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But the little sniff that "Appeal to authority is a logical fallacy" (gag) works only in a university classroom with 21-year-olds who would like to think that they could run a world that they haven't even met yet.  
Nobody with any authority in a winning real-world organization thinks like that.  They're all busy paying top dollar for expertise.
I just let a surgeon cut my guts open because I had reason to believe he knew what he was doing.  You could find 9,000 other examples of "appeal to authority," respect for expertise, in our lives every day.
When Steve Jobs said "this device will sell" and "that device won't sell" he was not infallible.  But his projection was worth a whale of a lot more than yours or mine, amigo.  F-500 companies pay billions to invest in projects essentially because of that "logical fallacy" that you sniff at.  No, sorry, you and I with our 3.9 GPA's are not equal to the legends of the game.
Like I said originally, if you've got hard facts that call the authority's judgment into question, facts that TRUMP an intuition that indeed is fallible, then you most definitely use those facts.  But this total lack of any respect whatsoever, for the accomplishments of people who are the best in the world at what they do, is merely a beginner's attempt to put himself on equal footing with people who have won games that he never has played.  We mean it in a good way.
.............
I'm wide open to an intelligent case that the industry over-values the Paul Konerkos, Shin-Soo Choo's and David Ortizes of the game.  But any child can see that the INDUSTRY - not a majority of GM's, but the INDUSTRY - pays 100 RBI men twice their Fangraphs value.
It's not a question of an antiquated arb system.  Shin-Soo Choo is gonna get paid, my friend.  And by Billy Beane if he's got the dough.

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