Athletics Nation

JRBH hasn't been through yet

It's Going All the Way

If Billy Beane was going to trade one of them, he might as well trade at least two of them.

They key is trying to maximize the talent that is on the field at the same time. If Billy was trading away Hudson -- which he pretty much had to do if he didn't think the A's would win the West in 2005 -- then he might as well trade away another commodity that would only help in the short term.

After trading Hudson, it's clear the A's next window of opportunity is coming soon but wasn't here right now. Billy increased the talent that will be on the field when the A's can seriously contend for a pennant in 2007 and beyond.

So they were gone last August?

That's a big surprise.

Ol' Billy......quite the chessmaster.

Mission1929 - March 2, 2005 reply

support

I certainly support the moves of the off season, and now is a good time to say thank you to all of the great voices on AN who have really gotten me excited for 2005. I was prepared for the Hudson trade, but when the Mulder deal took me completely by surprise, I was ready to head for the emotional ledge. However...after logging on to AN the next morning, it took all of 15 short minutes to be reassured and reenergized. I'll be the first to say that I don't know a whole lot about prospects and stats (though I'm improving!) and all of the info I found here was extremely helpful. During the off season whenever I meet any of my "non-AN" A's fans who are furious with the moves, I try to get them to hit AN for some positive perspective to balance their (understandably) raw emotions.

batgirl - March 2, 2005 reply

I pointed my brother

(who sometimes I think is secretly jrbh) to the Billy Beane interviews here, and it helped him considerably. He said

"Intersting that the gist also was that we are as much BB fans as we are A's fans. I hadn't considered that aspect, but I suppose I should. I put more weight on watching the team play than in the work that went into assembling the team. I suppose to be an A's fan means your a fan of the whole system!"

...then I poured him some kool aid...

ArakSOT - March 2, 2005 reply

your brother is

very insightful.

bigelephant - March 2, 2005 reply

You should also thank people like

JRBH and Eck - having more pessimistic walls to bounce stats and theories of off forces the SABRmetrically inclined among us to articulate that point of view better and keep the discussion more tied to reality than sometimes can happen without guys like them.

absolutely correct

ArakSOT - March 2, 2005 reply

You're Welcome

And thanks for the shout out!

I'm actually a very optimistic guy and I almost always believe the A's are going to pull out that day's game. I just think that in this forum we often blur the line between what we'd like to happen with that is more likely to happen. We take a lot of best-care scenarios to be visions of the future.

I think Eric Chavez put it perfectly:
"We could be really good, or we could be really bad. It all depends on how the young pitchers do. If some things work out the way we're hoping they will, we have a chance to have another great season. If they don't work out, it could get ugly. But even if it gets ugly, it'll be a lot better next year when those guys have a full year of experience. It's almost the same thing we had when the Big Three were just coming up, so who knows? Maybe these guys will be just as good."

I agree 100 percent.

And, believe it or not, I love stats. I just think they're a much better indicator of the past than they are of the future. Remember, the "Moneyball" approach uses stats to find the undervalued categories -- not simply to project future performance.

There are too many variables in baseball for statistics to accurately predict the future. If there weren't, the worst team wouldn't beat the best team 30 percent of the time and Vegas would lose a ton of money on baseball bets.

Plus, too many "stats" include arbitrary numbers that are just arbitrary judgements, stuff like "projected putouts" or "anticipated assists" or "Value Over a Replacement Player." If part of the formula is subjective, the result isn't objective.

Don't get me wrong, I'd rather have the GM evaluating talent based on quantitative analysis of past performance than some scout's hunch, but there is something to be said for potential and just plain luck.

And, of course, I like good debates.

What's subjective about VORP?

There are just so many things in that statement that I feel I should correct, but it's lunch time and I'm off to the gym (yes, I take a late lunch) so I'll just get into VORP.

Sure the creation of a AAAA "Replacement Player" is a tad arbitrary. In the end, however, it is entirely irrlevent, since all players (by position) start from the exact same baseline. You could create a statistic call VBBP (Value Below Bondsian Player). Everybody would be a negative, but if you graphed them, the graph would be exactly identical to the VORP graph, except with different Y values. There is nothing subjective about it, they just needed to create an arbitrary baseline to make the statistic easily understood and communicable.

"VALUE"

"Value" is subjective.

Good point on the starting point being irrelevant.

There are so many ways to determine a player's value -- defense, situational hitting, speed, etc. -- that just can't be effectively measured with statistics.

Plus, diffent guys are valuable for different reasons, power vs. OBP, for instance. A .420 on-base percentage is awesome, but a .420 Slugging percantage is good, but not nearly as valauble.

But most importantly, there is so much LUCK involved in statistics. A check-swing dribbler can result in a hit just as easily as a smoked line-drive can be caught by an outfielder in the gap. It's a cop out to say that luck always evens out -- it doesn't.

And look at win totals. There are too many factors involved in a baseball game to reduce it to stats. You can win or lose in so many different ways. You win some 10-2, you lose some 4-3. Last year the Angels had a run differential 51 runs better than the A's and their record was only ONE game better. The Rangers run differential was 15 runs better than the A's -- and they finished 2 games behind us.

Do you win your fantasy league every year? Of course not. There's too much luck involved. No formula or combination of statistics can accurately predict the future.

I used to love MicroLeague Baseball. You ever play it? It was a graphically simple computer simulation game where you managed you favorite team and the computer played it all out using statistics. It was great and the stats at the end of the 162-game season were always pretty close to the actual stats. But the stats created the outcome of the game. In real baseball, the players create the stats -- one isolated incident at a time.

Do you win your fantasy league every year?

Well, yeah, pretty much ... but that doesn't change your point. When I haven't won it usually isn't because I didn't want the right players, it was because I had the wrong draft strategy - I tried to wait to long to draft people to get the best bargains and the guys I wanted were gone. That's one of the challenges facing more basic statistics, especially when comparing players, knowing that players earned their various basic counting stastics in different contexts and different manners. But these differences can be measured - and they are. That's what advanced defensive statistics are all about. They take into account where and how hard the balls that a player fields or fails to field were hit.

They could do the same thing for hitters except, the truth is, it pretty much evens out. While certainly there will be a huge difference in the proportion of Ichiro's hits that are weak dribblers to the proportion of Frank Thomas'. That's a given. But take two guys of comerable base running abilities and an extreme difference from their "true talent level" (the result if magically they played the season 1,000 times) would be two or three hits over the course of a season. It would be very minimal and isn't really worth the effort. (Though I'd bet some teams are taking that effort, they just don't publish it)

Which brings up another point. The usefulness of the "advanced statistics" that some of us in AN quote pales tremendously to the usefulness of the stats the teams use. Most of the best statistical minds with a baseball inclination work for the teams (and most of the rest will soon enough) and the teams don't publish their statistics.

The final point is that, yes, statistics are not perfect. There is always a margin of error. You could have a sample size of ten million, and there would still be a margin of error. (It's roughly .03%) Statistics are aproximations. If, for instance, one player had a VORP of 39.8 and another player had a VORP of 37.6, you should know that this is within the margin of error and assume that this statistic is telling you that they had comperable seasons. They aren't perfect, nothing is, but they're about as accurate and objective as anything in the world - barring user error. (which is a serious issue. Using the rights statistics in the right manner can be complicated and is something to watch out for. [a quick aside, range factor is NEVER the right statistic])

One last thing:

Plus, diffent guys are valuable for different reasons, power vs. OBP, for instance. A .420 on-base percentage is awesome, but a .420 Slugging percantage is good, but not nearly as valauble.

Absolutely correct, and this can be shown statistically. It can (and is in more sophisticated stats then OPS) be corrected as well. A .420 OBP is roughly comperable to a .585 SLG.

Good Points, But ...

When you account for the different context of the counting statistics you end up with sample sizes that are too small.

There is no exact way to measure how hard a baseball is hit -- let alone how hard it is to field based on the spin, playing surface and types of bounces. For part of the formula to be a scorer judging how hard a ball is hit is just adding a human judgement to the mix and saying that if you add some other numbers that it is no longer subjective. As a former college infielder, let me tell you the view from the dirt is a lot different than it is from the scorer's box.

It's just folly to say some guys don't get lucky on more check-swing singles than others. Players have different strength levels, get fooled by pitches at different rates and, as you mention, run to first at different speeds. Some hitters have to deal with different defensive shifts than others and some are just plain unlucky for a season.

For example, look at Jason Phillips' from last year and 2003. (He was on my fantasy team last year.) In a comparable number of at bats, his average dropped 80 points, his OBP dropped 75 points and his SLG dropped 116 points -- yet his walks and strikeouts were fairly consistent. Thus, he's putting about the same number of balls in play and the number falling in for hits dropped off by about one third. Luck, or no?

Also take a look at Barry Zito's drop from 2003 to last year. (He was on my fantasy team, too.)You'd think he helped himself by increasing his strikeouts and decreasing his walks, right? No. He gave up 30 more hits in 18 fewer innings. He threw fewer at-em balls and gave up more seeing-eye singles.

I agree that advanced statistics can be interesting and I have no doubt that the A's, Jays and Red Sox know stuff about their players that are way above my head. But that just says what the players have done, not what they are going to do.

My point has never been that statistics are useless in evaluating players. (Aside from defensive stats. I still don't believe in advanced defensive stats.)

As I've said before, I'm psyched Billy and David use numbers instead of the hunch of some scout. But a lot of that is done to figure out what categories are undervalued. They can't predict future performance.

And that is my issue with so many of the blinders-wearing optimists at AN: we just don't know what the A's will be like this year. As Chavvy said, this season could be "great" or it could be "ugly."

That's why baseball (or sports ... or life) is beautiful. Because you just don't know how things are going to turn out until they do.

Good points as well, ... [it's coming] but ...

When you account for the different context of the counting statistics you end up with sample sizes that are too small.

Not usually, but sometimes, sure.

And you're right, a scorer's judgements are somewhat subjective. He's human ... he's joined in that "human" category by every alternative to statistical measurement, by the way. Stats aren't perfect, I'll grant ya that, but that doesn't mean they aren't the best we've got. You've got to pick something, otherwise you're walking (or talking) blind.

Players have different strength levels, get fooled by pitches at different rates and, as you mention, run to first at different speeds. Some hitters have to deal with different defensive shifts than others

Very true - but then these all are actual parts of the player, not random fluctuations. If you are prone to hit more weak grounders, you WILL have more weak grounders turn into singles. That's not luck, it's probability (a type of statistic, btw).

Phelps' k/bb rate actually increased significantly last year (from under 3:1 to over 4:1) but that is beside the point. Baseball players are humans, they aren't just equations on a computer monitor. Statistics assume that the human element remains largely the same (or some assume that it changes based on a predictable pattern). Which, again, is imperfect, but it's the best it can do on its own. No one is advocating not taking other factors into account besides the numbers. I, personally, just advocate using the numbers as a starting point.

Stats cannot predict the future - NOTHING CAN. Stats can only tell us what players who, statistically, were similar to the player in question did in their future. They aren't perfect, but they're pretty accurate. A hell of a lot more accurate than an unshaven scout spitting chewing tobacco and saying, he's got a good jaw.

We agree on the basic premise that stats aren't perfect and shouldn't end the discussion right then and there.

I just say that they should start the discussion as they can predict the most likely scenerios after which you can interject other factors (whatever was wrong with Phelps, slutty actresses distracting pitchers, etc) and adjust those scenerios accordingly.

Devo, My Friend,

I think we actually agree a lot more than we're willing to let on.

I've got to get out to the Bay Area this summer to see my wife's sister -- and you know I'll be spending a few days/nights at the (whatever it's called now) Colliseum.

I'd love to buy you a beverage.

I'm sure we do

and it'd be great to have a beer with you.

shoot me an e-mail (dlavelle at alum dot pomona dot edu) when you're going to be in town.

Hey!

Did you graduate from Cal Poly Pomona?

That's my alma mater.

Next town over

Pomona College in Claremont

Ah...thought I'd met a fellow Bronco

Tyler Bleszinski - March 3, 2005 reply

Nope, a Sagehen

yes, our mascot is an extinct desert chicken, whose only means of self defense was to play dead. Talk about striking fear into the hearts of opposing teams.

What you watch

I think when you are a kid, you watch and want to be the players. As you grow older, wiser, or at the very least reilize that you have no chance of becomming a player, you start looking and paying more attention to the Front Office and the GM rather then the players. At that point your dream becomes more to be a GM of a team then a player.

Zonis - March 2, 2005 reply

Does this have to be a yes or no question?

Jennifer - March 2, 2005 reply

I agree

My preferred answer is, "Wait And See" or "Only Time Will Tell".

MJB - March 3, 2005 reply

When I looked at it

I thought we got the best deal from the Mulder deal, but I hated it the most.

Its a thing that you have to sit on a week to appriciate and look at w/o the "what the fuck" still having control over you, to quote Byrnes and Chavez.

I think we could have gotten a littl better for Hudson, in that I think we could have gotten someone other then Juan Cruz in his Arby year (3 years) and instead gotten someone with 6 years left. But thats just the little things.

I think the only beef we (espn msg board guys) seem to have with the Mulder trade is that we didnt get the rights to Tyler Johnson in the trade.

Come to think of it, Blez, is it possible you can ask Beane why he didnt grab the rights? Would it really have made or brake the trade?

Zonis - March 2, 2005 reply

The first "no" vote!

I beat jrbh to it. No use sticking around and arguing about it, I suppose; I figured I'd be outnumbered, but 50-to-1?! Wow. That is some mighty fine Kool-Aid.

rubin sierra - March 2, 2005 reply

Another no

So it should be at least 3

RichardP - March 2, 2005 reply

Should we concede now ...

... or wait until the results from Florida are in?

rubin sierra - March 2, 2005 reply

Might as well concede

We can always sue for a recount later. And don't forget the absent kid!

RichardP - March 2, 2005 reply

If recent trends continue

and you naysayers get through the long lines in urban neighborhoods and at the polling places near universities, you might just make a lier out of Blez by pushing it below 90.

Here's an idea

Lets get everyone to vote no, then class action suit Sports Illustrated, get some tricky lawyer to win us like 800 million dollars, then buy the A's and build a new stadium.

RichardP - March 2, 2005 reply

lol

ohad - March 2, 2005 reply

That's why I voted "NO"

Great minds think alike... :)

OaktownTribesman - March 2, 2005 reply

yes, sort of

As Jennifer suggests above, it's more complicated than a simple yes/no.

Like everyone else, I was really shocked by the Mulder trade. In retrospect, I really like it. Haren sounds like he can already be a league-average or better pitcher, and given the questions about Mulder's durability, it wouldn't surprise me at all if Haren is just as good this year. Barton is still very young, but he is considered one of the top hitting prospects in the game by pretty much everyone - scouts and statheads alike. Calero should be a useful bullpen arm. If Barton becomes the hitter people think he will be, this will be a huge win for the A's on talent alone (not even taking payroll into account). Even if he doesn't it should be close to even. So put me down for a resounding yes to this one.

The Hudson trade, I still have mixed feelings about. I understand the A's payroll constraints, the need to stay competitive for the future, questions about Hudson's health and whether it is wise to commit another $50 million to him, etc. Taking all of this into account, if I were in Beane's shoes, I would probably have done the same thing. So in this sense, I support the Hudson trade too. In contrast with the Mulder trade, though, this one is almost guaranteed to make us a weaker team in 2005 than we would be if we had kept Hudson, and that's hard to get excited about. The fan in me would like to see the A's field the best team they can right now, and worry about the future next year. On a more personal level, Hudson had also pitched a couple of the best games I ever saw in person: a brilliant, dominating 3-hitter against Pedro and the Red Sox in 2003, and an 86-pitch complete game against Seattle early last season. I had come to expect those kind of performances when I went to see him pitch, and I'll really miss that.

(Technical query for Blez: the polls don't work for me when I use Firefox as my browser, on either Windows or Mac, and I think it's a server-side issue. Is this a known problem?)

andeux - March 2, 2005 reply

I use Firefox on a Mac

and I've never had a problem with the polls

OaklandSi - March 2, 2005 reply

options

Hm, just checked my site prefs, and there is an option to display polls or not, and it was unchecked. Silly me.

andeux - March 2, 2005 reply

It shouldn't be a problem...

that I know of. I'll look into it.

firefox on windows

I use it too and haven't experienced any problems. Also, there's no spyware to worry about.

sf drift king - March 2, 2005 reply

i'm surprised

by the overwhelming support for Billy, but I guess not that surprised. After all, these trades give us hope.

I wrote one of the first (if not the first) diaries to support the trades. Having said that, just because I support the trades doesn't mean that I'm sure the A's will do better this year. I really think they could be from first to last in the division, and probably will take some time to jell.

So people, don't get suicidal if the A's stink in the first half of the season (or even this year). If they still suck next year, then we have a problem.

Apricot - March 2, 2005 reply

Definitely not first to last

Considering that the A's got second last season, second to last is a distinct possibility.

I never get suicidal during the first half of the season. The A's are great at picking it up in the second half and can come back from anything. Although if they stink up the whole season, then all bets are off.

RichardP - March 2, 2005 reply

If they've stunk up the whole season

aren't all bets over and the winners paid? Or do bets on the A's only count if the A's do well?

Suicidal

All bets are off on be going suicidal.

As for baseball bets, well ever since the worst choke in history by the Yankees, I think I've given up baseball betting.

RichardP - March 2, 2005 reply

bah

should say me

RichardP - March 2, 2005 reply

I voted "no" too,

and I wish I had a kool-aid distributorship.

I'm continually stunned -- hey, maybe being continually stunned accounts for some of my opinions ;) -- at the Soviet-style pro-BB unanimity on this site. That's not to say I think Beane is bad or anything (or that good, either), but I'd just think there would be a little more dissent.

jrbh - March 2, 2005 reply

Moneyball fallout

when you have a nation best seller telling you that the GM of your team is a genius it gets hard to maintain a dissenting opinion. Plus I think for a lot of people it becomes a source of pride and makes it even less likely for them to question the system.

In retrospect I love the Mulder trade but think we should have kept and resigned Huddy while avoiding the Kendall trade. But I think there are factors I'm unaware of that made that scenario unlikely.

Tim J - March 2, 2005 reply

Kendall

I think we did very good on the Kendall trade. I mean, we got rid of two guys whom we hated and got a guy with a .400 OPS who plays tons of games at a position which we had no one to fill it besides a rookie who will be ready at best in 2006. If not, we'd might have just had Melhuse starting with Rose as backup.

Zonis - March 2, 2005 reply

Kendall vs. Hudson

Right, we gotta get over the "Kendall or Hudson" thing. Yes, their salaries are going to be in the same ballpark in 2006 and 2007. There the similarity ends.

Like Zonis says, getting rid of Rhodes and Redman and their salaries was a key part of the deal. It's not like we just had $33M lying around to spend however we wanted and chose to spend it on Kendall instead of Hudson.

Besides that, Hudson was not going to sign unless he was convinced the team was going to be competitive. If you imagine swapping Kendall for Hudson the team you end up with isn't so great that Hudson would necessarily be happy with it.

Anyway from the timeline it's clear that the decision to go for Kendall happened after the A's knew they were losing Hudson and Mulder, even though the Kendall trade happened to take place first.

matthias - March 2, 2005 reply

Rhodes and Redman

could have been moved in other ways.
Rhodes was moved for Lawton.
Given the market for starting pitchers Redman could have been dumped for prospects.

So no, I don't think you can say that Kendall's salary isn't a factor in looking at which of those two players (Hudson/Kendall) we could have on our team right now. I think is was Faust who wrote up an excellent diary just after the trade looking at what the "real" cost of Kendall was (after taking guesses at other ways we could have gotten rid of those 2 players) and it ended up putting him at about 8MM per season. But the hot stove season has shown those numbers to be a little generous- Kendall really is going to cost us about 10M per season over this deal.

I think the real story is that Hudson simply wasn't willing to give the A's the deal he brokered with the Braves. So it's just on the surface that I don't like the sequence of moves, but there's plenty of info that I'm not privy to that probably make them the best we were going to get.

Tim J - March 3, 2005 reply

"Soviet-style pro-BB unanimity"

Sorry, can't help it.

I wouldn't call it Soviet Style. If it was soviet style, anybody who made a disparaging remark about BB would be banned (their IP addresses too).

secret ASian man - March 2, 2005 reply

Has anyone

ever tried to send that to BB? He'd probably get a kick out of it.

love the poster/spring training

hey, is anyone coming to Phoenix for spring training? I'll be there on Friday, in section 3, row 5. Stop by for a refreshing cup of Billy Beane Kool-Aid (cleverly disguised as Samuel Adams....always a good decision!)

bakedzito - March 2, 2005 reply

We'll try to look for you

Friday and Sunday...
Can't wait to be at a ballgame..

LongTimeFan - March 3, 2005 reply

95 wins per season...

for the last five seasons will win you that kind of support. And frankly, even though the team has had a string of disappointing playoff performances, Beane has earned it with the team's regular season performances.

yep...

...and I don't really like being described as a koolaid drinking cult member. I've considered the trades time and time again, and that's why I'm put my yes vote in. I think that Beane definitely has earned the support, but considering the players he traded...I did have to think these through.

I mean the Kool Aid thing

tongue-in-cheek. And I think most other people do too. Maybe I'm wrong on that one.

Now, if the A's are horrible for the next three seasons, then maybe we need to reassess things. That doesn't mean that if the team bottoms out in 2005 we all jump off a cliff either. This team is going to need a lot of unknown variables to go right in order to truly compete for the AL West crown in 05. I think most everyone here realizes that.

I disagree

Not about the Kool-Aid thing. I've drank the SABRmetric Kool-Aid and (perhaps not suprisingly) it tends to very strongly support everything that BB does.

I very strongly believe that the A's and Angels are very comperable. Both's median level performance would be low 90s wins, in my opinion and from the stats I have studied. Therefore, we only need to have more things break our way than break the Angels way and we'll take the Division.

I guess I just meant

variables like Meyer, Haren and Blanton performing as expected and the offense not completely struggling because several guys had career seasons last year. Plus, you always have the injury thing to worry about. God forbid Chavez, Zito or Harden go down.

No, you're absolutely right about the variables

there are plenty of them, both for us and for Anaheim.

Los Angeles Blez of Anaheim would be saying, "God forbid Vlad, Finley, or K-Rod go down."

What about McPherson?

Aren't the Angels counting on him, too? He's supposed to be a monster this season.

GreenNGoldGirl - March 2, 2005 reply

Yeah, in the same way we're counting on Swish

but that wouldn't have paralleled what he wrote, so I left it out.

wait a minute...

you mean the rest of you haven't actually been driking kool aid this whole time??

xbhaskarx - March 2, 2005 reply

My tongue is bright red

from all the Kool Aid.
And there are spiders all over the walls.
And my plant is talking to me.

Kool-Aid

Is that what those unmarked packets of green and yellow powder that I mysteriously received with my AN t-shirt order were? :)

OaktownTribesman - March 2, 2005 reply

I wasn't referring to you about the kool-aid

I agreed with what you had to say about supporting Billy. Sometimes, even most of the time, the kool-aid thing can be very funny. But I would hope that people who want to have a insightful discussion wouldn't use that as part of their argument..."you're a crazy kool-aid drinker so I must be right and you must be wrong"...

And as devo wrote, many of us take a daily swim in sabermetric kool-aid. And that's something we use to assess these trades. Track record also helps, which was your point.

I know, I was trying to clarify it

for those who hadn't be familiar with the joke.

VORP and Pecota seem to indicate that the A's will be surprisingly competitive this season.

Perhaps I should add a Ray Ratto win meter somewhere. Didn't he say that the A's would be lucky to win 60 games this year on ESPNEWS? Maybe call it the countdown to Ratto's 60.

Great idea.

It would be so much fun to celebrate that 60th win on AN. I wonder if Ratto realizes how crazy he was with that statement. Didn't he say that just minutes after the Mulder trade went down?

Yeah...and it was something that

really got BB upset. He unloaded on that.

Ratto Rants, or Rantto Rats

He also ranted about how Beane basically gave A's fans everywhere the finger by doing these trades, and he summarily discarded any sort of rational economic reasons that Beane had for doing them. There was about as much meaningful analysis of the trades as you'll find on a bumper sticker.

not enough sugar in Ratto's kool-aid?

Apparently not

'cause he ain't sipping it.

That'd be awesome

good idea

does anyone know what the exact ratto quote was?

xbhaskarx - March 2, 2005 reply

JRBH - You might be surprised to learn

that in wearing one of my other hats (I have many interests and do manage to fit them in around my time here on AN), my Red White and Blue colored Political cap (no, I don't actually have a rwb hat ... okay, but I should fess up, I do have the tie ... seriously) but, while I may consistently extol BB's virtues and support virtually everything he does, in that Red White and Blue hat of mine, I'm an absolute reformist and frequently criticize my party's leadership.

I've thought about it, I have, and I really believe that the evidence shows that BB is doing a great job.

Billy is a Vulcan/Yoda

The fact that he was already thinking of a trade with Hudson last September was news to me. But when you look at the win total of the A's over the last five years you can see a peak and then a decline. And I think you put that, with the fact that in four straight years in the postseason. "The big three" were healthy once in 2001 I believe. You, could look at that and say yeah we made it to the post season because of all the innings the "big three" pitched during the regular season. I think the move to get younger in the staff and get a much better bullpen was brilliant. Sure, I was in shock when in a three day span two were gone. But after the shock, you get over it and look at what we got. You, can't tell me anyone out there in AN doesn't feel better going into this season with the bullpen we have right now than the last few years. We may need a better bullpen with our young rotation though. But we have options there for long relief that we didn't have before. If innings are spread out more and we do make the post season maybe we can get out of the first round. The Vision is clear with Billy. He had to remove himself from his emotional attachments to these players and in doing so moved them to competive teams in the NL. You almost need to be a Vulcan (Star Trek) remove the emotion to see his logic. It's there now like it's always been. Both players to whom he has a fondness for were traded to competive teams with legitimate shots for winning the NL pennant in 2005. A player being traded can't ask for anything more then to be with a team with a chance. In doing so he improved the A's bullpen for 2005 for sure and along the way we have two staters that will be developing along the way. The future is bright for the A's because we have a GM that is a Vulcan/yoda.

Mike Heath - March 2, 2005 reply

It's certainly not yes or no

I don't like the trades, the Huddy deal in particular, because Tim Hudson has been one of the best pitchers in baseball and Mulder has been outstanding (until his late-season collapse).

But Beane is operating within a budget. It's not a budget I like, but there it is. That makes these deals comprehensible. There's also the matter of whether or not either player could be retained under any circumstances. Blez hints that he couldn't be. We'll see. And I was always skeptical that we could hold onto Mulder.

I'm with andeux. I was depressed about the Hudson deal. I was struck by audacity of the Mulder trade, and by the talent we seem to have gotten in return.

I certainly understand what Beane is trying to do, and I sure want it to work. I just don't count myself among the Kool-aid drinkers. I want to see how these guys perform.

bear88 - March 2, 2005 reply

Soviet style unanimity?

that's not what I've been reading on AN these last few months. what I have been reading is a lot of argument, conjecture, and just plain trying to understand the A's offseason moves.

I like the Mulder trade better than te Hudson trade, mainly because of what the A's got in return and some worrying signs from Mulder. I understand why BB felt he had to trade Huddy, thought I can't claim to like it. But on balance I think BB's explanation is extremely reasonable, so I do support his moves.

...and if I didn't I would have no qualms in saying so.

OaklandSi - March 2, 2005 reply

i gotta believe in something!!!!

i voted yes because:

i believe in the a's ownership. i've stated in the past that without schott and co., baseball in oakland might have been moved, contracted or dead. baseball is a polluted game full of many problems and inadequacies. the manner in which the a's conduct their business keeps me interested. i (we) can only hope wolff and co. will do the same in the future with the a's.
i believe in BB. when everything is said and done i predict beane will be voted into the HOF in the builders category. through his willingness to think out the box he has given life to numerous baseball teams (toronto/LA, so far) and hope to their fans. i don't think i'm being overly dramatic here either. i've not always understood why beane did something but i've always trusted him...even when he has made mistakes (see rhodes).
i believe in AN. i'm not trying to blow smoke up anybodys ass here but i've learned more about baseball in general and the a's specifically in the past 4 1/2 months than i ever could have reading SI or from slusser in the chronicle. i may disagree with some posts and various ideas but i'm thankful that come april 4th in baltimore at 12:05 PM PT we're all cheering for the same team.

did beane make the right moves, hell ya.

bigelephant - March 2, 2005 reply

I'm not sure we

got enough for Hudson, but the Mulder trade I like a lot. The reality is that is life for an A's fan, we will continue to turn over the roster, and in some ways that is enjoyable.
Frankly I get tired of watching the same players year in and year out, there is a certain sameness to it, but as an A's fan it is fun watching new guys come up, hoping that they will become stars and of course they will go to the Yankees or Bosox as a free agent or we trade them for some new prospects.

china bob - March 2, 2005 reply

Haren

Haren will someday will be better than Hudson...without the injuries... He will blow everybody away this season... watch...

Andy907 - March 2, 2005 reply

The different levels of Kool-Aid intoxication

Not to promote racial stereotypes or anything, but first-time visitors to AN would probably come away surprised at the sizable African-American fan base present here with all these Kool-Aid references. Assuming that most of us (the Kool-Aid drinkers) here were black would be wrong but arguably justifiable; assuming that those whom have apparently drunk the Kool-Aid (say, all those who support the offseason moves pretty strongly) have exactly the same opinions or have formed their opinions in exactly the same way is not only wrong but not at all justifiable; all you have to do is look back at older diaries/threads if you need evidence of variations within the Kool-Aid camp. JRBH, for all your liberal ideology, you sure remind me of a certain oil-drilling Texan when it comes to frustratingly blatant unwillingness to concede even smallfactual errors, or, more frequently, an inability to recognize the conspicuous lack of facts presented by you as opposed to the plentiful amount of usually original facts presented by whichever member of the Kool-Aid drinking AN masses whom you happen to have incited. Your credibility suffers as a result.

sorry, you lost me

are you saying african-americans drink a lot of kool-aid?. i don't get that- but i'm laughing my ass off right now as i type....

bigelephant - March 2, 2005 reply

heh

might have to check with Fuzzy Zoeller on this one (or just one of my black friends), but a home cooked meal of fried chicken and collard greens is most often washed down with Kool-Aid from what I hear...sure beats the Polish food I've always had to endure

Please stop the racist stereotyping

right now. This place is better than that.

ehh, I respectfully disagree

First off, the intent of my original post was to, uh, criticize a certain presumably Caucasian AN regular. Delete it if you wish, but I would kind of like JRBH to see it. Then, there's a difference between "racial" and "racist." I think by virtue of a few phrases it's clear which category my comments fall into; if it isn't, well, let me point you to the former. The man I've always quoted in my signature was a black Chicago street musician whom will always be my single greatest human inspiration.

Recently I heard someone prominent proclaim that the US has finally made it far enough to be able to joke about racial relations. I apologize if I wrongly agreed.

Guess I should've said racial

stereotyping.

still don't get it

i give up, i can't figure it out... which means whether you're being racist, racial, neither, or whatever, at least write clearly so the rest of us know what you're talking about!

and what the hell does having a quote from a black Chicago street musician as your sig have to do with anything??

xbhaskarx - March 3, 2005 reply

I think the bottom line is

That while we do get to know each other quite a bit here, we still don't really know each other. Racially stereotyping jokes (especially when made in a context of mocking said stereotypes) can be appropriate in some crowds in some situations. That said, those crowds should be people who really know you and know what you're getting at and the audience should be limited to such people. I found Cut's joke pretty amusing. I saw that he was mocking the stereotypes in a manner similar to how I might if I were among close friends. That being said, an open forum, like this, no matter how close we might feel with some of the other members of this community is not an appropriate place to tell such jokes.

As far as JRBH's stalinist comment, I think he's understandably a bit frustrated that he's outnumbered 93% to 6% (and with over 400 responses that's a pretty scientific poll - though it does underrepresent members of the community who aren't able to visit as much as others) and, again, understandably (and probably partially accuratly) that there must be a certain amount of going with the crowd among some of us in the uber majority.

So lets stop with the personal comments, shake hands, make up. You're both good guys to chat with, I, personally, enjoy both of your company here. And lets all promise to raise a glass tonight both to each other and to the fact that in 2:30 hours Danny Haren will throw his first official pitch in the Green and Gold and we'll finally have some friggin baseball to talk about.

I thought the Kool-Aid reference

was to Jim Jones and the mass suicide in Guyana in 1978. But turns out it wasn't Kool-Aid but Flavor-Aid.

BillybUcko - March 3, 2005 reply

I'm so Out of It

that I thought it was a drug reference to Tom Wolfe's Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.

It's the Jonestown massacre after all

I looked it up.

BillybUcko - March 3, 2005 reply

Thanks

That "Word Spy" Website looks pretty cool.

drink the Kool-Aid v. To become a firm believer in something; to accept an argument or philosophy wholeheartedly or blindly.

That definition does seem to describe a few folks we know ...

Eck - March 4, 2005 reply

Kool Aid was also involved with Heaven's Gate

ArakSOT - March 4, 2005 reply

You're all up in my Kool-Aid...

Does anyone know why they use Kool-Aid? Does it mask the taste of poison or something?

Do sugar free beverages mask

the taste of poison as well as they mask the taste of liquor?

devo - March 4, 2005 reply

We need a volunteer...

I've got a pack of Tropical Punch Kool-Aid in my desk. I'll mix one glass with some bourbon, one with antifreeze, and leave one regular. We'll see if they can guess which glass is which. :) We'll have to work quickly though.

I'll volunteer to drink the bourbon

you can keep the kool-aid, though.

devo - March 4, 2005 reply

Say...

You have a packet in your desk? I thought you said you didn't drink kool aid. Unless that was the best you could get for 14¢.

ArakSOT - March 4, 2005 reply

You guys can have your Kool-Aid

BB or no BB, I'm drinking wine!

kaweahkaweah - March 4, 2005 reply

I have three packs in my desk.

Upon further review, I have Fruit Punch, Soarin' Strawberry Lemonade, and Ice Blue Raspberry Lemonade. I used to babysit three children so I've learn to love the stuff. I don't drink the proverbial "Kool-Aid." :)

OMG

The real stuff is much worse than the proverbial kind. As I recall, and its been a while, it was like choosing between red sugar water or purple sugar water. Icky.

ArakSOT - March 4, 2005 reply

There is an...

exact recipe you have to follow to make it taste pleasant. No, I can't share it. :)

I still want to know why they use Kool-Aid for the death cocktails. There has got to be a reason!

oh, and "Oh, and my quote in the story"

This has just become one eagerly anticipated Sports Illustrated

Could someone let me know...

...what's on the cover of the SI issue that we're talking about here? Sorry if I missed it somewhere else but I just want to make sure I grab the right one! :-)

Kelly - March 2, 2005 reply

"IBWT", I voted yes.

I wasn't for it at first, but changed my tune after finding out about the players we got in return, which is why I'm so excited about the 2005 season.

sf drift king - March 2, 2005 reply

I tried to read your piece, cutthemullett,

I really did. At first, I thought you were saying I was a racist, but after some thought, I can see that's not where you were going. Then I thought you were saying that I thought everybody here on AN thinks the same, but that would require me to mean "Soviet style" literally. (Comrade Josef Blez is getting way too intense here; I think I'll take a vacation in, uh, Mexico.)

I got the nasty personal stuff though. That part was pretty clear.

People here at AN argue back and forth all the time, mostly in a respectful way. I'm one of those people. I constantly site specifics in my arguments, respond to others who site specifics, and if I make a mistake, I try and fix it.

If there's anyone "W-like" in their posts here, I'm going to point the finger at you for a smirking little "us vs. them" personal attack on someone who disagrees with you.

Vis. "kool-aid": I couldn't agree with blez more. We all throw the term around pretty easily, and we all mean it as a humorous shorthand. No one, I'm sure, means it seriously in any way. The term comes from a horrifying tragedy, and any use of it in a serious sense in this context would be unbelievably creepy.

jrbh - March 3, 2005 reply

what doesn't make sense to me

you say you're "continually stunned ... at the Soviet-style pro-BB unanimity on this site."

why?
this is a site for oakland a's fans, shouldn't it be expected that people here are pro-beane?
i bet they're not nearly as pro-cashman.

are you stunned by the pro-chavez or pro-kotsay sentiments on this site?

this is a team that's played one meaningless game this millennium, a's fans better be 90%+ pro-beane.

xbhaskarx - March 3, 2005 reply

Blind Faith

I'm pretty sure what JBRH is referring to is the absolute blind faith in Billy on this site. "In Billy We Trust" is all over the place.

Most of the time it isn't critical evaluation of a particular Beane move, but a blind support that "Billy must know something we don't."

I am definitely pro-Billy Beane, but I'm not going to assume every move he makes is brilliance because he has been a great GM in the past. Just like I am pro-Chavez, but if he made a diving stop on a grounder and then chucked the ball into the stands, I wouldn't assume it was a good play and say "In Chavy We Trust" like the man is beyond all possibilities for failure.

RichardP - March 3, 2005 reply

I for one HOPE

BB knows something ... well, a lot of things ... that we don't.

I'm With RichardP

It's like saying "I love my country, but I don't believe everything the government does is right."

I love having such a creative and risk-taking GM running my favorite team, but I'm not going to just assume everything he does is brilliant.

That said, I also agree with Devo and hope Billy knows a lot more than we do.

okay...

..."I trust Billy, but I don't believe everything he does is right."

Is there any way we can fit that on the backs of our shirts?

I agree overall. That poll is asking about the trades this offseason. Ask everyone if they like the Lilly/Kielty trade. That should even the scale. :)

By the way, Eck, do you post at scout.com?

Nope.

I occasionally post at Kos' site and some other political sites, but not at Scout.com. It looks like a good site, but if I spend any more time on sports Websites I'm definitely going to get fired.

oh, okay...

...confused you with someone else then.

Ha!

I am an in the same boat. How did we goof off at work before the internet?

Let me explain what I mean

by the In Billy We Trust saying. To me it just says that even when he appears to have screw up, he usually has the ability to pull a rabbit out of his hat. It doesn't mean that Beane is infalliable.

I'm certainly not advocating blind faith or mindless following. I'm just saying that usually Beane has a very intelligent, well-developed plan. He's not one of the GMs that does things by a whim. And if we dig enough, we can often find it. Thankfully, he's shared his plan personally with us before.

But I think Beane wants us to try and figure out their thinking. He enjoys it, and it's part of why he believes that the A's fanbase is one of the most intelligent in baseball.

I guess that's how I view that saying and that mantra.

I mean who else could turn two clubhouse cancers (Redman and Rhodes) into an all star catcher?

The other thing is that to me, track record in the past earns someone the benefit of the doubt. So, often when we want to react emotionally to things, take a step back and rethink it. There's a chance that some real thought has gone into the moves.

Tyler Bleszinski - March 3, 2005 reply

I guess...

...the thing I disagree with(and could be very wrong about) is seeing this support of Billy as "blind faith." To say that would mean that we all jumped on the wagon within seconds of finding out about these trades. Maybe there are people here who did that, but there's been plenty of discussion by well-informed posters about the positives of dealing Hudson and Mulder. A number of us read Baseball Prospectus and visit baseballthinkfactory.com and get our information from sabermetrically inclined sources. That is what leads us to be in favor of these trades.(Now if you find yourself in disagreement with those guys...then that's something much bigger than Billy.)

But that could be just a few of us. I do think there are people who get their information from guys like devo, and everyone else I'm forgetting. Some of you can be very convincing.

I'd like to know if anyone here actually thinks that Beane can do no wrong.

I can't believe you...

just used the words "Beane" and "wrong" in the same sentence. :)

Just teasing.

I agree, Sharon. I like (okay, love) Billy, but I hate the "drink the Kool-Aid" "In Billy We Trust" stuff. I know it is meant to be funny, it just sounds as though we are a herd of mindless jackasses that will agree with anything Billy does.

right...

...I trust Billy. But it's not b/c I drink the kool-aid(b/c that crap is way too sweet...yuck). And contrary to popular belief, you and I would NOT bet our lives on Billy's decisions...even though we do love him :)

If I use the term "In Billy We Trust" it's not meant to be some insane portrayal of my undying love of every single move the guy makes.

But I could see where the stalking might give that impression.

I'm diabetic

So, is it cool if we all drink the sugar free Crystal Light instead? Thanks....

Tony - March 3, 2005 reply

Just get sugar free sugar to mix in your kool-aid

The "In Billy We Trust" Stuff

really turns me off, too.

Sharon is right, there's a difference between agreeing with Billy's moves and "believing" in him.

I can't remember?

was there a similar poll taken directly after beane traded both hudson/mulder? i would assume the results would have been far different than the one just taken.

as i stated earlier, i've learned a lot about baseball and the a's since joining AN in nov '04.
i certainly don't agree with everything posted here-but it causes me to pause and think and maybe change my perspective on stuff. an example was the hudson trade...i hated it when it went down. but, over time, i saw the rational behind it.

bigelephant - March 3, 2005 reply

Funny

I felt the same way, bigE.

At first I truly HATED the trades, but now I've come to see that they are truly in the best interest of the franchise. I now think they were gutsy moves that I'm glad Billy made.

Agreeing also.

My first reaction to the Mulder/Hudson trade can't be repeated here. :) Since then, I've been talked off the ledge and can see clearly now the rain is gone. The rational part of me knows (eh...hopes) we'll be okay. The freaky stalker part of me still misses Mulder and Huddy.

um

It should be much easier for you to stalk Mulder now.

Oh, you have no idea. :)

Why don't you stalk Melhuse?

He needs a stalker, too.

Melhuse?

Who the hell is that? I thought his name was Milhouse. :)

I rest my case. :-)

I bet Booby Kielty lacks stalkers, too.

I'm not stalking anyone...

with any part of the anatomy for a name. :)

I guess you wouldn't stalk

Jimmy Gobble of the Royals or Jimmy Journell of the Cardinals. =)

Or Yadier Molina of the Cards. J/K on that one, what part of somebodys body could possibly be a Yadier? My Yadier Hurts? Where could it possibly be?

ohad - March 3, 2005 reply

Milhouse

We're not so happy with him. And I would bet that Hudson and Harden are still fuming over everything that transpired last season. Milhouse needs to learn to keep his affairs quiet. Was it Hudson who decided to "play catch" with his wife after finding out about the affair?

Jennifer, help me out here.

I bet he's lonely...

I guess I could follow him to the grocery store or something. You know, to make him feel loved.

As long as it doesn't interrupt Law and Order, I guess I'm in!

That's the spirit!