For any Christians reading this who are not close friends, what denomination do you worship under? Are there specific tenets that have called you in that direction?
For the record, I am a member of the Presbyterian Church in America, or PCA.
Live or have friends near Pasadena, CA? My awesome pastor is taking an opportunity there, beginning around May. You won’t regret looking him up.
How many weeks of her life did Oprah set aside to take all the cover shots for “O” magazine?
In medieval movies involving war (a redundancy, I suppose), aren’t the use of bows-and-arrows a tad overrated? I mean, wouldn’t it take like 7-8 arrows to kill a guy unless you hit him in the heart? I’ll take a sword or ball-and-chain, thank you.
How is that we live in a society where the talented Heath Ledger’s death lasts 48 hours in the media cycle and the talentless Britney’s mental health issues get daily coverage?
Bob Knight has been uncommonly committed to aiding his former players in their post-basketball lives, but that positive doesn’t outweigh his inexcusable, outrageous behavior or demeaning treatment of media members over the course of his career.
The Giants beat the Patriots, as I predicted. My projected score was way off, but the margin of victory was exactly right. Give me some sugar.
It is time for Tallahassee, nay, the world to discover Michigan lefts and implement them swiftly and forcefully. Nobody should have to sit at a stop light for more than a minute for any reason, ever. I have never witnessed the inefficiency that is a Tallahassee traffic lights.
If Eli gets sacked on the third and long miracle to Tyree, are we still talking about how amazing the Giants pass rush was? How amazing Eli was? The post-game spin on big games by the media is a tad much, no? The Pats had three sacks of their own and Wes Welker went for 11/100+.
Does anyone really think the ‘72 Dolphins were better than the ‘07 Pats? Seriously. Does anyone find it pathetic that Mercury Morris’ 2008 self-worth seems to be rooted in a role he played on a football team that existed 35 years ago? That he so thoroughly enjoys an undefeated team being defeated? Was it better that the Pats lost so that we don’t have to suffer through a generation of Pats fans talking about their ‘07 team?
Despite all of the haranguing about the order of the state primaries (which I mostly agree with), how much more of a problem is it that presidential candidates who get 5-10% of the vote or more can drop out at any particular point? How much different would this year’s primaries be if Edwards, Thompson, Huckabee, or Paul dropped out at a different point? These blocks of voters could completely turn how the race unfolds. Don’t ask me for a solution, but this seems to me an underrepresented issue.
If you still weren’t sure, Bill Belichick thinks he is above reproach.
–Go ahead Mary Kate, give me one tooth, I dare you.
–How is it when you are running and there is an oncoming impediment (branch, hole, etc.), you know roughly eight steps ahead of time whether you will step on said impediment if you maintain gait/pace?
–The most embarrassing and indefensible ten seconds of the Mitt Romney campaign?
Next, please.
–Dear ESPN.com pseudo-comedic headline writer - you’re working too hard.
–The best individual, multi-faceted, intellectual blog today? Keith Law’s The Dish.
–My current reads: Catch-22, It’s Not About the Truth, and The Power of Story.
–Giants 41, Patriots 38
For those of you unfamiliar with the Baseball Hall of Fame, players become eligible for induction five years after retirement and must receive at least 5% of the BBWAA vote to remain subsequently eligible. If one fails to receive 75% of the vote by their 15th year on the ballot, he is removed permanently.
Every year there are players who are controversially elected or not elected because they approach the BBWAA-imposed deadline to be elected. So what happens? Well, as the years pass, certain players who have been retired for 5, 10, 15, or even 20 years with the same set of statistics continue to garner a higher percentage of the vote.
Let’s take a look at two of the most recent controversies: Goose Gossage and Jim Rice.
% of vote received during each year of eligibility, Gossage:
1 - 33.3
2 - 44.3
3 - 43.0
4 - 42.1
5 - 40.7
6 - 55.2
7 - 64.6
8 - 71.2
9 - 85.8 (elected)
% of vote received during each year of eligibility, Rice:
1 - 29.4
2 - 51.2
3 - 57.9
4 - 55.1
5 - 55.2
6 - 54.5
7 - 59.4
8 - 64.8
9 - 63.5
10 - 71.2
11 - will likely be elected in 2009
In sum, from their first year of eligibility to 2008, these men picked up 42 - 52% votes of the entire BBWAA.
The likely causes of this volatility would probably be explained by the BBWAA as some mix of the following arguments:
1) There are different voters from one year to the next, certainly between the initial year and the ninth year.
Certainly, I’ll give you 5-15% room for error based on that fact alone. No doubt every BBWAA member takes their responsibility seriously and performs due diligence every year before voting. What else?
2) It is difficult to judge a player’s accomplishments in an historical context after their retirement. More time allows for greater understanding of the player’s impact on the game.
Not buying. They’re not even eligible for voting until five years after retirement. A voter has had sufficient time to judge the merits of the player’s achievements. No one has proclaimed a voter must wait a certain length of time to see how a player will be viewed against players of future eras. Judge him based on what he did and the era he played, that’s all you really have to judge him on.
3) More useful statistics are becoming available that allow the BBWAA to compare eligible players against other eras. Therefore, some will get more votes over time.
Touche. There are more sophisticated statistics.
Are you sure that your writers are intelligent or diligent enough to use them? I give you the following writing samples: Mike Celizic, Murray Chass, Joe Cowley, Bill Conlin, Jerry Green, Richard Justice, Woody Paige, Bill Plaschke, Dan Shaughnessy, and Dave Van Dyck. And this is only a handful that Fire Joe Morgan has gleefully sliced and diced. Let’s just say I don’t have a lot of faith in the BBWAA. Please also read these posts as to why certain writers voted the way they did in 2008.
Also, if the premise of the availability of more useful statistics is viable, some players voting percentage should systematically drop. Maybe this is happening, but I’m too lazy to do that much additional work.
Here are my reasons for this ridiculous voting attrition:
1) The BBWAA is an egocentric, gatekeeping mess of an organization.
The sports writing media has been given too much power and has too little accountability (a topic for another day). There is a huge percentage of BBWAA members who have written it is a privilege to be voted into the HOF on the first eligible vote. Why is being elected to the Hall of Fame you deserve to be in more of a privilege in one year or another; in the first year of the fifteenth? Sure, there are only a select few who have been elected on the first ballot, but that fact does not give any writer the subjective authority to say “this guy isn’t first ballot-worthy because I say so.” He either deserves election in the first year or not at all, with few exceptions.
2 ) Players can actually gain momentum in the voting over the years.
This should not be happening. It does happen. As mentioned above, BBWAA adhering to the principles of Hall-worthiness who perform their due diligence should rarely, if ever, change their vote from year to year. The BBWAA website says the following regarding voting:
“Voting shall be based upon the player’s record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character, and contributions to the team(s) on which the player played.”
Granted, the wording is uncommonly vague. There are no markers or milestones that grant eligibility. Throw in four intangibles and you’ve got yourself a mess. Regardless, if the voting is taken seriously by the writers there should not be this much attrition, certainly not 40-50+% of the electorate. Each writer should have an idea of what this criterion means personally, vote in that fashion and stick to it, again, with few exceptions. Decide what does or does not display “integrity, sportsmanship, character, contribution” and vote your conscience. Be a big boy or girl. Otherwise, set up statistical markers for election based upon field performance (which should be the 99% focus, IMO) and take the subjectivity out of the process.
To boot, there is certainly a sympathy vote factor that occurs when a player begins approaching his (gulp) 15th year of eligibility. Sympathy votes? Seriously? This is the Hall of Fame.
In sum, a player can literally receive 35% of the vote in his initial eligibility, get another 30% in attrition, and then an added 10% sympathy attrition and be elected to the Hall of Fame.
3) The ambiguity of the criterion encourages attrition.
People think about things differently over time. The heroes of our youth do not seem as great when we mature and are able to objectively compare them to other people of their era or any other. Integrity and Character are judged on a continuum subject to the one putting it in place. It is also subject to the time the scale is put in place. So if it is a writer’s duty to judge morality, that judgment is certainly going to ebb and/or flow over time. This is not a sophisticated way of determining Hall-worthiness.
Election to our Baseball Hall of Fame is a tremendously flawed and subjective process. There are people who belong there and there are people who do not. Because the voting process has little credibility the institution itself is compromised. It is a shame and not worthy of obsessive amounts of discussion. That is why you will never see me write about it again in this space.
No, I have not read this book yet, nor do I currently plan to. However, I think Goldberg makes some interesting points in this interview and I would encourage you to check it out.
My personal feeling is that if we weren’t sinners and we didn’t have to worry about the state abusing power or simply taking more than it needs, maybe we could get to the utopia we all desire. This is not, however, the world we live in.
Definition here.
This election cycle’s populist presidential candidates are Mike Huckabee, John Edwards, and potentially Michael Bloomberg.
As Huckabee remains viable, I’m concerned about his pull with the evangelical voting block. I admit I really like him as a person, self-deprecating and funny, but his record doesn’t go with his conservative message. Make up your own mind, of course.
I currently support Fred Thompson, although he could probably use a Pulp Fiction-style shot of adrenaline.
…stop sharing your sports opinions at any time.
We’re all pompous-assed out.
(Way to go, ESPN.)
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