Advance praise for Cheater’s Guide to Baseball
“Derek Zumsteg should be ashamed to have such comprehensive knowledge of the history of cheating in baseball. Pete Rose gave me two to one odds this book would become a classic.” — Allen Barra, bestselling author of The Last Coach: A Life of Paul “Bear” Bryant
Pre-order now, folks. Your purchase supports me writing for USSM.
The Cheater’s Guide to Baseball
Only $11 – a bargain at twice the price.
USSM Q&A Q collection thread
and not the Q from Star Trek.
I got a lot of positive comments and emails from the last Q&A we did two weeks ago, so I thought we might give this another shot. I don’t know if two weeks between these in the off-season is too frequent, but we’re tinkering, and if it sucks, hey, everyone gets the day’s subscription fees back.
So toss your question in the comments and I’ll run through answer them tomorrow.
Cheater’s Guide Cover
Since I have a copy of the cover, I thought I’d share.
As always, you can pre-order The Cheater’s Guide to Baseball
That is, if you’re curious, a DZ logo on that hat. I’ve asked if they can have a real one made up for me, and they’re looking into it.
Advance praise for Cheater’s Guide to Baseball
“It’s all right here, from Vaseline to superballs to licorice, from Arnold Rothstein to Gaylord Perry to Sammy Sosa — a book sure to find its place in the pantheon of underground manuals. Wielding his sardonic humor like a freshly corked bat—lightly yet forcefully — Derek Zumsteg knocks it out of the park. The Cheater’s Guide to Baseball is funny, true and entirely original.” — Jeremy Schaap, ESPN correspondent and author of CINDERELLA MAN and TRIUMPH
Pre-order now, folks. Your purchase supports me writing for USSM.
USSM feature test: submit questions for Q&A
I’m going to attempt a reader suggestion today, and do something a little like the MLB.com Q&As (or the PI/Times features).
If you’ve got a question you’d like us (me) to take a crack at, drop it in the comments here. Later today (or tonight), I’ll go through and put together a post out of them. That last team projection post? The book? Whatever.
I have no idea if this will work, or if it’s better attempted in a different form, or what. It’s the off-season. It’s slow. We can try this kind of stuff.
And, as always, if you’ve got ideas for features, articles, or things you want done at USSM, drop us an email – we’re happy to hear from you. Well, Jeff isn’t. He feels the concept of reader-author communication is inherently flawed, as writing is an asymetrical authoritarian act. Don’t look at me, Jeff said it.
USSM Year-end Best-of: December 2006
I hope you’ve enjoyed these year-end posts. I know the off-season tends to drag, and it means sometimes we’re talking about music and doing USSM Endorsements or whatever, so I thought this might be cool. After all, we wrote 785 articles this year, not including this one, and there were 75,286 comments. It’s easy to forget the highlights, and I wanted to give some recognition of how many totally amazing articles Dave wrote. He was on fire, folks.
The Vidro Debacle: Initial reaction to the report. I tilt at windmills and pledge continuing Doyle support in “I will not hang up my High Epopt hat” It’s Official
12-15: Dave summarizes the M’s management in “After the storm“:
Incompetent.
We endorse Chris Antonetti as the next GM. We offer Antonetti for GM stickers and buttons for angry fans.
Other than that, what happened?
12-1: The M’s almost sign John Thomson, which we liked as a move.
This is how you assemble the back-end of a rotation. Sign John Thomson and Justin Lehr to give competition to the young pitchers, and use the money saved by not paying for experience to spend on position players.
John Thomson can help the Mariners, and for the price, it’s a good buy. Kudos to Bill Bavasi for finding one of the better deals in a crazy free agent market.
Later it turns out they agreed to terms if the team’s pursuit of other options failed, after which they… well, they managed to get other guys. I can’t help but think Thomson would make a better option than at least one, but anyway.
12-2: I look at where the M’s stood, and what they needed to do heading into the meetings. Dave made Winter Meetings predictions. If only it had gone like this.
12-11: Miguel Batista signs.
12-12: Future Hall of Fame denials, in the vein of McGwire’s troubles.
11-22: Sean Burroughs provides me the chance to get overly-detailed about a minor signing. Hee hee hee.
12-26: Free agent market and the boom and bust cycle
12-27: Why trading for Randy Johnson would help the rotation
12-28: Dave reviews the 2006 Free Agent Signings (pre-Zito)
USSM Year-end Best-of: November 2006
11-6: Discussion of reasons teams supposedly didn’t bid on Matsuzaka
Also: the a review of the Nationals’ amazing haul of almost unnoticed signings, an example of what you can find if you go fishing.
11-8 What the A’s move to Fremont might mean for the M’s.
11-9: Dave on the concept of budgeting wins, not money, and how it changes your perspective.
11-13: Richie Sexson’s contract is an albatross.
11-22 Offseason Adventure
Wayne Krivsky signs Alex Gonzalez.
> examine Gonzalez signing
Alex Gonzalez signed for $14,000,000 over 3 years.
> examine Gonzalez signing
No, you read that right.
Also on the 22nd: graphs on Willie Bloomquist’s offensive performance charted against AL averages and NL pitchers.
Other graphs:
Mariners total payroll and rank among MLB teams
Player previous season contribution to new contract value. I should update this.
11-23: Gil Meche’s Thanksgiving List, by Jeff.
11-25: Bloomquist gets an inexplicable extension, and in response, we offer A very brief reiteration of our position on Mr. Bloomquist
11-27: Jeff on “Collecting Ichiro”
11-29: “A short discussion of McGwire and the Hall of Fame”
11-30: Why Justin Lehr’s a nice little signing for the M’s.
Free agency reaction tracking:
Aramis Ramirez: Dave takes the opportunity to compare him to Beltre
Carlos Lee: a comparison to Emil Brown
Deluccia: nice
Baez: head-shaking
Gary Mathews: more insanity
USSM Year-end Best-of: October 2006
10-1: The first version of Dave’s 2006 off-season plan. Manny the DH! Edmonds in left field!
10-3: Jeff semi-live-blogs from the Twins playoff game.
10-8: A preview of what would happen if this Daisuke Matsuzaka guy posted.
The only thing we can know for certain is that if he posts, it’s going to get crazy.
10-11: Why losing Cruceta is not only bad, but symptomatic.
10-13: Unethical!!!!!
10-18: Dave offers recommended blogs for other teams.
10-20: I go through the matchups and write about why the Tigers should win the World Series. Heh.
during the playoff posts and comment threads I repeatedly said that I figured whoever came out of the NL was likely to be cannon fodder to the AL, and I’ve kept at it, writing that either the Cardinals or Mets were going to be mowed down by the Tigers.
Why, in a short series, would I be so certain about that? That’s a good point – in seven games, the chances the better team wins aren’t all that great anyway. I was being cavalier about it. But here’s my thinking.
Then, weirdly, it’s just a line that says “DUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR”
Anyway, having written some Playoff Prospectus articles at BP, I know how the drill works: you make a call and if you’re wrong, you get the mockery, even if you show your work and your reasoning was good. So be it.
10-23: A brief essay on Kenny Rogers cheating with pine tar in the World Series, by the author of “The Cheater’s Guide to Baseball“.
10-22: How the way the new CBA’s negotiations went is good news. Then, Dave on the new CBA’s rules.
10-26: Why the M’s decision not to pursue Matsuzaka but go after a corner outfielder doesn’t make sense.
A brief discussion of how to best arrange the Tigers rotation. The solution differs greatly from Leyland’s.
10/28 Roster Management and why it’s important
10-30: the first post on free-agency insanity.
If a few general managers get together and decide that a 4 win player like Alfonso Soriano is worth $16 million per season, that doesn’t establish his actual value – it establishes that they suck at their jobs.
We’ll return to this topic, as you’ll see.
USSM Year-end Best-of: September 2006
September was all Dave, all the time.
9-1: In a pointer to a really great article about Ichiro and Johjima. Dave:
Ichiro is disliked by most of the American media who follows the team around on a regular basis. Perhaps they should all spend more time with Brad Lefton and learn about why he does some of the things he does, rather than ascribing arrogance and aloofness to him because he’s not like the kids from Texas.
9-8: Generally, I’ve skipped the Big Board/Future Forty updates, but Dave’s post here talks about how the M’s aggressive promotion policy for hitters is hurting their development.
9-10: Are long-term contracts to pitchers ever worth it? Dave reviews recent signings with interesting results. I’m going to quote part of the ending, because it’s awesome:
It’s easy to look at what a pitcher like Barry Zito or Jason Schmidt is right now and say “do whatever it takes to sign himâ€, thinking you’re getting a pitcher who will anchor your rotation for years to come. We have to remember, though, that guys like Mike Hampton, Tim Hudson, Javier Vazquez, Carl Pavano, Chan Ho Park, and Bartolo Colon were looked at the same way. These guys were Cy Young winners, established playoff heroes, perenniel all-stars, and the best pitchers of their time.
By the years you hit free agency, however, your time is usually running short, and your best days are often behind you. Making a 4+ year commitment to a starting pitcher who has already been worked hard is rarely a good idea.
9-12: Dave, in one of the more succinct bits of analysis all year, compares Washburn 05 and 06.
9-14: Game 146’s intro includes a really good writeup about Odalis Perez.
9-18: Dave reviews his own offseason plan, using the “Dave’s a Genius” and “Dave’s an Idiot” classifications
9-20: Steve Kelley, awful sportswriter, taken apart by Dave, annoyed USSM author.
9-21: Jake Woods, Litmus Test.
Jake Woods is a litmus test. An organization that understands pitching would trade him this offseason. We’ll see if the Mariners are up to the challenge.
9-23: Your guide to Everett alternatives, revisited. I always like to return to previous discussions and see what we can learn from them. Here, it’s interesting to look back at the names being thrown around were and see who did well and who didn’t.
9-24: Dave talks about the cost of the team, and how payroll restrictions meant the M’s certainly weren’t going to sign two quality starters.
9-26: Is the lack of criticism of Carlos Garcia a sign that he’s really good, or that the team’s horrible and we’re focused on other issues?
9-27: In talking about the PI’s Andriesen’s off-season plan, Dave looks ahead to the off-season.
I don’t know anyone who doesn’t want Daisuke Matsuzaka. It’s like asking kids if they want pie.
9-28: The extra-snarky commentary on the M’s after-season letter to season ticket holders.
Dave points to Angel Guzman as a potential undervalued pitcher.
9-30: what were the strong positives of the season?
USSM Year-end Best-of: August 2006
8-1 Dave evaluates Gil Meche’s season through July. Then on 8-9 he does a similar breakdown for Felix.
8-8 Dave’s random notes include a section titled “My mother could beat up Willie Bloomquist” on WFB’s isolated slugging of .032
8-11 Dave on Hargrove’s appalling ignorance of his own staff.
8-14 Dave’s great write-up of Byran LaHair
8-15 Catcher defense discussed in the context of Johjima v Rivera.
8-17 I make a joking but still-dangerous statistical case for Carl Everett’s veteran leadership.
And I go insane in the day’s Bloomquist-tastic game thread. You get the post and then nutty comments.
8-18 Then you get snakes on a team.
8-20 Dave finds good news even as the M’s got swept.
8-23 Dave tears apart Hargrove’s late game management.
8-24 In the day’s game thread, Dave talks about meeting Randy Johnson.
8-25 Dave’s writeup on Jeff Clement
8/26 game thread
David Wells famously claims to pitch while drunk. Gil Meche just pitches like he’s drunk, but we’re pretty sure he’s not.
David Wells is a strike throwing machine. Gil Meche wouldn’t even know how to turn on said machine.
8/27 Super-exciting dual post on Bob Finnigan’s retirement column.