Coupla Fridays

Hooray! The week is over and here comes the weekend! (And, in my case, a trip to Ottawa for some frozen debauchery.) Want to ruin your weekend before it even begins? Consider this late addition to our Podunk Times series, a quote about ex-Mancrush Brett Cecil.

Growing up, Cecil rooted for the Yankees and watched players like Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriquez.

A few years later, he is pitching against the very same players.

We really could've been something Brett.

Attendance Issues

An anonymous commenter came late to the attendance party I held a few weeks back. This commenter made an interesting suggestion:

What about looking at it in terms of the amount spent by each organization in relation to the number of spectators each team has at home games.

Interesting but I don't think there's a connection to make there. The correlation between winning and spending is weak enough, as is the connection between winning and attendance. Removing the common bond of "winning" should only complicate matters. If anything, fans are less likely to trek to see and expensive underperforming club over a predictably shitty team.

The ever-excellent DRays Bay published a series of three posts on attendance the zillion factors that influence it. They consider regional income among other things. One really interesting point/stat is Att+. Consider their definition:

Much like the statistic OPS+, Att+ (or "Attendance Plus") is a measure of how a team's attendance figure compared to the league average for that season. One-hundred is league average; scores lower than 100 are below league average and scores higher are above average

Cool stuff. For shits and giggles, the Jays average Att+ for the decade
is 83, or 17 percent below league average. Tied with the Twins, just behind the A's and Reds. Two of those teams made the playoffs on a semi-consistent basis. Don't believe them when they say this isn't a baseball town.

Awesome image courtesy of BlogTO contributor Jonathon Castellino

When Everybody Wins

With the Jays rapidly distancing themselves from the HGH scandal orchestrating a "like for like" swap that sends Very Tall Troy Glaus to St. Louis for the equally mammoth and highly disgruntled Scott Rolen, I am left to think about the nature of baseball trades. Usually they fit the mold of "overpriced old guy for unproven young guys" while the rare and shocking "reprint the media guide, can you believe this just happened" two stars for two stars blockbuster is the exception to the rule.

Declaring a winner in most trades is easy for two reasons: most prospects don't pan out and the player to be named later is rarely named later.

An ESPN chat with Rob Neyer Friday had me thinking of a trade that should go down as one of the best. For everyone. The 8-player monster that sent Josh Beckett, Guillermo Mota, and Mike Lowell (coming off a season of abject failure while sporting a massive contract) to Boston in exchange for highly-touted prospect Hanley Ramirez and the rest of the Hannah Montana cast.
Note: One of the kids DID pitch a no-hitter, but was sent down and eventually missed a full year with a torn labrum.

Boston benefits in the most obvious way possible.


So they win, right? I'm not convinced. Is it my deeply ingrained hatred of all things crimson hose? Or is it the fact that Hanley Ramirez is the best player in the National League?



Beckett is still young and nasty, and getting out the Florida humidity seems to have ended his blister problems. Mike Lowell is found money. Not found money that stalks you with a cattle gun, ultimately seeing you shot in cold blood but found money that becomes World Series MVP and then tells the Yankees to lick it's balls.


I know what you are thinking: "Best player in the National League? Isn't that like being the coolest guy in your WoW guild?" Perhaps it is, but when you put up numbers like: 154 games .332 29 HR 81 RBI 125 runs 51 steals on a last-place team in a cavernous ballpark with 8000% humidity you are doing something right. Those numbers at the top of the Red Sox already murderous lineup? You could sign a certain rubber-armed junkballer and still win by a touchdown every night.

When Florida wins the 2010 World Series (as is their pattern) this trade will be cemented as one of the all-time greats. Right up until the moment the Marlins flip Hanley Ramirez to the Angels (or big money team X) for a plucky bunch of up-and-comers and Vlady Guerrero's dirty-ass helmet.