One Way to Gain an Edge
By Mike SanClemente - Managing Editor
10/14/2007
What is going to make you a better Strat manager than your competitor?
Plain & simple, it’s the ability to look at the same information and make better conclusions.
Case in point; your competitor and you may read the following article:
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/recap?gid=271013102
This details the Indians’ extra-inning win in game 2 of the ALCS vs Boston.
Understand the world of the sportswriter; his job is to entertain, NOT to inform. Same with broadcasters, usually ex-jocks who can only see the world through their own experiences (witness Dan Dierdorf on Monday Night Football, a former offensive lineman to whom the game turned solely through the success of the offensive line).
Having a ‘story’ is more important than truly telling what went on. And so, in this Indians game, a story emerged because ex-Boston player Trot Nixon had the game-winning RBI against them.
So here’s how the author led his story:
By JIMMY GOLEN, AP Sports Writer
October 14, 2007
BOSTON (AP) -- Trot Nixon spent 13 years in the Red Sox organization trying to prove he could hit lefties.
That ought to be pretty clear to everyone now.
So you (and remember, also your competitor) are reading along and you see this. You conclude from his second sentence that he’s finally able to hit lefties.
The author goes on to quote Nixon and other players, and detail the remainder of the game.
Trot Nixon
A full fifteen paragraphs later, in citing some actual statistics (where the author cannot interpret or, uh, modify), he says, “Nixon, the seventh overall pick in the 1993 draft, singled to right-center off Javier Lopez.
"I didn't hit it hard, but I hit it where I needed to," Nixon said.
It was his seventh postseason hit against a lefty in 132 at-bats.
Ah, yes, Mr. Author. You first assert that Nixon was trying to prove to the Red Sox during his whole career that he could hit lefties, and that his ability to do so, based (naturally) on one datapoint, should be crystal clear now: this guy can hit lefties for sure.
Instead, you read further and uncover that his 7 for 132 means that he has a ghastly .053 batting average vs LHP in the postseason.
Researching further, you see that in the regular season, the Indians fully disagreed with the author’s initial assessment that Trot can hit lefties: Nixon accumulated only 16% of his ABs last year against lefties. When he did ‘hit’ lefties, he did so with a .286 OBP and the same .286 slugging.
If you’re reading this piece, you like baseball. Those that don’t like it, love it. As such, we watch games on TV and read about them the next day in the paper or online.
In doing so, we must endure the horror of, say, Thom Brennaman’s “worst in class” announcing, John Kruk’s “analysis” (he should be paying us for the right to occupy our ear-time listen to his oft-incorrect thoughts), and authors like this person on Yahoo telling us that a guy with 6 hits in one hundred thirty one prior at-bats should instead be judged on one single to right-center.
You need to make your own call on this one, and hope your competitor didn’t read the piece all the way through, at which point you can trade him Nixon “because he’s so good against lefties.”