Sports Punditry Reaches New Levels Of Amazingness

This story has already been covered by Frisco Fastball and McCovey Chronicles (all blogs are required to have alliteration in the title, which is why my blog is running from the Feds). But I felt the need to chime in.

Rob Neyer, who gets paid actual money by ESPN to write about baseball, had this to say:

"There's going to be a great deal of change in the National League West."

Really? Did Kevin Towers finally put a diving board on the pool in Bank One Ballpark?

The Giants might surprise a lot of people by dropping from world champions to third place, and perhaps even a not particularly competitive third place. In 2010, almost everything that could have gone well for them did go well, with a number of Giants enjoying surprisingly good seasons. If there's reason for optimism, it's tied almost solely to the assumption that Buster Posey and Madison Bumgarner will continue to thrive in their first full seasons. Will that be enough to balance the presumed regressions of Aubrey Huff, Andres Torres and Jonathan Sanchez, along with the departure of Juan Uribe (who's been replaced by Miguel Tejada)?

We'll know in eight or nine months.

I don't mind if somebody doesn't think the Giants are going to have a good year; that's a legitimate opinion. But what is frustrating about Neyer and ESPN in general is their insistence that the Giants were a team of lucky breaks and a crazy confluence of fortunate events.

Giants: I raise this much. Is that a lot? Maybe I'll just put all my chips in. (giggles)
Yankees/Phillies/Whoever: But I have an Ace high flush, you can't possibly have me beat. I call.
Giants: Aw shucks, all I have is these here cards. Are they any good? Ooooh! That card you just put down in the middle is the same number as my card! Ooooh! Again! Do I win? Do I win?

The fact is that the Giants dealt with a pretty average amount of adversity during the regular season, including a horrible month of pitching from their ace, two months of Todd Wellemeyer, a ruptured appendix in September, injuries to their 2nd baseman and shortstop, and a horrible season from the player they had assumed would be their best hitter. According to the Bill James calculation, they still should have won 96 games. They won 92 instead, meaning they were unlucky during the regular season. They still won the division outright and had the 2nd best record in the National League.

Did Huff outperform expectations? Sure. Torres? Yes. Name a single team that didn't have two players outperform expectations. This is the basis of your prediction, Rob? That two of our players might not have as good a year this year as they had last year? And that outweighs a full season of Bumgarner and Posey and Ross, a possibly resurgent Sandoval, the addition of Belt, the likelihood that Timmy won't forget how to pitch for six weeks, the Jamesean calculation that the Baseball Gods owe us a few games in the standings?

Think about this sentence:
"If there's reason for optimism, it's tied almost solely to the assumption that Buster Posey and Madison Bumgarner will continue to thrive in their first full seasons. "
Think about that again.
Think hard.
What is wrong with that sentence...............

How about this:
If there's a reason for optimism, it's tied almost solely to the fact that WE ARE DEFENDING WORLD CHAMPIONS. That makes me optimistic. That makes me think, hey, we might have a decent team this year. We might have a chance to compete with the 4th place Dodgers or 3rd place Rockies.
If the entire core of a 95-loss team comes back, that's not a reason for optimism.
When the entire core of a World Championship team comes back, that's a different story.

Imagine if the Yankees won the world series and Boston's best player was traded during the off-season and Tampa and Toronto basically stood pat. Would you expect ESPN to make a prediction of a "not particularly competitive third place" finish for the Yankees? Of course.

Will the Dodgers be able to make up the 12 game gap between themselves and the Giants by fielding the same team they had last year minus Manny Ramirez?
Will the Rockies be able to jump from 3rd to a dominating 1st place finish by fielding the same team they had last year plus Ty Wigginton?

Well, let me make a profound prediction:
"We'll know in 8 or 9 months."

So I'll tell you then. Except I'll be asleep in Connecticut while the games in California are actually being played. So I may not watch. So I'll read about it online. Probably on ESPNLosAngeles.com. And then I'll retweet it. I promise.