In boxing they say if you've got a heartbeat, then you have a chance. Despite having once napped through an ESPN Classic -- the epic Tyson/Douglas bout -- I have always been a hopeless fan of the underdog. And more so after having seen my New England Patriots shock the oddsmakers senseless last Super Bowl Sunday.
In baseball, however, critics look at your record and base your success and/or greatness on numbers more than in any other sport. And numbers alone. Many sports writers and TV talking heads consult reference books and rattle off a cornicopian cavalcade of stat data to come off as experts. But all too often they hide behind the pedantry of academic research to excuse their grasp of logic and common sense.
For example, they might say that Nolan Ryan couldn't hold Tom Seaver's Hall Of Fame jock strap because he threw too many walks. But take Ryan's all time leading .204 lifetime batting average allowed and add it to compliment the mighty 70s Bronx Bombers once every 4 or 5 starts instead of the mediocre Rangers or Angels, and "The Express" leaves "Tom Terrific" in the dust.
But don't tell that to scribes who get encyclopedic orgasms from shallow value judgements based on numbers that fail to make crucial allowance for the fact that baseball is a TEAM sport and any and all stats are interdependant on the collective performance of the other 8 men in the field.
In a nutshell, star power defeats the team concept when so few of the game's modern greats are able to will their teams to victory based on cheerleading character and not just the hand-eye coordination of their last at bat. As a rule, the ego intimidation factor can render a star's contribution useless unless he can inspire his ballclub to play as one and win.
Again, let me repeat, baseball is a team sport, and yet we are obsessed by the performance of individuals as opposed to team units. A "Say Hey Kid" center field game-saving catch is an all or nothing at all "WinShare" in and of itself. And yet in the end it's the pitcher who gets credit for it because there are no game saving catch column entries in the box scores.
So the concept of boiling the game down to simple numbers falls apart when you enter the realm of unknown incidentals, known variables, luck, bad umpire calls or what have you. What percentage of a WinShare was the non-call of the Ed Ambrister interference play in the classic 70s Bosox/CinReds series? And is there a such thing as a stat for kismet?
Because of a black and white, show me-the-selfish-money-player, win now mentality, the fickle art of baseball management resembles a cold canvas in front of a jet engine more than it does a warm Norman Rockwell slice of life. We are lead to believe that he who plays for himself is more newsworthy than the 40 man roster that beats the odds when the proverbial "We Are Family" theme song kicks in.
Unfortunately, like the former bench utility player who is now suddenly a sports channel know-it-all who sees only stats and not the big picture, some GMs are prone to treat the task of building a winner like a game of fish---card game/boat trip---or both. Find the best players your organization can afford, put them together and hope they put up the big numbers. Thus running a ballclub becomes a sterile math equation with no regard for issues of sociology, human nature or the lessons of history.
Of the 97 Fall Classics played since 1903, there is not a decade in which an underdog did not win or a favorite did not lose. This past baseball century more than a third went down to the wire or were closely contested and 20 or more were all out upsets. Average that out and at least half of all World Series in baseball history have been up for grabs.
What that does is put the stat data snob's credo to shame. Because it says that a team that plays together and is built on chemistry and not superstar wherewithal has a 50/50 chance to go all the way. While it is a far cry from parity, the revelation lends itself to a road to success rooted in reinventing one's reality rather than basing perception solely on past results. In George F. Will's seminal "Men At Work", Orel Hershiser said it best, "History is history; the future is perfect."
The reason why teams win is not because they are stacked to the gills with 20 Sammy Sosas or Sean Greens and 20 Big Units or Pedros. Ultimate victory is an ethereal, uncommon thread that can't be woven together with numbers alone without weighing and balancing the social politics of humanity into focus. In team sports, it's the winners who stick together while the lonely big shots stand alone.
No doubt baseball is chock full of haves and havenots, teams that win with old rat infested ballparks and teams that feel that they need to build new ones to attract fans. The changling aspect of the baseball front office as a juggling act lacking a leap of faith makes numbers and the win/loss column the short term bottom line when long term destiny resides in the ultimate ability or inability of a club to succeed via the sum of its parts instead of the one man team myth.
So long as the game is scrutinized by those who intellectualize numbers rather than socialize groups, bottling the psychology of winning into a human
formula will be a bitter pill for stat
junkies to swallow. And the visionary intangibles that build winners will be scoffed at as too much talk or too many words between the lines. After all, it's still a game of inches, stats and role...and not heart and soul. Other-wise, Hall Of Fame induction would not be so stuffy and selective.
Since the modern game is ill fit with too many playoff rounds and often the best team in the regular season can be rendered an October no show by a fall club that gets hot, numbers in the modern era mean less than ever. Among purists, winning is the only stat that counts. And in a team sport, you can't win unless you do it together. For indeed there is no straw to stir if there is no drink.
» Hank Festa is a free lance writer who thinks baseball genius Joe Morgan needs to leave the ESPN booth if the Red Sox are to make it to the promised land.
Also by Hank Festa
» Gibby's '88 Series Limp Shot: Baseball's Last "Earned Home Run"
» Flamethrower's Epiphany: Confessions Of A Live Arm
» In The Event Of A Strike...: The Time Off Must Be Used to Fix the Game
» More submissions
Copyright © 2002 by Hank Festa. Posted June 7, 2002.
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