Bulimic Bucs

Derek Jacques works an extended lady-vomit metaphor in this notebook entry.

...my first impression of this piece was, "OK." Upon further review, however, instant replay clearly shows that the following paragraph is lazy or stupid:

But excitement is somewhat beside the point here. Littlefield apparently believes that his ballclub is at the stage where it needs to be supplemented with some veteran talent to rise to the next level. Based on recent research by Nate Silver, we’d have to disagree with that assessment, since the benefits of going from a 67 win team to a 77 win team aren’t likely to make a big difference to Pittsburgh’s bottom line.

First, excitement is never beside the point. All hail excitement!

Second, Littlefield has not made a lot of noise about veteran talent beyond the typical stuff. For example, on Roberto Hernandez:

"We like [closer] Mike Gonzalez a lot, but it doesn't hurt to have another option. Roberto is a veteran guy with a proven track record in late-inning situations."

And have you heard anything about veteran talent taking us to the next level? Littlefield, from the same article:

"We've made some improvements but when you're coming off a 67-95 season you've got a long way to go," he said.

So Jacques has his platitudes mixed up. Littlefield has not been indicating that the acquisiton of veterans like Hernandez will take the team to the next level. Rather, he's been repeating the humble fact that the Bucs still probably suck even with the addition of veteran insurance policies like Hernandez.

Finally, why promote Silver's analysis of the 77-win vs. 67-win team and the bottom line? It just does not follow. To get to 87 wins, the team has to get to 77 wins first.

Maybe Littlefield is worried, first and foremost, about the bottom line. But it makes no sense to criticize the Bucs for trying to get better. A 77-team may be mediocre, but it beats a 67-win team. Perhaps Jacques meant to write that BP disagrees with his assessment that some veterans will help make the team more mediocre. As it stands, though, he argues that the Pirates should not even bother trying to improve marginally, since marginal improvements are not likely to improve the bottom line. And that's just dumb.

I've long been a proponent of the theory that only winning sells tickets. Search the archives; I've said that again and again and again since we started this blog in 2003 1903. The team has to get to mediocre before they can get to good.