Albert Pujols is Really Good, but...

Albert Pujols is not the greatest player in the history of baseball.

Now, his performance last night in Game 3 of the World Series was nothing short of epic.  Last night he was a phenom, hitting three home runs and becoming the third person to do so (Babe Ruth did it twice, Reggie Jackson did it once, as I'm sure you've been reminded repeatedly).  He's great.  He's the greatest Cardinal of my lifetime (I'm 22 and thus it's not even close) and one of the best players in Cardinals franchise history.  But he's not the greatest player ever.

In light of his inspired Saturday night, Larry Bowa claimed that if he had Babe Ruth on deck, Reggie Jackson in the hole, and Albert Pujols at the plate, he would walk Pujols.  Now that's just silly.  I'm even willing to be pragmatic and say that Pujols is close enough to the Bambino that I would not consider walking Ruth to get to Pujols, but let's be reasonable.  Albert Pujols is a really, really good player.  He's a great player.  He should make the Hall of Fame (I always hesitate to say he will make the Hall of Fame--all he needs is one unsubstantiated steroid allegation and it can all fall apart).  But he ain't Stan Musial.  He ain't even close to Babe Ruth.

For those of you who don't know just how good Babe Ruth is, let's just say you can't simply look at his numbers.  714 home runs is really good but it's not gargantuan on the surface.  But consider his peers.  In 1920, Babe Ruth hit 54 home runs: an impressive total by any measure (it's more than Albert has ever had in an individual season).  #2 in the league was George Sisler, himself a Hall of Fame player for the St. Louis Browns.  He had nineteen.  Babe Ruth nearly tripled the second best home run hitter in the American League.  Pujols has never done this.  Nobody has had this kind of dominance.

The most dominant player of my lifetime in baseball was Barry Bonds in the early 2000s (dominant not only in power numbers and whatnot, but dominant in that he had on-base percentages over .600 for seasons--that is not a typo).  Bonds never came close to tripling the next highest guy.  Bonds, often referred to erroneously as the greatest power hitter ever as a result of having the most home runs, had 1.28 times the home runs of Luis Gonzalez in his 73 home run season of 2001.  In 1920, Babe Ruth had George Sisler beat by 2.84 times.  Oh yeah, and Babe Ruth hit at least 54 three more times.  Oh, and for what it's worth, Babe Ruth was also one of the best pitchers in baseball before moving to the outfield so that he could reinvent hitting more frequently.  Basically, what I'm saying is that it isn't sacrilegious to compare Albert Pujols to Babe Ruth--it's just wildly inaccurate.

But anyway, Albert Pujols is awesome.  And now everybody is freaking out about how much money he's going to make in the off-season and how Albert Pujols is going to cash in.  Well, I hate to break it to everybody, but in spite of what the Jayson Werth signing may have suggested to you, MLB GMs aren't that dumb.  It's not as though somebody was only going to offer Pujols $20 million and now after one game that total is up to $30 mil.  Yesterday will have very little, if any, impact on how much Albert Pujols makes.  He's been playing for eleven years--his resumé has been written.

As a Cardinal fan, it actually makes me a bit worried.  Albert is going to cash in somewhere and I'm convinced that it will be in St. Louis--for way too much.  Albert deserves to get paid more than A-Rod got paid a decade ago, but the important caveat is Alex Rodriguez didn't deserve 10 years and $252 million in the first place.  Individual players matter because baseball is essentially a combination of a bunch of individual matchups, but one player doesn't matter that much.  WAR enthusiasts (and I am one) will often point out WAR (of which Albert is routinely at or near the top, because he's a damn good player as has been established by basically any metric) and note something to the effect of: "Oh, Albert Pujols has a WAR of 10 and they won the division by four games; therefore, Albert got them to the playoffs."  But what people often ignore is that 1. The money that would theoretically be saved on Pujols would be spent on something else which would improve WAR at other positions, and 2. There's generally other guys who make up for that total.  If that situation happened and Holliday or Berkman had WARs of eight, didn't he also get them in the playoffs?  That's not to say they're as good, because they aren't, but from a practical standpoint, it didn't matter.  Pujols can't survive without contributions from other players just as they can't survive without him.

To test my theory on WAR, I looked at the eleven seasons in which Albert Pujols has played for the Cardinals.  Of his seven playoff seasons, his WAR exceeded the team's margin of getting into the playoffs four times.  Which is cool.  But in how many of those seasons did he directly make the difference, even just in compared to the replacement level (for those unfamiliar with the concept, imagine a situation in which he's lost for the year and replaced by Mark Hamilton).

The four years where WAR>Margin were 2001, 2006, 2009, and 2011:

• In 2001, his WAR was 6.9 and the team's margin was 3, meaning he needed a WAR of 3.9 to keep them in the playoffs.  Also with a WAR of 3.9 or higher that year: Jim Edmonds, J.D. Drew, Placido Polanco, and Darryl Kile.
• In 2006, his WAR was 8.3 and the team's margin was 1, meaning he needed a WAR of 7.3 to keep them in the playoffs.  He stood alone.
• In 2009, his WAR was 9.2 and the team's margin was 8, meaning he needed a WAR of 1.2 to keep them in the playoffs.  Also with a WAR of 1.2 or higher that year: Brendan Ryan, Matt Holliday, Yadier Molina, Colby Rasmus, Ryan Ludwick, Skip Schumaker, Adam Wainwright, Chris Carpenter, Ryan Franklin, and Joel Piniero.
• In 2011, his WAR was 5.4 and the team's margin was 1, meaning he needed a WAR of 4.4 to keep them in the playoffs.  Lance Berkman also did this.

I'm not saying Albert Pujols isn't the best Cardinal of my lifetime.  He is.  He is a fantastic player and I truly hope the Cardinals re-sign him.  I'm just saying that the team will survive with or without him.  The Cardinals had the NL record for World Series titles before he ever donned a Cardinal uniform and it will still be a proud organization once he leaves, whenever that may be.  From a practical standpoint, think of it this way--Berkman goes to first, Craig plays in right, and how much worse are they?  Craig had a WAR of 2.9 in limited time this year; theoretically this means we lose 2.5 wins.  And we get Adam Wainwright back.  And we have over $20 million to spend on upgrading the roster at large.

Yes, Cardinal fans.  We are going to be fine.

Ten Famous People Everybody Irrationally Hates

It's one thing to hate Bin Laden or somebody who actually, you know, warrants derision.  But for some reason, many of us are such cynical bastards that we must hate even people who enrich the world.  And here's ten of them.

10. Buster Olney--This entry could have been tons of people, but Olney symbolizes it better than anyone else I could think of.  Basically, he's mocked by fans (most of whom played no higher level of sports than Olney) as a dweeb who doesn't know sports.  When in reality, the criticism is not only unfair but also inaccurate--Olney is not a sports analyst, by and large, but is a sports reporter.  Woodward and Bernstein couldn't hit a ball 450 feet ever and they got played in the movies by eventual Oscar winners.  See also: John Clayton.

9. Spike Lee--Critics call Spike Lee a racist hate monger, a man who uses his platform to spread a propagandist message of hatred towards white people.  But, well, this doesn't actually happen.  Did people actually see Do the Right Thing?  The most sympathetic character other than Spike's protagonist was Richard Edson's (white) friend of Spike Lee.  Basically none of the characters come off as total saints and even the ostensible villain (Danny Aiello) isn't a complete ogre--subtly racist, maybe, but it's not like he was burning crosses at black churches or something.  And given that Spike Lee's second most important movie is about an assassinate black civil rights leader, it's fairly hard not to make white oppression of African Americans are a fairly critical theme.  Those who don't hate Lee generally overrate him--Spike Lee is basically one of many good directors of his era, like the Coen Brothers more than like D.W. Griffith.  Michael Moore also fits into this category, because his reputation of propaganda is overrated and his reputation for film-making is underrated, but, well, it's kind of sort of warranted a little bit.

8. The Speaker of the House--It doesn't matter to me if we're talking about when it was Nancy Pelosi or John Boehner, they both have a reputation of being politically narrow-minded douchebags that really come from nowhere.  They're both slightly more partisan than their party at large, but neither is an extremist--they're both hard-working civil servants who got elected heads of their hundreds-strong delegations in the House of Representatives because they have earned respect.  But the thing that really doesn't make sense is how much more blame Pelosi or Boehner get than, say, the heads of the more powerful body of Congress.  Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell get free passes by comparison.

7. Joe Buck--I say the reason people dismiss Joe Buck as a condescending douchebag is that there just aren't notable announcers in the way that there was in his daddy's day.  Besides Al Michaels, where are the iconic voices?  And while Buck may occasionally come off as smug, there's also a reason he's the top choice to broadcast baseball and football for the flagship networks of the sports--he's good at it.  The next time you hate on Joe Buck, consider this--would you rather him or Thom Brenaman?  Would you rather have Joe Buck or Dick Stockton?  Joe Buck is to modern broadcasting when guys who hit nine home runs a year were to the dead ball era--it may not look that good, but you have to consider it in relative terms.

6. Jay Leno--People hate on Jay Leno either because he's not Johnny Carson or because NBC screwed over Conan O'Brien.  Both of these things are true.  But while Leno may suck at that time slot compared to Johnny Carson, why does nobody mock the wildly unfunny David Letterman?  And regarding Conan O'Brien being pushed out of the Tonight Show slot, do you think Leno had a hand in this?  If Billy Devaney, proving his infinite genius, decided to push Sam Bradford out of the Rams QB role and bring back Tony Banks, it would be a terrible move.  You'd feel bad for Bradford for being the victim of such idiocy.  But would you blame Banks?  I know I wouldn't.  How do you pass up that opportunity?

5. Mark Zuckerberg--I'm going to limit this to his day-to-day operations of Facebook rather than his Social Network persona.  People regularly trash Facebook for its constant layouts changes and its seemingly hellbent desire to condense all social media into one all-stop shop like Wal-Mart.  But, like people who hate McDonald's, the point of it all is that EVERYBODY USES IT.  Facebook is free to use and thus free to exit; Facebook has steps which invade privacy, but ONLY IF YOU VOLUNTEER THE INFORMATION.  The people who knock Facebook and decide it must be stopped seem to not realize that it's voluntary.

4. Bill Gates--Bill Gates, the evil corporate raider who build the evil corporation that allows me to write this blog today.  The world hates Bill Gates essentially because he's really, really successful.  And thus he must be corrupt.  Perhaps he was ruthless, but consider that the primary side effects are an interconnected planet and the biggest individual charity in the world.  Bill Gates gave the world exactly what it wanted and want more.

3. Tim Tebow--Tim Tebow is vilified in the media for being overrated, overhyped, and being a Jesus freak.  But he also might be the perfect human being.  Tebow is the child of missionaries, he has a deep and unsanctimonious faith (Remember when he was asked about his virginity as a presser in conference and said he was a virgin and the media jumped on the story?  Did anyone actually care?), he is an extremely hard-working player, and he seems like one of the nicest people possible in interviews.  Even Colin Cowherd, who continuously bashes on Tebow's playing, referred to him as "The nicest person I've ever met."

2. Derek Jeter--Nobody likes Derek Jeter.  Similar to Tebow, he's a hard worker who is very successful and clutch.  Unlike Tebow, he parties in New York City and dates supermodels.  Nothing wrong with that either.

1. Bono--"Oh, Bono is an arrogant douchebag.  He thinks he's God.  I hate him sooooo much!"  Here is a list of observations about Bono, most of which aren't even all that subjective.

• Bono is the greatest rock frontman since Freddie Mercury
• Bono is the voice behind some of the most widely loved songs in rock history
• Bono has displayed an unprecedented range in creating Earth-shattering songs, going from edgy post-punk like "Sunday Bloody Sunday" to heartbreaking ballads like "One."
• Bono, unlike most rock frontmen, devotes a lot of his time and money to improving the world.  Even if you don't like when he is compared to Mandela or Mother Teresa, the fact is that he is still devoting more time to charity than basically everyone else in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  Besides maybe Sting, who's even close?

That dick...

Steve Jobs and Michael Jackson--Partners in Capitalist Evil

Some may want to make irrational comparisons like comparing the recent death of Steve Jobs to the death of Jesus of Nazareth, accepted by like a billion people as the Lord and Savior of the universe, but I recognize this as a shortsighted comparison.  Clearly, Jesus is no Steve Jobs.

For if you've heard any media attention around Steve Jobs's death, you know the truth.  You know that any comparisons to Steve Jobs to Thomas Edison are, if anything, too generous to Thomas Edison.  Because who needs a light bulb or recorded audio?  Steve Jobs invented the motherfucking iPhone!

But, beyond Steve Jobs being truly the greatest American in history, he is actually pure evil.  Now, I'm not a total Apple hater like some people, but I think I have a relatively balanced and even-handed stance--Apple is a consumer electronics manufacturer who makes slightly better than average products and charges above average products.

And that's all they are.  Apple didn't invent anything, Steve Jobs didn't invent anything, all Steve Jobs did was market the shit out of his products and help spearhead technological innovations.  Does this make him an important person?  Sure.  Does this make him comparable to actual inventors, guys whose products actually changed the path of the world and not just the brands people used?  Not a chance.

Basically, the most enduring and important legacy of Apple, besides the completely fucking over Steve Wozniak, is giving limousine liberals somebody to champion.  Now, to be fair, I'm a liberal myself, but I'd categorize myself as more along the lines of a blue collar and social liberal.  But the point is that people perceive Apple as being a significant and important company because of how it makes customers feel.  People use iPhones, iPads, iPods, iLikeSpendingWayTooMuchGoddamnedMoneyOnElectronicsOtherCompaniesMakeJustAsWell and they feel like they're using products which resonate with their left of center ideals, their creativity, and their general selves.  And Apple, by selling an esoteric concept which is completely and utterly impossible to define, made a lot of money.

Now, every company has a right to earn a profit.  Except drug dealers.  And in spite of the psychological addiction that seems to befall Apple fanboys, I won't categorize Apple products as drugs.  But only, it seems, Apple is given the right to earn a profit and be considered above it.  For Microsoft to make a profit is evil--a sign that Bill Gates, who actually donates money to charity, actually treats other human beings well, and actually has come up with truly innovative products (making slightly better phones or slightly better MP3 players can't compare to, you know, getting the internet established as a primary form of communication), is doing something malicious.  But Apple profits are clearly accidental--Steve Jobs, as a man who dresses casual and doesn't eat meat, is incapable of capitalist greed.  And again, I don't even mind that he is a greedy capitalist--I'd be if I were him, too--but he needs to be treated for what he is, a mildly important guy who made a lot of money.

The only death I could even remotely compare to Steve Jobs that I've seen is the death of Michael Jackson.  And truth be told there are some similarities between the two.  Essentially, both Jobs and Jackson are of fair talent and immeasurable fame and hype.  Michael Jackson got famous relatively young (I know he was ten and Jobs was in his twenties, but you have to consider the relative age of fame for musicians and corporate CEOs).  Michael Jackson had his creative peak in 1983.  Michael Jackson died and all of a sudden, all of his (considerable) sins became ignored and anyone who pointed them out was vilified.

Michael Jackson, also, is an ultracapitalist.  Now, in spite of most of what I say, Americans aren't that dumb and won't literally just buy anything.  Americans will only buy things they want.  And Michael Jackson, for years, provided Americans what they wanted--uncontroversial pop music.  There's a reason Hendrix had one top forty hit and the biggest hit of the Summer of Woodstock was from The Archies--people are lame.  Jackson, unlike Motown contemporaries like Stevie Wonder or Marvin Gaye, and unlike era contemporaries like Prince, didn't take his fame as a platform to launch unprecedented creativitiy.  Jackson enjoyed his fame and he got a lot of money out of it.  Fine.  He's allowed.  But why must we celebrate him as some kind of deity?  Take the money and run, quoth the Steve Miller.

But regardless, Steve Jobs and Michael Jackson won't always be viewed as immortals on the insane levels they are now.  Time will fade their legends.  Hopefully Bill Gates and Prince get their due respect.

Five Reasons Nickelback is Better Than Journey

Unlike my previous, similar list where I wrote about why Saving Silverman is better than Citizen Kane, I am making the prohibitive statement that Nickelback is better than Journey.  Nickelback, though generally considered to be a pile of utter dogshit musically, cannot yet hold a candle to the awfulness that has ruined mainstream pop-rock radio for the last thirty some-odd years.  These are the reasons Nickelback is better than Journey, in no particular order.

1. Nickelback songs are about real emotion, no matter how fucking retarded: Rock Star is about wanting to be a rock star.  Never Again is about how you will never again abuse a woman.  How You Remind Me is about how you remind me of the first single from my previous album.  Regardless, these songs have a point.  I'm not saying the point is good or that the songs are good, because they aren't, but there's a reason behind the lyrics.  In the same way that some kid writing angst-riddled poetry in his journal in high school about how much he hates all the popular kids and how they're all phonies and all those cliches has written SOMETHING and the artsier equivalent who just draws a bunch of irregular squares to symbolize their anger has, in effect, drawn nothing.  The motive of Rock Star is clear.  What's the motive of Don't Stop Believin'?  How you shouldn't stop believing?  That would be fair enough, but what the fuck does the small town girl and city boy have to do with any of this?  The answer--nothing.  The point is to make Steve Perry sound like some kind of deep and beautiful soul rather than a talentless twat.  But more on that later...now.

2. Chad Kroeger is a Better Singer than Steve Perry: Chad Kroeger's vocals are bad, but this doesn't really matter.  Jimi Hendrix's vocals were technically speaking bad.  Johnny Rotten's vocals are bad.  But they work.  Not that Chad's work is in any real way great, but the point is that the lack of technical ability isn't in and of itself a deal breaker.  Steve Perry, though better on the technical scale, lacks talent on the "Do you like to hear this man sing?" scale.  He goes on high pitched runs during whiny power ballads, but do you want to hear this?  His voice gets really high on Open Arms without cracking.  Cool.  The song still sucks.  Figured You Out, while a sexist and deplorable song, has exactly the kind of straightforward, dumbass vocal delivery the song requires.  There is no deeper meaning.  The point is what it is--that Nickelback will sexually assault you.  Again, not a good point.  But it's a point.

3. Nickelback has a Preferable Volume: I don't generally want to listen to Nickelback, but if you make me choose between listening to them at full blast or as quiet ambient sounds, I'm opting to turn it up to eleven. Because Nickelback music, at least the non-ballad majority of their songs (think Burn It To the Ground), is invented to be played loud.  This doesn't show a lack of musical creativity, really, any more than AC/DC being invented to be played loud in dirty pickups.  Now, AC/DC is better because their one generic sound is better than Nickelback's, but the point is that Nickelback has enough depth that altering something as simple as volume can possibly enhance your listening to pleasure.  Now, if you say "I'm going to play Any Way You Want It, how loud do you want it?", my answer is going to be "As fucking quiet as possible."  This matters.  Music that you want to hear inaudibly is probably a good sign the music isn't good.

4. Nickelback fans are more realistic: I know a decent number of people who like both Nickelback and Journey.  I have never heard somebody say Nickelback was the best band in the world, much less call them an all-time great band.  They are what they are--a popular band who makes really easy to handle rock music.  Journey fans, on the other hand, have been convinced that their bullshit music is good.  People actually complain that Journey isn't in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.  I would give you a baseball parallel to Journey, but you'd have never heard of the mediocre bastard.  Consider that when they were making Don't Stop Believin, Talking Heads and The Police were redefining rock while staying popular.  Journey went nowhere.  What band since Journey was inspired by Journey?

5. Nickelback has Better Music Videos: Nickelback videos have clocks counting down peoples' lives.  There's nothing even remotely great about this.  But here is their opponent: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LatorN4P9aA&ob=av2n

Billy Devaney is Really Bad At His Job

A quick rundown of major moves by the St. Louis Rams during the Billy Devaney era:

• Hired Steve Spagnuolo as head coach.  I'm really not going to get too intense about whether this was the right move or not, since in general, it's argued by Rams fans that Spags should be fired due to the Rams poor performance so far in 2011.  Since the whole point of this post is essentially comparing Spagnuolo and Devaney, I think it's best that we stick to the task at hand.
• Drafted Jason Smith with the #2 overall pick.  Hilariously, some in the St. Louis media will try to justify this move on the grounds that the 2009 draft class was quite weak.  Which it was.  But let's consider the guys we could have had instead of Jason Smith.  This may not be selecting Carriker over Revis or Chris Long (a decent player) over a ton of far better players but it's still guys who aren't, you know, really fucking terrible at football.  The following guys were first round picks the year we threw money at the walking tub of goo known as Jason Smith: Brian Orakpo, Brian Cushing, Alex Mack, Sandra Bullock's retarded friend from The Blind Side, Jeremy Maclin, Percy Harvin, Hakeem Nicks, and CLAY FUCKING MATTHEWS.  These guys were a little bit later and you could argue it's too revisionist to argue we should have taken guys who fell into the twenties over Smith, but what basis did anyone in the Rams organization have to believe Jason Smith would be any good?  He hardly ever run blocked and gave up 3 1/2 sacks his last season (by comparison, Bryant McKinnie gave up zero sacks IN HIS ENTIRE COLLEGE CAREER).  Devaney doesn't deserve a free pass here--the hype behind Aaron Curry could have warranted a trade down.  And frankly, no matter who the Rams pick, merely having traded down and paying less money to a player who, by definition, couldn't be worse than Jason Smith would be an improvement.
• We released such competents as Orlando Pace and Torry Holt.  Now, these guys were getting old and inevitably were going to decline, but perhaps finding replacements would have been preferable to "Let's get fat, lazy guys to fill in."
• The big move that everyone praises Billy Devaney for--drafting Sam Bradford #1 overall.  Uh.  The #2 and #5 picks are Pro Bowlers already.  I'm not saying it was the wrong pick, but can we stop pretending there was some kind of divine genius to drafting the Heisman winning quarterback with the first overall pick?
• The secondary continues to be pourous.  We replaced Todd Lyght the year after he won us the Super Bowl--Justin King still has a job in the NFL.
• The receivers remain atrocious.  Mike Sims-Walker just can't be the best receiver of the last five years for a successful NFL team.  He's a second or third receiver at the absolute best.  No particular effort has been given to actually make a move for a receiver.

Billy Devaney has a job and Terry Francona doesn't.  If you can explain that one, you deserve to be given an automatic passing of the Bar exam.