ESPN "analysts": room temp IQs all around?

Kaufman and I both came up with VOR re Kruk, hence KK is a genius.

lol@them!

RIP

Well, HR's butterknife insight is made for ppl who don't care about baseball.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=Wf1Vg9YwBqA

Kruk's Oliver Hardy take at the mention of "WHIP" and "advanced metrics" last night was priceless.

I wonder if Steve Philips will answer my chat question?

he did NOT!

"Steve, how are the D-Backs holding onto first place without any Veteran Presence in the lineup?"

i don't know anything about baseball, but these guys make me want to bang my head on an immobile object

this is kindof a fantastic sequence all around w/ the fattey mets fan pointing out the ball being fair

i mean if i didnt have to listen to joe morgan blubbering repeat himself 7times

i like the "<player> batting .290 in 3-0 counts" thing up above the score...

"the big city" is like the political version of "big guy"

"the Mets may need to start bunting b/c Wang is ON today" lolz

when the ball is down, you actually see just as much of it as when it's up in the zone

"and the curve of the earth"

Vinaisms

"Hands back, head down, barrel out, boom. Punto with the power."

"Glove down, get the hop, hose."

"Straight back, straight thighs, force play, guy's a stud."

"Ellis -- I mean what can you say, guy's one of the most underrated players in all of baseball, wants to win for those Oakland A's, plays hard. Look at the extension."

"Eck comes to play and here's another example. Didn't get two hands on it but that's OK."

"If I'm gonna go down and get that curve, 0-2 count but I'm protecting the plate, gotta keep my head down, not pull up on it, hands back, don't get ahead of myself, maybe foul it off, prevent the strikeout, create opportunities for my team to win."

Paraphrasing Kruk a few minutes ago, over footage of Cardinals trying to win a baseball game, including Looper accepting pinch hitting role and running (instead of jogging briskly!) to first base on ground ball: "THESE CARDINALS ARE GOING TO STAY IN IT BECAUSE THEY ARE TRYING TO WIN BASEBALL GAMES."

lol @ fernando vina

chris singleton continuing the trend...

"Hands back, head down . . ."

http://archive.southcoasttoday.com/daily/06-96/06-04-96/forearm.jpg

"Sometimes sacrificing your body like that is something you have to do if you are going to compete. Get the runner, play solid defense behind your pitcher who is trying to keep your team in the game, prevent runs."

Hi guys, I am new to the baseball board but have partcipated on the music board a bit. On this topic, did anyone see earlier tonight during the angels/braves game when Joe Morgan tried to explain why mark texiera isnt hitting as well from both sides of the plate? that was completely mind-numbing. Even Jon Miller seemed a bit stunned at how little sense he was making. Vina and Singleton(and even Eric Young) are fine. But the two people who I simply cannot stand are Steve Berthiaume and Orestes Destrades. 100% cringeworthy.

I've pretty much resorted to watching ESPNEWS instead of BBTN to spare myself the "analysis"

...

Steve Phillips, Buster Olney suck at predicting:

http://vegaswatch.net/2008/09/evaluating-april-mlb-predictions-2008.html

I suck at predicting Ray Durham's performance. :(

You're still better at it than film criticism.

Who isn't?

And btw I want both McCain and Obama voters to stay home or "go elsewhere," just like the Phillies and/or Brewers. (oh, for a Mets WS trophy followed by a 269-269 electoral tie. nirvana.)

Go Cubbies, then, just for you.

i'm for Dodgers over Red Sox, but I'll take an L-series as runner-up

Want Tampa to beat basically whoever.

Do not want Red Sox, Angels, Dodgers, Mets or Cubs to win.

Last night's Baseball Tonight made me so angry.

Was Kruk praising the Twins for hitting to the score or something?

Wow, I didn't realize Steve Phillips was a midget!

Is this the first year that ESPN has put OPS on a hitter's standard stat line when they're at bat?

those were Espn dudes covering the Indy 500, right? so bad I had to turn the volume off.

yeah, though i wish they'd just show the 2 components separately since there's a pretty big difference between a .270/.320/.530 hitter and a .270/.400/.450 hitter

They probably don't want to overwhelm John Q. Fungo with two new numbers at once. (I know, the logic crumbles immediately, I just figure that's the suits' reasoning.)

oh, Orel Hershiser listing "clean players" like he knows who they are.

Memorial Day always good for carrying the jingoistic flag on bloody sportscasts. Good job, Phillips.

would you shut the fuck up plz

EASY GARDY

steve phillips is such a fucking retard

Expecting some expert two-out walk nonsense from Phillips after the break.

which manning is kay supposed to be, the former sports star or the other former sports star

that's not a "manningcast" it's just a pbp/color commentary booth

i have no idea how this is supposed to work but cone is Good

I think we can all agree that Ravech and Cone (or any other combination of verbal lifeforms) is an improvement over Vasgersian and A-Rod.

i still don't know how kay is allowed to speak in public he has a horrible voice

Thoughts on ESPN's top 100 players of all time list? No real surprises in the top ten, but it's cool to see so many recent players (80's, 90's 00's) in the top 25.

Didn't know about it till your post. The full list:

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/33145121/top-100-mlb-players-all

Not sure how much overlap with Posnanski's list...I like Mays at #1 better, though.

NTBT you cut ESPN a lot more slack than everyone else on the internet - i've seen nothing but complaints about recency bias and typical papi/jeets/mo worship

i sort of mentally threw out the list when ripken was ranked below ortiz and reduced to 2131 and "consistency" - i'm not a hardcore ripken fan (don't even really like the guy!) but it told me what i needed to know about the list

The one active player that seems like a stretch to me is Harper. Three or four more solid years, maybe, probably. But you still don't know what you'll get next year.

I haven't read the whole list yet. But I don't have a problem with recency bias. Baseball tends to exaggerate its history, and a newcomer gets the impression that the best games and players were around 50 or 100 years ago. I have no problem with people claiming that Mays or Aaron were the best ever -- but their primes were over 60 years ago. Compare that with the NBA or NFL, where there's more of a sense that today's players are the best there's ever been.

What I'm saying is that baseball's anti-recency bias is one reason for its image problem compared with other major sports and helps explain why its fanbase skews older.