Tag Archives: WGOM featured

WGOM Half-Baked Hall

Half-Baked Hall: 1920-1923

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After a few ballots in a row with inner-circle players, it appears the early 20's was a time when old players just kept on playing, were permanently banned for gambling, or were killed on the field. There are only two Black Sox on this ballot. And a dude who was named after something he didn't do all that often.

Ballot Due: Tuesday, February 24

Player Stats

Last Time On The Ballot

Jack Beckley
Jimmy Collins

New Hitters

Frank "Home Run" Baker
Donie Bush
Ray Caldwell
Ray Chapman
Larry Doyle
Art Fletcher
Shoeless Joe Jackson
Clyde Milan
Slim Sallee
Hippo Vaughn

New Pitchers

Eddie Cicotte
Ed Konetchy
Smoky Joe Wood

Parentgood

Clad Them in Bubble Wrap

123 Comments

In among the many, many movie-related comments in Tuesday’s Movie Day post was this bit from Zee German, “I was trying to recall at what age I could really start roaming the neighborhood . . . probably 8-9-10 or somewhere in there.” A few people chimed in with thoughts, and it seemed to me there was more we could talk about in a dedicated FKB post.

As a parent of youngish kids (4.5 years and 1.5 years), I’m in the early stages of dealing with this stuff. So I guess I’m curious to know not just how much freedom people give their kids but also how they think about the question of how much freedom to give.

Not that long ago, Mr. NaCl and I had a . . . discussion (yeah, let’s call it that) about the jalapeño plugging in some Christmas lights. I thought it was completely fine. I mean, the jalapeño is certainly not timid, but neither is he a major risk taker. He’s also good about understanding rules about dangerous things and following those rules. But the mister obviously had a different opinion and thought it was just waaaaay to dangerous for a four-year-old kid to be having anything to do with an outlet.

Yesterday I came across a 2008 essay, "No-Man's-Land" by Eula Biss that addresses perceptions of safety, among other things. (Astute citizens may recognize Biss’s name; she the author of one of my favorite reads of 2014.)

Biss references The Culture of Fear by Barry Glassner:

Every society is threatened by a nearly infinite number of dangers, Glassner writes, but societies differ in what they choose to fear. Americans, interestingly, tend to be most preoccupied with those dangers that are among the least likely to cause us harm, while we ignore the problems that are hurting the greatest number of people. We suffer from a national confusion between true threats and imagined threats.

And also:

One of the paradoxes of our time is that the War on Terror has served mainly to reinforce a collective belief that maintaining the right amount of fear and suspicion will earn one safety. Fear is promoted by the government as a kind of policy. Fear is accepted, even among the best-educated people in this country, even among the professors with whom I work, as a kind of intelligence. And inspiring fear in others is often seen as neighborly and kindly, instead of being regarded as what my cousin recognized it for—a violence.

As it happens, this week Jane Brody has an article in the New York Times that ties in with all of this as well. It’s about Lenore Skenazy and a new tv show in which Skenazy works with overprotective parents to give their children a bit more freedom. The first episode is about a ten-year-old named Sam. His mother won’t let him ride a bike (“she’s afraid I’ll fall and get hurt”), cut up his own meat (“Mom thinks I’ll cut my fingers off”), or play “rough sports” like skating.

My heart kind of breaks for this kid. It's clear his mother loves him dearly and only wants to keep him safe. But by protecting him from all these perceived risks, what essential skills is she preventing him from acquiring?

Brody's article also includes the following quote from Dr. Peter Gray, author of the book Free to Learn: Why Unleashing the Instinct to Play Will Make Our Children Happier, More Self-Reliant, and Better Students for Life, “If children are not allowed to take routine risks, they’ll be less likely to be able to handle real risks when they do occur.”

As I’m sure is obvious to anyone still reading, I’m on the side of giving children more freedom rather than less. I want my kids to take risks, I want them to make mistakes, I want them to experience failure. That's not to say I'm going to teach them to swim by throwing them into the deep end of the pool. I want them to know I'll always be there for them, happy to offer support and guidance. But I also hope to give them opportunities, both big and small, to try out new things on their own and to develop the skills they'll need to one day navigate the world on their own.

The other day, the jalapeño dropped a raw egg on the kitchen floor. And that was okay with me. I had him help me clean it up, and afterward I asked him what he’d do differently the next time he was carrying an egg. He said he'd use two hands. That lesson was far more vivid than it would have been if I’d just followed him around calling out, “Be careful! Eggs can break! Don’t drop it!”

Well . . . I think that’s about enough from me. So what about you? How much freedom did you have as a kid? How much freedom do you give your own kids?

note: featured image is from a British ad campaign promoting a personal emergency service

WGOM Half-Baked Hall

Half-Baked Hall: 1917-1919

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Alright, we're back from the holiday break. And ready to look at some of the final players who saw the 19th century on the field. You may have heard of one or two of these guys. Ed appears to be a popular name.

Ballot Due: Wednesday, January 21

Player Stats

Last Time On The Ballot

Jesse Burkett
Jim O'Rourke

New Hitters

Sam Crawford
Harry Davis
Hughie Jennings
Tommy Leach
Sherry Magee
Terry Turner
Bobby Wallace
Honus Wagner
Heinie Zimmerman

New Pitchers

Bill Donovan
Ed Reulbach
Eddie Plank
Ed Walsh

WGOM Half-Baked Hall

Half-Baked Hall: 1915-1916

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Are you tired? I am. I can't decide if it's because I got just six hours of sleep last night, or if it's because we have two players on this ballot named Nap.

John McGraw prompted some to question whether or not we're electing people based on managerial or other contributions to the game. The short answer is that everyone decides that for themselves. Remember, no rules for why you want to vote for somebody.

Another answer is that at some point, perhaps when we've caught up to the current year, I'll run a ballot or series of ballots that include people who have made great contributions but just didn't do enough with the bat. For example, Connie Mack, Casey Stengel, T.C. Bear.

Continue reading Half-Baked Hall: 1915-1916 →

WGOM Half-Baked Hall

Half-Baked Hall: 1914 Election Results

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Before announcing whether or not anybody was enshrined, I would like to ask the community if anybody wants to volunteer to help with this project. Much thanks to Daneeka's Ghost (Results Spreadsheets) and Hungry Joe (graphics) who have been helping out.

And, if anyone is up for it, I could use some additional help with keeping the stats sheet updated. We still plan on only doing one ballot per month.

Continue reading Half-Baked Hall: 1914 Election Results →

WGOM Half-Baked Hall

Half-Baked Hall: 1912-1914

27 Comments

So life has been really hectic lately. Hopefully you've had time to honor Rube Waddell and Cy Young in your own way. We're adding six pitchers and six hitters this go round.

I noticed the player spreadsheet was getting really crowded. I've divided the hitters up into 8 separate tabs for their primary positions. I've still kept a tab for all hitters.

Player Spreadsheet

Ballot Due Date: Monday, November 3. I'll send it out within the next seven days.

Last Time On The Ballot

Buck Ewing

New Hitters

Frank Chance
Art Devlin
Kid Eberfeld
Deacon McGuire
Cy Seymour
Jimmy Sheckard

New Pitchers

Bob Ewing
Kid Gleason
Clark Griffith
Earl Moore
Jack Powell
Doc White

Parentgood

Father Knows Best – Hard Conversations

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It's been a hell of a year. My wife's grandfather, my cousin's baby, and my sister all passed away. My mother-in-law has cancer (treatable, sounds like it'll be OK, but a couple scary weeks). I left my job. Oh, and we added a third child in May. Sorry for bringing all that up again... sometimes I feel like it's all I talk about.

I'm sure my kids wonder sometimes too. They've been exposed to some big things this year, and they ask some good questions. We've had to have a number of hard conversations with our kids - especially our 5 year old - about they way the world is, why things happen like they do, etc. We've tried not to shy away from the tough answers, but always try to keep a focus on the positive. I know sometimes we slip and give more trite responses, but usually we've done pretty well explaining birth (well, not so much the causes thereof...), death, employment stress, joblessness, etc. And they seem to have done a pretty good job with their processing of the information.

Through each of these moments, sharing the reality of the situation with my kids has helped me too. One of the things that made me feel best about losing my job was when I explained to my son that I had been unhappy working there, and so leaving it was a good thing. I let him know there might be some changes and stress around home, or that we might have to move when I find something (or, I suppose, if I don't find something) but that I would find a new job and we'd all be happier for it. He thought it sounded good, and came up with some of his own positives, like now I could spend more time helping him color.

When my sister died, he was at the hospital. He asked if he could go see her body, and we let him. There were a lot of questions for a few weeks, about life, death, and the afterlife. We're a family of faith, so we talked to him about heaven, letting him know that we don't really have any specific knowledge about it, but that we have faith God takes care of us. Every once in a while there's a new question that pops up - the other day it was about whether animals go to heaven - and so we can tell they're still processing all this information. Heck, I suppose I still am too.

I've wondered at times if I'm doing the right thing by having these conversations with my kids. My parents didn't peel back the curtain on adulthood nearly as early as we are. At the same time, I'm still trying to shield my kids from some of the more trying items, and focus on positive aspects. My hope is that my willingness to talk about big things with them - no matter how young they are - will help them be open with me too.

How about it, citizens? What's your approach to tough conversations with your kids? How did it change as they got older? I'm still stuck with pre-school kids, so I'd imagine school adds all sorts of wrinkles. How much is too much when they're so young? Where have I already gone wrong?

Also, I've been wanting to have these posts feature music that is played for kids. So here's one my favorites for my kids, and when it's your turn, you should share one too!

httpv://youtu.be/4EiU9pTweyw

History, Minnesota Twins, MLB

One man’s opinion of the top300 Twins of all time-updated for 2014 with new additions: Hughes, Santana, Suzuki, Escobar, Gibson

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I stole most of the idea from when Gleeman started his top40 list years ago (still unfinished right?) The below quote is his, and the rest is an excerpt from a book I put together 3 years ago. Some of it is outdated, but I’ve updated the list and stats through 2014.

“The rankings only include time spent playing for the Minnesota Twins. In other words, David Ortiz doesn’t get credit for turning into one of the best players in baseball after joining the Red Sox and Paul Molitor doesn’t get credit for being one of the best players in baseball for the Brewers and Blue Jays. The Twins began playing on April 11, 1961, and that’s when these rankings start as well.”

I used a variety of factors, including longevity and peak value. Longevity included how many years the player was a Twin as well as how many plate appearances or innings pitched that player had in those years. For peak value, I looked at their stats, honors, and awards in their best seasons, as well as how they compared to their teammates. Did they lead their team in OPS or home runs or ERA for starters or WPA? If so, that got some bonus points. I factored in postseason heroics, awards (gold gloves, silver sluggers, MVPs, Cy Youngs), statistical achievements (batting titles, home run leaders, ERA champs, etc), and honors (all star appearances), and I looked at team success as well. If you were the #1 starter on a division winning champ, that gave you more points than the #1 starter on a cellar dweller. I looked at some of the advanced stats like WPA, WAR (as calculated by fan graphs and baseball-reference.com), WARP (as calculated by Baseball Prospectus), and Win Shares (as calculated by Bill James). For hitters, I also looked at OPS and the old school triple crown statistics like batting average, home runs, stolen bases, and RBI (and not only where you finished within the AL in any given year, but where you appear on the top25 lists amongst all Twins in the last 50 years). For pitchers I looked at strikeouts, innings pitched, win/loss percentage, ERA as well as ERA+). If there was a metric that was used for all 54 years of Twins history, I tried to incorporate it. I tended to give more credit to guys who were starters instead of part time/platoon players, more credit to position players over pitchers (just slightly, but probably unfairly) and starters over relievers (and closers over middle relievers). There’s no formula to my magic, just looking at a lot of factors and in the end going with the gut in all tie-breakers. Up in the top10 I’m looking at All star appearances, Cy Young and MVP votes, batting average or ERA titles or top10 finishes, etc, and placement in the top25 hitting and pitching lists in Twins history as well. In the middle 100s, it’s more about who started a few more years or had 2 good seasons rather than 1 with possibly an occasional all-star berth or top10 finish in SB or strikeouts. Once you’re in the latter half of the 200s there are none of those on anyone’s resume, so its basically just looking at peak season in OPS+ or ERA+, WAR, Win Shares, and who started the most years, had the most at bats, or pitched the most innings. What the player did as a coach, manager, or broadcaster is not taken into consideration for this list, so Billy Martin, Tom Kelly or Billy Gardner weren’t able to make the top 300 since they were poor players and Frank Quilici didn’t improve his status due to his managing career.
Continue reading One man’s opinion of the top300 Twins of all time-updated for 2014 with new additions: Hughes, Santana, Suzuki, Escobar, Gibson →