It's like deja vu, all over again.

Yogi Berra was one of the greatest players to play the game.  He played in 14 World Series and won 10 of them.  He was great on both sides of the baseball setting records for most home runs by a catcher (313) and most consecutive errorless games (148), and was a three-time MVP.   He also served our country in the US Navy from 1943-1946. After his playing career, he managed the two remaining NY teams and won a pennant with each. 

When Yogi spoke, you better listen.  He was as wise as they come and had the baseball accomplishments to back it up.  A master of nonsequiturs, Yogi knew how to communicate a simple truth in the simplest of ways.  Wise tidbits that are easy to hold onto, understand, and apply in future situations.   He was a walking, talking book of proverbs if you will.

Two of may favorites are ones that apply directly to our Dodgers management team.  I suggest they should chew on these and try to use them going forward as a mantra for all future Dodgers teams they’re a part of…

“You can observe a lot by watching.”

Yogi didn’t become one of the greatest players, scratch that, PERSONS to ever play the game on talent alone.  It takes more than swing mechanics and fielding repetition to become great.  It takes a strong will to be the best and it takes a vast understanding of a simple game.  How else does a bad catcher, turned outfielder, go back to catching and become one of the best ever?  You need to pay attention to your surroundings and pick up on the little things.  These tidbits provide clues on how to play the game the right way. 

“Baseball is 90 percent mental, the other half is physical.”

Lost in our recent Dodgers teams is this simple truth.  Analytics is dumbing down the sport like “smartphones” are dumbing down humanity.  We’ve become all too reliant on what the computer tells us instead of using our own capacities, our senses, our humanity.  We find ourselves sticking to the script instead of reading the room.

A great example of this is the shift and hitting into it.  It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy.  A never ending for-each loop that the Dodgers, and much of baseball, just can’t seem to get out of.  Modern hitting coaches teach players to pull and lift, so the defense is almost always stacked on the pull side leaving a gaping hole on the weak side.  No one adjusted and now we have a new rule to counter this phenomenon instead of adapting to it.  The stats say “Hit this way”, yet offense is waning, there’s more strikeouts than ever, batting averages are plummeting and no one is making an adjustment. 

Cody Bellinger is the poster boy for this conundrum. He is a dead pull hitter and much of his success is swinging from his heels and putting the ball over the fence, mostly to his pull side.  He often scorches ground balls and liners to the same pull side, only to be met by the glove of the rover in shallow right or the other two infielders stacked on the pull side of the diamond.  Instead of watching and observing, ten making an adjustment, he gets frustrated while continuing to punch himself in the face and it all turns into a downward spiral.  Common sense tells me that taking what’s given and hitting the ball the other way would get him to first base and spare the team an out in an inning where avoiding outs is the most important aspect of scoring. His elite speed can turn that single into a double at a rate that outperforms all of those hard liners for outs.

The Andrew Friedman End of Season Presser

I’m going to paraphrase here, but sill capture the essence of the Q and A session.  But, on a side note I’d like to ask if it’s intentional that you can almost never make out the question that’s being asked?  Andrew’s answers come out clear as day, but the reporter’s question is mostly impossible to hear. Surely we have the technology to resolve this?  I digress.  Let’s get started shall we?

He immediately breaks down the reason for the loss is hitting with RISP.  Is it baseball or are there things we can do to improve upon that?  We had more opportunities, but the Padres capitalized with runners in scoring position.

He goes on to state that analytics means different things to different people, but surmises his definition as “Analytics is matching our strengths vs others’ weaknesses.”  – Fair enough.  I can immediately see where this is going.  We did everything right, but it just didn’t work out.

He was as asked if he would build a team differently for the postseason than for the regular season.  He deflected by saying he believes the best team doesn’t win the World Series every year, he says the hottest team wins it.  – Okay then.  Accountability be dammed.

Andrew continues and goes on to say that It’s an organizational failure for losing this year.  But, really offered no explanation of what that means.  Wow, he must be really good at Dodgeball.

Reflecting on his thoughts, how do we put ourselves into the position to be the hottest team?  I don’t have the answer for that, but we’ll definitely spend time trying to figure that out.

Time out!!!  WTF kind of answer is that?  He says that being the hottest team is what gets you a World Series, but doesn’t know how to be the hottest team or get the team hot?  But, they’re going to spend time on figuring this out?  Well, WTF have you been doing for the last seven years?  Damn, I think I’ll use that one on my next job interview.  Whenever I come up to a tough question, I’ll just say “I don’t know, but I’ll spend time on figuring it out.”

Next, he was asked about the 7^th inning.  Specifically about Phillips.  There are decisions that are 50/50, or 55/45.  If those moves would have worked, Dave would have gotten praise for them.  – He didn’t acknowledge that a mistake was made (or any of the many).  He’s still sticking to the script.  If the computer says this guy has a higher probability in this situation, that it’s the right decision. 

This is where the dumbing down of humanity is in plain sight.  “But, this guy was 1-7 with 4 K’s against that pitcher”.  It had to be the right move.  Oh yeah, how many of those those 7 Ab’s had runners on?  How many in blowouts where motivation is limited?  How many was when the pitcher was on 3 days rest?  How many when the pitcher wasn’t warm?  All these things come into play especially with a small sample size.  Now, that he’s 2-8 with some RBI does that decision change next time?  Yency was better against lefties than righties all year.  He just got two righties out.  Don’t those things come into play here? 

At some point Andrew was asked about Mookie’s performance.  He responded saying that he hit the ball hard a few times and they found gloves and that the umpire called a lot of balls strikes against him.  These were the same as my own observations.  He failed to mention RISP in his assessment of Mookie.  I wonder why. 

When the reporter asked who makes these decisions, referring to the 7^th inning, Andrew got really touchy here.  He started by cutting of the reporter as he was speaking.  After every season, I’ve answered that question.  It’s 100% Dave that makes those decisions.  If it ever changes, I will let people know.  Really?  That’s how you answer that question?  Excuse me but methinks the lady doth protest too much!

Asked if Dave was coming back?  100%.  The reporter pointed to Phillies getting hot after changing their manager and Andrew came back to RISP.  Maybe if we felt a different voice would help us cash in those situations with runners in scoring position than maybe we would. – Okay then, back to stats now.  It’s RISP’s fault, and remember we have no clue how to control RISP, but we’re “Definitely” going to spend time on that this offseason. 

He went on to say that Dave and his coaching staff did an incredible job during the season coaching this team to 111 wins.  No changes to the coaching staff.  – Okay, I can understand this as a rational position.  Even as I wrote about firing Doc, I knew that lofty mark would all but prevent it.  But, another rational position would be that Dave has thrown away a game in each postseason series in which we were eliminated, and even one in the World Series we won.  It’s already hard to win in the postseason.  Isn’t it harder when you always throw one game away?

At this point in the interview (Around the 22 minute mark) he must have mentioned RISP somewhere between half a dozen to a dozen times.  He said that a lot of it is when a pitcher really executes his pitches, the batter is almost always out.  Makes it hard to have a very steady line in terms of what your production is in those moments, but obviously (MY MOST HATED TERM. Because it’s obviously not obvious. If it was he would have ananswer) anything we can do to improve it, even on the margins, is definitely worth it.  Hmmm, improving RISP on the margins, but not knowing how to improve RISP…”But, it’s definitely worth it.”?  **Expletive** Is this really how he thinks? I can see another Hanser type signing in our future for a guy that had high RISP only to lose it as soon as we sign them.

Do you expect to replace Trea with a star level bat if he leaves?  Andrew doesn’t know because he didn’t expect to be talking about 2023 right now.  But, he’s going to use this time wisely to make sure he isn’t sitting in a press conference at this juncture next season.  Wow, he’s going to spend a lot of time cracking the RISP code this offseason.  Thank God we have AF on the job cracking the RISP code instead of thinking about player personnel!  THE ONE FREAKING THING HE’S TRUELY RESPONSIBLE FOR!!!

He mentioned not getting hits in those situations again.  Brandon Gomes finally spoke, after 20 minutes into the interview sitting like a bump on a log. He talked about having a great pitching staff and not having a closer trusting Doc to choose the right pitcher in any situation is something they were comfortable with. –  Well, that worked out well consider that Doc seemingly saved the one guy that put out fires like the one in the seventh inning all season long to pitch at the end of the game.  Do you want to think about you answer and resubmit it for partial credit?

Any regrets not adding a starting pitcher at the deadline? We are tasked to do everything we can to win in the current year, but also maintain our future outlook.  If something made sense, we would have made a deal, but he doesn’t regret not doing a bad deal for us.  – Okay, so you thought the price was too high.  I don’t want to bash on the pitching too much here.  May was coming along nicely at the time and Gonso was on fire.  They carry 45-50 pitchers between the 40-man and the 60-day IL.  How the hell do they always run out of pitching in the postseason EVERY DAMN YEAR? It can’t possibly be the script.

He continued about the pitching staff stating that it was the best he’s ever had.  – Again, I agree completely here.  They had so many pitchers that they passed over several good options to get to the post-season roster.  Rumor was that V-Gone would be ready for the NLCS.  Why wasn’t he ready for the DS?

Reporter said the fans want some changes to the staff, front office, something.  What do you say to those fans?  The passion they have is shared, and their disappointment is shared, blah, blah, blah…  We aren’t making any changes to the front office or coaching staff.

He continued deflecting while siting the randomness of the playoff tournament.  Doesn’t think that making a personnel change would be beneficial.  But conceded that they need to learn and make improvements together…whatever we can do to improve our chances next year. – Excuse me Andrew, your 111 win team earned home field advantage throughout the playoffs.  You’re not going to make any changes to how you run the club, or the personnel involved with running the club, but somehow you’re gonna figure out how to get better next year?  Isn’t this the definition of insanity?

They talked about Belli.  He’s got elite defense and there’s still upside with Belli.  Asked about JT, they didn’t want to answer that question, not prepared to talk about the team personnel at this point. 

So, they were willing to comment about Belli, but not about JT?  I completely agree, there’s no need to bring JT back.  He’s a great guy and had a hell of a hot streak.  But, old guys break, he broke, and was broken in the postseason.  Better a year too early than a year too late.  Andrew really needs to start remembering these idoms.

Is the current level of spending sustainable?  There are times when payroll is higher and other times where it isn’t as high.  The front office will do everything they can to win a World Series.  A lot of reduced payroll happens as a result of younger players being ready.  We currently have a lot of talented players at the upper levels and part of the focus will be how many we can to look to at the beginning of the year, how many to integrate during the year to serve as depth during the year to gain experience to be part of the core going forward.  – This was the best news in this presser.  Most likely there isn’t a budget defined.  The good news is there isn’t a need to define one.  This team is rich AF. I would have loved it if he just came out and said “We have a shit-ton of money, we can spend as much as we like every year.”

Clayton, no qualifying offer because he’s going to give Clayton time to figure out what’s best for him and his family.  – This is fine with me.  At this point, with all of starting pitching options we have, it really doesn’t matter if we bring CK back or not.  It’s more important to avoid the embarrassment of him bolting to go play in Texas.  If he comes back, he’s a solid option to limit innings on all the pitchers we have that are unprepared to cross the 200 inning mark.  I just hope the rest of the staff is healthy enough to not have to lean on Clayton in the postseason.

When asked about the cap.  He does not have to reset salary cap.  He answered this question very as a matter of factly.  Easiest question of the day.

Summing it all up

There’s a lot I like about Andrew Friedman.  He does a great job finding really good role players at times, especially in the pitching department.  He has a highly rated farm system even though he always picks last.  Overall he does a great job at what a traditional General Manager is responsible for.  I also appreciate that scouting is valued, as many stat geeks don’t value them as much as they should.  I also like that he gives his guys chances to learn and improve.  I think it’s a good mantra to invest in the guys you have because it takes a lot of time to bring new guys up to speed.  Turnover is very costly to businesses. But, you also need to know when it’s time to cut bait and that’s when you people don’t learn from their mistakes.

Andrew could improve overall by understanding that this game is “90% mental and the other half is physical” and to “observe a lot by watching.”

Throughout the presser he was laser focused in blaming RISP for this failure.  Completely ignoring what every reporter saw when answering questions about the pitching, more specifically the pitching moves in the 7^th inning of game 4. 

Andrew is just completely failing at observing what he’s watching.  I can see him now telling his geeks to compile a list of hitters that have high RISP.  Another with high RISP in the postseason.  One for RISP against righties and another against lefties.  Create an algorithm that selects these players while considering a list of conditions to spit out a list of players and create a lineup that optimizes them for scoring.  Good luck Andrew!  You’re dealing with humans here. Maybe you should observer the 100+ years of wisdom where your leadoff guy is fast, get’s on base and can steal, the second hitter that can make a lot of contact, stay out of a double play, and move a runner over, you best hitter batting third and your most power who can also make contact fourth, a guy like Muncy 5th, etc.

Maybe you should consider what can be done to get his players to have a higher RISP. I have some suggestions; sacrifice, squeeze play, hit and run, hit the other way, go with the pitch, and steal some bases.  Nah, the geeks already proved that’s not the right way to play the game.  Let’s get on base, strike out and wait for a double or homer and wonder why we don’t hit in the postseason when you face great pitching. Maybe the geeks should break away from writing code and playing with the game simulator (MLB the Show), go to the park every night and observe by watching. 

After observing the things that Andrew spoke about while watching his presser I’ve come to the conclusion that we’re effed.  Nothing is going to change.  They cracked the code to winning during a long season, but winning in the postseason is in direct contrast to the principles that they’re so deeply invested in.

The game of baseball is about making observations and reacting to those observations.  Some people describe it as being a “ball player” or having a “High baseball IQ”.  Knowing what to look for and exploiting it.  You just aren’t going to get that with algorithms and spreadsheets searching for RISP stats.  You aren’t going to get results by taking out a pitcher that has a 65% chance of getting an out and replacing him with a guy that has 70% of getting an out without considering that the cold pitcher’s 5% advantage is negated by being cold and entering the game in an unfavorable count.  He just doesn’t seem to have the capacity to recognize that following the script and getting poor results isn’t an outlier when it sends the best team home early, year after year.

Not a damn thing is going to change.  Doc’s job is safe as long as he’s following the script and Andrew’s is safe as long as the club is selling tickets, beer, hotdogs and jerseys. That’s what’s important to management. Championships are a byproduct of luck and hot streaks.