"We Not Me" works for the Red Sox too!
I wrote this yesterday:
BUT the idea that Nick Swisher and his .375 OBP, his .509 slugging percentage and his .883 OPS is winning this thing over Youk and his .299 average, .416 OBP, .586 slugging and 1.002 OPS is ridiculous. Swisher is currently batting .296, has two more hits than Youk and 15 more strikeouts than him. Aside from the hits and Ks, Youk’s numbers are higher in every other category. He is, as they say, freaking better than Swisher and Swisher has the added taint of being a Yankee on him so, again, this is a no-brainer peeps.
Last night, after the Sox game was over but before the Yankees had finished pummeling the A’s, I received an email from my favorite Yankees fan telling me that the numbers meant nothing and Swisher was the better player (she also admitted to Youk having the Sox “taint” on him…fair enough given what I wrote about old Nick). This is the same person who thinks that Swisher’s “beauty” should get him on the team. (She also was very pleased at the prospect of Youk being injured, noting it would make it easier for Swisher to get the votes. Something else I can understand. I wouldn’t want them hobbled for life but it wouldn’t vex me any if any one of the Yankees came up lame tonight.)
I’m not a stat geek and math was never my best subject in school. It took me a long time to “get” some of the newer statistics, I admit this. Given my favorite players don’t/haven’t always put up the best numbers, I understand not basing your preferences on the numbers, I do. But to tell me the numbers don’t mean anything is just ignorant. If we are comparing two players and we want the better player to be on our team, we look at their numbers. Youk’s numbers are better. There is no arguing that. I get why Yankees fans won’t vote for him (spite, as I’ve mentioned, is quite the motivator) but don’t tell me Youk isn’t a better player than Swisher…he is.
So get your butts out there and vote for Youk! 🙂
I’m not going to dwell on “right ankle pain” or “cramping” today. Youk says he’s fine. Tito says Youk’s fine. Youk is fine, dammit.
Sox are currently 3.5 games out of first place with four games to go before the All Star Break. Winning the next four would be nice but I’ll settle for the one game at a time approach and hope Tim Wakefield can lead the Sox to one victory before they leave Florida. It won’t be easy but it is definitely possible. I’m at the point where I’m not letting these losses eat me up. Felix Doubront, Kevin Cash, Eric Patterson, Bill Hall, Darnell McDonald and Daniel Nava are all starters on the team right now and the team is only 3.5 games out of first place. We should all be enjoying the baseball they’re playing right now and appreciating their attempts to keep the team in the running until (hopefully) the injured all get back to playing ball. What else is there to do?
Special thanks to everyone who stopped by the live chat last night. It was lots of fun in spite of the loss and the panic that set in when Youk went down. We’ll be back here next Tuesday to live chat the All Star Game starting at 8pm!