THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

I believe they are (or were) also big proponents of sport psychology as well, having on staff as many as three full-time sport psychologists.  Not sure how many they have left at this point.

That is pretty refreshing.

On the other end of the spectrum is our guy, Wayne Krivsky, who has to be about the most absurdly secretive GM I’ve ever encountered.  Not to mention someone who’s among the worst public speakers…
-j

Those in power who say little, probably have little to say.

Also knowing that he sucks at public speaking means he’ll try to avoid it as much as possible. He knows he might say something stupid if he says anything at all.

Just curious… I realize that we don’t know the ins and outs of every organization, but what do you guys think the top 5 and bottom 5 (or 10 if you want) organizations in terms of being sabermetrically inclined?

How about just “sabermetric-friendly”?  I don’t want to evaluate something I don’t know. 

Indians are definitely sabermetric-friendly.  Redsox too.  Yanks, Padres, Cards: probably.

Huntington seems to be leading the Pirates that way too, and I’d venture that the White Sox are on the other end of the spectrum.

Mark,

Also knowing that he sucks at public speaking means he’ll try to avoid it as much as possible. He knows he might say something stupid if he says anything at all.

Thing is, I’m not sure that he knows that.  I’m not a particularly good off-the-cuff speaker, but I compensate for that by preparing bulleted remarks whenever I have to give some kind of presentation (e.g. when teaching).  Krivsky seems to just goes into his press conferences with the idea that he’ll speak from the heart.  The result are very long ramblings in which he says almost nothing over and over.  Just carrying a notecard with some key points written down would help a heck of a lot.
-j

Have any of you ever heard Minaya speak?  I was shocked when I first heard him.  He says more “likes” and “you knows” than a Valley girl.

Tango has mentioned before that he thinks that the Yanks are saber-friendly.  What evidence is there that they are?  I have never thought of them as having much use for sabermetrics.  I mean that in the somewhat perjorative sense (as opposed to that they don’t need it to be successful).

I was looking forward to reading that interview, but both the questions and answers were pretty vanilla, unenlightneing, and uninteresting.

I read a Cashman interview where they asked him about their “in-house” sabermetrician, and he replied with some long-winded answer that didn’t explain anything. I get the feeling that whenever their stat guy brings up a point, the Boss(es) give him the stare down and he goes back to his office.

Well, of course the smartest people in the world are Indians fans!