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When Whitey Herzog took over the Cardinals around 1980, he decided he had to get Ted Simmons, Pete Vuckovich and Rollie Fingers out of his locker room.  (For you kiddies out there, this would be loosely comparable to Davey Johnson taking over the 2013 Angels and deciding he wanted Jered Weaver, C.J. Wilson and Albert Pujols off his team.)  Herzog called Harry Dalton in Milwaukee and asked him, How would you like to win the pennant next year?  Dalton's reply was classic.  He deadpanned, "I'd like that fine."

Supposing that the Seattle Mariners won the World Series next year in a 4-game sweep.  Would that be all right with you?  

Let's say that Zduriencik brought in Josh Hamilton, that Paxton and Erasmo had big years, that the Mariners posted a 107 ERA+ and 95 OPS+.  Let's say they Pythag'ed 88 wins, had 88 wins' worth of run differential, but actually won 94 due to an excellent bullpen, some rawhide-tough hitting in close games, and/or some random luck.

Here's the question.  As sabermigos, would you take joy in that?  Or would your "knowledge" that the M's weren't the best team spoil a lot of it for you?  Wouldn't spoil any of it for me:  my saber-mig'ing would enhance my appreciation of a championship.  Will tell you exactly why.

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=== Point Counterpoint "You Ignorant Misguided Feeb" Dept. ===

Brian Sabean, having won two World Series in three years, chortles about a victory for tools scouting.  Baseball Girl tears him a new one.  I mean you think we get pithy around here?  Check that article out...

Baseball Girl's basic premise is, hey, let's not get carried away here, Brian.  You spent $117M and won 94 games.  The A's spent $55M and won 94.  Let's not declare the Computer Revolution dead yet.  That premise is, obviously, rock solid.  You go girl.

She goes on, however, to ask "Bruce? Pumpkin?"  (HEH!!) Did you realize that the only thing you did that the A's didn't, was win 9 more games in the playoffs and "was that due just to better luck"?

Not wishing to misrepresent that blog, we're talking about a growing sentiment among sabertistas -- that winning a World Series gives you exactly zero to brag about.  In fact, the implication almost seems to be that the 2012 Giants just had a year they should be ashamed of, at least relative to the A's.

It's a reaction to an overstatement, of course, which are mitigating circumstances.  An old sensei once taught me, if you want to get somebody to take an overly extreme position, just hit them with the opposite extreme position ... 

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=== Founding Father Dept. ===

On the other side of the ball, here's Bill James on the Giants' ... um, DYNASTY?!

I reread portions of your Dynasties article to see what the Giants still need to do to be regarded as a dynasty under your system. As I understand it, they earned five points for their 2010 championship, but they lost two points in 2011 for failing to get into the playoffs or win 90 games (they won 86) leaving them with a two year running total of three points. After winning the World Series this year they are back up to 8 points. If they only win their division next year with 90 or more games, that would give them 2 more points and a running total of 10 points for the period 2010-2013 thus qualifying them as a dynasty. Is this correct?

Asked by: Michael Skarpelos

Answered: 10/30/2012

I believe so.   Two World Series titles is a big deal.   If they can do anything at all to build on that, they deserve to be listed among the great teams of history. 

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Sabermigos complain about the view of sabermetricians that they "need to catch a game sometime."  Of course sabermigos watch as much baseball as anybody else.  But it's this kind of thing that does imply that they are losing the thread of what on-field competition is for.

The basic complaint here is, "The Giants don't get to declare sabermetrics dead."  Well, sure.   The Giants' championships don't resolve such a discussion.  There's no closure here.

Am not sure they were doing that, exactly.  But the follow-on complaint is, "The Giants don't get to brag about winning two World Series."  Actually they do get to brag.  And they get to brag about how they did it.

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=== It Depends On What Your Definition of IS is, Senator ===

It's one thing to have the best team on paper.  It's another thing to win a championship, and to become the champion.  

As Bobby Fischer put it, "It's not enough to be a good player.  You also gotta play good."  That's what the PGA Masters tournament is for:  not to determine who is the theoretically-best player, but to determine which warrior walks out of the coliseum that day.

We asked James once, right before 2004, what he thought it took to win the World Series.  He said "Maybe it's like 30% who has the most talent, 30% whose roster is best constructed for a short series, 30% luck, and 10% some other factor."  It took the San Francisco Giants a whale of a lot of FORCE to suppress the teams that they suppressed, and it wasn't as simple as getting hot for two weeks.  Saying that they got hot for two weeks implies that it was totally up to fate, and not at all up to their ballclub to control their own destiny.

Felix Hernandez IS a step in the right direction, as it pertains to October baseball warfare.  Josh Hamilton would be, also.  There is such a thing as an athlete you'd prefer to have on the mound, or at the plate, when 100 million people are watching the game.  When sabermetricians argue that it is now ONLY about WAR, that personality does not factor into the discussion, then they do open themselves up to the "watch a game sometime" protest.

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=== Don't Ask the Question If You Don't Want to Hear the Answer, Dept. ===

The San Francisco Giants have kicked booty and taken names.  Local blogs have asked how they did it; it's an appropriate question, one that can lead to light bulbs.  And shouldn't we listen, at least, to the Giants' own answer?

"Hey, we used our intuition.  That was the big key to our finding Pagan and Melky and Scutaro and these other guys.  We didn't choose them because we saw stats other people didn't see.  We chose them because our judgment told us they were going to have good years."

Maybe the Giants do have better judgment than other teams.  Pat Gillick did.  Maybe Sabean does too.  I wonder why this possibility is so distasteful to sabermigos?

..............

If Jack Zduriencik manages to find 25 guys who can win 11 games in October, against the ferocious level of competition that he will face, he'll get a ring for it.  And he'll deserve it.

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