Monday Classic Video: The Boob Apron

From KSK, someone invented some stupid cleavage-hider, and this is the infomercial for it, but with some gie dubbed over the voice making fun of it. Pretty funny. (note: it's nothing too scandalous, but don't open at work if you are sensitive about that kind of thing.

The World Cup Was Awesome, Then it Wasn't

In keeping with our recent theme (to wit: professional sports that no one gives a shit about), I wanted to share my thoughts on the World Cup. Well, I actually wanted to share my thoughts on the World Cup several weeks ago, but I just didn't get around to it. If I had written this post a few weeks ago, it would have gone something like this:

Wow. The World Cup is really great. It is so fun and exciting to watch, and it is encouraging to see Americans really get behind the sport. Each match is quick (compared to say, a baseball game), lively, and totally action-packed. Unicorns, rainbows and hope. Hugs.

And I think I would have been justified in writing that post at the outset of the World Cup. People were excited about the American team, the games are a bit swifter than most U.S. sports, and they are punctuated with moments of incredible drama. The U.S. win over Algeria in extra time was incredibly exciting, and it really felt like all of NYC (at least where I was watching) had taken time out of the day to root for the team. Ergo, World Cup was great. The U.S. team's loss to Ghana was disappointing, but there was still plenty of great soccer left to watch.

But even then, there were some cracks in this happy facade. A U.S. goal against Slovenia was disallowed on a phantom call. And as frustrating as that was, it was compounded by the fact that the referee (note the singular - because there is only one fucking referee who is responsible for covering the entire match) was not required to identify the nature of the penalty, or the player who committed it.

And the flops. Oh those god-damned flops. How many times have we seen players lose their footing when they engage a defender, go flying through the air, and land on the ground writhing in agony, only to have a television replay reveal that there was absolutely no contact whatsoever? A good clue to this nonsense is often that the gie who looks like he is about to pass out from the pain one minute is happily trotting down the field the next. It has become so much a part of the game that it takes over the game; a good slide with no contact earns a yellow card, while a kick to the chest is overlooked by the referees. I think most U.S. fans find this incredibly unsatisfying -- refs miss penalties or calls in our sports all the time (just ask that gie for the Tigers) -- but it is very, very difficult to get used to the level of inconsistency on yellow cards, and the frequency with which these gies dive and just beg for penalties.

There is also the matter of "stoppage time." The concept makes perfect sense: the clock is not stopped during each 45-minute regulation half, so the referee has discretion to add a few extra minutes to the half to to account for any stoppage of play due to injuries, etc. But in practice, the clock is so loosely enforced as to make it laughable. There has never been a single World Cup game that has ended on a breakaway, or just before a corner kick could be taken, etc. Stoppage time always ends when the ball settles in the middle of the field, or rolls out of bounds, or there is some other natural break in play. It is almost as if the ref looks at his watch and thinks, "man, time is up, but I gotta see how this thing ends." The lack of precision with timekeeping is completely foreign in U.S. sports that play off of a clock.

But there is more. Because there is only one ref, he tends to miss really, really important things. Like goals. Like goals being scored against Germany by England. Like the one everyone in the world saw (even me, because Jet Blue is awesome) except the one guy who needed to see it. And yet, despite the incredible consequences a single goal can have on the match (though, in fairness, perhaps not that particular Germany-England match), FIFA has long maintained that they won't introduce instant replay (though that might finally, finally be changing). Even baseball uses instant replay now to determine whether or not a ball was hit for a home run. There are no good arguments left to allow goals to stand that were not goals, and to fail to award a goal when one was scored.

And there is still more. Remember those yellow cards? The ones that sometimes are given out when a player commits a penalty, but other times are given out for no particular reason at all. Well, if you get two of those in consecutive matches, you do not get to play in the next match. This is the equivalent of benching an NFL player in week six who was flagged for personal fouls in weeks four and five (Jeremy Shockey would have missed all of 2006 under this regime). It would be one thing if the yellow cards actually meant something, and were only handed out in response to truly dangerous play, or blatant rule violations. But as it stands, they are handed out so wantonly as to make the punishment (missing an entire game) completely out of whack with the crime. Just ask Thomas Mueller of Germany, who was benched against Spain because of a yellow card issued after an alleged handball. There can be little doubt that Mueller - the top scorer in the tournament and winner of the "Golden Boot" - might have helped Germany alter the outcome against the eventual champions.

The most frustrating aspect of this is how easy it would be to change most of it. Add another ref. Introduce instant reply on balls that may or may not have gone in the net. And, if a player gets two yellow cards in successive matches, review both yellow cards (after the games but before the next one) to determine whether a game suspension is warranted (the NBA does this now when a player is suspended for getting too many technicals).

Referees will always have an impact on sports, but the extent of that impact, and the extent to which the human element can just completely ruin a game and a tournament, can be minimized with little to no impact on the game itself.

Things That Are Overrated: The Stock Market

So, Greece can't get their shit together and they have a financial crisis. Some other countries are trying to think of ways to help them out. All of a sudden, someone is concerned that there might not be an easy way to help them out. Therefore, the stock market in America plunges. The Dow Jones Average dipped by a billion points or something today based on the fact that there was nothing that happened in Europe.

This stock market thing is a fucking sham. Some freaking scrote didn't have anything better to do with his time when he thought up this one. We'll raise a bunch of capital by selling shares of our company to the public and then once we do that, anyone with a few bucks in their pocket can go and buy that piece from the other gie and then he owns a little piece of the company. That one little piece of the company is essentially worthless save for the fact that it's value is constantly changing and maybe this gie can unload it for more than he got it for at some point in the future.

And then all of the stock prices are interrelated in some sort of Adam Smith invisible hand wet dream for absolutely no reason whatsoever. There isn't anyone on Earth who knows how this thing actually works. The fact that Jim Cramer is considered an expert on anything other than his own masturbatory habits is just downright disconcerting, but this is the guy that people look to for advice on this sort of thing. The notion that the entire market should cycle up and down when it represents companies that do entirely different things is just dumb. The whole "times are tough" thing is just a vague notion that no one really understands.

You can step in if you like with some sort of macro argument and the entity that is known as the "national economy" or even moreso today the "global economy", but all of that just doesn't sit with me. The whole notion is nebulous, and is, by it's very nature, indecipherable by anyone. The fact that people take this shit so seriously in conjunction with the fact that people can't see shit coming with any clarity whatsoever is just proof that this is a system that somehow everyone just got suckered into.

I'm happy to accept the idea of a stock market as a single trading post to represent all of the companies that want to participate. It's essentially a farmers' market for shares of companies. I am unwilling to accept the notion that the entire market in aggregate represents the state of things in the world. The few people who are privy to a more objective view of the market don't try to improve the state of business or the world, instead they try to exploit its weak points before anyone realizes what they've done.

In my opinion the stock market is proof of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. The more we observe the state of the market, the less accurate is our knowledge of the market in what would otherwise be its natural state. We are bombarding the market with metaphorical photons and not allowing it simply be the electron that it wants to be.

Please To Explain: Masters Coverage

Dear whoever decided this,

You're aware of an invention called television and on this invention they show shows? One of those shows is the Masters golf tournament which is taking place this week. The tournament starts at 8:00 in the morning or some such thing. Tiger Woods tees off at like 2pm. Why in the world is the live covereage only going on ESPN from 4-7pm? ESPN shows more garbage on all their various networks than many other networks put together. Between 2pm and 4pm yesterday all they did was live updates every 5 minutes of every shot Tiger took. Can't you gies just pay a little more money or whatever it would take in order to actually show Tiger's whole round?

And I'm not necessarily just interested in Tiger. I'd like to actually see all the live coverage of as many gies as possible. This really doesn't make any sense to me. I'm sure there are a ton of old retired gies who would sit and watch this all day and you could show your commercials for Viagra and retirement services. There's got to be something that can be done about this.

I'm On Board With Full Body Scans

Hey now!

Last week some Nigerian fucker tried to blow up a plane in Detroit.

He didn't get the explosion he was looking for the first time around and instead only lit his pants on fire.

Now, this guy decided for some reason that it was best to blow up the plane not from the bathroom but from like row 15, seat A - thus drawing the attention of his fellow passengers who jumped on him and stopped him from getting a do-over.

This is now, including the shoe bomber, the second gie that tried to blow himself up with explosive chemicals they smuggled onto airplanes.

Had either succeeded, people would be going nuts but since they didn't we're all take a very blase' attitude toward this shit.

I'd put this in the 'shit we need to deal with right away category' and the thing is we have a way to deal with it.

Full Body Scan machines are essentially an x-ray through your clothes that can detect things like, oh-I-don't-know, explosive being smuggled onto a plane in order to kill everyone on board.

Yet, it seems these haven't been deployed in all airports because they are, one - too expensive and, two - too invasive.

First, I will respond to those who complain that it would be too expensive. We are spending trillions of dollars to invade foreign countries to kill mad people and build democracies all in the name of stopping Islamic terrorists from blowing up planes. This would be maybe a couple hundred million dollars. Sounds pretty cost effective to me.

Second, to you, the ACLU and privacy worriers who are concerned about full body scans cramping their style. Fucking blow me. Stop bitching. You know what I'd consider invasive? Being blown to pieces landing at Liberty International Airport.

Yeah, so someone you will never know will see you naked but they'll also see the explosive that terrorist is going to use to kill you.

I'm OK with that trade.

The Future Is Now

"The future is now! Soon every American home will integrate their television, phone and computer. You'll be able to visit the Louvre on one channel, or watch female wrestling on another. You can do your shopping at home, or play Mortal Kombat with a friend from Vietnam. There's no end to the possibilities!"
-Chip Douglas aka The Cable Guy

First of all, I'll never miss an opportunity to say how much I love the cable guy. But, also it's amazing how well that quote actually fits in with the tone of this post. That movie came out in 1996 which is long before all of those things were entirely feasible, yet it was clear that every one of them was going to come true. Interesting. Anyhow, I read this article a few days ago about a guy who cancelled (for the record, I've decided that I'm going to spell cancelled with two L's from now on. I really don't like this one L spelling.)his cable TV service because he's able to use his XBox along with a couple other devices to watch all of his TV shows and play video games and surf the web and stream movies through Netflix. This guy is my hero. I mean, I guess I knew it was theoretically possible to hook this up and cancel your cable all together and not have to deal with absolutely terrible service that they provide, but this guy just went out and did it. He's a revolutionary.

Reading this article inspired me to change my Netflix subscription to the unlimited plan so I can run it through my PS3. In order to run it you have to get some sort of disc to put in the Playstation, which should arrive today, so I can't tell you yet whether it works well or not. But I will say that I have started to watch a lot of TV online. I have been watching Heroes online because, for some reason, I like it better that way. I have watched episodes of Lost online after having inadvertently missed one on my DVR somehow. The same is true of a Modern Family episode that I missed earlier this year. (PS - If you're not yet watching Modern Family, then stop reading this post and go to the ABC website and start watching it right now. I guarantee that Modern Family is more entertaining than the remainder of this post.) Additionally, this Netflix thing streaming through the PS3 is a fairly recent turn of events.

When I first got the PS3 the Playstation Network was essentially a small scale operation. I mean the scale of it must have been huge, but the scope of it was pretty narrow. It was basically just for playing video games online against other people. Recently when I updated to the new operating system a whole new world opened up. The new Playstation Network is an incredible thing. They've integrated movies and TV Shows and obviously you can still do the video games. You can do the Netflix thing and obviously also just browse the web. I'm uncertain as to the current state of their web browser, but in the past I know that it didn't really work properly with a lot of websites. That may have also changed with the recent upgrade of the network, but I don't know for sure.

Anyway, the one bad thing about cancelling your cable subscription is that you can't watch any live sports. This, for me, is a dealbreaker. There's no way I can go without watching the Mets, Yankees, Knicks, Giants, and Jets. Also the Sunday and Monday night football games and also the occasional interesting NBA game. At the same time, Time Warner Cable and the Fox Network are both grandstanding now about how that network may be removed completely from the cable system. If that happens, then we'll lose NFL football on Sundays. Whatever ass clowns are running Time Warner need to die immediately. Whoever is deciding to let the Fox Network go is probably the same gie who decided to take a perfect DVR system and replace it with an absolutely terrible DVR system.

Anyway, if they can work out that live sports thing, I will be among the first people to completely cancel my cable service and go entirely online. Something tells me that's going to be difficult, however.

The Audacity of Hope

Last year I wanted to make sure that I saw the new CitiField and also the Mets were a team that was going to contend for the NL East championship and play meaningful games throughout the season. So I figured that it wouldn't be a huge deal to buy a 15 game package to see the Mets. Having said that (do you...respect wood?) last year at CitiField was an unmitigated disaster. The first few games were interesting checking out the stadium and watching the full team on the field. Circa June it just became a chore to head out to the stadium and find someone to go with me.

There are a few exceptions. The Kath and I took our son to his first game and he had a good time and talked about it for months afterwards. There was also a rain delayed game I went to with Side Bar that was one of the more fun and interesting baseball game experiences. There was something about the atmosphere in the 25% full stadium that just struck me that night.

Anyhow, I decided long ago that there was no way I would be renewing my seat package. Back in Shea Stadium they used to have 6 packs of games, which was just about the perfect amount of games. Now, there was one year when I went with my buddy, the Commodore, to 25 games. We went to every Tuesday and Friday game and, I must say, it was a lot of fun. But the Commodore has moved out to an entirely new continent and the Mets were actually good that year (until September). I was expecting an overture from the Mets to renew my seats, but what I got was quite unexpected. They sent me a letter, the upcoming season's schedule, and an invoice for upwards of $750. I was assured in the letter that my invoice was for less than I paid last year, which frankly just served to remind me how much I blew on those tickets last year with not much to show for it. Add to that the fact that the ticket package they were trying to sell me was for 15 games where there was one Philly game, one Yankee game, 11 incredibly mediocre games, and where the first and last games were both against the Nationals.

So let me understand, Mets. You guys suck. There's no real conceivable way you are going to be any better this year barring the unlikely incapacitation of both Omar Minaya and Jerry Manuel that miraculously ends in October of next year. You lowered your prices by roughly 1%, since I paid basically the same for those tickets last year. And then you have the audacity to send me an invoice rather than a letter begging me to renew my seats. And on top of all that the ticket package you're trying to sell me literally sucks balls (yes, literally).

Look, I like the Mets. I will root for them to improve and watch all their games on TV and probably go to a few this season. But I am not, as the gies who call up WFAN are so proud to exclaim, a die hard Mets fan. I am a die easy Mets fan. And I will not be buying a ticket package from you gies this year.

(Somewhat relatedly, I have discovered that I am, in fact, a die hard Knicks fan. It's basically inexplicable, but I still watch all of their games. I kindof expect them to compete even in games where they are clearly overmatched. It's not really something I set out to be, it's just something I am.)

What the Eff, America? Ed Hardy Edition

Take a good look at this picture on the right there. This is Jon Gosselin who, along with Spencer Pratt, currently co-chairs the Douchebag of America Society. This picture perfectly encapsulates my feelings on this newest trend of idiocy in American society.

This whole Ed Hardy fashion thing is really just very stupid. I mean, it's a tattoo artist whose designs were co-opted by the same gie who made the Von Dutch brand a flash in the pan trend and put on t-shirts and sweatshirts and so on and so forth and sold to the masses at ridiculous prices. And then the masses were like, well, I don't have a big ass tattoo of an eagle on my chest because if I did that it would be mad weird, but I want to appear as if I have a big eagle tattoo on my chest and as if I always show it off except in like another 6 months when it's no longer cool to have all these shirts that look like I have tattoos all over myself or shoes or sweatshirts or handbags or anything then I'll just have a bunch of dishrags with eagles and dragons and skulls and tigers growling on them that cost me $40 each; well, it was fun while it lasted and when I look back at pictures of myself at this time I'll wonder what the hell I was thinking, kindof like that Flock of Seagulls thing back in the '80s.

I mean, tattooing to this extent is really a subculture of people who are really dedicated the whole idea of body as art and the beauty of the designs and such. Also if you get tattoos like that then you know going in that you have to live with them forever. When you get an Ed Hardy t-shirt, you violate everything that that particular subculture stands for. Did I forget to mention that all of these t-shirts and such are really ugly? You look like a fucking idiot walking down the street in these ridiculous clothes and its made worse because you think you look cool. Do these gies look cool? Answer me!

Zen and the Art of the iTunes Playlist

I first got an iPod in 2005. Getting an iPod versus having a CD player is one of those enormous leaps on the technological timeline that really is life changing. I don't want to overstate the idea when I say it's life changing. It's not like having a kid or anything, but at the same time, for someone who likes to listen to music (and I assume that everyone falls into that category. Like making a subgroup of people who like breathing), having an iPod changes the way you live your life. First of all, you don't have to buy CDs anymore. Secondly, you can carry your entire music collection on one iPod. I'm guessing that I have a relatively large and eclectic music collection that has grown pretty steadily since roughly 1989. My collection, combined with my wife's comprises roughly 30GB of memory on my iPod, which is cabaple of holding 80GB. So I've got a ways to go.

Incidentally, at the time i bought my current iPod, the choices in terms of memory (side note: I really hate people who use the term vis-a-vis and also people who use the suffix -wise. For example in this current sentence, if you would say "my choices vis-a-vis memory" or "my choices memorywise" then you suck. If you use the first one, then you are a pretentious douche, the heir to the Masengill fortune, if you will. If you use the second one, then you need to gain a firmer grasp on the English language to more clearly state what you mean.) were to get an iPod that held 4GB, 8GB, 80GB, and 160GB, and nothing in between. I really only needed like 40GB to hold my existing collection and potentially grown into a slightly larger one, but that choice was lacking. At the same time, I seriously considered buying the 160GB one because it was actually a good value vis-a-vis paying like $50 more for twice as much memory, but then I decided I would never use the 80GB, so there was no way I'd ever use the 160GB.

All of this is sortof beside the point I want to make, except that it's all related iPodwise. My real point is that since I got that first iPod in 2005 I've been working on creating the perfect iTunes playlist. It's much harder than it seems it should be. The nature of the iTunes playlist is that you are not limited by things like space and time (Roads? Where we're going we don't need roads.) and as such, you can make the playlist as long as you want. On a CD you've got to pare the choices down to basically 15 or so songs, so you end up with a pretty tight mix every time (it's in the gies) although it could get boring to listen to in a couple months or so. My working theory was that I should be able to create one playlist that I could listen to forever. It would basically act as what I would consider to be the perfect radio station with songs from every genre with different energies and really the only thing they have in common is awesomeness.

With awesomeness as my copilot my first iTunes playlist, creatively titled "Jerry's Playlist", consisted of about 600 songs. I would put my iPod on shuffle, and listen to it wherever I went. In the car, running, walking to places, you get the idea. The problem with the 600 song playlist is that there are too many marginally good songs and not enough awesome songs. I would end up skipping a lot of songs and that kindof defeated the purpose of the perfect playlist in my mind. The second playlist I made, "The Short List", was created to remedy that song skipping situation. I knew the problem was that there were too many songs on the list and I needed to limit myself to only songs that I really liked. That list had about 350 songs. The second list ended up being only the second step in the evolutionary process. Still there were some songs that were not good enough to stand up to repeated listening, which is to say forever.

About three weeks ago I created what, to date, is the greatest iTunes playlist ever created. It's titled "Frabulous", obviously, and it has 192 songs. I went through my entire music library and picked only the songs that I was confident I could listen to over and over for eternity. The other day something happened that has never happened before. I was listening to the playlist at work and the music stopped. I thought it might be a really low intro to a song and then I thought that the battery may have died, but when I looked at the iPod, it turns out that I had actually listened to the entire playlist all the way through. Again, this is something that has never happened. Typically I'll listen to the playlist until I get in the mood to listen to a particular album or a specific song and then I'll back out of the playlist to do that and then come back to it. When you come back to the playlist it reshuffles the songs and the count starts over again.

In short, this playlist is amazing. It's as close to perfect as I've come so far vis-a-vis playlistwise. I was initially confounded by my ability to make what was essentially a neverending playlist, but now I realize that all good things must come to an end. Like this post.

Dear The Mets,

This letter goes out to Omar Minaya, Jerry Manuel, and anyone else who has a say. Brian Schneider sucks more than a thing that sucks a lot. Ramon Castro has proven that he's a good hitter and a pretty good catcher. It seems apparent that Omir Santos is a pretty good hitter and I don't know anything about his catching but, really, how bad could he be? Let's keep Brian Schneider on the DL indefinitely so we can keep that suckfest off the field.

Brian Schneider couldn't get a hit if his life depended on it and they let him hit the ball off a tee and the ball was a softball and they let him use an aluminum bat and all the infielders were sitting down and all the outfielders left the field and everyone was blindfolded except for him and also everyone is handcuffed and isn't allowed to use their gloves and once they field the ball they have to kick it over to first base like a soccer ball.

Can we please give up on Brian Schneider? Both of these other gies are decent hitters. I'm tired of the Mets lineup being a complete black hole in the 7, 8, and 9 spots.

And while we're at it, can we keep Ryan Church in the lineup please? Enough with this Sheffield crap. And can you gies give some kind of seminar on clutch hitting?

Awesome Music Week: Phoenix

I first heard them: Last week on Saturday Night Live
Would Side Bar like them?: possibly
Would Open Bar like them?: probably not, it's a little new wave-ish
Would LJT like them?: Since the default is no, we'll go with that.
Bonus Guess, Would WinIt like them?: Indubitably. If there were a party at his place, this would be on the playlist before the party would be canceled.

(Has anyone else noticed that there seems to be a debate raging among grammerians as to whether canceled is spelled with one or two L's? It seems like it should be two, but for some reason, one L seems to be the technically proper use. Both are acceptable in Microsoft Word. It's kinda strange.)

There's a thin line between real good band and a bunch of douchebags, and Phoenix toes that line really well. There's a real possibility that I'd be the only of the four of us who'd like this band. These gies have what some might deem strikes against even before any songs play. First of all they're from France. Secondly they have a real distinct 80s laid back pop sound. You can almost imagine them with huge hair and androgenous clothes jumping around on the stage. Despite that fact, however, I'm really digging on them in the last week or so. I've basically spent the last week listening to a lot of these gies along with our last two entrants, Glasvegas and the Ting Tings.

This particular band just seems to hit me in a sweet spot. Really mellow vibe, catchy tunes, the singer has a cool voice. And they use their synthesizer really well. It's not overused, as is probably the temptation, but it really adds to every song. Phoenix seems to me like the type of band that would really appeal to people under the influence of mind altering substances. I can't really say this for sure, but for some reason they just throw off that kindof vibe to me. This band has actually been around for a long time. They released their first album in 2000, I believe, and actually have 4 albums all together. Their first couple records are not as great as their more recent efforts, in my opinion. They really seem to have grown into their sound. This song posted below, 1901, represents everything that is good about them. Kick back, put your feet up, and break out your phat nug if you're still into that sort of thing, because you'll need it.

Awesome Music Week: Glasvegas

I first heard them: Last week on the Jimmy Fallon show. Maybe it was the week before.
Would Side Bar like them?: Yes.
Would Open Bar like them?: Yes.
Would LJT like them?: Actually, I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say yes.

Glasvegas is just a fucking rock and roll band from Glsgow, Scotland. The "fucking" was definitely necessary in that last sentence, lest you were wondering. The absolute best part about this band is that the guy sings with a phatty Scottish brogue on every song and it's great. In addition to that, though, the songs are really good.

What I love about this band is that you kindof get glimpses of their influences, but you really can't say that it sounds particularly like anyone else. Part of it is the accent that the gie sings with, but just when you think it's about to get derivative, it goes and switches it up a little bit. The sound of the band is not groundbreaking or drastically different or anything like that, but in an era when other gies are trying to reinvent the wheel, Glasvegas is just coming out and kicking ass.

I genuinely believe this is the one band that all of you gies would like.

Playing Baseball With the Monte Carlo Method

This article in the New York Times about using computer simulations to model scenarios in baseball games is really interesting. In essence, rather than try to come up with an ubercomplicated statistical model to predict outcomes, some gies just write a computer simulation program and then model like 100 or 1,000 or even 10,000 entire seasons in order to smooth out the stats and so forth. Now obviously all this depends on how good your simulator is, but since they've been around since the 1950s, I'm guessing they've made some headway in the field.

The most interesting part about this is that the guy who created one of the more well respected simulators is now employed by the Red Sox. I've got to say I'm really impressed by the Red Sox approach to the game. They also employ the guy who invented sabermetrics, which tries to accomplish the same thing as these simulators, but looks at the problem from a different perspective. I'm confident that all of this research affects the types of players that are currently on their roster, but I wonder how much of this actually gets onto the field in terms of strategy and lineups and such. Anyway, whoever decided to hire Theo and these other gies at the Red Sox was a foreward thinking dude.


I like math

Funny Thing About Baseball

Studying baseball statistics is really an interesting practice. I find it to be pretty interesting that the sport that relies most heavily on statistics, and the one in which peoples' statistics are used to judge them most heavily is also the sport where the statistics between players, teams, and eras are the least comparable from an objective standpoint.

Let's take the largest, and probably least relevant, issue, steroids. Assuming a lot of gies were taking steroids circa 1990 through 2004 and were not taking them much outside of this window, then those stats are, in one way or another, skewed. How much they are skewed is really beyond the scope of this post. It also seems like something that would be really hard to determine, certainly from my perspective, but just aknowledging that they are skewed is enough.

The more important issue here is really the arbitrary nature of the baseball field. Can you imagine in the NBA if you went to Boston to play the Celtics and whenever you went there the basket was 9 ft. high istead of 10? And going into Cleveland the court was an extra 20 feet longer. And in Phoenix the 3 point line was 5 feet farther back. All of those are ludicrous notions, but in baseball they are completely acceptable. Guys who call themselves "purists" will tell you that's what adds to the charm of the game. I'm somewhat surprised that no one makes a bigger deal of this to be honest with you.

If Joe DiMaggio didn't play in Yankee stadium with a 500+ ft. left-center field, he would have had conceivably hundreds of more home runs. If Babe Ruth didn't play in Yankee Stadium with a 300 ft. right field porch, he would have certainly had fewer home runs. Nearly every stadium built since Camden Yards has shrunk the dimensions of the field it replaced, and made it far easier to hit home runs. There are some exceptions, PetCo Park in San Diego and the new CitiField come to mind, but for the msot part fields are shrinking. Would Ryan Howard be nearly as valuable a player in any other stadium? Ryan Howard must hit more opposite field home runs than any other player in baseball. He's got tremendous power to the opposite field, but it doesn't hurt that they play their home games on the Clubhouse Field (Clearly the Middle Field would be more conducive for MLB games).

Home runs is the easiest statistic to point to relative to the arbitrary nature of each field, but is certainly not the only statistic that's affected by it. Smaller fields mean fewer doubles and triples. Different size fields mean different defensive alignments, and what I'm sure are significant differences in fielding percentages and assists, put outs, things of that nature.

The point here is that comparing gies from the days when a lot of fields were cavernous to today when fields are much smaller, and comparing guys directly who play in different home stadiums is, in many respects, and exercise in futility. No one tries to control for field size or other conditions that confound the statistics. I'm not saying they should, but then we should also not point so heavily to those statistics when we talk about baseball players.

Just One Question, Omar

I'm definitely not complaining that the Mets signed the gie who just set the record for saves in a season when they desparately needed a closer. I'm just wondering why the Mets were the only team who wanted him. Why didn't the Angels even try to sign him? Do they know something? I know he took a physical and everything so I guess it's not that big a deal, but I find it very strange that no one else seemed to be in on this.

Mitigating that to a certain extent is the fact that in addition to Francisco Rodriguez aka K-Rod, the Mets also traded for JJ Putz, who was Seattle's closer for the last couple of years and an all star.

Also my heart sank a little bit when I'd heard that as part of the deal for JJ Putz the Mets traded Endy Chavez to the Mariners. That guy was easily my favorite Met.

New Wave Strikes Again

Well, guys we've been blogging the hell out of the web-o-sphere this month....NOT!...schwing...i like to play...i don't even own A gun, let alone many which would necessitate the use of an entire rack.

Anyhow, since you gies don't have any ideas, I'm gonna have to chime in with some new music for the holiday season. You all know how much I love new wave music, so it will come as no surprise when I recommend these hits for the holidays.

I want everyone to go out and get The Killers new album, Day and Age. The Killers are awesome. And if you don't have their first two albums, Hot Fuss and Sam's Town, then get those too. And if you're feeling saucy, then get Sawdust, an album of B-sides they put out last year.

Secondly, if you love The Killers, and I think I've just proven that everyone does love The Killers, then you should check out The Bravery. Another 80s influenced band that feels a lot like The Cure to me, with a little bit of REM and maybe some of The Smiths.

I recently bought two albums by The Police, Ghost in the Macine and Synchronicity. Ghost in the Machine is a little bit dated for me, with the obvious exception of "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic". There's a possibility that that's my favorite song of all time. Synchronicity, on the other hand, is a great album. Like great. You should get it.

And anyone who took enough of an interest in the New Wave post up until this point should go out and get an album by The Smiths. I would recommend "Singles" as a good start. Now The Smiths are not for everyone. Here's my theory on The Smiths. There are plenty of cool people who don't like The Smiths, but there isn't anyone who likes The Smiths that isn't cool. Therefore, fans of The Smiths are just a subset of all cool people. Again, it's really not everyone's cup of tea, but if you're a cynical malcontent who secretly revels at how great the world really is, then I know you'll like The Smiths. Check them out.

PS-the title of this post is a blunt allusion to a song by The Smiths, "Bigmouth Strikes Again", one of their best.

Holy Crapballs, Bailoutman

I'm in disbelief that the bailout didn't pass. And the vote had essentially nothing to do with party lines. The vote was 228 to 205, with 133 Republicans and 95 Democrats in opposition. Then 140 Democrats and 65 Republicans were in favor. It's fucking chaos. At least 90% of these gies are trying to politicize the issue and it seems likely that there won't be any real resolution until after the election.

I guess everyone can blame this on everyone else, but from my biased perspective it seems like this might be something that would push undecideds or independents away from Republicans in all the races, not just the presidential race. Maybe the Republican gies are voting against this in an effort to save their jobs in their districts.

Really at this point I have no idea what's happening. In fairness, I don't think anyone in Washington or on Wall Street seems to know what's going on either. I just don't know what to think at this point. I'm not sure this is an issue that's going to hold its breath until November.