from Amazon
Wednesday, November 04, 2009
A wonderful, concise article on the typical stories from the media when a team wins something…
We don’t normally just link to baseball articles on this blog, like, say, the BBTF Newsstand, but I really liked this one, which has to do with the nonsense you hear continually from the media (and the players and managers).
Here are some excerpts although the article is short:
If Pettitte outpitches Martinez, or if the Yankee offense proves too much for Philadelphia in game six, the Yankee victory will be attributed to Pettitte’s determination, the Yankees ability to bounce back “as they have done all season long” and the coolness under pressure of whoever delivers the big hit.
A similar storyline will emerge if the Yankees win in seven games. In that case, Sabathia will be the one with grit and determination, but the Yankees will be hailed again for their ability to bounce back “as they have done all season long”, as well as inevitably, their drive and understanding that anything less than a World Championship wasn’t good enough for their fans or their city. In either case Joe Girardi will be lauded for his confidence and willingness to stick with his three man pitching rotation in the face of criticism.
If the Phillies manage to beat Pettitte and Sabathia in New York, Girardi’s stubborn refusal to be flexible and insistence on using only three starters throughout the whole post-season will be at fault, but the larger story will be the determination of the Philadelphia Phillies, their unwillingness to quit and the importance of momentum.
All of these explanations are, of course nonsense, based on seeing causalities where they don’t exist and making assumptions about behavior and motivations that simply are not true. Is it even remotely plausible that the team that loses will have done so because they didn’t try hard enough, or that the team that wins will have done so because they were more determined? Baseball players at the Major League level are all determined, hard working and possess extraordinary drive, otherwise they wouldn’t be there. Nobody works all year, and in many cases all their lives, to get to the World Series and then stops caring.
This is a good point. Watching the series, and watching the earlier regular season interleague series between the Yankees and the Phillies, my impression is that the teams are about even in talent. The Yankees’ higher payroll is cancelled out by the fact that they are an older team in the Phillies and have fewer players in their prime, though they do have more depth.
From a fans’ standpoint, this is a good series because you have two talented teams that are actually playing to their potential. I genuinely have no idea who is going to win.
Plus random chance affects outcomes much more than the media says (this applies to other ares than sports). This is one area where reporters and editors could benefit from a few courses in statistics.