The Formidable Aura of Gammonsology

It's amazing to me that Peter Gammons still has a job, when he continues to write things like this:

"The Philadelphia Phillies are primed to repeat as champs."

Gammons, master prognosticator, has determined that the Phillies, one of three teams (at the time of the writing) still eligible to win the World Series, might win it!

The Phillies wait a week for the World Series, which may rest their pitching staff, and may or may not cool the hitters that pummeled the Dodgers. As the rain beat down Saturday morning in the Northeast, they didn't know if their next game was at Yankee Stadium or The Big A, but it really doesn't matter, because whomever they play had better be ready for the best American League team that plays its regular season in the National League.

I'm pretty sure Peter is confusing the verb " may" with the verb "will". The Phillies' delay before the World Series will cause their pitching staff to be rested (the wait itself did not "rest" the pitching staff); there is no doubt about that. Furthermore, stating that the wait "may" cool the hitters is sufficient, since the word "may" by itself implies that the alternative is also possible. For example, if I say "Peter Gammons may be the worst writer in the history of the Internet," I am implying that it is also possible that he is not (though this is doubtful). Also, "the best American League team that plays its regular season in the National League" is so trite and unnecessarily verbose that I'm now dumber for having read it. Can't he just say "the Phillies play an American League style?" Of course, that's also a dumb thing to say; most teams that play in a bandbox have a lot of home run hitters, regardless of whether they're in the AL or the NL.

How much the Phillies deserved their 2008 World Series rings got a little waterlogged because so many followed the Tampa Bay series on Doppler radar. And while the Rays had won the AL East and defeated the Red Sox and White Sox to get to the Series, there was some fairy-tale perception that further slighted the Phillies' accomplishments.

"Doppler radar?" "Fairy-tale perception?" These are nonsense terms with regard to baseball. Also, he's using classic politician-speak, intentionally ambiguating who, exactly, were the "so many" and who had this "fairy-tale perception" because, guess what? It was Gammons himself leading the Rays fellatio party (and, by extension, "slighting the Phillies' accomplishments"). See my post here, where Peter calls the series "the worst ever". Perhaps the Phillies felt slighted by this, Mr. Gammons?

But make no mistake this year: The Phillies can win the World Series, whether it's against the Yankees or the Angels.

Peter Gammons, boldly going where no man has gone before: predicting that one of the two World Series entrants "can" win the World Series. I find it ironic that he refuses to predict an actual winner, presumably for fear that he will be called out if he is wrong, yet he has no problem writing absolute crap, presumably because he has absolute carte blanche at ESPN.

He spends the next couple of paragraphs reviewing some legitimate reasons why the Phillies are good and can win, which is funny because he's waiting until they've already made the World Series before brashly explaining why they're good enough to win. Again, Peter, just because you stiffed them last year doesn't mean they got no credit for winning, or that they have no chance this year. Then he produces a couple of REALLY important reasons why the Phillies will win:

"...they have played on the Fox stage..."

Do players really react differently depending on which NETWORK is broadcasting their games?

"they had the best road record in baseball (48-33) and aren't likely to be intimidated by the formidable aura of Yankeeology."

Shane Victorino: Hey, coach, can I talk to you for a second?
Charlie Manuel: Yeah, Shane, what's up?
SV: I'm worried about the World Series.
CM: But we won last year. We can do it again!
SV: Yes, but this year we are playing against the Yankees.
CM: Listen, the goal is to get to the World Series. That means, in our case, facing the best team from the AL every year. Last year, it was the Rays, and this year it's the Yankees.
SV: But coach, you don't understand! We're going up against the formidable aura of Yankeeology! I'm intimidated!
CM: Ah, but you see, we had the best road record in baseball. Thus, the formidable aura of Yankeeology (which means the study of Yankees, by the way) shall not intimidate us.
SV: Ohhh. I get it. Thanks, Coach!

The fact that Brad Lidge (4 IP, 1 H, 0 R), Ryan Madson (6 IP, 8 K) and Chad Durbin (4 IP, 0 R) have pulled the bullpen together in the postseason, with J.A. Happ and Chan Ho Park, give them the wherewithal to steal a couple of 7-5, 9-6 games.

There are two incredibly basic grammatical errors in this sentence. First, the prepositional phrase "with J.A. Happ and Chan Ho Park" is misplaced, and frankly I don't know why it's there. Are they good relievers? Did they also pull the bullpen together? Second, "the fact" is a singular subject, so when Gammons finally gets around to the verb, it should be "gives", the singular form, not "give." This would be a moderately difficult question on the SAT. You know, that test that most high-schoolers have to take. You might think that Gammons would raise his game to give the aspiring sportswriters of tomorrow a role model to look up to, but he can't even master the fundamental rules of the English language.

Layoffs affected the 2006 Tigers and 2007 Rockies, and so, too, the Phillies may not be the same come Wednesday. But they are much more experienced than those other two teams, so the rust should never sleep. Bring on the Yankees, bring on the Angels; the Phillies are going to make for a fun November.

Another classic Gammons-ism: hedging the bet. "The Phillies CAN win the World Series, but this is why they might not." Also, another Gammons classic, the retarded mixed metaphor. "The rust should never sleep?" Really? I didn't know rust could sleep.

Then Gammons goes into "Leftover notes from the ALCS", of which one is particularly noteworthy.

2. It doesn't take Sandy Koufax to tell us the Dodgers need a No. 1 starter, but they aren't likely to get one this offseason.

Ok, cute, but I get it, Sandy Koufax himself WAS a No. 1 starter, so presumably he'd know a No. 1 starter if he saw one. Obviously, the Dodgers lack a No. 1 starter. It's so obvious that you don't even need Sandy Koufax to tell you this. But wait! What about Billingsley and Kershaw? They were both pretty good this year, right?

No one seems to be able to say whether Chad Billingsley's leg affected his stuff, but he was not the same the past month.

First of all, why is he so damn wordy? Why can't he just say "No one knows whether..." instead of "No one seems to be able to say whether..." It's so sloppy and childish to add extra words. Second of all, this sentence seems to contradict his thesis, since he's implying that before the last month (when he was "not the same"), he was pretty damn good. Maybe even a No. 1 starter?

Clayton Kershaw has everything it takes to be a No. 1, but he is 21 years old, and the command is a work in progress. "Kershaw's going to be special," Brad Ausmus says. "He has everything it takes in terms of stuff and makeup and drive. Just give him time."

So...in other words, Kershaw is going to be a No. 1 starter. So, after stating that the Dodgers obviously need a No. 1 starter, Gammons proceeds to explain that they had one for most of this year, and another guy who's going to be one. Well played.

Finally, Gammons is such a flake who refuses to take a stand that he didn't even submit a World Series pick on ESPN.com. He did make playoff predictions along with all the other ESPN writers, and guess which team he picked to lose in the first round? (Hint: they had the best road record in baseball, and they are unlikely to be intimidated by the formidable aura of Yankeeology.)

The Chronological Misadventures of Peter Gammons

As usually happens with blogs, Joist and I slacked off on this one. Harping on one lousy writer, with some Buster on the side, is not exactly worthy of a long-term commitment. And we were mostly just amusing each other, anyway. But yesterday, Mr. Gammons posted an article on his blog that motivated me to resurrect this page, for two reasons: 1) it discusses, primarily, the firing of Eric Wedge, a topic that hits close to home for me; and 2) it contains an immense amount of factual inaccuracy and spuriousness, in addition to the usual grammatical and stylistic atrocities. It proves without a shadow of a doubt both that no one edits Peter Gammons, and that someone absolutely needs to. It also made me realize that Gammons -- a Hall of Fame baseball writer -- is overrated on an unprecedented scale. He has been given the highest honor in his field, but not only is he not all that great -- he is positively terrible at his job.

The headline:

Wedge not to blame for Indians' misfortune

So this article should be primarily about Eric Wedge. But if you know your Gammons, you know it could be a while before we read anything remotely relevant to Wedge. Until then, grab a drink and enjoy the tangential gibberish.

It was late May and the host asked, "Do you think the Red Sox will send Jon
Lester down to the minors?"
"Whaaa …" I stammered.
"He's not pitching well," the host continued. "Callers are saying he's got to go."
"He's 24, he's got the best stuff of any left-hander in baseball, he's won in the World
Series, he was an ace down the stretch last year, everyone believes he'll turn
it around, and if, by chance, he doesn't, the Red Sox don't make the playoffs."
"The callers and most of our anchors have had it," the host said.
"Bobby Knight was, as usual, right," I said. "If you listen to the guys in the stands, pretty soon you'll be sitting up there with them."

Peter Gammons loves telling dubious and completely unverifiable stories about his coversations with unnamed insiders. (As one commenter notes: "Peter, name a source for once - this is baseball, not national security.") This one occurred, apparently, on a radio station, so it should be more difficult for Peter to get away with making it up. And yet, it's bizarre -- were people really calling for the demotion of Jon Lester in May? His ERA was kinda high but he was pitching pretty well and hits were just dropping in. And Red Sox fans LOVE Lester. Sure enough, read the comments -- several Bostonian sportsradio listeners cast some serious doubt on this story. I mean, would any radio host say "the callers and [especially!] most of our anchors have had it"? Sports talk jocks don't call themselves "anchors." And the story of a host talking generally about how most of the hosts on his station feel just doesn't ring true. It's just not in the talk radio style. The whole thing is fishier than a Boston menu.

A smaller point, a tangent on the tangent: Isn't Gammons' suggestion that "if, by chance, he doesn't, the Red Sox don't make the playoffs" an argument for sending Lester down? I don't get it. Don't the Red Sox want to avoid not making the playoffs? Shhh, Peter, that's a rhetorical question.

Finally, note that in an article supposedly about something else, Gammons leads off talking about the Red Sox. No surprise there!

In late September of 2005, the Indians were closing on the White Sox, and
"SportsCenter" was leading with the story of the chase. The Indians were good
and they were hot, but a Chicago sports shock jock ranted about GM Kenny
Williams' being fired because he didn't trade for a hitter at the July 31
deadline. The fact that no significant hitter was traded at the deadline didn't
enter into the discussion.

And the White Sox won the World Series. Shouting is easy.

Ah, here we get some plain ol' bad writing, in classic Gammons style. You read this once, and for a second you might react in suprise, "Wait, Kenny Williams was fired in 2005? Isn't he still the GM now?" Then you remember to repair Gammons' broken English. He meant to say "the shock jock ranted that GM Kenny Williams should be fired," etc.

And: "Shouting is easy." How pithy, Peter. Duh, I'm being sarcastic, y'all! My point is that this phrase is desperately un-pithy precisely when he was trying to be pithy. A hallmark of bad writing.

Still no Wedgie...

Talk radio didn't approve of Red Sox players' coming back to Fenway Park for a
modest celebration after they backed into the AL wild card. I wore my Don
Mattingly Baseball Academy shirt Wednesday because Don Mattingly was a great
player, is an even better human being, and the only time he ever got to
celebrate a playoff berth in his career was in his final season when the Yankees
won the wild card.

Oh look, more Red Sox.

I did not combine these two sentences into the same paragraph. They were adjoined on espn.com, as you see them here. If you follow me a bit, I think that -- only because I am a renowned expert in deciphering Gammons! -- I can explain how the two sentences are related.
Peter wore the Mattingly shirt, you see, because winning the wild card in 1995 was tremendously special for Mattingly, because he finally made the playoffs in the final year of his long and distinguished career. Therefore, we learn from the shirt that winning "only" the wild card can be special and is nothing to laugh at, because it took a special guy like Mattingly umpteen years to win just that (yes, I know the wild card did not exist before 1995, just stay with me here). Therefore, finally, the Red Sox celebrating winning the wild card is perfectly reasonable.

However, the reason (I think) that "talk radio" thought the celebration ridiculous was the fact that the Red Sox, as Peter said, "backed into" the wild card in the midst of a long losing streak. The fact that it is only the wild card, as opposed to a division title, is irrelevant. (Don't get me wrong -- the alleged "talk radio" opinion is silly, because the Red Sox' wild card and their party both celebrated their season-long superiority, not just how they played in the last week.) So as usual, even after making the most possible sense out of Gammons, Gammons still makes no sense.

News today travels by cell phone or by satellite or over the Internet, and its
immediacy demands instant gratification for questions raised. The easy part of
the answer, of course, is fault.

Huh?

Gammons: "Damn kids and their lightning fast satellites."

Yes, I get that the gist of this is that it's easy to point fingers, and that Gammons is just trying to say this creatively. But Gammons' attempts at creative writing are just so mind-bogglingly disastrous.

Mark Shapiro never felt that the 2009 fall of the Cleveland Indians was Eric Wedge's fault, or that any other manager could have done better with Grady Sizemore and Jake Westbrook hurt, with Travis Hafner declining after shoulder surgery, and with an Ohio economy that after the Indians got to within a game of the 2007 World Series forced ownership to move the contracts of CC Sabathia, Victor Martinez and Cliff Lee, knowing that by the end of the 2010 season all would be gone to free agency.

Ah, finally, some mention of Eric Wedge and the Indians, introduced in a magnificent, cascading run-on sentence!

Here begins the chronological fuzziness, even if we have not quite reached the level of outright falsehood. This paragraph of a sentence seems to say that right after the 2007 ALCS, Shapiro had to dismantle an excellent team for purely economic reasons, ala the 1997 Marlins. This is not true. CC Sabathia was traded on July 7, 2008. At that time, the Indians were 37-51, 13.5 games out of first place. Sabathia was to come a free agent at the end of the season and was making $11 million in 2008 already. It made perfect sense, whatever the state of the Ohio economy, to trade Sabathia.

And why were the Indians out of contention on July 7. 2008, even with all the pieces still in place from their 2007 run? Because most of the bullpen arms, and that of Fausto Carmona, completely failed, possibly due to abuse they had sustained at the hands of Eric Wedge the previous season. Other young players also got worse instead of better under the tutelage of Wedge et al., such as Ryan Garko and Asdrubal Cabrera (although he rebounded in 2009). This is just some of the evidence in favor of Wedge's firing that Gammons ignores. More to come. Lee and Martinez, of course, were not traded until 2009, so juxtaposing those trades with the 2007 playoffs is even stranger.

The Jacobs family understands that Shapiro has developed an organization that
has inherent stability given its fiscal restraints in the free agent, amateur
and developmental markets. Even with this season's disappointments, the Indians'
stability has enabled them to twice win more than 90 games over the past five
season, beat the Yankees in an ALDS, get to within a game of the World Series
and maintain an average of 83 wins in a Rust Belt division in which 83 wins in
2009 would have kept them in contention until the final weekend.

Gross inaccuracy no. 1: Dick Jacobs no longer owns the Indians. Sadly, that wonderful savior of the Indians franchise is no longer even living. What any of his family members currently "understand" is plainly irrelevant to the discussion. He sold the team, at an inflated price, to the notoriously cheap and incompetent Dolan family.

Also, observe that this error reveals more than just the error itself. It proves that Gammons' statements regarding what ownership "understands" is complete, half-baked speculation and is not based on any actual interviews or inside information regarding ownership's feelings. It also demonstrates that Gammons is completely unaware of the biggest problem facing the Indians -- the stinginess and incompetence of the Dolan ownership, in contrast with the leadership with Dick Jacobs.

Moving on, does Gammons possess an even basic understanding of math? How does mathematically -- and arbitrarily! -- leveling out the seven years of Wedge's tenure into an 83-win average show the Indians' stability??

Grade-School Gammons: "Mommy! Based on what I learned in school today, I just averaged out all of these numbers. Look at how similar they are now! Isn't that fucking AMAZING?" (In my fantasy, Peter was a foul-mouthed child.)

Then consider that the ultimate result of this pointless mathematical endeavor is that the averaged-out-Wedgie Indians, in 2009 alone, would have been "in contention until the final weekend"... but still would have missed the playoffs in a lousy division. Your point??

Meanwhile, hitting "undo" on that pointless averaging, we see that the Indians finished under .500 in Wedge's first 3 season, jumped to 93 wins in 2005, plummetted back under .500 in 2006, lurched back up to 96 wins in 2007, collapsed to an even .500 in 2008 (only because of a September garbage-time rally), and finally collapsed yet further in 2009 in Wedge's worst season yet. Could a seven year tenure possibly be any less stable?

A constant refrain in the ongoing (excellent!) Ken Burns documentary on the National Parks is that words cannot describe the grandeur and beauty of, e.g., the Grand Canyon. Well, this article is the Grand Canyon of stupidity. There are no words.

But it wait, it gets worse.

When a team loses close to $20 million, when it struggles to win 70 games, when
it sees attendance at The Jake dwindle from close to 43,000 a game during a much
different time to 22,144 with staggering declines in both the population and job
markets, someone had to go. So Wedge was offered up to the fan base.

Reality is that when The Jake was full every night and the Indians were a nightly bash happening, the Ohio economy was far different. There was no NFL franchise. The Cavaliers played in the suburbs. LeBron James was 10 when the Indians played the Braves in the 1995 World Series.

This is where Gammons' timing gets really surreal. Sorry, not surreal -- false.

Let's make this simple. Actual timeline:

April 1994: Indians begin playing at Jacobs Field.
November 1994: Cavs begin playing at Gund Arena, across the plaza from the Jake.
June 7, 1995: Indians consecutive sellout streak begins.
November 6, 1995: Art Modell announces that he's moving the Browns to Baltimore.
March 1999: NFL announces the return of the Browns.
September 1999: Browns are back.
October 2000: Indians miss playoffs for the first time since 1993.
April 4, 2001: Sellout streak ends at 455 games.

The most glaringly false thing about Gammons' list of excuses, of course, is his suggestion that the Cavs played "in the suburbs" while the Indians were selling out games. I have heard him say this on ESPN on tv (whereas Gammons usually restricts his more extreme stupidity to print). It's just not even close to true; the Cavs played mere yards away from the Indians at the time. The Cavs did stink then; but the more salient fact is that the Indians did not stink.
(Plus, even if the factual predicate weren't false -- where does Gammons think the Indians fans come to games from? Two blocks down Carnegie Avenue? East Cleveland? Nobody lives in Cleveland proper nowadays. No, they drive in from the suburbs.)

The Browns point is less inaccurate, but not much more convincing. The Indians sold out most of their games in 1995, before anyone knew of Art Modell's nefarious plans (the Browns had actually made the playoffs in the previous season). They continued to sell out for 2 full seasons after the Browns' return was announced, and over one full season after the Browns actually started playing games again.

Yes, the economy in Ohio has gone to the deep south in the last couple years. But the attendence plummetted way back in 2002... when the Indians started losing. Are you starting to get the pattern? The Indians problem under Wedge has been losing, and the manager has to be held responsible at some point for losing, especially when there are very specific reasons to believe that he bears some blame.

But don't look to Gammons for any meaningful or specific discussion of Wedge's actual performance. Applying reductio ad absurdum to Gammons' claptrap, if a manager can't be fired for woefully underperforming expectations; for consistently underperforming run-loss differential (which is very hard to do -- Wedge has been amazing at disappointing Indians fans); for having young players consistently become worse under his watch (cf. Peralta, Garko, Carmona, Francisco, Shoppach, Rafael Perez, Sowers, Jensen Lewis, Andy Marte, Josh Barfield etc. etc); for biannual bullpen implosions; and for just all-around sloppy, mistake-prone play... then a manager could never be fired. According to Gammons, baseball manager should be a lifetime appointment, like the Supreme Court.

Oh sorry, Wedge is also a lousy tactical game manager.

The Grand Canyon stretches out before me. No words.

The articles goes on a bit more about the Tribe and then moves on to other topics. There's probably a lot more atrocious writing and factual inaccuracies, but I don't have the time or the patience. Perhaps Joist wants to continue the resurrection...