Snobs vs. Slobs

I know I’m a couple days late on this, but Jon “Boog” Sciambi had Buzz Bissinger on his Miami radio show Friday (interview here) to talk about Bissinger’s recent NY Times feature story “My Right Arm.” The piece is well-written and it mostly retells the tragic story of Kerry Wood.

Anyway, he went on Sciambi’s radio show to talk about it and the interview goes well for about 75% of it. Then, Sciambi—a self-described “sabermetrics guy”—asked Bissinger about some hard evidence regarding the average age and MiLB inning numbers for pitchers, as part of Bissinger’s argument is that pitchers don’t spend as much time in the minor leagues “learning to pitch” as they used to. Bissinger doesn’t have the statistic.

(I’ll say this, I don’t think this is a bad conclusion. It could be totally true and in a discussion I had last week with Taft about the piece, we both posited that there is a possibility that the “not enough time in the minors learning to coast/get easy outs” could be true.)

Bissinger then quotes La Russa, Nolan Ryan and other ex-players/managers whose “opinions I respect” as his evidence. Anyone involved in sabermetrics knows that these numbers probably aren’t hard to find. Certainly with the NY Times research staff, Bissinger could’ve had that number in his piece.

Well, Sciambi pressed him on it and Bissinger—already condescending—became Mr. Condescending. He pressed Boog on whether Boog knew any of the numbers (He asked him how many MiLB innings both Mark Prior and Felix Hernandez pitched and when Boog answered “He didn’t get very many,” Bissinger supplied the numbers, without anything to compare them to). This caused Boog to try and calm the argument down with “easy, easy.” He eventually called the 12-4 host on WAXY “the worst slimebucket,” after which Book hung up on him.

It really is quite strange. You should listen to the clip.

Bissinger’s two fatal flaws are his lack of numbers (When using the ex-players as evidence, he tells Sciambi “I haven’t seen any specific examples or numbers”) and his condescension. The condescension, I think is what made Sciambi so edgy.

Before the argument at the end, Bissinger clearly didn’t know Boog’s name or anything about him. He asked him questions about whether he knew about Kerry Wood “throwing across his body.” Sciambi has been an MLB play-by-play guy for a while now. He knows a little about pitching mechanics. He certainly read the piece. Bissinger acted like he was talking to a five-year-old.

Where Bissinger calling Sid Rosenberg a “Slimbucket” came from, I’ll never know.

I know that book tours and stuff are strange and whirlwind-y, so authors don’t always know every host they’re on with, but the name should’ve rung a bell. Sciambi does games for ESPN. He did a bunch of WBC games. He’s been in two big markets. Bissinger was told, I’m sure, that Sciambi is based in Miami and—at the very least—is currently a Braves broadcaster. He’s not an idiot. It is really bad for someone going on an interview and not knowing who the host is.

Media members aren’t used to being pressed or criticized on anything. Tony Kornheiser—someone I basically worship—went ballistic on a Washington Post writer when that writer suggested that TK wasn’t great on Monday Night Football. I have a feeling that Bissinger has spent all of his book tour stops and radio interviews with questions akin to “Why are you such a good writer, Buzz?” or “What’s Genius La Russa really like?” When someone actually asked him a question of substance, he got mad.
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When Taft and I talked about “My Right Arm” last week, my problem was and remains similar to the one Boog brings up. Going to Nolan Ryan for advice on trying to keep an arm healthy is idiotic. As Taft pointed out, Ryan probably thre the most pitches of anyone. Ever.

His career K/9 rate is not that of a pitcher who started his career in 1966. me: I’d actually—as I feel with just about everything pitching-related—like to hear what Maddux has to say about this stuff. [He had a] 9.54 K/9 in his career, 4.67 BB/9 in his career, 5386 IP. Basically, there’s no way he didn’t throw more pitches than anyone in big-league history.

Nolan Ryan’s elbow is probably made from Martian metal or something. It’s indestructible. To ask him how to stay healthy is to ask Ted Williams how to hit. He’s superhuman. Those guys aren’t taught, they’re born.

Same thing with Greg Maddux or Tom Glavine. They’re two of the 20 best pitchers ever. To compare them to Kerry Wood or Phil Hughes is ludicrous. And to use their opinions is foolish when you can get numbers on the subject. Again, it’s not like the NY Times doesn’t have people around to fetch those numbers.

It’s not like he had to do the research. Get an intern to do it. It’s hyperbolically lazy to just ask a bunch of old guys about that sort of thing. You’re looking for a certain quote and you’re getting it (“These whippersnappers are coddled today! Get off my lawn! Stop stealing my newspaper!”). L-A-Z-Y.
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That’s not to say it isn’t a good piece. It is. It’s pretty well-written and the parts specifically about Wood and the way the Cubs treated him are great. Any and all Cub fans should check it out, if only for that.

(Thanks to Will Carroll over at BP.com’s Unfiltered for the tip to the clip.)

Also, here are my biases:
First, I am a fan of Braves announcer Boog Sciambi. I think he’s one of the best play-by-play baseball guys in the game and he’s a big fan of what he calls “sabermetrics.” (If you listen to the clip, you’ll hear him talk about it at the end) I got into his work because he used to work for the Marlins and Dan Le Batard had him on Le Batard’s old Sunday morning radio show. However, I also know that Boog is a bit of a hothead and is certainly argumentative.

On the other side, I don’t like Buzz Bissinger. I think he is a good writer, but has—like Buster Olney—gained prominence largely because of a pushback on “Moneyball” writers. Bissinger’s “Three Nights in August” is well-written (I didn’t say he isn’t talented), but wrongly worships Tony La Russa. In fact, Bissinger seemingly has made a career as La Russa’s lap dog (also, he wrote “Friday Night Lights”). And, we all know how I feel aboutLa Russa.