This Is Going To Take Crackerjack Timing

While I'm working on my HBP post . . . you know who's awesome? Fucking John Carpenter. The Thing, Halloween, Escape From New York . . . They Live, for the love of God. Jesus Christ. What more can a man do?

Fantasy Camp

I meant to get to this earlier, but here's a link to Eric Brown's blog about his experiences at Mets fantasy camp (via Metsblog). Eric's a lifelong Mets fan, and I remember reading his blog from the first time he went to Mets fantasy camp, two years ago. Fantasy camp might not be everybody's cup of tea, but any innocent pleasure is a real good.

95 Theses

At some point, vis-a-vis my last post, and soon I think, people will either describe themselves as Ecksteinians, or Sabermetricians; the same way we've got Catholics and Protestants.

Obviously, Moneyball is the 95 Theses nailed to the door of this Church of Baseball; and I think we all know what side of this heresy I'm on. My point here is that, whether or not you agree with Moneyball, or think it's some kind of nerd porn sent from Al-Qaeda to corrupt the American game; everyone should agree that it's the most important baseball book written since Ball Four.

Look, Joe Morgan: just because a book is important doesn't necessarily mean that you agree with it. One could make the case that Adolph Hitler was the most important man of the 20th century; that doesn't mean that I necessarily agree with him.

Not that I think Billy Beane is Hitler or anything.

I'm Pretty Sure This Is Actually How He Feels

God knows, I would. Non-baseball-related, but I thought I'd mention it. Also, that rant is funny as hell.

There's also a funny shot at Bill Simmons here. I don't ordinarily mention the Sports Guy, because:

1. He doesn't really talk about baseball. When he does, he's more of an ecksteinian than a sabermetrician.

2. I think most of his columns are written with AutoText. Seriously, he says the same three things over and over.

On the other hand, I do still read him. So who am I to criticize? Anyway, as soon as I can remember how to update my template, Kissing Suzy Kolber are gettin' a link. I'm sure they're thrilled.

Insomnia

Man, this freaking rules. I just can't get enough of being awake at 4:00 am.

John Thomson Hates Lo Duca

Via Baseball Musings.

Huh. I'm surprised that Thomson would let Lo Duca's presence push him to the Blue Jays. Not only do the Jays have, like, zero chance of making the playoffs in the same division as the Red Sox and Yankees; but I'd have to assume that any pitcher, the money being equal, would much prefer to be in the DH-less and generally weaker league. Especially if he could be in an nice pitcher's park like Shea. He must really hate Dookie.

Of course, he also thinks that Cliffy still plays for the Mets, and that Toronto has better outfield defense, so he's clearly an idiot, too.

First Mini-Camp

I'll bet D.W. slept in his uniform the night before and everything. Seriously, I think he looks forward to Spring Training even more than I do.

Willie Rocks

No, not the Mets manager. Willie Nelson. Apropos of nothing, apart from the fact that I'm listening to some Red Headed Stranger right now, but Willie Nelson kicks ass.

Who's Left?

I took a quick look today over at ESPN.com's free agent tracker, to see which starting pitchers were left for Omar to pick over on the scrap heap. Included in this chart is each pitcher's 2006 Win Shares Above Bench. A pitcher with a WSAB of zero is a bench player; it looks to me like these options aren't any better than what we've got internally.

I've got some more thoughts on pitching rotations, and how good the #4 and #5 starters need to be; actually, I've been thinking about this for a long time, but Jeff Sackmann does a good job talking about it here and here. God, I fucking love the Hardball Times.

Has anybody expressed any interest in poor Steve Trachsel? Boy, he could not have looked worse than he did in his final playoff start. Played himself right out of a contract with somebody. Remind me, I need to write up my defense of Steve Trachsel sometime soon. He might not be a bad sixth option for some team. The Mets'll never take him, though; Willie hates him.