Who are You, and What Have You Done With the Real Richard Griffin?!
So I wake up after noon after another crazy night living the celebrity blogger lifestyle (read: drinking alone in parents’ basement). The Drunks are mocking me for not posting this offseason (maybe I DID have AIDS, you insensitive bastards). Time for some easy blog filler – how about the old slam dunk of cutting apart some hack’s statistically uninformed statements out of context. YES! Richard Griffin has a new article up. Time to pour some coffee, sharpen the claws, and really dig in and enjoy this one.
Hmmm…solid intro. No random dumping on J.P.’s 5-year-world-series-guarantee yet. Reasonable assessment of current situation. Thinking about creative alternatives. *Checks byline*. Ok, he’s just warming us up for a real doozy. Pleasepleasepleaseplease trade-Snider-so-he-can-win-a-world-series-somewhere-else. I need this one.
Acquire JACK CUST?! But…but…he struck out 197 times last year! Strikeouts! That means he didn’t even put the ball in play weakly or run, he just missed it and walked back to the dugout, head hung in shame. That’s terrible for morale. No player could possibly be productive without trading groundouts slapped straight to the second baseman for nothing at all. No? No love for the infield pop-out? The rolled-over bay — I mean ball — two hopped to the second baseman for a double play?
Deep breaths. Sometimes you have to mine a little to strike the real gold, just push through. All-or-nothing not sneered at…sigh…100 walks brought up as a virtue…wait. On-base-plus-slugging?!? WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT? At least you misspelled it (OPA) but Jesus, Dick! What are you doing to me! You can’t walk in runs…errr…the Jays need to manufacture offense not swing for the fences…durrr…he’s a one-dimensional player…buhhh…Am I bringing back any memories? Snap out of it! Come back to the light! Don’t you dare leave me!
It’s all over. This is like Obama being elected for Jon Stewart. The Jays are doing less than nothing, pitch f/x is months away, and Richard fucking Griffin is quoting OPS. I’ll be in the basement getting high if you need me.
The Mockingbird 
jon, sorry about the possible-AIDS. You’re gonna maybe pull through and do sort of great. I’m kind of pulling for you.
Ice Cream Jonsey
January 23, 2009 at 6:07 pm
how is it possible that he can call it OPA and that can slip through and be printed/published online?
un-fucking-believable.
and good luck with the AIDS bro. we love you.
eyebleaf
January 23, 2009 at 7:02 pm
True story: Bill James was actually homeless before the Red Sox took him in
Lloyd The Barber
January 23, 2009 at 7:28 pm
Maybe he was thinking about how chicks dig the long ball and confused Slugging for Awesomeness. Of course, that’s a misnomer, because while On-base Plus Awesomeness sounds like a fun stat, On-base is perhaps even more awesome, so the stat should be called Awesomeness Plus co-Awesomeness or something.
Torgen
January 23, 2009 at 7:35 pm
Thank you all for the well-wishes concerning my ill health. Now I feel like a royal asshole because I don’t actually have AIDS. Gonhorreah, Syphillis, Chlamydia, Genital warts, you name it – including something they haven’t even come up with a name for yet that makes my urine invisible, but not AIDS – and that’s really not something I should be kidding around about. Again.
halejon
January 23, 2009 at 9:03 pm
Griffin’s fact checker is himself once he sobers up. It boggles me more than anything about his continued employment that more often than not (I’m not even hyperbolizing here) it doesn’t take more than a quick scan of one of his articles to find some glaring error that could have been easily corrected by an intern with a bookmark (not even a subscription!) to baseball reference. And it’s not like the facts in question are particularly rocket science…
halejon
January 23, 2009 at 9:10 pm
“WILL WORK FOR SPSS”
halejon
January 23, 2009 at 9:17 pm
Wait, you misspelled Jon Stewart’s name? You? You’re one of the no-H club, how could you mix that up? Way to go, “halejohn.”
(reads the SPSS joke)
K, you’re forgiven this time.
jw
January 24, 2009 at 3:06 am
Ugh…I had no idea he was one of us. I just assumed he was part of the oppressive majority, being famous and all. That’s one of my pet peeves, too – you have no idea how much being called halejohn offends my delicate sensibilities.
halejon
January 24, 2009 at 1:47 pm