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Jun-24-09
 | | Phony Benoni: <playgrund player> None at all. I'd be perfectly happy if it just kept score and compiled the stats for me; those chores are what ususally made me quit. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | playground player: <Phony Benoni> I can't believe I used to sit there and compile ERAs without even a pocket calculator! I must've been going through a rough patch in life. Still, it was fascinating to see how close they were to "real life" (if baseball can be said to be real life). <To Whom It May Concern> Anyone in here ever play in a Chess 960 (Fischerrandom) tournament? A friend of mine wants to set one up on his internet site, and has asked me to inquire among the CG community. Do they arrange it so that all pairs of players have to play with the same random arrangement of pieces, so as to equalize matters (as in duplicate bridge, where all teams have to play the same hands so that their scores can be compared meaningfully)? Of course, it has been eons since I played duplicate bridge. They've probably changed it--brought in a designated hitter or something. |
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Jun-25-09
| | Phony Benoni: <playground player> I played in a few blitz Chess 960 tournaments on ICC, and believe that each game started with a unique position. There was certainly no comparison of results between White only and Black only, as there would be in duplicate bridge. I played a bit of dupoicate myself years ago, even picking up one-seventh of a Master point. But it's not my game. What I hate is being yelled at by my partner--and even my opponents--for being an idiot. Even if I'm sure I made the right play, they still yell at me and I'll take it. No fun at all. My father, who was a computer operator back in the 1950s (yes, the <1950s>) once brought home an old manual adding maching. No electricity. No tape. You just punched the keys and the answers showed up in little windows at the bottom. You could only do addition, but I managed to figure out a way to efficiently calculate batting averages with it. I could proably describe the process, but it doesn't seem worth the time. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | Jim Bartle: I was the umpire for a six-team Pony League back before hand-held calculators came out. One night I took all the scorecards home and figured the stats. The kids were all over it, looking at every detail. And what was interesting was that many of the flashiest players, the hardest throwers and most powerful hitters, did not have the best records. They looked good, but less impressive-looking but more efficient players were better. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | Deus Ex Alekhina: I have some good news & some bad news for all you Cubs fans. First, the good news: the Cubs will be in the World Series!! Now the bad news: they will be playing the Tigers. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | Travis Bickle: <Deus Ex Alekhina> If you think The Cubs will be in The Series you are drunker than a monkey! |
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Jun-25-09
| | Phony Benoni: On Tuesday, Maggio Ordonez returned from a wee-long "benching", and went 0 for 3. Wednesday afternoon, before the game, he had his famous flowing locks cut off. That night, he got two hits. Today, he hit his first home run since April.
I expect the Tigers to announce the hiring of a new team barber tomorrow morning. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | Jim Bartle: A wee-long benching? That sounds like about two minutes. |
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Jun-25-09
| | Phony Benoni: We have got to get a spell checker around here. There have been too many goof-ups by our local wizards and sorceresses. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | Jim Bartle: Goblins. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | Jim Bartle: My favorite typo was on the Karpov page, where somebody was arguing he was the equal of Kasparov because he was doing well in a match: "Karpov was in the lad until..." |
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Jun-25-09
| | Phony Benoni: Believe it or not, library catalogs have typos as well. There's even a discussion list devoted to the topic. Yesterday, typos on the spelling of Ernest Hemingway's name came up, particularly "Hemmingway". I mangaed to find a couple of examples where the letter "w" was left out. But my favorite library typo of all time came in a catalog record for a segment from The Flintstones television show. It was called "Little Bamm-Bamm", and someone had written this summary. <Tells how Wilma and Barney got their son, Bamm-Bamm.> Wilma, you'll remember, was married to Fred. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | Jim Bartle: Maybe there was a reason Fred got tossed out along with Dino every night. |
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| Jun-25-09 | | Travis Bickle: <Phony Benoni: I mangaed..(managed)Spell Check haha! |
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Jun-26-09
 | | keypusher: <Jim Bartle: While moving I found a copy of the Bill James book on managers, which I not only didnt know I had, I didnt even know existed. In any case, he had a rough rating system for managers, based on certain benchmarks for each season. In 1997 LaRussa rated No. 31 all-time, but a quick calculation shows him at No. 6 now, the only manager in the top ten from the past forty years. Didnt check Bobby Cox, though.> Who was #1? Joe McCarthy? I seem to remember reading somewhere that James was very high on him. Any other surprises? How did Connie Mack rate? I'm curious because I think he wound up with a losing record overall...but would rate very high if he had retired in 1914 or so. |
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| Jun-26-09 | | Jim Bartle: The list was largely based on longevity, and only includes positives, no points lost for negatives. Here's the top ten: McGraw, Mack, McCarthy, Stengel, Alston, Sparky Anderson, Weaver, Harry Wright, Durocher, McKechnie. This was from 1996. LaRussa and Cox would now be rated #6 to 8. |
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Jun-26-09
| | keypusher: By the way, this is a great forum, <Phony Benoni>. I had better stay away from here. |
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Jun-26-09
| | Phony Benoni: Interesting that of James' top ten, McGraw was probably the best player as well as the #1 manager. It's rare for great players to become great managers. |
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| Jun-26-09 | | Jim Bartle: Well, what about Maury Wills then?
I should emphasize that James' list was just a summary of the accomplishments of each manager's teams. He wasn't trying to say these were the top ten managers of all time. He gave one point for each season with: a winning record; 20 games over .500; 100 wins; division championship; pennant winner; and World Series winner. So a team with a 100-win season which won the Series would receive 6 points, while a 92-70 season coming in second would get 2 points. |
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Jun-26-09
| | Phony Benoni: Thanks for the clarification. The one criterion I might question is the extra point for division champion. which seems an unfair advantage for current teams. Still there were a good selection of pre-division managers in the top ten. How Harry Wright got in boggles my mind. He managed from 1871-1895, which meant no post-season play. And for a good portion of that time, his teams didn't even play 100 games in a year. By the way, I tried to figure out Joe Toree and got a total of 55. How does that rate? |
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| Jun-26-09 | | Jim Bartle: 55 points would put Torre 4th, behind McCarthy's 71 and ahead of Stengel at 52 and Alston at 51. James justifies including the division championships by saying there are many more teams today, and thus more competition. |
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Jun-26-09
| | Phony Benoni: Well, I'm not one to argue with Bill James.
But now I'm trying to figure out how Casey Stengel got 52. Here's his managerial record: http://www.baseball-reference.com/m... Winning record: 13 (Braves 1937, Yankees 1949-1960)
20 games over .500: 11 (1949-1958, 1960)
100+ wins: 1 (1954)
Pennants: 10 (1949-1953, 1955-1958, 1960)
World Series: 7 (1949-1953, 1956, 1858)
That adds up to 42 in my book. If you count each pennant as a division win as well, that would make 52. |
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| Jun-26-09 | | Jim Bartle: Looks like you're right. I'm trying to read the text, see where either he screwed up or I got the rules wrong. I think he made a mistake, as he says winning the World Series without winning 100 games is worth 5 points, though by his rules that would be 4 points before the divisions exist. 42 points would only drop him into a tie for 6th with Earl Weaver and Harry Wright, being passed by Alston and Sparky Anderson. |
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Jun-26-09
| | Phony Benoni: Just did Joe McCarthy, who has 71 points:
Winning 22
20+ 18
100+ 6
Pennant 9
World Series 7
That's 62; add nine for pennants as division champs, and you get 71. Looks like that's definitely what he's doing. |
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| Jun-26-09 | | Jim Bartle: Yikes! Mets infield commits three errors in the second inning vs. the Yankees. This after last week, when their second baseman dropped A-Rod's easy popup with two down in the ninth, turning an 8-7 win into a 9-8 loss in five seconds. |
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