Commentary:
Fantasies meant for bedroom, not ballpark
Casey Michel
Issue date: 3/28/08 Section: Sports
As someone more famous than me once said, "Life has its poetry." It's a good phrase, but, being the entitled English major that I am, I'm going to fix it up a bit: "Life has its irony." Granted, I completely changed the meaning of the original phrase, but "irony" happens to be the word that captures the essence of a situation I encountered last Saturday - at least better than any Yeats ode or Eminem ballad ever could.
With a brilliant afternoon beaming through my windows, March Madness was busy lighting up the faces of me and my friends. Couch sagging, eyes focused and Duke-hate-mongering all around, the holidays of hoops had arrived.
But as my gaze wandered during an AT&T interlude, I noticed my roommate perusing an article that had nothing to do with O.J. Mayo's altruism or Dick Vitale's Diaper Dandies (the awesome freshman class, not a Depends surprise). In fact, the content of the article was the antithesis of the team-first focus that college basketball has worked so hard in developing - fantasy sports, the essence of individualism and the bane of my existence.
More specifically, it was about baseball, the original team sport.
Yes, life has its irony.
While I could insert some trite joke about fantasy sports not actually having anything to do with Jenna Jameson pitching to Tommy Lee (with Pamela Anderson as the catcher), I'm sure everyone now knows what this bile entails. During the season-opening "draft," a group of stat geeks gather in a set location to select, one by one, the best players of the league. Graphs, whiteboards and scouting magazines often litter a dank basement as the guys get dolled up in their Devil Ray emerald and Oakland Athletic yellow.
While I will always hold America's pastime in higher regard than, say, world peace, I don't know if I can ever forgive it for giving us a man who spawned such an evil: Bill James, the bearded bastion of baseball blunders. James helped introduce the field of "sabermetrics," the numerical analysis of absolutely everything baseball, whose end result was turning players into Borg entities (yes, I just pulled out a Star Trek reference).
With a brilliant afternoon beaming through my windows, March Madness was busy lighting up the faces of me and my friends. Couch sagging, eyes focused and Duke-hate-mongering all around, the holidays of hoops had arrived.
But as my gaze wandered during an AT&T interlude, I noticed my roommate perusing an article that had nothing to do with O.J. Mayo's altruism or Dick Vitale's Diaper Dandies (the awesome freshman class, not a Depends surprise). In fact, the content of the article was the antithesis of the team-first focus that college basketball has worked so hard in developing - fantasy sports, the essence of individualism and the bane of my existence.
More specifically, it was about baseball, the original team sport.
Yes, life has its irony.
While I could insert some trite joke about fantasy sports not actually having anything to do with Jenna Jameson pitching to Tommy Lee (with Pamela Anderson as the catcher), I'm sure everyone now knows what this bile entails. During the season-opening "draft," a group of stat geeks gather in a set location to select, one by one, the best players of the league. Graphs, whiteboards and scouting magazines often litter a dank basement as the guys get dolled up in their Devil Ray emerald and Oakland Athletic yellow.
While I will always hold America's pastime in higher regard than, say, world peace, I don't know if I can ever forgive it for giving us a man who spawned such an evil: Bill James, the bearded bastion of baseball blunders. James helped introduce the field of "sabermetrics," the numerical analysis of absolutely everything baseball, whose end result was turning players into Borg entities (yes, I just pulled out a Star Trek reference).
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Viewing Comments 1 - 2 of 2
Carlos
posted 4/01/08 @ 6:13 PM CST
Casey,
First of all, baseball is not the ultimate team sport. How would you explain A-Rod winning the MVP with a last place team? Basebal values individual achievements and awards, such as MVPs, Cy Youngs, Rookies of the Year, Gold Gloves, batting titles, HR championship, RBI leader, etc, more than any other "team" sport. (Continued…)
Carlos
posted 4/01/08 @ 6:38 PM CST
Stats are the only thing that keeps fans interested in baseball for 162 games. Who would watch the sorry Mariners or (Devil) Rays if not to watch Ichiro and Crawford nab a base every so often? Sit players when they face your favorite team if that will help you from having a rooting interest in the opposing team. (Continued…)
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