George: ". . . WELL IT WAS A BIG SALAD. AND WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW IS, HOW DOES A PERSON WHO HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE BIG SALAD CLAIM RESPONSIBILITY FOR THAT SALAD AND ACCEPT THE THANK YOU UNDER FALSE PRETENSES - AH - AH?"

Julie: "George, all I did was hand someone a bag."

Why do people continue to engage SBB when he is clearly trolling?

I would also like to know the answer to this question.

I would also like to know the answer to this question.

FBI man 1: Tell you what, Mr. Simpson, from now on your name is Homer Thompson,at Terror Lake. Let's just practice a bit, hmmmm? So when I say hello Mr. Thompson, you say hi.

Homer: Check!

FBI man 1: Hello, Mr. Thompson.
[Homer stares blankly]

FBI man 1: [pause]

FBI man 1: Now, remember, your name is Homer Thompson.

Homer: I gotcha!

FBI man 1: Hello, Mr. Thompson.
[again Homer stares blankly]

FBI man 1: [FBI men stare at each other]
[hours pass by]

FBI man 1: [frustrated] Argh... Now when I say "Hello Mr. Thompson" and press down on your foot, you smile and nod.

Homer: No problem.
[stepping hard on Homer's foot]

FBI man 1: Hello, Mr. Thompson.
[Homer stares blankly again for a few seconds]

Homer: [whispering to the FBI man next to him] I think he's talking to you.

Lederer's answer that Blyleven beat Morris in one postseason game is worthless to statheads, sample size and all. But if the Morris supporters were to say,"That's just one game," that would undermine their 7th game of the 1991 World Series argument. So Lederer is answering in the logic of the Morris supporters.

How about actual head to head regular season starts? There are 9 starts of Morris v. Blyleven from 1983 to 1992. Jack's teams won 5, Bert 3. Jack was 5-2, Bert 2-3. However, in those games, Bert had a 4.28 era to Jack's 4.84.

And I don't really see that what SBB is doing is all that fundamentally different, even if his repetition and his selective use of facts sometimes gives him the appearance of simply trying to argue for argument's sake.

Have you seen some of the Jack Morris/HOF threads he's hijacked? He's invented words to describe Morris' ability to win for pete's sake.

He's invented words to describe Morris' ability to win for pete's sake.

After awhile it's just amusing. But you don't need to attribute mystical powers to him to explain any of Morris's success. His ability to win is exactly what you'd expect from a pitcher 5% better than average combined with offensive support 11% better than average.

I don't agree with him on Morris (or much of anything else, for that matter), but what's "trolling" about arguing in favor of a candidate (Morris) with widespread HoF support, if it's not "trolling" to spend just as much time arguing against another potential candidate (Ichiro) whose likely support is nearly unanimous?

What's trolling about it is making bad faith arguments that he doesn't believe and doesn't expect anybody else to believe, but just tries to get attention for himself.

Jon Heyman
#facepalm

"Morris' detractors generally point to one unextraordinary number, and while it's an important number, it should not define his career. His lifetime ERA of 3.90 would be the highest of any pitcher in the Hall of Fame, and his ERA plus of 105 is barely above average. But Morris pitched deep into his games and deep into his middle age, trampling his lifetime ERA. Morris is known by teammates to have pitched to the score, which enabled him to win more games than anyone else in the '80s and 254 games overall. (The leading winners in the seven preceding decades are all in the Hall.) In seven seasons, he received Cy Young votes. So he had plenty of great years."

He is known by his teammates have pitched to the score, so ignore any game-by-game analysis that empirically proves that "knowledge" wrong.
Sigh.

I also like how Heyman whines that Morris had to pitch through his decline years, which no other Hall of Famer ever had to do.

I don't agree that it "trampled his lifetime ERA," either. Morris had a 110 ERA+ in his 20s, and a 111 ERA+ from 30-34. From 35-39 he took a hit to the tune of a 93 ERA+, but we were talking about a 110 ERA+ pitcher to begin with. It's not like Morris was at 125 and then got dragged down.

BTW I'm not saying that those who are arguing against Ichiro are trolling, only that Sugar Bear's not, either. He simply represents a POV that few of us here subscribe to, but what's the big deal about that?

Because even he does not subscribe to the POV he represents?

Heyman's bad arguments are better than what SugarBear is spewing forth.

I think SBB sincerely believes the stuff he writes. I think he does a lot of poor analysis with his selective "big games" stuff and whatnot but I think he, like that Ron Guidry guy, sincerely believes what he is saying.

I think SBB sincerely believes the stuff he writes. I think he does a lot of poor analysis with his selective "big games" stuff and whatnot but I think he, like that Ron Guidry guy, sincerely believes what he is saying.

The problem is the other cases in which he's taken extreme WTF? positions. Such as when he argued in defense of Andy's copyright infringment by making up the case law as he went.

I think SBB sincerely believes the stuff he writes. I think he does a lot of poor analysis with his selective "big games" stuff and whatnot but I think he, like that Ron Guidry guy, sincerely believes what he is saying.

I don't buy that. The Guidry guy was Tommy in CT. In his non-Guidry posts he came off as uninformed and unintelligent. The opposite is true of SBB, and that is why I believe he is just trolling.

What's trolling about it is making bad faith arguments that he doesn't believe and doesn't expect anybody else to believe, but just tries to get attention for himself.

Well, if that's all he's doing, he's certainly succeeded. (smile)

But what evidence is there that he doesn't believe what he's saying? Has he admitted this**, or are you just reading his mind? I guess I'm just saying that bad arguments by themselves, no matter how loopy they may seem to anyone else, aren't the equivalent of trolling.

**Here I'll admit that I haven't read every post of his on the subject of Morris, so if you can quote me where he admits he's just saying things for shock value I'll drop my defense of him.

SBB gets anti-troll points from me for answer my question in #41 without some excruciating twist of logic. Sure he's a homer for Jack, but he recognizes that Orel was better.

I wouldn't have a problem with the Morris support if guys like Hershiser/Cone/Saberhagen/Brown got more support instead of being one and done.

The Blyleven comparisons are silly, but I think they came about more for the two guys being the best pitchers on recent ballots. Blyleven is comparable to Sutton, to Perry, to Robin Roberts, and even to Nolan Ryan. Jack Morris is a quite a few levels lower than that.