be saved during this time and a pitcher can routinely turn it on and off, it would seem that a pitcher would have a higher winning percentage and a lower ERA because he would use better stuff to allow less runners to score.
Pitching to the score is a dangerous argument because in theory if a pitcher who had a higher ERA because he pitched to the score, it would imply that he is giving up runs when he does not need to. If this is the case, there is a higher chance that a higher leveraged situation will come up with a lesser pitcher because of the whole pitching to the score. For example, if Morris' team was up 5-0 in the 7th inning, he pitches in the 7th and gives up 3 runs because he is taking stuff off of his pitches. It is now 5-3 in the 8th or in the 9th. Do you really think the manager is going to let Morris finish out the game or is he going to bring in the closer? Wouldn't it have been better if Morris kept pitching hard at 5-0.
The last argument against pitching to the score is Occam's razor. When presented with two competing theses, you should choose the simpler one. In this situation, Morris has a high ERA because he is simply not an outstanding pitcher. If you believe in pitching to the score, it is because he is giving up runs because he is pitching to the score and he is actually a pitcher who can turn it on and off consistently. Occam's razor states that we should accept the simpler thesis. The simpler thesis is that Morris is not an outstanding pitcher.
All in all, I don't think Morris is a Hall of Famer. I hope this post will help you in case you run into someone who thinks Morris is a Hall of Famer and uses one of these arguments. There are other arguments that people use to try and convince you that Morris is a Hall of Famer but they run along the same lines that we've focused on, already.
Saturday, December 10, 2011
Movie Review: Donnie Darko
Donnie Darko follows Donnie, a troubled teenager, who might be schizophrenic, who doesn't get along with just about anybody. He befriends a man dressed in a bunny costume, who may or not be real. He's involved with some type of mischief after narrowly escaping death. It's also about time travel, coincidences, and probably the meaning of life.
Story writing: Donnie Darko gets awakened by Frank the Bunny who allows him to escape what would be his certain death. After following Frank, he has conversations with Frank who makes him do a series of mischeivous actions. Donnie tries to figure what the meaning of all this is before Frank's apocalyptic message comes true. Or you know, none of that happened. Score: 9.5/10.
Dialogue writing: Beyond the awesome phrases of "fuck ass" and "suck a fuck", there were some periods of dead dialogue or at least dialogue that was supposed to be deep but ultimately failed. Well, there was the very thorough Smurfs discussion that some of my friends have labeled as Tarantinoesque. Some of the examples of dead or forced dialogue, could be found mainly in Drew Barrymore's scene where she forces Gretchen to choose what boy she thinks is the cutest will be the one she sits by. Score: 8.5/10
Characters: Donnie was a certainly well-developed character, there was some mystery surrounding Donne but it contributed heavily to the movie. Drew Barrymore's character, while a minor character, wasn't very good. The minor characters were for the most pretty interesting, including the pedophilic Jim Cunningham but could have been described better or at least better acted for more development. Score: 7.5/10
Directing: The movie really portrayed Donnie's sickness and allowed us to get inside Donnie's sick mind. It also allowed us to have questions at the end of the movie. While we've been taught that movies are supposed to wrap up nicely at the end of them, it's somewhat more satisfying to figure out what really happened after the movie was over and overanalyze it.
Score: 10/10.
Suspension of disbelief: It kind of depends what you think happened in the film. If you believe that Donnie was shizophrenic and that the majority of the movie is him coping with his impending death, you are able to believe a lot of the movie could actually happen. If you believe that the movie is literal and that he is explaining how to travel through time, that requires for a lot of suspension of disbelief
Score: 9/10.
Timing: I never felt like the movie was dragging and for the most part almost every scene contributed in some way to the film. This applies even moreso if the movie is a set of coincidences all needing to happen in this particular order. Score: 10/10.
Genre specific: I'm not sure where to classify this movie in a specific drama. I guess that that the genre would be a dramatic sci-fi, since I can't list many movies in the genre, it's a high score. Score: 10/10.
Theme/Pseudo-philosophical questions: Of course this is going to be a high score. Ask any 20 something year old stone and they'll tell you of the relative importance of this movie. Score: 10/10.
Acting: Like I said before, some of the characters could have benefitted from better acting. This applies mainly to Drew Barrymore. I didn't really buy her acting in this movie. It seemed like she was intentionally acting like she had never acted before. I didn't think that the mother or father were particularly well acted. Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal, I thought did, fantastic. Especially Maggie. (Weird crush alert). Score: 10/10.
Re-watchability: This movie actually gets better the more times you watch it. You start to notice the little details that you missed the last time. Score: 10/10
Total Score: 91/100.
Story writing: Donnie Darko gets awakened by Frank the Bunny who allows him to escape what would be his certain death. After following Frank, he has conversations with Frank who makes him do a series of mischeivous actions. Donnie tries to figure what the meaning of all this is before Frank's apocalyptic message comes true. Or you know, none of that happened. Score: 9.5/10.
Dialogue writing: Beyond the awesome phrases of "fuck ass" and "suck a fuck", there were some periods of dead dialogue or at least dialogue that was supposed to be deep but ultimately failed. Well, there was the very thorough Smurfs discussion that some of my friends have labeled as Tarantinoesque. Some of the examples of dead or forced dialogue, could be found mainly in Drew Barrymore's scene where she forces Gretchen to choose what boy she thinks is the cutest will be the one she sits by. Score: 8.5/10
Characters: Donnie was a certainly well-developed character, there was some mystery surrounding Donne but it contributed heavily to the movie. Drew Barrymore's character, while a minor character, wasn't very good. The minor characters were for the most pretty interesting, including the pedophilic Jim Cunningham but could have been described better or at least better acted for more development. Score: 7.5/10
Directing: The movie really portrayed Donnie's sickness and allowed us to get inside Donnie's sick mind. It also allowed us to have questions at the end of the movie. While we've been taught that movies are supposed to wrap up nicely at the end of them, it's somewhat more satisfying to figure out what really happened after the movie was over and overanalyze it.
Score: 10/10.
Suspension of disbelief: It kind of depends what you think happened in the film. If you believe that Donnie was shizophrenic and that the majority of the movie is him coping with his impending death, you are able to believe a lot of the movie could actually happen. If you believe that the movie is literal and that he is explaining how to travel through time, that requires for a lot of suspension of disbelief
Score: 9/10.
Timing: I never felt like the movie was dragging and for the most part almost every scene contributed in some way to the film. This applies even moreso if the movie is a set of coincidences all needing to happen in this particular order. Score: 10/10.
Genre specific: I'm not sure where to classify this movie in a specific drama. I guess that that the genre would be a dramatic sci-fi, since I can't list many movies in the genre, it's a high score. Score: 10/10.
Theme/Pseudo-philosophical questions: Of course this is going to be a high score. Ask any 20 something year old stone and they'll tell you of the relative importance of this movie. Score: 10/10.
Acting: Like I said before, some of the characters could have benefitted from better acting. This applies mainly to Drew Barrymore. I didn't really buy her acting in this movie. It seemed like she was intentionally acting like she had never acted before. I didn't think that the mother or father were particularly well acted. Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal, I thought did, fantastic. Especially Maggie. (Weird crush alert). Score: 10/10.
Re-watchability: This movie actually gets better the more times you watch it. You start to notice the little details that you missed the last time. Score: 10/10
Total Score: 91/100.
Monday, December 5, 2011
The Hall of Fame Ballot part 1
Here at RCIAAS, we would like to announce our excitement that Ron Santo finally got into the Hall of Fame. We also would like to say that for every Hall of Fame ballot, we would vote for tha maximum of 10 people as long as they were close to being worthy of being enshrined. We would like the players who are close to being Hall of Fame worthy to be investigated further, so that the best players can finally be enshrined. Without further ado, we present the RCIAAS Hall of Fame ballot.
1. Jeff Bagwell- It's sad to say that Bagwell wasn't elected into the Hall of Fame on his first ballot. Accordint to the Hall of Fame score, that we use, with 38 being a Hall of Famer, he got a 56.43. Of course, our Hall of Fame score is based primarily around using WAR, both Fangraphs version and Baseball Reference's version. Hopefully, most of you accept the basic premises of WAR, but if not, we'll break it down even more.
Pro: Triple slash of .297/.408/.540 with an OPS+ 149. Those are fairly impressive career numbers. He had 6 seasons with a batting average of .300 or higher. He had seven seasons of OBP of .400 or higher. He had 10 seasons of .500 SLG % of .500 or higher and two seasons of a slugging percentage of .600 or higher. He had 9 seasons of OPS of .900 or higher. He had six seasons of OPS+ of 150 or higher. Look at his 1994 season, just look at it. 8.9 rWAR, .368/.451/.750, that's nearly Ruthian or Bondsian. Just a fantastic season and a great career. If you want to compare him with the other players in his league well, here we go. 3 top 10 finishes in Batting Average, 8 top 10 finishes in On-base percentage, 6 top 10 finishes in slugging percentage, 7 top 10 finishes in OPS. He led the league 3 times in runs scored, once in total bases, doubles, RBI's, and walks. He led the league once in OPS+ with a total of 9 top 10 finishes (including every year from 1993-2000). He also stole a total of 202 bases. According to the standard of 5 WAR being all-star caliber, he had 8 all-star caliber seasons and three MVP caliber seasons.
Cons: PED accusation, although never linked once during his playing career, there have been rumors from journalists that Bagwell used PED's. Even though there is no justifiable evidence. His counting numbers are not there, finished short of 500 homeruns (at 449) and never led the league in home runs. Despite numerous players hitting 50 home runs in a season, Bagwell never did. He also only made one World Series and didn't exactly light the world on fire during the post-season. He only made four All-Star teams.
2. Edgar Martinez- 46.6 RCIAAS HOF Score. 10 All-Star caliber seasons.
Pro's: .312/.418/.515 with a 147 OPS+. 11 seasons with a .300 batting average or higher. He had 11 seasons with a .400 OBP or higher. He had 9 seasons with a Slugging Percentage of .500 or higher. He also had 9 seasons with OPS of .900 or higher. In addition, he had 9 seasons with an OPS+ of 150 or higher.
He finished top 10 in rWAR in four seasons. He finished top 10 in batting average seven times, leading the league in average twice. He finished top 10 in on-base percentage 11 times, leading the league three times. He finished top 10 in slugging percentage six times. He finished top 10 in OPS eight times, leading the league once. He led the league once in runs scored, doubles twice, RBI's once, and OPS+ once. He finished top 10 in OPS+ 9 times including (1995-2001).
Cons: He was a designated hitter. The Mariners didn't win the World Series.
3. Mark McGwire- RCIAAS HOF score: 46.41. All-Star caliber seasons: 8. MVP caliber seasons: 1.
Pro's: Homeruns, lots of them, 583 to be exact. He led the league 4 times in home runs and 1 more time that he led the major league while being traded from one league to the other. Triple slash: .263/.394/.588. One full season of .300 batting average or higher. He had 5 full seasons with .400 OBP or higher. He had seven full seasons of .500 slugging percentage or higher. He had six full seasons of .600 slugging percentage or higher. He had seven full seasons of .900 OPS or higher, including 5 seasons of 1.000 or higher. He had seven full seasons of 150 OPS+ or higher. He had two seasons of 200 OPS+ or higher. He finished top 10 in rWAR four times.
He had four seasons of top 10 in OBP including leading the league twice. He had 8 top 10 finishes in slugging percentage and led the league four times. He led the league in OPS twice and finished top 10 seven times. He led the league once in RBI's. He led the league twice in walks. He had 6 top 10 finishes in OPS+ and led the league four times.
Cons: Admitted PED user. He also was a bit injury prone so his counting stats are a little lower than they would be if he was healthy for his entire career. He wasn't exactly the best fielding first baseman. Despite his prolific slugging, he never won the MVP award.
1. Jeff Bagwell- It's sad to say that Bagwell wasn't elected into the Hall of Fame on his first ballot. Accordint to the Hall of Fame score, that we use, with 38 being a Hall of Famer, he got a 56.43. Of course, our Hall of Fame score is based primarily around using WAR, both Fangraphs version and Baseball Reference's version. Hopefully, most of you accept the basic premises of WAR, but if not, we'll break it down even more.
Pro: Triple slash of .297/.408/.540 with an OPS+ 149. Those are fairly impressive career numbers. He had 6 seasons with a batting average of .300 or higher. He had seven seasons of OBP of .400 or higher. He had 10 seasons of .500 SLG % of .500 or higher and two seasons of a slugging percentage of .600 or higher. He had 9 seasons of OPS of .900 or higher. He had six seasons of OPS+ of 150 or higher. Look at his 1994 season, just look at it. 8.9 rWAR, .368/.451/.750, that's nearly Ruthian or Bondsian. Just a fantastic season and a great career. If you want to compare him with the other players in his league well, here we go. 3 top 10 finishes in Batting Average, 8 top 10 finishes in On-base percentage, 6 top 10 finishes in slugging percentage, 7 top 10 finishes in OPS. He led the league 3 times in runs scored, once in total bases, doubles, RBI's, and walks. He led the league once in OPS+ with a total of 9 top 10 finishes (including every year from 1993-2000). He also stole a total of 202 bases. According to the standard of 5 WAR being all-star caliber, he had 8 all-star caliber seasons and three MVP caliber seasons.
Cons: PED accusation, although never linked once during his playing career, there have been rumors from journalists that Bagwell used PED's. Even though there is no justifiable evidence. His counting numbers are not there, finished short of 500 homeruns (at 449) and never led the league in home runs. Despite numerous players hitting 50 home runs in a season, Bagwell never did. He also only made one World Series and didn't exactly light the world on fire during the post-season. He only made four All-Star teams.
2. Edgar Martinez- 46.6 RCIAAS HOF Score. 10 All-Star caliber seasons.
Pro's: .312/.418/.515 with a 147 OPS+. 11 seasons with a .300 batting average or higher. He had 11 seasons with a .400 OBP or higher. He had 9 seasons with a Slugging Percentage of .500 or higher. He also had 9 seasons with OPS of .900 or higher. In addition, he had 9 seasons with an OPS+ of 150 or higher.
He finished top 10 in rWAR in four seasons. He finished top 10 in batting average seven times, leading the league in average twice. He finished top 10 in on-base percentage 11 times, leading the league three times. He finished top 10 in slugging percentage six times. He finished top 10 in OPS eight times, leading the league once. He led the league once in runs scored, doubles twice, RBI's once, and OPS+ once. He finished top 10 in OPS+ 9 times including (1995-2001).
Cons: He was a designated hitter. The Mariners didn't win the World Series.
3. Mark McGwire- RCIAAS HOF score: 46.41. All-Star caliber seasons: 8. MVP caliber seasons: 1.
Pro's: Homeruns, lots of them, 583 to be exact. He led the league 4 times in home runs and 1 more time that he led the major league while being traded from one league to the other. Triple slash: .263/.394/.588. One full season of .300 batting average or higher. He had 5 full seasons with .400 OBP or higher. He had seven full seasons of .500 slugging percentage or higher. He had six full seasons of .600 slugging percentage or higher. He had seven full seasons of .900 OPS or higher, including 5 seasons of 1.000 or higher. He had seven full seasons of 150 OPS+ or higher. He had two seasons of 200 OPS+ or higher. He finished top 10 in rWAR four times.
He had four seasons of top 10 in OBP including leading the league twice. He had 8 top 10 finishes in slugging percentage and led the league four times. He led the league in OPS twice and finished top 10 seven times. He led the league once in RBI's. He led the league twice in walks. He had 6 top 10 finishes in OPS+ and led the league four times.
Cons: Admitted PED user. He also was a bit injury prone so his counting stats are a little lower than they would be if he was healthy for his entire career. He wasn't exactly the best fielding first baseman. Despite his prolific slugging, he never won the MVP award.
Movie Review: Paranormal Activity 2
I know I'm a little bit late on reviewing most of the movies that I post on here for reviews. This is mainly because I don't actually go out to movies all that often. I believe that if you see a movie in theatres, it should enhance your viewing pleasure of the movie. This is probably why I get suckered into seeing the big blockbusters every summer, or at least try to get suckered into them. Anyway, it has been awhile since Paranormal Activity 2 came out in theatres and even awhile since it's been out on DVD. That's right, I watch movies on DVD, still. It took me a little bit for me to watch the first Paranormal Activity, as well. So let's break it down.
Story/writing: If you've ever heard of Paranormal Activity, you know the basic story. I'll explain it, anyways. A family moves into a new house or there is a new baby born. For whatever reason, weird/creepy things begin to happen at the house. The family also chooses to videotape these eerie occurences. In this one, they place the security cameras up because they are concerned after a break-in. Of course, during the break-in, almost nothing was taken. These security cameras begin to tell the story of the overall creepiness that takes place in the house. It also shows what a terrible baby-sitter the daughter is. Considering, it's supposed to be the true story of this house, there are a lot of things that happen in the movie that do not illustrate how a family would handle the situation. Score: 3/10. I guess, I don't know, I'm not really a fan of the storyline of Paranormal Activity.
Characters: You have the skeptical father. There is the mother who believes that all of these "paranormal activities" are really happening. There is the daughter who is at first skeptical but ultimately tries to convince the father that what is happening is really ghosts or demons. There is the baby, Hunter, who is the target of all this "paranormal activity." There's more about him but if you want to learn about him, you can watch the movie. There's also the maid who unsuccessfully tries to get rid of the evil spirits from the house. There's the two main characters from the first Paranormal Activity, they're not that great in this movie, either. Characters: 3/10.
Directing: I wasn't a fan of the directing. There were constant views from the security cameras that didn't add anything to the movie. There were better options available to explain some of the story, either with the camera that the family uses or with the security camera, yet the director chose the worse of the two options, consistently. Score: 2.5/10.
Suspension of disbelief: This movie would require a lot of suspension of disbelief and it doesn't pull it off, at all. 1. The family doesn't react as a family would probably react given the situations that occur in the movie. The first Paranormal Activity had the same problems. 2. I'm not sure Hunter's room is accurately reflected in the mirror that is shown on the security camera. 3. The father could explain most of the "paranormal activity" by saying things such as the windows were open, etc. however, it doesn't take place. 4. The family doesn't systematically watch the security cameras, if you have them installed, why the hell are you not watching them?
Score: 0/10.
Acting: Poor. The acting wasn't very good, overall. Noboy did a real good job at their particular roles. I wasn't impressed by any of them. The only ones that even did a decent job was the daughter, the baby, and the dog. Score: 1/10
Dialogue: Well, like I said they don't react like a family would really react given these situations. This has to do with suspension of disbelief and the story writing, as well. However, it's still pretty bad.
Score: 2/10.
Genre Specific: I guess the movie was somewhat scary. I'm not really a fan of scary movies and wasn't overly impressed by the scariness of this movie. It made me almost jump once but didn't give me the lasting scare effect. Score: 5/10.
Timing: This movie felt like the longest movie I've ever seen. It was a LONG hour and a half. Score: 0/10.
Pseudo-philosophical/theme: Was there a theme? I guess the theme was that you can't really pass blame from one person to another. Or it was that you should be careful what you wish for. I'm not sure. Score: 2/10.
Re-watchability: I will not watch this move again. I don't really recommend seeing this movie, once.
Score: 0/10.
Total Score: 18.5/100.
Story/writing: If you've ever heard of Paranormal Activity, you know the basic story. I'll explain it, anyways. A family moves into a new house or there is a new baby born. For whatever reason, weird/creepy things begin to happen at the house. The family also chooses to videotape these eerie occurences. In this one, they place the security cameras up because they are concerned after a break-in. Of course, during the break-in, almost nothing was taken. These security cameras begin to tell the story of the overall creepiness that takes place in the house. It also shows what a terrible baby-sitter the daughter is. Considering, it's supposed to be the true story of this house, there are a lot of things that happen in the movie that do not illustrate how a family would handle the situation. Score: 3/10. I guess, I don't know, I'm not really a fan of the storyline of Paranormal Activity.
Characters: You have the skeptical father. There is the mother who believes that all of these "paranormal activities" are really happening. There is the daughter who is at first skeptical but ultimately tries to convince the father that what is happening is really ghosts or demons. There is the baby, Hunter, who is the target of all this "paranormal activity." There's more about him but if you want to learn about him, you can watch the movie. There's also the maid who unsuccessfully tries to get rid of the evil spirits from the house. There's the two main characters from the first Paranormal Activity, they're not that great in this movie, either. Characters: 3/10.
Directing: I wasn't a fan of the directing. There were constant views from the security cameras that didn't add anything to the movie. There were better options available to explain some of the story, either with the camera that the family uses or with the security camera, yet the director chose the worse of the two options, consistently. Score: 2.5/10.
Suspension of disbelief: This movie would require a lot of suspension of disbelief and it doesn't pull it off, at all. 1. The family doesn't react as a family would probably react given the situations that occur in the movie. The first Paranormal Activity had the same problems. 2. I'm not sure Hunter's room is accurately reflected in the mirror that is shown on the security camera. 3. The father could explain most of the "paranormal activity" by saying things such as the windows were open, etc. however, it doesn't take place. 4. The family doesn't systematically watch the security cameras, if you have them installed, why the hell are you not watching them?
Score: 0/10.
Acting: Poor. The acting wasn't very good, overall. Noboy did a real good job at their particular roles. I wasn't impressed by any of them. The only ones that even did a decent job was the daughter, the baby, and the dog. Score: 1/10
Dialogue: Well, like I said they don't react like a family would really react given these situations. This has to do with suspension of disbelief and the story writing, as well. However, it's still pretty bad.
Score: 2/10.
Genre Specific: I guess the movie was somewhat scary. I'm not really a fan of scary movies and wasn't overly impressed by the scariness of this movie. It made me almost jump once but didn't give me the lasting scare effect. Score: 5/10.
Timing: This movie felt like the longest movie I've ever seen. It was a LONG hour and a half. Score: 0/10.
Pseudo-philosophical/theme: Was there a theme? I guess the theme was that you can't really pass blame from one person to another. Or it was that you should be careful what you wish for. I'm not sure. Score: 2/10.
Re-watchability: I will not watch this move again. I don't really recommend seeing this movie, once.
Score: 0/10.
Total Score: 18.5/100.
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