The shortest radio interview in history

[playthrough]

You're right, there's no conflict at all with writers voting for for people they cover. In the NBA it is not negotiated in their contracts it's part of the CBA.

Since you agree with this writer, why don't you make a case for Scherzer, or is just wins?

Why do you feel writers are above explaining their vote?

I never said I feel writers are above explaining. I said I don't necessarily think they HAVE to. And this whole thing is Exhibit A. People demand an explanation, he gives it, he gets trashed.

 

[Joe Williams]

I generally hate the trend of "let's mock someone for voting differently!" People disagree, you don't have to be assholes about it

Next stop: He must have his vote taken away from him.

Stop after that: He must not be allowed to cover this sport, whether that means changing his assignment or firing him.

We're already there in some areas of the culture. Can't be far off in stupid-ass sports awards.

 

[JC]

Next stop: He must have his vote taken away from him.

Stop after that: He must not be allowed to cover this sport, whether that means changing his assignment or firing him.

We're already there in some areas of the culture. Can't be far off in stupid-ass sports awards.

Awe the poor guy. Sportswriters should never be questioned.

 

[Cybersport2015]

Typical of what sports talk radio is. It would be nice to hear intelligent, thoughtful conversation and debate but that's not what the genre is.
I rarely listen to sports talk radio because 90-plus percent of the hosts in the Philadelphia market are terrible. They don't care about the basics of journalism, all they care about is stirring up controversy. That drives ratings, but it's not journalism.

 

[Vombatus]

Typical of what sports talk radio is. It would be nice to hear intelligent, thoughtful conversation and debate but that's not what the genre is.
I rarely listen to sports talk radio because 90-plus percent of the hosts in the Philadelphia market are terrible. They don't care about the basics of journalism, all they care about is stirring up controversy. That drives ratings, but it's not journalism.

Listen to Czabecast. Yeah, there's a focus on GB and Washington, but there's all kind of funny stuff too.

 

[GoogieHowser]

I never covered more than 10-15 Diamondbacks home games in my brief baseball days, but I did get to vote for NL Rookie of the Year once. Was a BBWAA member for six years, which was a nice resume item, I suppose.

Who'd you vote for?

 

[Cosmo]

Who'd you vote for?

It's been so long that I don't remember. I can't even remember which year it was. Getting old sucks.

 

[justgladtobehere]

To you. It was incredibly ill informed and illogical to you. I'm not going to carry the torch for Scherzer vs. DeGrom, but the guy's numbers were darned good and he had a great record on a mediocre team. Until wins and losses aren't used as statistics anymore, they're fair game as voting criteria. The voter didn't pull some arcane concept out of his ass to defend his vote, he used mainstream numbers and talked to a former Cy Young winner from his market. I don't see how that is grounds for being mocked. If you don't agree with his vote, that's fine.

He spoke with one Cy Young award winner from over 40 years ago who is biased towards giving the award to the guy with the most wins because that is how he got his. It's weak support for his argument and he does nothing to back up his claim about pitching to run support (i.e. evidence that either Scherzer or DeGrom did pitch to the scoreboard).

 

[The Big Ragu]

He spoke with one Cy Young award winner from over 40 years ago who is biased towards giving the award to the guy with the most wins because that is how he got his. It's weak support for his argument and he does nothing to back up his claim about pitching to run support (i.e. evidence that either Scherzer or DeGrom did pitch to the scoreboard).

So it's clear, this isn't me speaking, as in, this is my opinion, re: pitching to run support. ... But there is not much of an argument to make when it comes to pitching to the run support your team gives you. A pitcher's won-loss record makes that argument, doesn't it? As in, "On days you pitched how often did you give up fewer runs than your team scored." Do that, and your won-loss record will reflect it.

If you look at the column Maffei wrote, Randy Jones said, "Wins are the most important thing in the game. You need to pitch to the run support you get, whether that's one, two, three or 12." I personally don't agree with making that the sole, or even a majority, factor in a Cy Young vote, especially when it was coming down to Scherzer vs. a pitcher who got almost comically shirtty run support. It's one thing, and yeah, wins are important, but there are lots of things that you can value in a pitcher as much or more. If that is your argument, though. ... I don't know how you support what you are saying beyond, "Look at their records."

 

[justgladtobehere]

So it's clear, this isn't me speaking, as in, this is my opinion, re: pitching to run support. ... But there is not much of an argument to make when it comes to pitching to the run support your team gives you. A pitcher's won-loss record makes that argument, doesn't it? As in, "On days you pitched how often did you give up fewer runs than your team scored." Do that, and your won-loss record will reflect it.

If you look at the column Maffei wrote, Randy Jones said, "Wins are the most important thing in the game. You need to pitch to the run support you get, whether that's one, two, three or 12." I personally don't agree with making that the sole, or even a majority, factor in a Cy Young vote, especially when it was coming down to Scherzer vs. a pitcher who got almost comically shirtty run support. But if that is your argument. ... I don't know how you support what you are saying beyond, "Look at their records."

Look at when they gave up runs. Did Scherzer disproportionately give up runs when his team already had the lead or did he benefit from the Nationals coming back after he let up a couple? It has been studied and pitchers' performances don't change based on the score.

 

[JC]

So it's clear, this isn't me speaking, as in, this is my opinion, re: pitching to run support. ... But there is not much of an argument to make when it comes to pitching to the run support your team gives you. A pitcher's won-loss record makes that argument, doesn't it? As in, "On days you pitched how often did you give up fewer runs than your team scored." Do that, and your won-loss record will reflect it.

If you look at the column Maffei wrote, Randy Jones said, "Wins are the most important thing in the game. You need to pitch to the run support you get, whether that's one, two, three or 12." I personally don't agree with making that the sole, or even a majority, factor in a Cy Young vote, especially when it was coming down to Scherzer vs. a pitcher who got almost comically shirtty run support. It's one thing, and yeah, wins are important, but there are lots of things that you can value in a pitcher as much or more. If that is your argument, though. ... I don't know how you support what you are saying beyond, "Look at their records."

Then don't look at the W-L record and look at stats that show how effective the pitcher was, not how effective his offense was or wasn't.

 

[The Big Ragu]

Look at when they gave up runs. Did Scherzer disproportionately give up runs when his team already had the lead or did he benefit from the Nationals coming back after he let up a couple? It has been studied and pitchers' performances don't change based on the score.

1) You are criticizing him for some kind of ianalysis that he never made. He simply said, "Wins are important, and I value a pitcher who gets them." To put it simplistically, at least. Now you can argue against that being a sole criteria for a Cy Young, or even any criteria. But unless I was missing something, I didn't see him getting into the kind of thing you are trying to paint him into about breakdowns about when he gave up runs, his team scored runs, etc. That is you, not what he actually said. Unless I was missing something.

2) I am always wary of vague, "It's been studied" comments. I don't mean that personally. But athletic performance is part talent, but there is also an element of how you react situationally -- there is a mental aspect to competing. Not all games are equal, for example. A normal person is going to feel different pressure pitching in a meaningless mid season game than they are in a late-season, close pennant race game. And I would bet for certain that there have been some players that perform well in different situations, and some that don't perform as well. Just as I would guess that there are some who handle a tight game where their team isn't scoring runs better than some other pitchers. We are talking about people, not robots. Where a lot of people go wrong, in my opinion, is that they think everything about athletic performance can be distilled down to broad numerical formulas of some sort. Typically, they are trying to break it down into just single numerical values (and some of the formulas they come up with are ludicrous, because they add human bias -- adding random controls -- into how they try to calculate their number), which is absurd, because there are way more inputs that go into what makes a good player (in any sport) than even the best controlled, and sound, statistical analysis could ever account for. Even worse, though, a lot of people who don't even get into those kinds of statistical weeds (which are exercises in futility anyhow), distill things into broad statements like, "pitchers' performances don't change based on the score." Maybe that is true. I'd guess it's way more likely untrue, if you are looking at it beyond an aggregate look. Even if that is true of the broad swath of pitchers, let's say (and I have no idea if it is), can you really find me a study (one that isn't made of mud and bullshirt) that demonstrates there is no such thing as ANY pitcher who handles pressure better than most other pitchers do? A guy who in tight games consistently pitches better? Even if you go through history and could find only handful of pitchers from any era who defy a broad, "studies show" thing in that regard (and I would bet you would), I'd suggest that there might have been something special about those handful of pitchers that made them extraordinary. When trying to find extraordinary performance, you should never look at the average performance. You need to look at the outliers, and then consider what made them outliers.