Dear Mr. Simmons,
I have to admit, I've never really paid much attention to politics. I've always felt a little guilty about it and I've wanted to learn more, but I've just never been able to take the plunge. Then you came along with your southpaw boys on the Channel 33 feed. I've listened to the first five or six shows and I have to admit it's a pretty decent listen; even for someone who doesn't understand ass economics.
But as much as I've enjoyed 'Keepin' It 1600, I think your guys have missed the boat a little on the Republican Primary. They've been relentless on Donald Trump's competitors, particularly John Kasich for staying in the race. I'll admit, despite my Ohio support to the guy who was the only marginally decent candidate from either party, I couldn't really disagree with your guys at the time. Then both Cruz and Kasich dropped out and it hit me. It made perfect sense to stick around. In fact, I'm not so sure I wouldn't still advocate for him to remain in the race. He essentially has no delegates. There wasn't really any hope of him to win any more. There's no real path for him to win the nomination and well... wait a minute, are we sure about that? Everyone seems to be fixating on/ cringing at/ bracing for/ fainting with incredulity about Donald Trump's success, but I'm not sure anyone is asking the most interesting questions. I don't think it is a matter of if there is dirt on Trump filthy enough to render him un-nominateable (sorry, I'm going to pretend like that is a word) as a presidential candidate, it's a question of how much of the radioactive filth exists. And then there's the follow-up (and one of my favorite questions that can be applied to almost any topic), where is the line? How bad of a story has to surface to crash the Donald's Greyhound bus of doom that is chugging relentlessly like a snowball of death rolling down a mountain towards the White House? Some will argue there is no line. Every day, the quotes and headlines get more ridiculous, but the momentum never stops or even slows down. Let's be clear, there is a line. If Donald Trump were indicted on murder charges he would not be the Republican nominee. Have a little faith in humanity, the line is there. We can all agree murder crosses it. Apparently being a terrible idiot does not. So where is it then? What if he wasn't really that rich and he wasn't really that good of a businessman? Wup, okay that isn't it. What if he was caught on camera telling his girlfriend that he didn't like black people? Hmm, getting warmer. That will cost you your basketball team, but Trump is pretty slippery. He might be able to weasel his way out of that one. What if he owned slaves? Score one more for the "Damn it Trump you've gone too far" category! The truth is there is probably a large grey area in the middle with things that would cost Trump the election but not the nomination. Regardless, this is a fun topic more people should be discussing.
So leave poor Kasich alone. He was just waiting for TMZ to do their job. Probably, dropping out doesn't totally eliminate him if the Trump derailment happens, but there will be so many wolves that pounce if that happens, sticking in the race might have kept his foot in the door a little. It's sad that that's what we have to cling onto. "Maybe the paparazzi will submarine one of the candidates so that another batch of political lunatics can have a deathmatch for the Republican nomination and maybe, just maybe the winner that emerges will be slightly better than the two dopes we have to pick from now."
Unfortunately, I think we're stuck with #NeverTrump vs. #NeverClinton. God help us all.
Who knows what will happen, but the carnage will be fun to watch. And through it all, I am glad that I will have the 1600 boys there to narrate it for me.
Alright Billy Ice, take it easy. Long live Bill Simmons. Congrats on The Ringer.
Talk to you later,
a fan
Wednesday, June 1, 2016
Thursday, May 12, 2016
What the "V"?
Dear Mr. Simmons,
It's official, Stephen Curry is the unanimous MVP of the 2015-16 NBA Season. Lebron James has blessed the notion. I think. As seems to now be second nature for the crotchety king, he couldn't resist quickly following his acknowledgment of Curry's accomplishment by lobbing an enigmatic-awkward-sticky side quote onto the table for the entire sports media world to crawl all over and feast on. James quipped that Curry definitely deserved the award, "But when you talk about most valuable then you can have a different conversation."
What is that? He continues, "You know, that's not taking anything from anyone that's ever won the award. It's just another thinly veiled dig at my teammates." Oh... I think I added that last part.
Here's the thing. Regardless of whatever weird psychological game James is playing with himself or his teammates or the planet (no need to unravel that here. I'm sure the all of the talking heads will do a fine job of that continuously over the next 3 days), the king has a point, the criteria for the award changes year to year. It is one of my biggest sports pet peeves. Every few months as the sports calendar cycles, the same MVP debate surfaces into sports media conversations. Who should it be, player X? He's really good. No, it can't be. His team isn't good enough. Player Y is pretty good too and HIS team is going to the playoffs. By what about player Z? He was unstoppable for 3/4 of the season before he got hurt. Can he really be considered most valuable if he didn't play in all of the games? To James' point, sometimes player X gets anointed MVP and sometimes it's player Y. But where I get wrapped around a tree is how every $%*# time we have to go back and forth about what's right and what's wrong and who deserves it more.
Hey, it's just healthy debate right? It's all part of the fun of sports fandom.
Right. It's not healthy for me I'll tell you that. My blood pressure sky rockets every time I have to listen to everyone within reach of a microphone quibble over what the "V" actually means. Everyone has their own slightly different prerequisites necessary to be a "V" player.
Bill Simmons, you have to do something about this! Let's just decide what the award is for all sports. Let's decide right now. And by decide, I mean let's use my definition (because it's the right one), and we can all go on being happy sports fans.
Who is the best player? That's it. That's the question we are trying to answer. Football, baseball, and basketball all call it MVP, when they really mean player of the year. There is no reason for it to be called anything different. Why do we have to over-analyze the name of the award and twist around arguments about how much a guy adds to a team. It doesn't matter. Watch the games. Who is the best player?
Here are the only necessary qualifiers (this is going to sound like a lot, but hang in there. It's really not that complicated):
- We are redrafting the entire league.
- You have the number one pick.
- The only frame of reference you have are the games played in the current regular season.
- You know nothing about prior seasons.
- You don't need to worry about future development or performance regression.
- Salary and contracts don't matter.
- You are building a team for one year only and you are guaranteed the output from each player equivalent to their respective output from the that season.
Who do you pick?
THAT is the best player. That is what the award is for. You've talked before about how the All-NBA team is best used as a historical reference to document the best players at each position each year. MVP is just a subset of that. Who was the best player for that year? Not, "Who was the best player on the team that also had a really good year?" You can look at the season's standing to figure out which teams were good. Not, "Who is the best player that isn't a quarterback, because we're starting to feel guilty that a quarterback wins every year so we are going to start floating stupid ideas like J.J. Watt should win the MVP?" (Quarterback value. Another hot button issue inside my brain. I'll save that one for another day). If the word valuable really bothers people that much, maybe we should stop calling it MVP. I vote.. Best Guy/Girl First Named By A Draft After Season, or...
BGFNBADAS.
Slam dunk. Make it happen Billy Ice. There is too much information out there for us to have to keep weeding through crappy arguments like this. That's all I have for now. Long live Bill Simmons.
Talk to you Later,
-a fan
It's official, Stephen Curry is the unanimous MVP of the 2015-16 NBA Season. Lebron James has blessed the notion. I think. As seems to now be second nature for the crotchety king, he couldn't resist quickly following his acknowledgment of Curry's accomplishment by lobbing an enigmatic-awkward-sticky side quote onto the table for the entire sports media world to crawl all over and feast on. James quipped that Curry definitely deserved the award, "But when you talk about most valuable then you can have a different conversation."
What is that? He continues, "You know, that's not taking anything from anyone that's ever won the award. It's just another thinly veiled dig at my teammates." Oh... I think I added that last part.
Here's the thing. Regardless of whatever weird psychological game James is playing with himself or his teammates or the planet (no need to unravel that here. I'm sure the all of the talking heads will do a fine job of that continuously over the next 3 days), the king has a point, the criteria for the award changes year to year. It is one of my biggest sports pet peeves. Every few months as the sports calendar cycles, the same MVP debate surfaces into sports media conversations. Who should it be, player X? He's really good. No, it can't be. His team isn't good enough. Player Y is pretty good too and HIS team is going to the playoffs. By what about player Z? He was unstoppable for 3/4 of the season before he got hurt. Can he really be considered most valuable if he didn't play in all of the games? To James' point, sometimes player X gets anointed MVP and sometimes it's player Y. But where I get wrapped around a tree is how every $%*# time we have to go back and forth about what's right and what's wrong and who deserves it more.
Hey, it's just healthy debate right? It's all part of the fun of sports fandom.
Right. It's not healthy for me I'll tell you that. My blood pressure sky rockets every time I have to listen to everyone within reach of a microphone quibble over what the "V" actually means. Everyone has their own slightly different prerequisites necessary to be a "V" player.
Bill Simmons, you have to do something about this! Let's just decide what the award is for all sports. Let's decide right now. And by decide, I mean let's use my definition (because it's the right one), and we can all go on being happy sports fans.
Who is the best player? That's it. That's the question we are trying to answer. Football, baseball, and basketball all call it MVP, when they really mean player of the year. There is no reason for it to be called anything different. Why do we have to over-analyze the name of the award and twist around arguments about how much a guy adds to a team. It doesn't matter. Watch the games. Who is the best player?
Here are the only necessary qualifiers (this is going to sound like a lot, but hang in there. It's really not that complicated):
- We are redrafting the entire league.
- You have the number one pick.
- The only frame of reference you have are the games played in the current regular season.
- You know nothing about prior seasons.
- You don't need to worry about future development or performance regression.
- Salary and contracts don't matter.
- You are building a team for one year only and you are guaranteed the output from each player equivalent to their respective output from the that season.
Who do you pick?
THAT is the best player. That is what the award is for. You've talked before about how the All-NBA team is best used as a historical reference to document the best players at each position each year. MVP is just a subset of that. Who was the best player for that year? Not, "Who was the best player on the team that also had a really good year?" You can look at the season's standing to figure out which teams were good. Not, "Who is the best player that isn't a quarterback, because we're starting to feel guilty that a quarterback wins every year so we are going to start floating stupid ideas like J.J. Watt should win the MVP?" (Quarterback value. Another hot button issue inside my brain. I'll save that one for another day). If the word valuable really bothers people that much, maybe we should stop calling it MVP. I vote.. Best Guy/Girl First Named By A Draft After Season, or...
BGFNBADAS.
Slam dunk. Make it happen Billy Ice. There is too much information out there for us to have to keep weeding through crappy arguments like this. That's all I have for now. Long live Bill Simmons.
Talk to you Later,
-a fan
Thursday, March 17, 2016
The Return
Dear Mr. Simmons,
I've been away for a while. This little blog never got off the ground. But now I'm back. Plan on hearing from me more and more. I wanted to wish you belated congratulations on your new venture. The sports landscape wasn't the same without you last year. And cleaning up the kitchen Monday nights at the start of football season this past year was a little lonely too. But now all is well. Your new digs suit you well. Long Live Bill Simmons. Stay tuned.
Talk to you later,
-a fan
I've been away for a while. This little blog never got off the ground. But now I'm back. Plan on hearing from me more and more. I wanted to wish you belated congratulations on your new venture. The sports landscape wasn't the same without you last year. And cleaning up the kitchen Monday nights at the start of football season this past year was a little lonely too. But now all is well. Your new digs suit you well. Long Live Bill Simmons. Stay tuned.
Talk to you later,
-a fan