Saturday, November 06, 2004
Our Ears Are Burning
Readers have recently sent us the following URLs that mention this website:
This UPI article covers bias in baseball and references some work David Marasco did on walk rates of Latin Americans.
This review of Negro Leagues sites gives a thumbs up to our webpage.
A quote from David Marasco's book review is the lead in Amazon.com's listing of Joe Mock's Baseball Guide.
Baseball supersite The Baseball Almanac nods in our direction several times. They quote James Floto's article on Wally Pipp, David Marasco on a Federal League debut, and opinions on Gavvy Cravath and Smokey Joe Wood.
posted by David 7:27 PM
Sunday, October 31, 2004
A Modest Proposal
This was sent to us by Barbecue Joe
The play that will probably be remembered from this Series is the Game 3 gaffe of Suppan not running on the infield out to the right side, and then subsequently getting caught in no man's land and picked off third. It has been pointed out that this was the last time Pedro was in a jam, and that he found his rhythm after this double play.
It has also been said that with all the cheering, Suppan may have been confused because "GO!" and "NO!" sound very much alike. This is one of those situations where having the third base coach yell louder won't help.
This is a problem that the people who invented the NATO phonetic alphabet confronted. How do you make absolutely sure there can be no confusion in a noisy environment? You pick words that cannot be mistaken for others. See:
http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/phoneticalphabet/
Now you also need words that are short - one syllable - and have visceral meaning. I would suggest that in the future there be only two words used in the Suppan situation:
RUN!
and
STAY!
Neither one can be confused with the other, nor sounds like a synonym of its opposite.
Is this too simple to be adopted? Can major leaguers be trained to use these two, and only these two, words? Put another way, can we train them to NOT use the words GO and NO?
In a related area, I know we have been successful with STAY and FETCH in the case of canines. Perhaps more research is required with professional athletes and their coaches.
Let 's start with the pitchers. As they find themselves infrequently on third base, they are the most in need of remedial help. At least in the National League.
posted by David 10:05 AM
