What is this crap on “productive outs” that ESPN is trying to foist on us anyway? (Note the attempt to get the phrase “productive outs” linked to refutations of the statistic. Time to start the Googlebombing.) Advancing someone with a groundout seems more like a making-lemonade-out-of-lemons kind of thing, not something players are actively seeking to do. It’s nice to win a 3-2 game using 3 sac flies, but a high-OBP team would always have chances of doing that…
Which brings me to the point tha there seems to be a great deal of anticipatory schadenfreude about seeing so-called Moneyball-style ball fail. Is that because people want the style to fail, or because people want Billy Beane to fail? Even in the laudatory Moneyball, Beane doesn’t seem like a very nice guy to be around. Maybe he hangs with A.J. Pierzynski? (Man, that Pierzynski article is a whisper campaign and a half.)
In any case, it’s not that speed isn’t an asset. In fact, it’s an asset that’s valued, and perhaps overvalued, and when you’re running a tight ship you gotta look for the bargains… and speaking of talent at a fairly reasonable price, David Ortiz signed for next 3 seasons gabba gabba hey!