O'Dea Knights, my fantasy team... a few insights.

As most of you know I do fantasy baseball, and have done so for a long time.  My first team had (among others) Kevin Romine, Dennis Eckersley, Roy Hassey, and Rickey Henderson, which will tell you how long I've been doing this.  I've been in my current league for well over ten years, and the core of it (that is, teams in the league since the beginning) is a bunch of really good people... as are the newer teams.

I did some analysis on my team this week because injuries have put me in a bind:  I don't have enough outfielders to stay competitive.  While I'm not in the league for money or prestige (I do it because it's fun), naturally those two things are still enjoyable.  The things I do for fun are the statistical analysis pieces, such as what my yearly pace is, how I stand among the other teams, and so on.  This is the first time I've put anything about those analyses in a blog entry; it's much better for league harmony than posting it on the league's web site (some owners in the league are very competitive).

Anyway, here's a few tidbits for those people who enjoy baseball statistics.

• We've just finished Week 16 of the 26 weeks of the regular season.  There are 12 teams and we count the "standard 5x5" categories.  In hitting, those are BA, Runs, RBI, Home Runs, and Steals; for pitching, they are Wins, Saves, Strikeouts, ERA, and WHIP.  (Interestingly, this is a case of Major League Baseball taking a cue from the modern groups of baseball fans, such as SABR (Society of American Baseball Research), Total Baseball (Pete Palmer), and Bill James' work, among others).  WHIP is Walks + Hits divided by Innings Pitched and is a measure of the number of runners a pitcher puts on base by himself (errors are not the pitcher's fault).  Ten years ago WHIP was a fantasy baseball-only stat; today pitchers' WHIPs are listed in the newspaper.)
• My team usually has fair to poor first halves and good second halves.  I am hoping this year is no different as I'm in seventh place now.
• This year is the most competitive in recent memory.  The difference between 8th place and first is only 14 points, and the standings change quite a bit from week to week, even day to day.  I like this; people stay happier and are more likely to come back next year.
• Injuries usually play a big part of a team's standings.  This year, last year's winner is essentially eliminated from competition, as is last year's second-place team and another team which is usually strong, all because they had all-stars who ended up out for the season early on.  They will come back strong next year; all three owners know their baseball, this year they were unlucky.

Moving on....

• At this juncture my hitters lead the league in team at-bats but rank next-to-last in team strikeouts.  That shows my team puts the ball in play a lot.
• My team is also next-to-last in number of walks.  Most of my hitters are from countries such as the Dominican Republic, where the saying "You don't walk off the island" is common, so they have high contact rates and don't walk much.  Alberto Callaspo, for example, is hard to strike out (once every 12 AB) but swings at everything (a walk every 21 times up).  The net result is a high number of AB and a good BA but only a middling OBA (on base average).
• So why am I only in sixth place in runs scored?  I answered that partially in the previous bullet (low OBA), but there's more to it than that.  Most of my hitters hit low in their team's batting order, and hitters batting in slots seven through nine do not score as many runs as those hitting lead-off or #2.
• While I don't have top power hitters, almost all of my lineup is capable of hitting 15 or more HR in a season.  In this case my team is "making it up on volume" rather than having a few top HR hitters (the one exception is Paul Konerko), so I'm in the top three in the category (usually).  After the leader there are four teams within a handful of HR of each other, so the standings change almost daily; one hot week vaults a team from fifth to second.
• 60% of my team's SB come from one player, Carl Crawford.  The reason for that is, as I mentioned above, injury.  My other SB threat, Brian Roberts, has missed the entire season.  If Roberts hadn't gotten injured I'd probably be three points higher in the standings in SB.
• Streakiness both helps and hurts.  One team had Ty Wigginton until May 15, during which time he led the AL in HR with 12 and was hitting .312.  I traded for him, knowing full well he would not continue to hit that way, and he hasn't... in twice as many AB he's hit only 4 HR and batted .210.  Some teams in the league take advantage of that, and change their active rosters accordingly.  I usually don't, because 1) the only thing which matters is team totals at year-end, and 2) whether nor not a player will have a hot week is unpredictable; I've sat players who proceeded to hit enough to move me two or three places in the standings, and also sat players who hit oh-for-the-week.
• Our league's talent penetration is so deep we have lineups featuring players who are in the minors or who are just not playing because there just isn't anyone else available.  Even without injuries I'd still have Eric Patterson in my lineup.
• Part of my "pitching problem" is simple:  the rest of the league has caught up with me.  Normally I shoot for a balanced team, and then mid-year make a shift to an all-reliever squad.  The result is leading the league in saves, ERA, and WHIP, and finishing in the middle of the pack in strikeouts and wins.  This year I moved too early, and now have to be careful to meet the league's minimum IP requirement.  Also, there are two teams using the same strategy, and they are as good at it as I am.  When I was the only one using it the strategy had an advantage; now that advantage is gone.  The other two teams using the strategy have better numbers than I do, and so my pitching staff's league ranking is among the worst I've ever had.  Thus I have to discover a new strategy which would again set me apart from the other teams.  It's too late for this year, so I need some luck; next year is another animal.
• Along the same lines, as usual I lead the league in strikeout rate but am last in the league because I am also last in IP.  In other seasons I had enough IP to be in the middle of the pack; this year I traded my starters too early (because my offense was bad) and thus my IP is too low.  I will still make the minimum IP (700 IP), but it will be hard (my prediction with my current staff is 714-1/3, and that assumes a pitcher now in the minors is called up before September).  If I make no changes to my staff I'll finish around 680 IP, and none of my pitching points will count (thus I'll finish out of the money).  BTW, I consider putting myself in this situation as a major mistake running my team; I've never had this problem before, and I know why I have it now.  It was just a stupid mistake I'll have to learn from.

I suppose that's all I really have on this; I enjoy fooling around with numbers and this has been a welcome break from making politically-charged statements.  Until the next time, "Be excellent to each other" - Ted Logan.

Follow-up to yesterday's post

In yesterday's post about people calling the Obama administration on things out of their control, I mentioned there were some things about Obama and his administration I don't like.  Well, here's one:  CBS news story on Shirley Sherrod's firing.  I know Obama wasn't personally responsible for firing her, but he is still in charge of his cabinet and should never bow to right-wing (or left-wing) extremist pressures when making policy or personnel decisions.

It's quite clear the majority of people know Glenn Beck and Fox News edited the tape of Sherrod's speech to make it seem as if she were discriminating against a white farmer (she did not).  This type of lying is very common on Fox News, and with Beck as well.  It's offensive, unethical, and just plain wrong.

And when the administration bends over to accommodate this crap, it just makes things worse.  Listen to the whole speech, learn the facts, and then act.  Gut reactions are inappropriate when running a government, and especially so when Obama makes such a point of thinking things through.

I understand compromise is necessary to pass bills and so on.  This case, though, is not a matter of compromise over different opinions or situations, it's a matter of an obvious lie and letting that lie create a political action.  At least Tom Vilsack and the White House apologized to Sherrod and offered her another position in the USDA.

For an interesting (and brilliantly satirical) take on Glenn Beck, see the South Park episode Dances with Smurfs.

Obama and the economy

It is so easy to blame our economic woes on Obama.  He is our president, and he is the most powerful single person in the US.  There are many things Obama and his cabinet have done (or haven't done) which annoy me; but I should point out our current economic woes are, for the most part, not his fault.  Yes, I know our budget deficit has skyrocketed over the last several years.  I remind you Obama's been in office only a year and a half.  Further, a great deal of the overspending we're seeing under his administration falls into three categories.

1. Paying for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.  Neither of these were his doing, they belong to the Bush years.  You cannot blame those staggering costs (nearly $1 billion a year) on Obama; he didn't start the wars, he's stuck with them.
2. Paying for the bailouts of banks and automobile companies.  Most of both of those policies were decided before Obama took office in January of 2009; besides, they would not be needed if the Republican congress under Bush had not repealed most of the banking regulations between 2000 and 2006.
3. Stimulus packages.  In this case Obama had little choice:  either let a failing economy continue to fail or inject some cash into it.  Also, the stimulus bills are not his; while he urged Congress to come up with something and he did sign them, he did not create them.

Again, let's be clear here.  I do not think Mr. Obama is completely blameless for our continuing economic woes.  However, one cannot expect him (or Congress, mostly) to fix in two years a mess the Bush administration (and his Congress) took six years to create and another two years of apathy from Democrats and resistance from Republicans and Mr. Bush himself.

What I'm hearing from people is disingenuous at best, hypocritical at worst.  If Obama and Congress let the Bush tax cuts expire, they'll be blamed for raising taxes; if they extend the tax cuts, they'll be blamed for worsening the economy.  The way I see it, the Bush tax cuts need to expire.  Further, regulations protecting consumers from the runaway profiteering from banks and corporations must be reinstated; those regulations brought tax income into the economy.

For those of you who think Bush did the right thing with his tax cuts, consider this:  he said it would make the economy better and help the middle class.  Well, did they?  We've had eight years to find out.  I think the answer is obvious:  we (the lower and middle classes) are not better off now, we're much worse off.  And before you blame Obama, consider this:  economists agree it takes at least two years for an economic policy to take effect, and Obama hasn't been in office that long.  Further, conservatives (mostly Republicans, and some Democrats) have been fighting Obama every step of the way; how can we know if Obama's policies would work if they aren't passed?

Final thought:  keep in mind our economy is not Obama's only worry.  Historians agree almost unanimously Bush was the second-worst President we've ever had, particularly concerning foreign policy.  Not only does Obama have to fix Bush's mess at home, he has to fix it across the entire world.  Our reputation among the world's governments suffered horribly during Bush's eight years, and the eighteen months since Obama took office is hardly enough to fix that.

The people really responsible for our continued economic problems are Congress, who cannot agree on anything, primarily because many Republicans seek to discredit Obama at every turn.

If you think I'm making this up, please see the memo sent by Republican leader Michael Steele and other strategists to Republican members of both Houses (CBS news at http://tinyurl.com/26mmnrc).  This is public information now; in the memo, Republicans are given various parliamentary and other strategies to stop any legislation proposed by Obama (primarily health care but also other proposed legislation), with no consideration whether the policy is any good or not.  Also see the Facebook group "Stop Obama" and the group StopObama,org, among others.  I cannot remember any worse vitriol directed at our presidents, ever.

In short, I don't see how we can blame Obama for our current mess because a) he hasn't been around long enough to fix pre-existing problems, and b) nor has he been around long enough to create any new ones.  What we can blame him for is not keeping some of his campaign promises, a big one being more transparency in government.  Where is that?