Classic: Now winning the Al Central: the Detroit Tigers

[This is from a simpler time when the Cabrera-Willis trade looked like a good idea, and Dontrelle Willis wasn't in A-ball working out 'control issues', namely December 2007.]

I give the people what they want, so here's my take on wild-and-crazy, insanely good trade the Tigers just made.

First, I guess I should state all the downsides of this trade. Obviously, Miller and Maybin could turn out to be fantastic players, better than Cabrera and Willis, respectively. I also have doubts about players switching from the National to American League. The quality of play is better in the AL, particularly hitting, and pitchers have a hard time making the adjustment. And I'm just not sure about where to hit Cabrera so his skills are optimally used.

Um, that's it. I can come up with only three downsides to this trade, and the last one really isn't a downside. As for the first, Miller has been both very good and very bad in his short career, but he should be okay, and there's no telling with Maybin. Basically, unless Miller leaps in Beckett/Santana territory and Maybin turns into the second coming of Curtis Granderson AND Cabrera and Willis crap out, I think this trade is at least even. But I like trading prospects, even good ones, for established talent, and Cabrera and Willis are absolutely established talent. Cabrera especially. According to ESPN, his career stats are comparable (and better) than A-Rod's at the same age. Though he's definitely a downgrade from Inge defensively (he had 23 errors last year, near the bottom of the NL), he's a huge upgrade offensively. And his defensive troubles can be worked around. He could definitely use some coaching, and beyond that I don't think moving him to first and putting Guillen at third is a bad idea. (I also don't think it's a great idea, either, but I'm just tossing out suggestions.) Given Cabrera's physical shape, first base is probably his future, if not DH when Sheffield retires/moves on. (Actually, I think I really like that idea.)

So where to hit Cabrera? He, Granderson, Polanco, Magglio, Guillen and Renteria are all .300-hitters, with Sheffield the big RBI guy, leaving Jones and Pudge. Granderson and Polanco worked so well at the top last year, I'd leave them 1-2, though Renteria could step in at 2. Eighth is the traditional catcher's spot, and I think having Pudge and Jones finish the order works. In between, I have no idea. I wasn't really a fan of having Sheffield hitting third and Magglio fourth; Magglio needs to be in the three hole, and Sheff, as the RBI guy, in the four. I guess after that it could go Cabrera-Guillen-Renteria, but that's just a guess. Other than protecting Sheffield with high-average guys like Ordonez, Cabrera and Renteria in front and behind, any combination could work, though I think this would be ideal:
1-Granderson
2-Polanco
3-Magglio
4-Sheff
5-Cabrera
6-Guillen
7-Renteria
8-Pudge
9-Jones
But again, this is just a guess, and I don't have a definite answer.

What about Willis switching to AL hitters? This is the biggest (potential) downside to the deal. Willis hasn't been great since 2005, though he hasn't been bad, either. (Though it should be noted that he and Bonderman had the worst second halves of any regular starters last season.) It should also be noted that after 2005 Willis wasn't sharing the load with Josh Beckett, which probably had a lot to do with the drop-off. With the Tigers, instead of being THE ace that he had to be with the Marlines, he doesn't even have to be AN ace. Despite official blockbuster-trade status, the expectations for Willis aren't that high, and are probably less than they are for Cabrera. If Willis puts together a winning season (even 15-10 would be fine) and is solid in the playoffs, I'd call it a success, depending on how the team does in October. Think Dice-K this past year. No, he didn't blow everyone away, but he wasn't a flop, either, and the expectations were much higher. As far as the Tigers' staff goes, Verlander and Rogers are at the top, Willis and Bonderman are about equal, and Robertson is a great fifth starter. If Rogers stays healthy and Bonderman doesn't commit ritual suicide during a first-inning meltdown sometime in July, that's an excellent rotation.

So what now? Contrary to what I said yesterday, Inge is gone. He makes over $6 million a year, and that's just too much for a ultility infielder. Any number of teams could use a very good defensive third baseman, and he could bring the Tigers some minor league pitchers, which, Al is right, they need to get more of. Thames doesn't necessarily have to go, and neither does Durbin. Durbin is probably gone, just because I doubt he can be sent back to Toledo and Willis takes up his roster spot. But if they can find a way to keep him, I don't see any reason why he couldn't be productive as a middle-innings reliever. And I don't know why this trade affects Thames' status at all, except in terms of money. He is a good backup outfielder and pinch hitter, and if they have room on the team, I think he should stay. Alternatively, though it may be late for this, I think they should resign Sean Casey as a bench player if they don't keep Thames. He hit .500 as a pinch hitter, which is both unheard-of and incredibly useful over a long season.

This trade doesn't help everything. The Tigers went into the season looking for a bullpen upgrade, which they still haven't found. The Capellan-Bautista trade, while possibly good (I honestly have no idea), doesn't address the hole created when Jamie Walker left. They still need middle relief, somewhere. On a related note, with five solid pitchers, the starting rotation should be able to go deeper into games, easing the load on the bullpen. One problem last year was that the number five starter was never set, mainly due to injuries, and so at least every fifth day the middle relief was busy.

The other problem last year (and the year before that) is that Leyland doesn't leave his starters in long enough. Just because five innings counts as a quality start doesn't mean pitchers should only go five innings. Verlander's no-hitter was the only (ONLY) complete game last year. Even during Robertson's one-hit gem against the Indians he was yanked in the ninth. Given the option between a kinda struggling starter (by definition one of the five best pitchers on the team) and a fresh reliever in the fifth or sixth, it should be the starter. If a pitcher's getting shelled, then fine, he should go, but if a starter scatters four runs over five innings and is still working well, he should stay in the game. I would trust a starter who's a little off that day to a reliever who may be completely off. Leyland overworks his bullpen this way, and I think if he gave the starters more innings they would have made the playoffs last year.

I guess those are all my thoughts on the deal. I was planning to write my next blog about Israel, but it seems (shockingly) that sports is more popular. So hey, I guess I should wrote more about sports. I think my next entry will be on how Jason Maxiell makes me want to have his shot-blocking, double-double-scoring babies.

Oh, and big ups to Dave Dombrowski for the general manager's "Fuck you" to the Yankees and Red Sox.

Classic: Now playing third base for the Detroit Tigers: Alex Rodriguez

From October 2007:

It's my first sports-related blog, so we should celebrate (yayy). This started as a response to Al's question about who should be the Tigers' shortstop, and just got longer and longer. But I've been thinking about this, and there are two separate questions here: who should play shortstop, and should the Tigers go after A-Rod. They are not identical issues.

Starting backwards, the Tigers should go after A-Rod. Make him an offer, nothing insane, but just offer him, maybe, $25 million a year for eight years or so to play for a team that definitely can win the World Series next year and in a city where the fans and media will pretty much love him. If he says no, he says no, there's nothing the Tigers can do about it. Neither the Tigers, nor any team, can control what A-Rod and his megalomaniacal agent Scott Boras will do. He may stay with the Yankees and it may all be moot anyway. We don't know. He may only care about the home run record, and if that's the case then Comerica is definitely not the place for him. My point is the Tigers can only make an offer, and they lose absolutely nothing by talking, and you never know what might happen. Boras and Mike Ilitch have a good history together (Pudge, Magglio and the new draft pick Porcello are all Boras' clients) and we know from the Red Wings that Ilitch is not afraid of spending money to win championships. Something may happen here.

So the Tigers should make a play at getting A-Rod, and if successful he'll obviously be the shortstop, right? Well, no. The Tigers would be getting him for his bat, not his glove. He's already 32, his range is only going to decrease, and he's too big physically to stay quick much longer (much like Carlos Guillen, who's 31 and whose knees are already going). A-Rod is great offensively and not bad defensively, which is perfect for a third baseman, but not really what you want in a shortstop, where defensive ability pretty much trumps any offensive prowess. The shortstop is the captain of the infield, and range is incredibly important for turning possible singles into outs and especially double-plays. A good third baseman needs only stop doubles down the line and play the bunt. And A-Rod can do that quite well. He's not a liability on either side, and probably won't be for several years, at which time he can become a DH, but right now he, and the team, are much better off with him at third than short.

But these two questions are separate, and any discussion of A-Rod's advantages at third have little bearing on the candidates for the Tigers' shortstop. So who plays short? Um, how about Brandon Inge? He's young (under 30) and is fantastic defensively. He has great range, quick hands, a solid throwing arm and an inclination for sheer recklessness that is good for shortstops. He is by all accounts the most athletic person on the Tigers, and yet he plays a position better suited to bigger, slower players. This seems like such an obvious choice I'm shocked I haven't heard anyone else suggest this. Also, hitting .250 with 20 homers and 75 RBIs he's an offensive liability at third, where much more production is expected, than at shortstop, where .250/20/75 is not bad at all (see Lugo, Julio). And possibly more than anything else, Inge is already a Tiger, so they don't have to worry about losing something as they would with a trade for Jack Wilson, bringing someone up from Toledo or shelling out a bajillion dollars for A-Rod. Moving Inge to short makes perfect sense, particularly given the weak free-agent market for infielders. The Tigers know exactly what they'd be getting, and have him signed for the next four years to boot.

I think it's critical for the Tigers to separate the question of A-Rod from the question of shortstop because if they don't, they could very easily talk themselves into picking from those three options (trade, calling-up Santiago, overpriced free agent). With Inge at short, the Tigers would of course have to find a third baseman, which honestly is an easier position to fill. Mike Lowell is a free agent, to say nothing of any free agent catchers/first basemen/DHs who usually do a passable job defensively at third, or even someone already in the Tigers' farm system (Chris Shelton, anyone?). A-Rod or not, I think Inge to short is a very good move for the ballclub.

Now that I think about it, of course, I wonder if they really should go after A-Rod. He is, without a doubt, an incredible talent and a tremendous draw, attention-wise, for the team. But does he solve the Tigers' problems? Sure their lineup could use an upgrade, but is a 32-year-old righthanded power hitter what they really need? Honestly, I don' think so. Their lineup already leans too much to the right, and while they scored lots of runs last year, their average could be improved, which is not what A-Rod provides. Solo home runs don't win championships. Besides Granderson and Polanco, the Tigers don't really have solid on-base guys, which is what they really need, particularly at the bottom of the lineup. Lowell or any other random (right-handed) third base masher isn't the answer either. Would I love to see A-Rod hitting behind Ordonez? Fuck yeah. (While we're on it, I'd love to see Pudge draw a walk once in a while.) But something about Sheffield, Ordonez, A-Rod, Guillen, while scary for pitchers, doesn't seem like as good of a lineup on the field as it is on paper. (Sheffield behind Rodriguez looks a little better).

Maybe the Tigers would be better off going after a good, young switch-hitting shortstop who can get on base than moving Inge and installing A-Rod at third. But that's kinda unrealistic. Inge has been gradually improving at the plate, but a move to shortstop, which is more draining defensively, might hinder that. The perfect solution: Clone Polanco.

Classic: Michael Ignatieff is an asshole

[As a disclaimer, this was written in August 2007, not June 2008. Plus I got a little worked up while writing this, so the language may be a little rough. And by 'a little rough' I mean it sounds like it was written by a sailor with VD.]

For the (much delayed) second installment of my fancy-ass new blog, I have some current events commentary. I came across this article and basically, it pissed me off. Here's my partially thought-out reaction. It may be a bit judgmental, sue me. [Really, don't sue me. I have nothing.]

[There should be a link here. If not: www.nytimes.com/2007/08/05/magazine/05iraq-t.html ]

In Aug 5th’s New York Times Magazine, Michael Ignatieff, the neo-conservative (though I suspect he’d take issue with that label) pundit/intellectual wrote an article both expressing regret for and defending (and rationalizing) his support for the invasion of Iraq. Given other prominent intellectuals’ (like Francis Fukuyama’s almost a year ago) similar writings, why is this noteworthy? Well, mainly because Michael Ignatieff is a clueless, self-serving prick. (The preceding opinion is based solely on this article, and not on other instances of intellectual cocksuckery of his I’ve read.) Why does it matter that some guy is a clueless, self-serving prick? Because powerful people listen to this guy.

Ignatieff traces his mistaken support to the significant gap between intellectuals and politicians, stating that politicians’ ideas need to be true and applicable, while intellectuals’ need only be interesting, This, to me, is an extreme cop-out, and even with his defensive rationalizations, the part of his article which I most take issue with.

It should be noted at first that there is some truth to this point. An idea which is strictly academic does indeed live and die by how interesting and engaging it is, rather than its applicability to the real world. While the entire storyline of “Crime and Punishment” may have been avoided if someone had just given Raskolnikov a job, that isn’t nearly as intriguing as his character’s similarities to the Devil. Whether or not Raskolnikov is like the Devil may be entertaining to think about, but it doesn’t actually matter. At all. It’s ultimately irrelevant; no one should get worked up over it, and certainly no one should ever die because of it.

But this is only the case with strictly academic ideas. If you stand up in a class and say something totally out-the-box, like Julius Caesar was just a big homo, people will think you’re strange and then go on doing whatever the hell they were doing. Cause again, it doesn’t fucking matter whether he liked it in the butt or not, and it really doesn’t matter what you or anyone else thinks about the subject. But Ignatieff doesn’t teach Russian literature or ancient history; he teaches political science, and ideas tossed around in political science classes aren’t strictly academic. If you stand up in one of his classes and say—for instance—that Iraq should be invaded in order to form a more secure Middle East, you’re not just pissing into the wind. And if you say that in, I don’t know, the New York Times, and happen to be a prominent Harvard professor and adviser to presidents, well then, somebody may die because of it.

Political ideas, even if raised in an academic setting, are not merely academic, and all potentially have real-world implications, no matter who says them. The problem is that Ignatieff apparently doesn’t understand the fucking difference. He rationalizes his support by invoking some kind of intellectual immunity, that because he was at a university when he espoused these ideas, it’s okay--acceptable, even. He wasn’t a politician or a general, how could he predict or be responsible for the potential consequences?

Speaking of consequences, Ignatieff states that it was his job, as a scholar, to take his ideas all the way to their conclusion: “An intellectual’s responsibility for his ideas is to follow their consequences wherever they may lead,” yet it is up to politicians “to master those consequences and prevent them from doing harm.” I certainly agree that politicians bear a huge responsibility--more than intellectuals--to use ideas only as necessary and helpful. But does this mean intellectuals bear none of that responsibility? If it was Ignatieff’s duty to follow the consequences of invading Iraq (which I believe it was), wouldn’t failing to predict the actual consequences be a failure as an intellectual? And even if he couldn’t predict the consequences, since when is it acceptable for an intellectual to blindly follow an idea? Isn’t it also an intellectual’s duty to challenge and alter theories as circumstance dictate? If Einstein’s theory of relativity is disproved in an experiment tomorrow, any physicist who sticks by it unchanged would be considered a hack. How then can Ignatieff support his theory of military intervention for humanitarian reasons and its application, no matter the circumstances, and still be a considered competent intellectual? While the theory may have worked in Bosnia and Kosovo, it clearly does not in Iraq, making Ignatieff at the very least incorrect. Ignatieff, to his credit, admits he was wrong about Iraq, but only, he says, because those who correctly predicted the consequences did so either out of luck, or because they exhibited slightly better judgment, despite their similarly faulty knowledge of the situation.

Which, if I may say, is self-serving horseshit. Ignatieff states (as a rationalization) that he followed his emotions and was ignorant of the circumstances in Iraq. Since when did it become okay for intellectuals to spout (technically speaking) ignorant ideas? I understand this frequently happens, but its frequency doesn’t make this kind of half-assed intellectualism okay. Isn’t it also his duty, besides following his idea, to fucking find out where it might be going? He couldn’t read a book, or, God forbid, do some research before he ran his mouth off in the New York Times? He adds, completely disingenuously, that the people who correctly predicted Iraq “labored, as everyone did, with the same faulty intelligence and lack of knowledge of Iraq’s fissured sectarian history.” Um, what? What about all the actual experts who knew what was going on? How about the Knight-Ridder reporters who discovered in 2002 that there were no WMDs? How about Jacques Chirac telling Tony Blair (in 2003) that the invasion was a mistake because a Shia-led government wouldn’t equal democracy and civil war was inevitable? Everyone labored with the same lack of knowledge? How the fuck does Ignatieff get off defending his ignorant opining as merely a lesser assessment of the situation?

Apparently Ignatieff, now a member of Canadian parliament, understands the difference between the role of ideas among politicians versus among intellectuals, and any improved self-awareness among politicians is certainly a good thing. But eventually his term in parliament will end and he’ll go back to the other side, and I can’t help wondering if he learned anything about what an intellectual is supposed to do. Frank Rich, in his column from the same day on a similar topic, calls Ignatieff’s article a personal mea culpa, but in all honesty I see a whole lot of ‘mea’ and very little ‘culpa’ here. Ignatieff blames the insularity of academia, the role of the intellectual, the difficulty of politics, faulty intelligence, even reality, before he blames himself. And it is for primarily this reason that Michael Ignatieff is a clueless, self-serving prick.

Brick

Due to the overwhelmingly positive, or at least ambivalent, response to floating the idea of writing a blog, I give you the very first entry to my riveting, entertaining, informative, not-at-all tedious, self-involved attempt at letting the world know what I think. Since I haven't come up with a theme or name for my blog, I'll just go with whatever's on my mind. Today that's the movie "Brick".

I saw "Brick" for the first time yesterday, and loved it. The thought actually occurred to me mid-way through the film that it may be the best movie I've ever seen, and it actually got better as it went on. Seriously, this is a sure candidate for great-fuckin'-movie status.

That said, while watching it I couldn't shake one hugely distracting thing about the movie: it's set in high school. I'm sure there's a noir movie to be set in a high school, in fact, I think a high school would be an almost perfect setting for noir, with the cliques, the deception, the power games, whatever. My problem is not with "Brick"s premise in a high school, my problem is with its characters and the way they act. I think the movie misses it in two ways with its characters: their behavior, and the circumstances around them.

For starters, the characters are much too self-assured to be teenagers. The scene where Brendan punches Doad and then successfully threatens his six or so friends is a good example. It's a great scene, and fits perfectly with the vibe of the film, but Doad's and Brendan's actions are completely implausible. How does Brendan, as a 17-year-old, have the stones to sucker punch someone, then slap him around, to get information? That kind of action takes not only tremendous self-confidence that the other guy isn't going to kick your ass, but also self-restraint to hit the guy only a few times, instead of just beating the hell out of him. Brendan has a sense of real balance in his actions, and knows, almost preternaturally, to avoid going too far. Since when do teenagers have that kind of balance? They think and act in superlatives; everything is either the best or the worst thing EVER. There is no middle ground. Additionally, Doad's reaction to getting slapped around (brooding while still witholding from Brendan information), is just as false. How many teenagers are self-possessed enough to get slapped around in front of their friends and not either fly into a rage at the other person, or completely surrender and offer up any and all that the person wanted to know? Again, Doad's ability to avoid those two extremes contradicts his character's supposed age. (The actor who plays Doad looks like he's 29.) Either way, neither character screws up in a situation where it would easy, and almost understandable. (Jesus that was a long paragraph.)

The sheer absence of any mistakes on their part, with the exception of Tug, who has a temper, is completely unrealistic. Teenagers fuck up ALL THE TIME. It's what they do. Between the ages of 13 and 19 I must've fucked up five-ten times a day (COUGH Colleen COUGH). And while I'd like to think I'm being honest with myself, that's probably a generous estimate. I don't mean serious, life-altering mistakes here, the kind that stick you with injection scars, probation, child support, the nickname 'Backdoor Sally' (I'm looking at you, Andrew F) for the rest of your life, just errors in judgment or execution. Honestly, most of the things I remember most about my teenage years are things I screwed up and now know how I could have done them better. The lack of mistakes by the characters makes the mystery actually mysterious, but no more realistic for its setting.

As for the circumstances surrounding the characters, why are there no adults? Except for the principle (I realize it's a good, if short role, but is Shaft that hard up?) and the Pin's mom, there are none, just as there are apparently no boundaries on these teenagers' acts. None. Not school, not parents, not jobs. The only indication of any limitation is when Brain is at school an hour early because he had to take the city bus. (Apparently there aren't even school buses at this non-school high school.) But in the real world, being a teenager is all about a lack of control. That's why teenagers cling to the few things they can control, like having a car. There are the things that parents control, that school controls, that laws control, even that your own abilities control, leaving very little left for you to determine for yourself. Anyone who remembers how often I bumped into shit knows I couldn't even control where my head went. Yet the Pin and Tug could have a meeting at 4AM on a school night with their entire crews present (did anyone else wonder where the hell they each suddenly got posses at the very end of the movie?) while the Pin's mom serves them drinks? What the fuck? Yeah, it's kinda funny, but also seriously distracting, because there are no other parents anywhere, and the Pin's supposed to be in his twenties anyway.

I realize I'm kinda beating up on this movie, which is seriously really good, but as I think about it it gets more and more absurd. I mean, the girl dies in the beginning, but nobody seems to be involved. I mean, where the fuck are her parents? I mean, even "Kids" had parents, even if they didn't really do anything, there were at least around. I think if you took the exact same script, changed all the mentions of lockers and lunch to apartments and bars and set the movie among 25-35-year-olds, it would almost be a perfect movie. I really do. As it is now, it really takes something away from the film.

This blog is supposed to express my opinion, which I think it does, without getting too bogged down and boring, which I hope it does. I have no idea what the next one's going to be about. Maybe how Ford commercials haven't changed since as long as I can remember and that might have something to do with why they can't sell any cars. Maybe how Jay-Z should get poor again because he was such a better rapper when he was. Whatever it is, the one theme uniting all these topics is me telling professionals how to do their jobs better (like me telling the director of "Brick" how his setting was completely unrealistic). It is what I do.

So tell me if this blog sucks, or if it rocks, or if it was okay, but here's all the things I should do differently. If you liked it, tell your friends. Shit, tell your friends if you thought it was comically bad. And remember to include the Andrew F jokes. Now that I've finished, let us bask in my self-involvement.

I tried to find a good clip as an example of what I'm talking about, but the best I could find is the preview:

In the beginning(ish), there was blog

Because I'm so self-involved, and also opinionated, I've decided to start my own blog. Well, I decided to start my own blog like a year ago, but because I'm good with the ideas and not so good with the follow-through (and I couldn't settle on a good name for it), it took me a year to get around to setting one up. But here it is: The Jaded All-Czars. Why puns are so acceptable in blog titles but so shunned everywhere else, I have no idea. (But they ARE shunned; I'm looking at you, Lockner.) Now, you're probably thinking, 'it's just him, why not All-Czar?' Well, two reasons: the plural just sounded better, and I'm so self-involved, that I figured others might want to join my little blogging team. So consider this a standing invitation. Anybody who wants to be a Jaded All-Czar and opine alongside me, even infrequently, is welcome. Who knows? We might just have to make our own t-shirts. I'm even hoping to poach Stefan from Midnight Poutine.

The topics of my posts will broadly cover three areas: culture, politics and sports, often in overlapping fashion (or as I like to call it, Cajun-style). All of my previous rantings which were confined to the Faces-Book will be included, and here's a sneak preview of what I'll be going on and on about in the near future:

How the NHL can save itself from itself
What I'd do if I were governor of Michigan (with limited constraints of reality)
A write-up of my all-time favorite songs
Why Tempe, AZ sucks, or, I hate new cities
We suck: a critique of American foreign policy
Environmentalism's need for hypocrites
How American soccer can get better
And for my Montreal friends: Why I dis/agree with Quebecois separatism

All of this is right off the top of my head, and I'm sure other topics will pop up along the way. That list is also in no particular order, and of course there's no schedule, because I wouldn't keep it anyway. Hopefully having an honest-to-God blog that anyone on the Interwebs can read will get me a little more motivated. Either way, I'd be excited if I just get through that list. I think the over-under right now is five.