"Narrative Likability Factor" & The New York Yankees

A Yankee win this evening would bring their playoff magic number to 1.  With both Tampa Bay and Minnesota neck-and-neck in terms of overall record, the Bombers still need a good week to assure themselves home-field advantage, but it seems a foregone conclusion, at least, that they'll once again be part of the drama of October baseball.

Earlier this week I discussed the invention of Narrative Likability Factor, a metric for baseball humanists.  NLF definitely gives priority to players and teams which have overcome obstacles and adversity, have suffered from perpetual underdog syndrome, have long-suffering fan-bases, and are replete with soulful, underrated players and coaches.

It probably goes without saying that the franchise which won last year's World Series, owns more championships than any team in professional sports history, consistently boasts the largest payrolls and revenues in the league, and caters primarily to the most affluent citizens of the nation's largest city does not score particularly high on the Narrative Likability scale.  In truth, the Evil Empire acts something like an inverse curvebreaker.  Their presence in the playoffs helps to raise everybody else's score.  Even the Phillies, two-time reigning NL Champs boasting multiple MVP winners and Cy Young candidates, seem like pesky underdogs compared to the team that ousted them just under a year ago.

Still, it seems necessary to set this bar, no matter how low.  The following narratives will probably only be appealing to that unfortunately preponderant sociopathic strain in American culture known as Yankee fandom, but here goes:

• The Boss Is Lost:  He is one of the great antiheroes of baseball history, but that doesn't necessarily make George Steinbrenner's career any less compelling.  We engorge ourselves on baseball villains as ravenously as on baseball's virtuous paragons.  In the event that - God Forbid! - the Yankees hoist another banner in 2010, there will undoubtedly be an entertaining postmodern perversity to the posthumous treatment of the curmudgeonly demagogue with "win-one-for-the-gipper" sentimentality.  His psychotic hellspawn - Hank and Hal - accept the trophy in his honor and blubber, through forced blood-tears, about their early years, hiding for weeks in tight, dark corners of the Steinbrenner mansion, quivering in response to the Boss' tendency towards filial cannibalism.  "We didn't know it then," Hank whinnies, "but he was just preparing us for the reality of the business world.  I will think of him most fondly every time we negotiate a new competitive-bargaining agreement."
• El Capitan:  Derek Jeter has been so uncharacteristically bad this year, posting by far the lowest OPS (707) of his fifteen-year career, that even his most rabid apologists have questioned the wisdom of resigning him to the kind of outlandish contract ($15-$20 Million/year) that seemed a foregone conclusion when the season began.  Several New York columnists, finding it more and more difficult to defend Jeter's performance, which has gotten progressively worse over the course of the season, have already resorted to commending him on rising to the occasion in October.  Captain Clutch, we all assume, will be right back to his old exploits (980 career OPS in ALDS) when the playoffs begin.  If this premonition proves accurate, prepare yourself for a even greater chokeload of Jeter love from Joe Buck and the rest mainstream media in the ALCS and World Series.  Jeter's postseason prowess is the well-placed dimple which provokes a father to call his plain-jane daughter "beautiful."
• Flipping the Script:  The Yankees biggest offseason acquisition, Javier Vazquez (10-9, 5.07 ERA) and Curtis Granderson (779 OPS), have had rather mediocre seasons, prompting the typical backlash from the coven of New York sportswriters who worship exclusively at the church of the trinity - Jeter, Rivera, Posada.  New guys suck, basically.  Granderson, who's been dogged by injuries much of the year, has quietly been very hot over the last month, with 8 HR, 22 RBI, and a 912 OPS.  Vazquez has continued to struggle, fueling the pervasive "can't hack it in New York" rants which began as soon as he was re-acquired.  Expect the tune to change if either or both of them step it up in October.  
• Spend, Baby, Spend:  In the wake of the MLB Confidential leaks at Deadspin, which suggest that teams like the Marlins may be making nearly as much in pure profit as the Yankees by merely pocketing their revenue-sharing dollars (many of which come directly out of the Yankee coffers), the "buying championships" argument is thinner than ever.  If there was ever a reason to root for the Yankees, this is it.  They're annually asked to subsidize their rivals, but then have to listen all year long to bitching about their $250 Million payroll while slimy owners like Jeffrey Loria trade away their best talents the moment they become eligible for arbitration.  At least the Yankees profit-model, as ugly as it may be, especially in the era of Yankee Stadium III, involves putting a competitive product on the field.  You'll need a sizable trust fund if you want to catch an obstructed view of that field, but you'll never have to worry about them starting Emilio Bonafacio is center-field in September.

At the end of last season, after the Yankees made relatively easy work of Minnesota, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia, I was able to take solace in the fact that if the Yankees didn't win at least one championship every decade, we might lose our sense of evil in the world.  The offseason will be even darker this year if they manage to repeat.  

Narrative Likability Factor: F (uck the Yankees!)

"Narrative Likability Factor: A Metric For Humanities Majors" & The Minnesota Twins

Any of you who have read this blog before are well aware that I have no problem being conversive in sabermetrics.  This is not a intended as an anti-SABR diatribe or parody.  All I intend to suggest is that at times, and especially in the romantic seasons (i. e. spring and fall), it is easy to become immersed in baseball humanism.  Baseball humanism is the perception that the game possesses a metanarrative, something akin to a parable, or a synechdoche of American history, which makes it more than just a mechanism for enabling gamblers.

Certainly, at its worst, baseball humanism inspires crass nostalgia, old-fogeyism, and self-righteousness.  It is the undercurrent of belligerent steroid conspiracy theories, short-sighted assertions that baseball's "Golden Age" happened prior to integration, basically the entire body of Murray Chass' forgettable canon, and the abundant moralizing of other half-wit sportswriters.  Being a good baseball humanist does not, as Chass believes, mean you hate statistics and stubbornly believe that the abject coincidences of your own experience are necessarily equivalent to "truth."  Bill James and Rob Neyer, two of the most notorious voices of sabermetrics, are both apparent baseball humanists.  The power of baseball humanism (like all humanisms, for that matter) is in our hope that the game, governed by a fairly knowable system of laws, conventions, and politics, is analogous to everything else, that broiling, festering knot of opaque inconsistency and unfathomable immensity we call life.

Some of the heroes of baseball humanism are obvious: Jackie Robinson, Roberto Clemente, Curt Flood.  The powerful social implications of their careers are inestimable.  Likewise, there are antiheroes - Ty Cobb, Pete Rose, Jose Canseco - whose stories, though not to be emulated, are equally compelling.  One of the reasons we adore sport is that the lives of such athletes unfold in front of us as though they were the protagonists of a serialized fiction.  And we have great patience for every variation within the genre.  We are equally amused by the heroic ascensions of Horatio Alger (i.e. Hank Greenberg) and the absurdist tragedies of Franz Kafka (i.e. Milton Bradley).  Omniscience is limited, obviously, but not as much as proponents of privacy would expect.  Thus, we are guided along by an anonymous author whose incredible skill is his ability to write as eloquently as Michael Lewis and Buzz Bissinger, when the occasion demands, but also as amateurishly as Gene Wojciechowski and Mark Fainura-Wada, when his aims are satirical.  It's a dexterity not even John Dos Passos could equal.

One of the great joys of the postseason is joining narratives in media res.  For those players who advance deep into October, especially, a major episode is being written, one which, when we reflect on their "story," will likely help to guide our interpretation. (Clemente's story is soulful, regardless, but is made so much sweeter by his performance in the 1971 postseason.  Similar claims can be made for Bob Gibson, Reggie Jackson, Brooks Robinson, etc.)  In this season's postseason primer, I preview each team based not on their talent, but on their dramatic potential.  What narratological traits have guided them so far, what kind of stories could be yielded by a deep run in October.  Let's begin with a look at the narrative potential of the first team to officially punch their postseason ticket, the Minnesota Twins.

• Retribution Songs (Verse 1): In order to reach the World Series, the Twins will need to upset at least one and likely both of the AL East juggernauts.  New York upended Minnesota with relative ease in the ALDS a year ago, so that sting is relatively fresh for several Twinks, but the personal scars run deeper for Carl Pavano.  Pavano spent four years in the Bronx as part of the largest contract of his career ($40 Million).  During that time he managed to make only 26 starts and compiled a 5.00 ERA.  Through a combination of flukish injuries, off-the-field antics, and clubhouse scuffles, he became one of the most ridiculed figures in New York sports and a major scapegoat for the Yankees inability to get past the Division Series from '05-'08.  Last year, Pavano pitched an outstanding game (7 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 0 BB, 9 K) against his former team in Minnesota, but the Yankees still won, finishing off their sweep.  This year, Pavano will likely get the chance to pitch in Yankee Stadium, in front of fans who unmercifully booed him for most of his tenure in New York.  Beating the Yankees is always sweet, but for Carl Pavano it would be even sweeter.
• Retribution Songs (Verse 2): If the Twins matchup with Tampa Bay in either the ALDS or the ALCS, their lead singer will be Delmon Young.  The Devil Rays made Young the #1 draft pick in 2003 and in 2007, at the age of 21, he played all 162 games and finished 2nd in the Rookie of the Year balloting.  As reward, he was traded to the cold Northwest for Matt Garza and Jason Bartlett.  The following season, the team exorcized the "Devil" from their name and went to the World Series.  The underlying narrative was quite simple.  The entitled, bat-tossing Young had been the bad egg amongst a group of outstanding prospects, including Josh Hamilton, B. J. Upton, and Elijah Dukes.  For two seasons Young floundered for the Twins, struggling to even hold onto a starting role, while Matt Garza and Jason Bartlett were key players for the Rays.  This year, however, in the parlance of our times, the "script has been flipped."  Young was on the Final Vote ballot for the All-Star game.  He leads his team in doubles (42) and RBI (105), and he just turned 25 last week, while Bartlett is in danger of losing his starting position to Reid Brignac and Garza has posted the worst ERA of his career (4.01, not that bad).  If Young can help the Twins eliminate the Rays, it would be a cold, raw plate of revenge.  This is the window of opportunity for the Rays team as it is currently constructed, featuring many of Young's longtime compadres.  Next year, Tampa will lose many key players, slash their payroll, and begin the rebuilding process.  They'd like to do so on the back of their first championship.  Standing in their way is their former top prospect.
• Overcoming Adversity: If Justin Morneau cannot recover from his concussion in time for the playoffs, the Twins will take the field without two of their three highest-paid and most popular players.  Minnesota lost long-time closer, Joe Nathan, before the season even began and Morneau, who was an MVP candidate in the first half, hasn't played since the All-Star Break.  Nevertheless, the Twins are in the running for the best record in baseball, fueling Ron Gardenhire's candidacy for Manager of the Year.  
• Dome Sweet Dome?:  This is the Twins first year in a new waterfront stadium, Target Field, which is, by all reports I've gathered, a lovely place to see a ballgame.  Moreover, its opening inspired Twins management to raise their payroll by $30 Million and resign the face of the franchise, Joe Mauer.  Nevertheless, there is still a small but vocal minority who believe the Twins sacrificed a franchise icon and one of the keys to their prolonged success by leaving the florescent glare of the Metrodome, and they can back their arguments up with a pretty potent home-field advantage demonstrated over many seasons.  Bringing home the first Twins championship since 1991 would be the most effective way of putting a sock in the naysayers.  
• Sweet Ole' Jim:  The Twins DH, Jim Thome, is high on the list of greatest players who have never won a World Series.  He hasn't even been to a World Series since 1997, and, at 40, he's not got a lot of chances left.  By all accounts, Thome is an all-around nice guy and a superb teammate.  He's also put the team on his Paul Bunyan shoulders for much of the second-half, following Justin Morneau's concussion, so he's more than just a familiar face.  In terms of "win one for the gipper"-type sentimentality, Thome is pretty easy to get behind.  

As with just about any team, you can point to several other soulful players - Orlando Hudson, Francisco Liriano, J. J. Hardy, Matt Capps - who have something to prove in the bright lights of the postseason.  The likely pairing of the Twins with the Yankees makes them feel like a natural underdog.  However, we should point out that they will have the third highest payroll of any team in this year's playoffs (regardless of how it all plays out in the NL).  And, frankly, does MLB need anymore fuel for their "if you build it, they will come" mantra?  Especially since, by "they," MLB means "the affluent."  New York and St. Louis both won championships in the opening season at their gaudy new stadiums, each within the last five years.  It's kind of a tired premise.  Still, of all the teams battling for a playoff bid, only the Reds (1990) and Rangers (19-never) have gone longer without representing their league in the World Series.

Narrative Likability Factor: B+