Mephistopheles

it is still here.

honestly letting zambrano go wouldnt be the worst thing that could happen

So you're stating that having an opinion of preferring 98 Sosa over 98 Olerud is wrong? Do you really have to say that everyone else is wrong if they don't agree with you? There's a concept called agreeing to disagree. It's not that bad of a thing when it's clear that one side will prefer one extreme of the argument and the other side will prefer the other. agreeing to disagree is fine when the only answer is an opinion. in something like this there is always a right and a wrong. sosa is wrong and olerud is right.

I do care about what I post, what I don't care about is wasting my time volleying stats back and forth with you. well youve done it for awhile now. :lol:

everyone does before they learn about things. its not bad being wrong. its bad being wrong and not learning why you were wrong.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/pi/gl.cgi?n1=wainwad01&t=p&year=2007 nah hes not even close.

really post count has nothing to do with it. im saying if you dont care about what you post why post? Thanks for explaining it without mocking me. That did make a good bit of sense the way you laid it out. I appreciate you taking the time to do that. you know the things he said have been brought up before. no one went out and ran the numbers. we didnt have to. eqa should have told us enough.

Does anyone know if this is a record?

Looks bad on me? I could care less. If you don't care then why bother posting 9,379 times.

In my best interest? Or what? You're gonna get even MORE haughty and arrogant than you already are? I am just saying it looks bad when you do things like this and forget the discussion......Sosa and Olerud.

Thanks, I thought you'd like it. It's very much in the mold of a snotty thing you'd do. Why dont you actually respond to the rest of the post. If you don't answer it it only looks as if you dont have an answer for it. So if you have one it is in your best interest to spit it out.

best player ever.

How would Olerud have made up the difference in runs and runs batted in? He had less hits and less extra base hits than Sosa did that year. So that means that the 20 more walks that he had over Sosa would have made up that difference in contribution? Who would have driven Olerud in? Henry Rodriguez? Gary Gaetti? thats where the 90 or so outs come into play. 90 outs = 30 innings. A terrible offense with crap would use those innings to score 15 or so more runs. There'd also be more runners on (HIM) so there are some more runs. Even the complete dropoff of Sosa's RBIs to his RBIs would be less thanks to guys behind him knocking in some of the runs sosa did. Not to mention that whole RBI + R idea of contribution is flawed. It's more like RBI + R - HR. as one can imagine, RBIs are incredibly stupid and you should be embarrassed to use them. Right now I am embarrassed that I post at a place where they are even brought up in legitimate discussion.

I sure wouldn't. Because of his slightly higher OPS and higher OBP and other miscellaneous sabermetrics? I'm just a caveman; your flashing lights, zooming cars, and mathematics frighten and disorient me, but I think I'll go with the guy who had over 100 more bases that season. Would you have the guy who made 474 outs or the guy who made 382 outs. If the guy with 474 outs contributed more than the guy with 382, then I'd go with the former. Youd still be wrong. If the guy with 474 outs contributed more than the guy with 382 PLUS the teams use of the other 90 outs, then you could take Sosa. Quite frankly that isn't all that likely.

we can certainly assume that they will hit their overall line in those situations. my argument has nothing to do with grossman and the fumble. my argument is that "the bears would have won more games with manning not grossman at qb". your response would be "we cant assume the bears defense would be as sharp in the more possessions manning would have created for the other team so we dont know if the bears would win more with manning."

Why do you want an answer? It's a stupid, pointless question. You're not arguing but obfuscating at this point. no i'm not. olerud's contributions to the scoreboard were less than Sosa's. The percentages posted on the previous page show that was entirely a matter of opportunities created thanks to his teammates. right, which makes me ask the question again: given the same opportunities as Sosa, would Olerud have driven in as many runs. why won't people answer? no but if Olerud was on the Cubs the OTHER players would have driven in MORE runs than the difference between Sosa and Olerud. really. your proof is what? his eqa and stuff his higher. thats about all we need to know. the team would score more runs and eventually trickle down to the other player's RBI column. there are other ways to illustrate it. this isnt a hard concept to grasp

That's bogus. You're counting the times when Sosa was walked against him. He can't control if he gets pitched around. I don't know where you're getting your numbers otherwise I'd look it up myself, but... take away the times when he was walked, and then what percent of runners did Sammy drive in vs. Olerud? Stop the BS. You DO realize that Olerud walked a lot more often than Sosa, right?

Why do you want an answer? It's a stupid, pointless question. You're not arguing but obfuscating at this point. no i'm not. olerud's contributions to the scoreboard were less than Sosa's. The percentages posted on the previous page show that was entirely a matter of opportunities created thanks to his teammates. right, which makes me ask the question again: given the same opportunities as Sosa, would Olerud have driven in as many runs. why won't people answer? no but if Olerud was on the Cubs the OTHER players would have driven in MORE runs than the difference between Sosa and Olerud.

sorry for posting all those confusing numbers actually my argument is obp duh. not rbi. And every non-Cubs fan who is sabermetrically-inclined would say Olerud. No. I am not saying anything about RBIs except its a waste of your time to even think about.

Are you going insane? I'm only discussing your argument. You are saying Sosa rocked at driving guys in. I am pointing out Olerud did just as good of a job. In other words, I pointed out the flaw in your argument statistically rendering it obsolete. You've done nothing. Your only argument against mine is skirting the issue and being a Cubs homer.

Olerud was just as efficient at driving in runs with runners on 2nd or 3rd? Sosa: Man on 2nd: .837 OPS Man on 3rd: .525 OPS Man on 2nd & 3rd: 2.269 OPS Olerud: Man on 2nd: .950 OPS Man on 3rd: .377 OPS Man on 2nd & 3rd: 1.283 OPS are you ill? Sosa had 211 guys on 2nd or 3rd when he came up, he knocked in 56. Olerud had 202 guys on 2nd or 3rd when he came up, he knocked in 53. 26.5% Sosa 26.2% Olerud I am right....again.

No Im not.

and i bet if you took a poll of major leaguers, they'd say juan pierre and david eckstein are good baseball players. that's a little unfair why? even if it's an exaggeration (and I don't think it is), it makes the point that players are biased, and even ignorant, towards evaluation of players/stats/results. well it wasn't my argument.... either way, Sammy drove in 158 runs on a team with a .335 OBP while Olerud drove in 93 on a team with a .328 OBP. In other words, the frequency with which their teammates got on base was negligible, but Sammy made much better of it This is a stupid way to look at it. 1. You are actually rewarding Sosa for making outs. Sosa's low walk rate would lead to more outs with runners on. Olerud took walks. 2. You are rewarding Sosa and penalizing Olerud for the parks they played in. 3. Sosa had 13.3% more PAs w/ runners on base. 4. Sosa had over 50 more runners on when he came up. 5. Olerud was JUST as efficient as driving in runners from 2B and 3B as Sosa was. Sosa was obviously more efficient with runners on 1B due to the home runs, but one has to remember the walks. Sosa hit a bunch of HRs. Olerud did EVERYTHING else better.

i see we're ridiculing people's religious beliefs now... that seems appropriate. not really. it's more about blind faith. people believe what they can't see in religion and its the same here. i have nothing against anyones religious beliefs. don't get so defensive.

The hell? Why in the world would someone decide to ONLY look at home runs. That's insanely wrong. If you do NOT want to look at things in a rate form (such as EqA) and you want to look at runs produced, then you can easily use linear weights. LWS give runs for each specific play based on how much the plays mean to scoring. So a 1B is worth X runs, a 2B is worth Y runs and so on. Olerud's going to come out on top here. No one's saying that the HR is not the best offensive outcome, but let's be honest, no player has ever been the best on the long ball alone which is what you're doing.. While there ARE little things that these formulas do not include, they don't amount to much and to take Sosa because of RBIs and HRs just because of some mythical energy field that controls his destiny is like hitting on 20 in blackjack. So what, we're not allowed to disagree with you now? Sosa had 66 HR's that season. Of course the individual goal of the game is to get on base, which Olreud nearly did one in two times that season. But Sosa had 66 homers and drove in 158 runs. Let's be honest, there wasn't much else around Sosa that year on the 98 team. Grace had a solid season and Henry Rodriguez was decent, but that was about it. Olerud would have gotten on base, but who was going to drive him in? The point of the game is to score the most runs (wow I feel like an idiot saying that). Like Derwood said, baseball is a TEAM game. Based on the 1998 team, I'd much rather have had Sosa as he had the ability to not only drive others in, but drive himself in on every given AB. Why are we talking about the teams when we are asking about an individual player. Derek Jeter's Yankees didnt win four rings because he gave better "favors" to his teammates. They won because he had good teammates. He didn't cause them to be good. It's the same damn thing here. The Cubs had a LOT better offensive team than the Mets did that year. So you really don't have an argument with Grace, Henry, etc. and i bet if you took a poll of major leaguers, they'd say juan pierre and david eckstein are good baseball players. and Derek Jeter is the best defensive SS in his league --- oh wait they did that at BA and he did win.