The Case for Jeter’s Gold Glove

Nobody votes for who lead the league in home runs. Nobody votes for who had the most strikeouts. The numbers tell you that.

Fielding stats are more complicated now than they used to be. But nobody ever voted for who made the fewest errors, and nobody today votes for who has the highest fielding runs above average. Because the numbers tell you that.

But people vote for Most Valuable Player, and Comeback Player of the Year, and for the Gold Glove award.

If the answers are objective, determined by the numbers, voting is superfluous. Where there is voting, then, there’s subjectivity.

If a holy book tells you all you need to know about how to structure a society, why should everyone get to vote on what the law should be? No reason, that’s why. And that’s theocracy. But when everyone is free to pursue their best interests, subjectively construed, that’s democracy (or a reasonable facsimile thereof).

Derek Jeter has just won his 5th Gold Glove award, and Rob Neyer complains it is at least the 4th he doesn’t deserve. Neyer notes that the sabermetrically inclined Fielding Bible Award voters didn’t see fit to give Jeter even a 10th place vote. And although these awards do consider “subjective judgment” to be a “very important part of determining the best defensive players”, it is probably understated that the Fielding Bible “puts a lot of emphasis on the numbers.” (The award winners and the numeric leaders in e.g. runs saved do not diverge tremendously.)

Of course, the Gold Glove voters do not put any emphasis on numbers. Neyer thinks they care about something else.

I think they keep giving [Jeter] the award as a gesture of respect. In a different sort of society, they might simply bow in his presence, then kiss one of his World Series rings. Or cross themselves whenever Game 3 of the Yankees’ 2001 Division Series is mentioned. Instead they somewhat mindlessly give him their Gold Glove support every year, even as everyone who’s actually paying attention knows the Yankees would prevent more runs if almost anyone else were playing shortstop.

Neyer doesn’t realize, though, that this is an argument for giving Jeter the Gold Glove. Think about gold for a moment. It’s shiny and makes you go ‘ooh’ and everybody thinks it has intrinsic value and indicates status but it’s really just a yellow rock. Libertarians want a gold standard, kings want gold crowns. But it’s just a yellow rock. So, nothing better captures the meaningless symbolism of rank and status than gold.

So, I say, the Gold Glove should go to Jeter. Jeter is shiny and sleek and when he makes that back foot pivot jumping play in the hole everyone goes ‘ooh’. It looks good, but it’s not really worth anything. And that’s the Gold Glove. That’s subjective. That’s seeing meaning in things that don’t really have meaning. It’s seeing status in symbols. If you want to know who really saved the most runs, read your Fielding Bible. But if you want to know who’s king of the shortstops, adorned with gold and jewels, well, that’s something the numbers just can’t tell you.

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Examples multiply with ease. Where liberals tend to see systemic, institution wide problems, conservatives blame individuals. Where progressives want to see public institutions help people- social security, health care, gun control- conservatives want people to fend for themselves. (For brilliant discussion of this phenomenon, see chapter 7 of George Lakoff’s book “Whose Freedom?“)

In short, whereas liberals don’t hate the player, they hate the game, conservatives hate the player.

Speaking of hating the player, look at what Roger Clemens is up to lately. He’s pleading not guilty to charges of perjury. Knee-jerk moralizing tabloids and conservative papers such as the New York Post won’t shut up about it. Sports fans, being conservative, flock to lead stories on SI.com and ESPN.com. And what did Clemens do? He lied. An individual’s moral failing. What did he lie about? Doing steroids. A morally misguided individual choice.

But where’s the attention and outrage over the recent findings that the Pittsburgh Pirates took 69 million dollars in revenue sharing in 2007 and 2008, turned a nearly 30 million dollar profit, and didn’t spend diddly on payroll? Where’s the outrage at the fact that the Pittsburgh Pirates ownership has a financial incentive to field a shitty team?

That problem is institutional, and so systemic. As a result, you won’t here much about it from certain corners. (In fact, a search of the New York Post website yielded zip.) And when the news of the Pirates’ financial practices broke, the Major League powers-that-be cited the leak of the financial information- an individual act- rather than what that leak revelaed- a systemic practice- as the bad apple.

Pirates fans, having endured 18 consecutive losing seasons, may be few and far between, and may not complain so loudly. (Not that they have much clout in the marketplace). But this isn’t just a Pittsburgh problem, it’s a baseball-wide problem. But so was- or is- the steroid era. Teams, advertisers and fans rewarded steroid users for using steroids. The system encouraged it. Granted, baseball has since taken steps to institutionalize a penal system for steroid use, though the players union, citing individual privacy rights, did everything it could to leave steroid-prevention in the hands of individual choice rather than league-wide policy.

On Jonah Keri‘s Twitter feed yesterday, he noted that the ESPN poll on whether the addition of Manny Ramirez would be an asset or liability to the Chicago White Sox broke down by red state/blue state. In blue states, Ramirez rated as an asset, in red states, a liability. Permit me to hazard a guess. Red Staters judge Ramirez as an individual, and find his moral qualities wanting. Blue Staters see how Ramirez will fit in to a system, or structure- the White Sox lineup- and see him as a run-producer.

Conservatives see only a caricature of progressives if they don’t recognize that progressives also judge individual moral failings. But conservatives miss the bigger picture when they don’t temper judgments about individuals with knowledge of the contexts, structures and institutions which encourage – even if they do not determine- the choices of individuals. Ballplayers will be liars as long as people, who are liars, will be ballplayers. It’s human nature, presumably. But the institution of Major League Baseball- its structures and financial rewards system- is something created by, and so changeable by, human beings. The system which incentivized steroids, and which incentivizes profits over victories, can be changed. It is disgusting that a corporation’s desire to profit can pull rank on the public’s desire to see their hometown team make good. Maybe a judgmental pun on the front page of New York Post would help.

pic by Lamarque/Reuters

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Though some of these allegations are still disputed, the perception at the time was that Manny Ramirez- future Hall-of-Famer and the first ever Red Sox World Series MVP- quit on his team for money. The following is what I wrote on the occasion of the Ramirez trade, for my now-defunct blog, Soxlosophy.

Time doesn’t flow the same way for all parties concerned. Fans are fans for life. Businessmen have careers that span generations. But ballplayers can only be ballplayers for a very short period of time.

After the age of 32, every second of every day sees a ballplayer dwindle and decay, and become less and less himself. Not so for the other parties. Businessmen perhaps become more savvy in middle age. Fans become more experienced, have longer memories. They grow into their skins, develop their identities over the years.

Not ballplayers. They just get shittier and shittier until they can’t be ballplayers anymore, at an age where other professions are just getting started. And then there’s a whole lot of life left.

They can’t all go into broadcasting; too many already do.

Some ballplayers are lucky and develop other careers, and form new identities for themselves. Others live off their name, selling white wall tires or family friendly restaurants.

But every player knows their window is short, their skills are ephemeral, and what and who they are will die long before they do.

Manny Ramirez may or may not know, believe, or agree with any of this. But it’s in the back of my mind anytime I feel the urge to blame a player for wanting to be paid whatever he can get for the superhero talents he knows aren’t long for this world, before he turns into Clark Kent forever. And it’s in the back of my mind when I try to figure out who to side with in a dispute- the rare baseball talent who we pay to see, and whose life expectancy is just about up, or the front office business men, who I don’t pay to see, and who can go on being front office business men for 50 more years (in Theo’s case, at least), or me, who will keep on watching the games and going about my business.

That’s not to say that Manny is absolved; by all accounts, Manny was a Grade A asshole. I’m not denying that. But I don’t doubt that there’s at least a half-truth in one of Manny’s statements, because the Front Office probably did make Nomar and Pedro and Manny all feel one particular way, and whether it was intentional or not is immaterial. I suspect they were all made to feel that they no longer were who they had always thought they were.

Nobody wants to feel replaceable. Interchangeable. Everybody wants to feel unique. I bet guys like Pedro, Nomar and Manny have spent a good part of their lives feeling unique, and deservedly so, because they have been blessed with talent that millions of people would do unspeakable things for. Who they were, why they were loved, why they were the gods of Yawkey Way, was to be found in the arm, the legs, the hands, and the subtle harmonies only they could play.

Of course, superstars age, their skills wither. But to them, from their own point of view, they’re still the same unique divinity they’ve always been, ever since that first scout raved about their tools or wheels or gun at their 13th birthday. But that age of 32 or so rolls around, and that OPS or ERA starts to regress to the mean, and suddenly, these guys are one thing they’ve never been. Replaceable. They can be substituted; after their prime, the front office can find someone else to put up those same numbers they will. The person goes, the numbers stay the same. Oh right. And the salary shrinks. Profits go up.

That’s fine, that’s business. But I don’t blame the players for wanting “respect”, or “mental peace”, as Manny put it, which they always say they want instead of money, though of course they want the money. But they don’t even need to be shrewd in their investments with the money they already have in order to stay rich for life. No, the money is a symbol. A symbol of being desired. A symbol of being that guy that everyone wants, and pays, to see. That’s respect to them- respecting them as The Man they are. The money says that they’re wanted, to a quantifiable degree that much more than everyone else. What they want is to still be treated like the stars they were, not thrown out and replaced for an cheaper model. Manny will have mental peace when he’s desired the way Manny Ramirez should be desired. And Manny’s now getting that. The Dodgers are raving about the Hall of Fame slugger they acquired. Manny can strut into Joe Torre’s locker room and Be what he’s always Been: Manny.

You can call it ‘ego’, and it probably is. But the sense of ‘self’ applies as much as ‘conceit’. This is all they’ve been, this is all they know. All that lies ahead is decay and death. Yes, for all of us too, unfortunately- you heard it here first- but the rest of us still have a narrative, and not just the epilogue that a former ballplayer has. Sure, people will always want their autograph, and they’ll always eat for free in the local joints, but any player will tell you, it’s not the same. They’re never really themselves ever again.

Do you know what the moral of Field of Dreams is? Heaven is where you get to be yourself. (spoiler alert.) Shoeless Joe gets to be a ballplayer again. Doc Graham gets his one major league plate appearance, the one he should have had. And then, because he really was a doctor, not a ballplayer (‘Son, if I’d never gotten to be a doctor, that would have been a tragedy’), he gets to be that again too. Terrence Mann, after years of public silence, gets to be a writer again- he promises to give a full account of what it’s like out in the corn field. Ray Kinsella and his estranged father get to be an American Boy and his Dad, by having a game of catch.

But that’s Hollywood. Ballplayers can never again be themselves. When Manny learned that he wasn’t going to get the 4 year $100 million dollar contract extension that the great Manny Ramirez deserved, he shut down. Undoubtedly, Manny’s response was immature and hurtful to those that knew him, and he let his teammates down, and he disappointed fans who cheered for him and paid to see him be himself.

But nonetheless, I find it hard to be mad at Manny. I love baseball, and I know The Game and The Team are bigger than Manny, and Manny Ramirez didn’t do right by The Game, or The Team. I don’t condone his actions, but The Game and The Team are idealizations, not real people. They don’t have to stare death in the face before they reach middle age. They go on. Ideals are forever, Plato taught us.

Yes, Manny needs to ‘grow up.’ He should learn to leave an identity behind, and learn to face one reality that he agreed to- his contract to finish out this year- and one he didn’t- that who we are must change. He’s blameworthy for the first, but not the second, of course. And I can’t help suspect that behind the inflammatory statements and the knees and the jogging to first and the wanting his option to be picked up when the team has no reason to do so because he’s a Hall of Famer worth $20 million which everyone should recognize NOW, dammit, is the idea that the only self Manny has ever known is dissolving, and that Manny won’t be being Manny for very much longer.

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Fairness is when the same rules apply to everyone. Greatness, in the minds of some, is deserving of special treatment.

There’s a famous anecdote, presumably apocryphal, attributed to the Hall of Fame Umpire Bill Klem. “Son,” Klem said to a rookie who believed his pitch to Hall of Famer Rogers Hornsby caught the plate, “when you pitch a strike, Mr. Hornsby will let you know it.”

In Klem’s view, Hornsby’s greatness allowed him to call his own balls and strikes. He was above the law of the umpire. He was his own authority. A mere rookie, condescendingly referred to as ‘son,’ must defer.

This was not an isolated incident. It is often said that umpires expand the strike zone for star pitchers, or give them the benefit of the doubt on close calls. It is believed that a pitcher struggling with his control won’t get that same benefit. Which means a pitch thrown two inches outside by a Hall of Famer may be a strike, but a pitch thrown by a journeyman on the corner following successive walks may not be. This is not fair. But it follows, perhaps, from greatness, or the lack thereof.

It seems to be a fundamental truth of the universe that Washington Nationals pitcher Stephen Strasburg possesses greatness. The 2009 number one overall draft pick made his Major League debut Tuesday night in front of 40,315 fans in Nationals Park, Washington, D.C.. This following the previous game’s attendance of 27, 2002. Strasburg manifested his greatness nearly immediately. He struck out fourteen and walked none over seven dominating innings. He allowed only four hits and two runs.

But in the minds of Washington fans, Stephen Strasburg didn’t even need to prove his greatness; it was, apparently, self-evident. Home plate umpire Tom Hallion, however, was not to be Bill Klem on this night. At least, not for the first two innings.

Each of Strasburg’s first two pitches – both tailing fastballs over 95 miles per hour- were well off the plate. Both were rightly called balls. But on each, the sell-out crowd booed. Loudly. They did not boo Strasburg, who had not disappointed already. They booed Hallion, who, apparently, had the nerve to call balls on the great Strasburg.

After Pirates leadoff hitter Andrew McCutchen lined out to short, Neil Walker strode to the plate. Strasburg unleashed a devastating curveball on the inside corner at the knees, which Hallion called for ball one. The next pitch- a biting fastball at the knees- was called for ball two. The audacity; the man in blue was treating Strasburg like a mere rookie. The crowd let him have it. The packed house booed yet again when Andy LaRoche singled to right in the second for the first Pittsburgh hit.

Two out singles with nobody on in the second inning are not typically booed. Only an affront to authority can provoke such a defensive reaction.

At this point- with two outs in the 2nd- Strasburg already had 3 Ks. He would get his fourth on the next batter, striking out the side for the first time in his Major League career- and on just his second try.

And that was enough to prove the point. To start the 3rd, inning, Strasburg got a first pitch knee high strike call on Bucs catcher Jason Jaramillo. He then got a strike call on a changeup well off the plate away, pushing the count to 1-2. The called strike three on the borderline backdoor curveball was then a matter of course.

So, it took Stephen Strasburg just two Major League innings to established his legitimate Rogers Hornsby-esque authority. In the bottom of the third, Strasburg, now at the plate, lollygagged down the line after grounding a ball in the hole between short and third. He was thrown out by two steps. What other rookie in first big league at-bat could jog down the line and not get an earful? Fairness- the equal treatment of all- was already history. Strasburg, like the greats before him, is exempt.

The MASN TV sideline reporter informed the viewing audience in the bottom of the sixth inning that the holy objects used by Strasburg- the pitching rubber, the plate, and so forth- were being “authenticated” in several ways because of the “historical” nature of game, before their trip to a baseball shrine.

Reporters do sometimes use the perfect word. ‘Authentic’ comes from the Greek ‘authentes’, meaning “one acting on one’s own authority.” (‘Authentes’ itself comes from ‘autos’- “self” – and ‘hentes’, meaning “doer, being”.) The word ‘authority’ comes from ‘auctor’, meaning “master, leader, author”. So, something that is authentic derives from the genuine self-directed actions of an authority, the master, author, or creator of events.

It is appropriate to certify – authenticate – Stephen Strasburg’s authority. It ritualizes, and so legitimizes, his greatness. It recognizes it.

After Strasburg allowed a two-run homerun to Delwyn Young in the 4th inning, he retired the next- and final- ten hitters of his outing, including the last seven in a row by strikeout. Like Nuke LaLoosh in Bull Durham, Strasburg had “announced his presence with authority.” In response to Young’s challenge, he simply asserted his dominance. He had, in the words of the Nationals broadcaster, “shut-down stuff.”

Authority- being genuine and authentic- is not to be challenged. The dogma of the infallibility of the Pope entails that Catholics cannot question the Pope’s authority on matters of faith; he is thus the ultimate authority. The Pope, to many, thus appears above the law, and not subject to the same rules- or penalties – as everyone else.

Stephen Strasburg, of course, has been described as the savior of the oppressed Washington franchise. After his dominating debut, he will have converted many (though of course the level-headed and skeptical will need further persuasion). It is ironic, then, that Strasburg wears number 37, the jersey number of anti-authoritarian ballplayer Bill Lee, and anti-authoritarian inmate “Cool Hand” Luke Jackson. In Bull Durham, Crash Davis called strikeouts “fascist”, and groundballs democratic. Strasburg, though, did not try to avoid contact. He walked none and threw only 94 pitches in 7 innings, despite striking out 14. He didn’t try to do too much, he didn’t strain, as did Paul Newman’s Luke, to eat all 50 hard-boiled eggs. He tried to be democratic, to be fair to his whole team, and have his defense equally involved. But he couldn’t; he was just too great.

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Galarraga retired the next batter, completing a one-hit shutout, but that didn’t put the oil back in the well. (And Israel later peacefully deported the flotilla activists.) The anger continues to gush.

Many are calling for baseball to expand its use of instant replay. Others are advocating a direct appeal to MLB commissioner Bud Selig to intervene and reverse the call, retroactively granting Galarraga a perfect game. Others want – perhaps wistfully- umpires to be replaced by robots. Shared by all these responses, though, is the sense that a grave injustice has been perpetrated.

Which is interesting. Had Tigers first baseman Miguel Cabrera booted the ground ball, no one would have called for a rule-change. There would be no suggestion that first basemen should be replaced by robots. Though regrettable, an error would not have violated anyone’s notion of what a first baseman should be doing, such that radical action need be taken- at the institutional level- to rectify the problem. It is of course understood that a ballplayer who strives may fail, and that professional sports are hard. Nobody’s perfect, as they say.

Yet people are far less forgiving of umpires. It’s not because anyone thinks an umpire’s job is easy (though of course refrains that ‘my blind grandmother could have made that call’ will be sung). And it’s not simply that the technology exists to aid with or even entirely replace a human umpire’s judgments- for a machines can catch ground balls too. It’s the conflict between the role and the reality of the actor playing the role. The purpose of an umpire is to make the right call. So, the role of the umpire is to make sure the game corresponds to reality, to eliminate the biases and partial perspectives that would exist were the players to call their own games. (Umpires exist to dispense justice, and so the old joke that justice is blind and so are umpires is appropriate.) From Jim Joyce’s angle behind first base on the right field foul line, the runner appeared to beat the throw. That partial perspective- the particular angle- is, ideally, to be eliminated. An umpire should know all, and see all, and not be blinded or shielded by a limited perspective. That our human condition lacks the complete perspective is regrettable, an impediment to the dispensation of true justice.

But instant replay and robot umpires approximate the ideal of having all perspectives, and so having no perspective. The replay would show the play from any and all angles, and the robot would have near perfect precision. There would be no injustice, no disappointment, no letdown. No human element. Only a congruence between purpose and execution. Fans may be disappointed when their favorite players or teams fail to do what they try to do, but it is nowhere in the ballplayer’s job description that he embody justice or truth. Failure throws victory into relief. A player need only try to succeed. Yet the umpires job is to make sure that success is recognized.

People are angry at British Petroleum. But should they be disappointed? Some may claim that BP has a responsibility to its stakeholders. But it is not out to serve the public good, or to protect the environment or the livelihoods of Louisiana fishermen. Its sole purpose is to make money. Oil is its means. And as a private corporation, the only accountability it has comes via the market, wherein consumers may choose not to purchase its products. If BP wishes to gamble that the costs of maintaining safe rigs are greater than the potential loss of profit that would result from boycotts or a public relations hit, well, then it is just doing its job as a corporation. It is playing its role. One may lament the damage, but why should one expect anything else? Though BP is now employing saw-wielding robots, few suggest that the CEO be replaced with a robot. Though I’m sure the technology exists.

Some are angry and disappointed with President Obama’s response to the oil spill. The defense of the President is that it is not clear what exactly he is supposed to be doing (besides better managing public perception) to clean up the spill. But because the president’s role, unlike a CEO, includes the protection of the public, the (perceived) failure to do so results in disappointment and anger. (This is especially the case with Obama, who’s campaign fostered great expectations in his ability to play the role of leader.) When it is revealed that Bush-staffed government agencies (including the Mineral Management Services) were in bed with BP, thereby failing to live up to their role as protector of the public and regulator of corporations for the public good, there rightly exists indignation and betrayal. But a robot president?

The wish is to go up the ladder, to appeal to a higher power to make things right. To the commander in chief to reign in corporate recklessness for the good of society, or to the commissioner of baseball to reverse a bad call for the “good of the game.”

It is not new to say that sport- and baseball in particular- can be a model of a perfect society. Well-run, fair, meritocratic. Rules apply to all, justice is served, grace and beauty are quotidian, and beer and peanuts are plentiful. We expect baseball to be an idealized world of fairness. Umpires are there to ensure the rules are enforced, and reality well-represented by accurate calls. Like any model, though, it is oversimplified. It is austere, and so lacks messiness. In domestic and foreign policy crises, there are probably only bad and worse calls. The hope, though, is that in baseball, ideal meets reality. Between the lines, the universe is small enough and neat enough to allow the perfect administration of justice. When an historic occasion of athletic perfection – an 88 pitch 28 out performance by Galarraga- is nullified by an imperfect call, the glaring discrepancy between expectation and reality- even in the toy universe of the stadium- is wrenching and disappointing. For if they can’t even get it right here, where can they get it right? In an age of bad calls, we hope that in baseball, at least, they don’t just call ‘em as they see ‘em. We need them to make the right call.

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On Monday, Vizquel tied Aparicio for the second-most career hits by a shortstop, with 2,674. On Tuesday, Vizquel announced that he would probably retire at the end of the year. Batting only .200 in limited duty, he is an unlikely candidate to unretire in 2011.

Jokes of the ‘what’s the difference between x and y’ variety highlight the sense in which x and y are of different categories. Sports teams, with less comedic flair, highlight similarity; ballplayers are the same- uniform- in so far as they wear the same uniform. The difference between individual players is marked by the unique jersey number assigned to each.

As Plato would say, there may be many horses, but only one horseness. And though the category- horseness- is something to which the many individual horses may aspire, no horse can become horseness itself. Yet baseball tries anyway, by symbolically transforming a uniquely distinguishing number into a higher category, a mark of ideal uniformity.

To mark the anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s breaking the color barrier in 1947, all Major Leaguers wore number 42 on April 15. In so doing, Robinson was transformed from a unique individual into an ideal, something with meaning, something higher. Fans wear the jersey of their favorite player to participate in the glory of their idols; the unique player thus becomes an ideal category with many imperfect instances. Vizquel and Aparicio are not only both shortstops, but are both Venezuelan. Instead of number 11 being unique, something only designating Aparicio, number 11, to the Chicago White Sox at least, has become an ideal of slickfielding Venezuelan-ness, something which any slick fielding Venezuelan may aspire to and hope to become. Take that, Plato.

Last November, Vizquel said of getting his boyhood idol’s number: “For me, it’s like a huge celebration, trying to keep his name alive and trying to spread the word of Venezuelan shortstops.”

Immortality, evangelism (‘word-spreading’, etymologically speaking); these are the marks of a higher ideal. Aparicio approved of his alchemical transformation from person to category, from Earth-bound mortal to ghostly yet approving Ewok party-attender. He said of the double-play turning Jedi who is to take his place:” If there is one player who I would like to see wear my uniform number with the White Sox, it is Omar Vizquel.”

But the Force has a dark side. Jason Giambi played first base for the Yankees as number 25 for eight years. He was replaced at first by Mark Teixeira in 2009, who was promptly given number 25. When Trot Nixon left Boston in 2007 after nine years in rightfield, his number 7 was immediately given to new rightfielder J.D. Drew. Rather than treated as ideals, these players were discarded as fungible, and replaced with newer and (somewhat) improved models. Their individuality taken from them, they were absorbed into the mass of baseball mediocrity and anonymity in Oakland and Cleveland. Rather than being one of a kind- unique- they were just another one of a kind- another lame horse put out to pasture. Hardly horseness itself.

Vizquel, now 43 years old, has 11 Gold Gloves, which is second best by a shortstop (behind Ozzie Smith’s 13). Upon arriving in Chicago earlier this year, however, Vizquel had to forego his traditional number 13, as White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen, another Venezuelan former shortstop, already wore it. Vizquel didn’t mind Guillen’s keeping it, for “As long as a Venezuelan is wearing it, I’m pretty happy with it,” Vizquel noted.

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Will’s best-selling Men at Work was re-released as a 20th anniversary edition in April. In it, Will sets forth his theory of the “craft” of baseball that looks like a paean to the industriousness and personal responsibility that bowtie conservatives (profess to) love. Yet, what Will admires most in baseball is exactly what Karl Marx lamented is missing from capitalism; Will’s doctrine of labor on the baseball diamond is the Marxist ideal through and through. As Mel Allen said to his comrades, “How about that?”

Will certainly believes he’s writing a conservative tract. He describes his book as “antiromantic,” and in the forward to the new edition, he writes “baseball has had quite enough books of romance, nostalgia and gush.” Will associates such traits with bleeding heart liberalism, of course. (He writes of former Yankee Tony Kubek that he “is a liberal and therefore as warmhearted as all get out”. By contrast, Will argues that “umpires should be natural Republicans- dead to human feelings.”)

The book’s full title- Men at Work: The Craft of Baseball- captures Will’s thesis. Baseball is work, and to work is to ply a craft. “What spectators pay to see”, Will writes, “is a realm of excellence,” where excellence is achieved through good “character, work habits and intelligence.” Men at Work, first published in 1990, focuses on just four figures -Tony La Russa, Orel Hershiser, Tony Gwynn, and Cal Ripken, Jr.. (According to Will, each represents excellence at one of the four facets of the game: managing, pitching, hitting and fielding.) Men at Work does not awe at their innate physical abilities, but instead is a study of their character, studiousness and dedication to self-improvement.

Whence conservatism? Will writes that one of his “most deeply held convictions” is that “character is destiny”. (Etymology backs him up; ‘character‘ derives from a word meaning ‘to scratch or engrave’, i.e. to set in stone). Conservatives have long lamented that government involvement in daily life, particularly via welfare programs, causes (or rewards) laziness. Their derision of the “nanny state” suggests government is infantilizing, and hinders the formation of a strong, self-sufficient character. Pontificating near the end of the book, Will suggests that “America’s real problem is individual understretch, a tendency of Americans to demand too little of themselves, at their lathes, their desks, their computer terminals.” Rewards, then, should not be forthcoming. Will complains that Andre Dawson and George Bell both won MVP awards in 1987 despite their “indiscipline”; after all, they homered more often then they walked.

Men at Work, then, is a story of just rewards. It depicts the upright character of those who are dedicated to the craft of baseball. Will downplays natural advantages- such as the sink on Hershiser’s 90+ mile per hour fastball- and the advantages conferred by high birth- such as Cal Ripken Jr. being the son of baseball lifer Cal Ripken Sr. Will even ridicules those who think the law exists to protect rights: “the pitcher’s principle problem today is to get away with pitching inside as often as he needs to. There is too much litigiousness by batters who, like all other Americans, are very sensitive about their rights, real and imagined.” In short, conservatives should love it.

Yet Will is a closet Marxist.

Karl Marx believed that having consciousness and free will are distinctively human. Whereas nonhuman animals instinctively and unknowingly toil to satisfy physical needs, humans can freely undertake more creative projects. Humans, unlike other animals, can conceive of what they wish to accomplish, and can follow their internal mental blueprint in order to make objective- real- the objects of their conceptions. To freely undertake such projects is, according to Marx, to live a fully human life.

But in capitalism, Marx laments, physical labor is divorced – alienated- from the idea that motivates the work. The man on the assembly line is only familiar with one small part of the finished product, and he need not even know what he is making. As the division of labor increases, labor becomes more fragmented, and the worker has no conception of the whole. Man’s consciousness is wasted, Marx argues, and the worker can only operate on something akin to instinct, as an animal. Such labor is thus experienced as a degrading subhuman activity.

As a result, “alienated labor” can only be a means to an end, an objectionable way to receive a wage so as to satisfy needs outside of work, such as food and shelter and speculation about Lebron James’ free agency. Consequently, Marx writes, “as soon as no physical or other compulsion exists, labor is shunned like the plague.”

When labor is alienated, it is not its own reward. So instead of the happiness and joy that comes of freely completing a project of one’s own design, there is only the “torment” and “misery” of monotonous meaningless work. Instead of the pride that comes from making real what had been only a concept in the mind, there is no concern for the finished product. Instead of the internal desire for good work, there is only the external compulsion of the boss’ directives and the landlord’s demands. In short, there is no craft.

Yet Will gleefully describes his book as being about “four men who are happy in their work.” What is happiness, according to Will? “For a fortunate few people, happiness is the pursuit of excellence in a vocation. The vocation can be a profession or a craft, elite or common, poetry or carpentry. What matters most is an idea of excellence against which to measure achievement.”

Where is that idea of excellence to be found? Will contends that “A great athlete has an image graven on his or her imagination, a picture of an approach to perfection.” Exactly what Marx claims capitalism is missing. But because it is present on Will’s baseball diamond, Will knows that the craft of baseball is not merely a means to an end, an objectionable way to feed the family, but an end in itself, something done for it’s own sake. Consequently, it is not merely the result that matters, but the process. “Winning is not everything”, Will writes. “Baseball- its beauty, its craftsmanship, its exactingness- is an activity to be loved, as much as ballet or fishing or politics.” It is the activity, not the goal, that is worthy of love. So rather than shunning work when no compulsion exists, even ballplayers with long term guaranteed contracts show up early to take extra batting practice.

Will starts Chapter 3 like this:

“Early in the 1989 season Tony Gwynn hit home runs in consecutive games and was even more displeased with his hitting than he generally is. The second home run came after an afternoon spent toiling to remove the flaws in the way he had swung the bat in the game in which he hit the first one… The previous night he had hit two balls hard. One pleased him, the other distressed him. The pleasing one was an out, the distressing one was a home run.”

Gwynn’s goal is not to get hits, but to hit well. “Even though the results are there,” Gwynn tells Will, “I’m not swinging the bat the way I want to swing it. I’ve hit one ball hard to left field out of the 27 at bats I’ve had.” Yet when labor is alienated, only results matter: the order is made or it isn’t, the products are sold or they aren’t. Eschewing the external demands of the marketplace or the box score, Gwynn is free to hone his skills by his own lights, and to his own satisfaction. When labor is alienated, Marx wrote, man only “feels at home when he is not working, and when he is working he does not feel at home”. Gwynn, a California native, a career-long San Diego Padre, and now head coach at his alma mater San Diego State, is clearly at home when he’s at work.

Of course, Marx’ solution to the problem of alienated labor was to eliminate private property. Fittingly, there is no private property on a ball field, dugout, or even in the team showers. Marxists don’t use stalls.

Will does mention Marx once. “About one thing Karl Marx, a lefty, was right”, Will concedes. “Change the modes of production and you will change the nature of work, and consciousness.” Will brings this up only to argue against adopting the aluminum bat.

Conservatives dismiss Marxism as utopian, and hence unrealistic. They think that leftists foster an unrealistic hope in the power of government to transform people into cooperative team-players, even without the profit motive of the free market. Will asserts that “acknowledging limits is, surely, the essence of conservatism (and of realism, which conservatives consider much the same thing.)” But though there are physical limits- fastballs can’t go 200 miles per hour- Will’s is a demonstration of the limitless dedication to perform. Instead of profit, Will’s ballplayers- financially set for life- are motivated only by excellence. His is a case study of the irrelevance of profit to craft. As Shoeless Joe Jackson – a man not enjoying an early retirement from work- says in Field of Dreams, “I’d have played for meal money. I’d have played for nothing.”

Will, in addressing the perennial baseball question- perennial since 1973, at least- as to the legitimacy of the designated hitter, has this to say:

“The best case for the DH is this: it represents the rarest of things, the triumph of evidence over ideology. The anti-DH ideology is that there should be no specialization in baseball, no division of labor: Everyone should play ‘the whole game’. That theory is obliterated by this fact: specialization is a fact with or without the DH. Most pitchers only go through the motions at bat.”

In Men at Work, Will has provided a Marxist counterexample to his own conservative ideology. If only he were to step up to the plate.

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Having already thrown 99 pitches, the fragile looking yet hard throwing Buchholz took a 2-1 lead into the 8th inning. He promptly fell behind Adam Lind three balls and one strike. Phase change appeared imminent; in a leadoff walk, the transition from a hard fought victory to a soft surrender was in the offing. But Buchholz battled. He fired a fastball down and away for strike two. Two more fastballs- at 93 and 94 miles per hour- found the strikezone but were fouled off. The count remained full. Lind fouled off a tough slider, and Buchholz came back with a fastball, this time inducing a routine flyout to left.

This was already progress. Last July, I asked if Clay Buchholz pitches for Boston when Clay Buchholz pitches for Boston. I suggested that Buchholz had yet to form a self, a locus of control from which his pitches flowed. I wrote

“If he is to become a Major League pitcher, in the metaphysical sense, Clay will have to act, and not suffer whatever will happen next. Papelbon inauthentically blamed the universe following last night’s blown save- “What am I going to do? Things like that happen”, he shrugged. Clay cannot afford to be shaped by external pressures, as he is still wet and malleable; his baseball self is not yet formed. Pitching is pure agency- all assertion, no reaction. An inner self is required.”

Coming back to retire Lind after falling behind 3-1 was an act of agency. He refused to back down when Lind fouled off pitcher’s pitches. And they were pitcher’s pitches; Buchholz possessed them, and decorated the interior of the strike zone as he wished.

But Buchholz further solidified his progress when he maintained his integrity against a rapidly collapsing universe. On the very next pitch, Toronto centerfielder Vernon Wells hit a high chopper to Sox third baseman Adrian Beltre’s left. Beltre juggled the ball, and threw wide of first, up the rightfield line. Wells raced passed second, and took a wide turn towards third, before retreating. It was ruled an infield hit (and a throwing error), but Beltre should have made the play. Instead of two outs and nobody on, the tying run was now on second, nearly on third, with just one out. The old Buchholz would have felt the pressure. As the walls closed in, he would have wondered, despairingly, “What’s going to happen next?”. His apparently well-made “stuff”, prized by scouts, would have come apart at the seams, revealing itself a cheap knockoff of a genuine pitcher.

Instead, Buchholz created a magnificent, masterly thing of beauty. After just missing on a fastball away, Buchholz dusted the outside corner with a flitting changeup that Lyle Overbay could only flail at. After Overbay foolishly failed to dig out a burrowing Buchholz slider for strike two, Overbay just bought a ticket and watched strike three, a perfectly placed fastball fired over the inside corner. Buchholz had showed up.

Now with two outs, and in an RBI situation, a first pitch fastball would be irresistible to former Sox shortstop Alex Gonzalez. So Buchholz threw what appeared to be a belt high middle-in fastball, an easy tramp of a pitch, whetting Gonzalez’ appetite, seducing his lust for glory. But when the coquettish pitch teased and faded like the archetypal changeup, Gonzalez was scorned. His pride wounded, Gonzalez only persisted, chasing after two more changeups, each less hittable than the last; as his unrequited love grew more distant, his desire only intensified, and Gonzalez could only manage a meager pop to shallow center. To retire the side.

Buchholz got out of the jam by turning the hitters to jelly. He did not become viscous, he did not take on the shape of the container. He did not let the Beltre error define him. He stood his ground, solidly and stolidly. He held the lead. He exited after 8 innings, allowing one run on 7 hits, 2 walks, 4 strikeouts. And the W.

Statistics may be better predictors than grit. After striking out 10 and walking one in his last outing versus Texas, Tuesday’s numbers may only stand out for their relative efficiency (117 pitches over 8 innings.) But this was a quality start, as opposed to quantity. It was a game where Buchholz defined himself, as a self. Rather than fading into the background, Buchholz fought to defend his borders. And this may portend greater things than the small sample size of a single pitching line.

But there is an irony here. The Sox scored the second- and winning- run in the top of the 8th when Mike Lowell walked with the bases loaded. Lowell was pinch hitting for Big Papi, David Ortiz. And if any single event exemplified the change from one phase of life to another, it is the man who was once hailed by the team owners as the “greatest clutch hitter in the history of the Boston Red Sox” being pinch hit for with the bases loaded and the game tied in the 8th inning. That at-bat may steal the headlines. But if it turns out that Clay Buchholz has become a true pitcher- an autonomous agent, able to possess the powers potentially at his disposal, and to stand up when his teammates fall down- then the Sox have something. Not a prospect, nor a suspect, but a spectacular pitcher whose raw stuff has become something solid and well-crafted.

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Two-time World Series champion Boston manager Terry Francona has come to the defense of his misunderstood (perhaps former) monster masher. But not merely out of loyalty. Refusing to replace Ortiz in the lineup, Francona argued that when it comes to benching a player, “It’s not fantasy baseball, it’s not like chess pieces”, and that there’s a “human element” in making personnel moves.

The “human element”, rather than being a position on the periodic table (or an ill-conceived Milla Jovovich vehicle), is, apparently, that additional component which humans have but chess pieces and numerical representations of humans lack. That added element, presumably, is consciousness. Does consciousness help? Is the human element valuable? Many philosophers these days debate the existence (duh) of “zombies“, which, in these debates, are creatures physically indistinguishable from people but who lack consciousness. Can such creatures possibly exist? If something can be physically indistinguishable from a person yet lack consciousness, then the mind is not physical. Such zombies would lack the “human element”. But they could still hit a curveball. Presumably, then, they could be substituted in and out of a lineup with no ill-effects, as they could suffer the vagaries of slumps or platoon splits without suffering.

Chess pieces do not move themselves, nor do fantasy baseball players; an intellect outside the system must do so. But the human element involves agency; Francona- the chess player- employs some “strategy and things like that”, but he knows the players “appreciate” being “let [to] go play”. The well-trod refrain that games aren’t played on paper but on grass is intended to prevent trespassing on the agency of the players. On paper, data is the fuel that drives the formula, the engine of prediction; here, the numbers do the work, and generate their own conclusions. The players are but pawns.

Some philosophers think the line between human and zombie is not so clear. Daniel Dennett argues that treating another entity as conscious is a matter of adopting a “stance” for the purpose of predicting its behavior. So, when predicting what that human-shaped object is going to do tomorrow, don’t attempt to compute the trajectory of each of its subatomic particles; instead, assume it has beliefs and desires and ask for its plans. Rather than working out all the possible moves a chess-playing computer might make, assume it wants to take the bishop. Treating something as conscious is a method for overcoming intractable computations. Nobody here but us Zombies.

The accuracy of Ortiz’ calculations have waned over the past year as he has treated himself as increasingly human; the added human element has made him a worse computer. According to Fangraphs’ Dave Allen, Ortiz has lost power to right field as he has aged. And, in so doing, he has become prone to chasing high and inside pitches. Perhaps “Ortiz thought he would generate power only on inside pitches, so he forced the issue rather than taking these pitches as balls and waiting on better offerings.” The human element in Ortiz has only gotten in the way; had it not been for the fearful expectation of losing power, Ortiz may not have become desperate to swing at unhittable pitches. Zombies keep their cool, and, being undead, don’t fear the death of their skills.

The Red Sox have the option of removing 36 year old Mike Lowell- now relegated to bench duty due to hip surgery- from cold storage. [update: Lowell, a righthanded candidate for designated hitter, started in place of Ortiz Thursday against Minnesota lefthander Francisco Liriano.] Lowell’s slow, lumbering gait may remind some of the non-philosophical, brain eating sort of zombie. Having been through a winter where saying the Sox were searching for pitching and defense became a cliché, that so much in 2010 might turn on the plodding one dimensional slugger might appear an irony. Which zombies probably don’t appreciate.

picture here

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No doubt there exists a collective consciousness that associates ‘Nomah’ with the Red Sox, and the Red Sox with the 2004 World Series championship, the first for the club in 86 years. But the transitive property is no help to Garciaparra here. For despite being the proverbial ‘face of the franchise’ for nearly a decade, it is widely believed that the July 31 jettisoning of the disgruntled slugging shortstop spurred the Sox to a glory they would not have otherwise achieved. Which included winning 22 out of 25 in August, and, of course, a miraculous comeback from three games down to the Yankees in the ALCS.

One could be forgiven for thinking that winning the World Series in 2004- and again in 2007- changed Red Sox culture. How could it not; for what are Jews to do when the Messiah comes- become Christian? Cultures accustomed to waiting and hoping don’t take to success without an identity crisis.

The religion analogy runs deeper. As an expert in analogy, Dr. Micah Goldwater of the Spatial Intelligence and Learning Center of Northwestern University had this to say of a parallel between Nomar and Moses.

Each led their tribe to the Promised Land, but were not allowed to enter because they were from a previous generation that only knew slavery. Nomar was the last of a continuous line of our star players being a homegrown Red Sox. Williams, Yaz, Lynn/Rice, Clemens, Vaughn, Nomar. It took free-agent stars for us to finally win one. (Or two).

Despite his greatness, Moses was never allowed to win the big one. He had sinned. But the Israelites had sinned as well; they had worshipped a Golden Calf. And Red Sox Nation had its golden calf moment. The Red Sox traded for false idol Alex Rodriguez in the 2003/4 offseason; he was to displace Garciaparra as shortstop and leader. Though the transaction was nixed, and Nomar remained. And then, in July, just weeks before the trade, Red Sox Nation did the unthinkable; they worshipped hated rival Derek Jeter. As Dan Shaughnessy recalls, in a Biblical narrative,

then came the nationally televised midsummer game at Yankee Stadium, when Nomar refused to play while Derek Jeter saved the game with a face-first plunge into the stands behind third base.

Whereas Jeter was a gamer, a real leader, Garciaparra was an illusion, a sulking and selfish quitter. Red Sox Nation had given up on Nomar, and coveted Jeter, the Yankees’ own golden boy. Yet Red Sox Nation was given the promised land, and Nomar was left to die on the banks of the River Jordan, in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Oakland.

Citing the numerous injuries that have (10) plagued Garciaparra’s career, and the SI cover photo of a frame bulking beyond its natural contours, one could be forgiven for thinking Nomar sinned against the commandment banning performance-enhancers. But Moses was able- at the age of one hundred and twenty- to climb a mountain in order to die; that can’t be natural either.

Let’s end with a song, lyrics by Barry

When Nomar was in Yawkey Land Let my people go He fiddled with his bat glove hand Let my people go

The post The Five Books of Nomar appeared first on The Faster Times.