I'm Sorry for Posting This, but It's Really Good
Best take I've read on Cashman for a long time by a writer I really enjoy. Sorry for pre-emptively breaking the Yankees moratorium.
almost 3 years ago
NickFantana
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“…Giving a normal, red-blooded, pattern-baldness-suffering American male access to the Steinbrenner fortune and asking him to buy 25 baseball players a year in an unregulated market is no different, in any meaningful way, from handing Sarah Jessica Parker a blank check and asking her to fill a three-bedroom apartment with shoes and dresses. And we’re not even asking her to get good deals. All we ask is that the outfits match.”
That sums it up nicely, you’ve got to admit.
Not really. I would say it’s more like giving Joan Rivers unlimited funds for plastic surgery. She can erase all the mistakes or shortcomings of the past, but she creates (and overpays in the process for) unsightly errors that are visible for years at a time.
by Toxicadam on May 8, 2009 11:32 AM EDT up reply actions 1 recs
Matt Taibbi, the author, is a really interesting guy. He tells a hilarious account of joining a Texas-based armageddon-mega church for one of his gonzo journalism projects.
Terrific journalist.
Well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
by Jay on May 7, 2009 4:48 PM EDT up reply actions
Geez, how long have you been waiting around to bust me on a poor word choice?
1. extraordinarily great or intense: terrific speed.
2. extremely good; wonderful: a terrific vacation.
3. causing terror; terrifying.
I could ascribe any of these to Taibbi’s work, the third one based on the information he uncovers.
But having worked briefly with Stephen Glass, I guess I should stay away from “terrific.”
Well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
The etymology points to the third definition, which incidentally is listed first in my dictionary. I suspect the additional definitions were added to accomodate common misuse (see also: fantastic; awesome).
I would love to hear stories on Stephen Glass, though I suppose that’s for another time and place.
Foul. Language evolves through use.
Though I look right at home, I still feel like an exile
by Manhattan Tribe Fan on May 8, 2009 3:32 PM EDT up reply actions 1 recs
I’m restraining myself. I really don’t get why he is called a good writer—he pretty much has one trick, which he does over and over. The invective, to me, lacks the wit of HST or Mencken. I think he’s pretty lazy as a writer, sloppy as a thinker, and quite impressed with himself. That doesn’t add up to me. But other than that, I am pretty pissed about the Indians.
ShysterBall had a fun takedown of this article a few weeks ago. You should really read the whole thing, especially the kicker, but here’s the crux of his criticism:
And I suppose it’s entertaining on some level to see someone work so hard to construct such complicated put-downs, but ultimately the piece is a showy, ignorant mess. Taibbi fails to grasp the same thing every other casual Yankee critic fails to grasp, and that’s that contrary to his premise, the Yankees’ GM is not responsible for “buying 25 baseball players a year in an unregulated market.” Indeed, it’s a highly regulated market, with many of the best players being completely off-limits to Cashman until they’re not quite as good anymore.
I didn’t actually think his takedown was very strong. Sure, ShysterBall points out that the original article is shrill and not particularly deep, but we knew that. But he doesn’t really do much better in response. It’s certainly not an unregulated market, but Cashman still undeniably has a huge advantage.
Shyster is missing the forest for the trees here. It would take an article five times longer to explain that (a) the market is highly regulated, and yet (b) Cashman nonetheless enjoys immense advantages such that the regulation is by no means an excuse.
In other words, (a) very few players are available as free agents, but (b) the Yankees can sign the three best ones by paying more than $150 million over and above what other clubs would pay. That $150 million overpay is, by itself, larger than the payrolls of almost every other team. So he in essence is just making a nerdy correction.
Well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
Bill Simmons interviews Taibbi on his most recent podcast. The only thing mentioned from the article is how Simmons was jealous he didn’t come up with the idea first.
That’s where the conversation went next. How the backlash was very similar to the type he recieves when he writes a political piece. Then an allegory was made between the similar mindsets of people who root for a sports team and a political party. Except that the sports partisan was a tad better, because they could admit when their team stunk.
This correlation is essentially the founding principle of SBN. The Daily Kos guy is in the middle of an Internet community phenomenon centered around politics, and he asks himself, what else are people this insane about?
Well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
by Jay on May 8, 2009 1:27 PM EDT up reply actions
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