Pitchers and Catchers Report

3 weeks until pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training. Thank good. We are about to enter the longest part of the year - February (also the shortest month. Weird.). I don't know why Feb. is so bad, but hearing the countdown to pitchers and catchers always makes me happy.

In other baseball off season news, here is an awesome quote from Peter Gammons' ESPN blog about the Indians:

"This winter's quiet, with all that is in place to repeat as the winningest team in baseball, is testament to all the work the Indians have done the previous seven years."

With all the hype surrounding the Tigers monster free agent moves, there is growing concern in Cleveland that the lack of counter moves is unwise. Not so, The Indians have made 100% more wise moves than the Tigers, at a tenth of the expense, stretched over the last seven years. Start comparing those offseason moves and see how you feel about 2008. or 2009. Let me put it this way: below is the roster of a team that tied for first in the Majors in record, beat the Yankees at home in October and sent them packing, and had the eventual World Series winner a game away from elimination:

Pos. Name Year when current contract expires
C – Victor Martinez (2010)
1b – Ryan Garko (2012)
2b – Asdrubal Cabrera (2013)
SS – Jhonny Peralta (2011)
3b – Casey Blake (2008) (and he batted 9th)
OF – Grady Sizemore (2012)
OF – Franklin Guiterrez (2012)
DH – Travis Hafner (2013)

SP – CC Sabathia (2008, but supposedly we’re renegotiating to extend his contract. It’s “our first off season priority.”)
SP – Francisco Carmona (2013)
SP – Jake Westbrook (2010)
SP – Paul Byrd (we did exercise an option on him to bring him back)
SP – We have four potential candidates (Cliff Lee, Jeremy Sowers, Aaron Laffey, and Adam Miller (AAA prospect))

RP – Rafael Bentancourt (2009)
RP – Jensen Lewis (2013)
RP – Rafael Perez (2012)
RP – Joe Borowski (exercised club option on him)
RP – Aaron Fultz (exercised club option on him)
RP – Tom Mastny (FA, he’s pretty much a lock until someone like the cubs offer him a huge contract)

FA’s – Kenny Lofton, Trot Nixon (I'm sad to lose Kenny, but David Delucci is back from the dead

Backups – C Kelly Shoppach (contract up), 2b Josh Bard (contract up), Jason Michaels (2008)

So yeah, a team that was one game from the World Series returns at least 8/9 of the lineup, at least 4/5 of the rotation (with the 5th starter already being an Indian, just not a regluar rotation pitcher), and all but one or two of the bullpen. That’s a worst case scenario of losing three players before spring training.

Tribe in '08. And '09. And '10 . . .


In other news, I just returned from a law seminar in Vegas. I didn't gamble at all. I'm probably the most boring person to ever visit that city. The food was amazing though. First night, we ate at a French Steakhouse with the best Ribeye I have ever had. It came sizzling over small baked potatoes, creamed spinach, and sliced mushrooms. For an app, I hada Ceasar salad shaped like a crown.

Second night, I ate at an Italian restaurant. I had prosciutto with grilled pita bread and sliced mozzarella. For dinner I had Chicken Parmesean. The chicken was amazingly tender because it was the the thigh. Last night there, we ate at Wolfgang's Puck restaurant and I had Duck Confit and 13-layer tiramisu. Gourmet all over the place. Even the sandwich shops were unbelievable. For lunch, 3 colleagues and I got an appetizer sampler from the local cafe. it came with Buffalo Chicken Tenders, Spinach Dip, Spring Rools, Chicken Taquitos, Shrimp Rolls, and Potstickers. It was amazing.

One note about Vegas, it's somewhat interesting that no matter how nice and luxurious the hotel rooms, lobby, shops, restaurants all look, the casino always looks sad and despressing. I'm not adverse to gambling, I just get sad when I see people invested in the casino with all their hopes and with more than they can afford.

I'm a big believer in statistics and math when it comes to gambling. For example, the pay out on rolling a hard 12 (6 on both dice) in craps is 30:1 (bet $1 and you get 30 back). yet, the odds on actually rolling a hard 12 is 1:36. Thus, in 36 rolls, you will roll it 1 time. Thus, if you bet $1 on 36 consecutive rolls to hit a hard 12, you would hit it once for a payout fo $30 (and profit of $29), and lose 35 other times for a total cost of $35. Thus, you just spent $6 to roll dice thirty six times.

Now expand that notion to every casino game (except poker) - Blackjack, Pai Gow, Roulette, etc. You have the same odds working against you. In the long run, you are slowly losing money because the casino is not giving you even money on some edge bets.

Thus, my attitude towards those table games is that I sit down with the same amount of money I don't mind spending at a bar for a long night out (e.g. $100). If I can make that amount of money last until it's gone and I've gotten enough free drinks and had a lot of fun with friends for 3 or more hours, I was successful. To me, there is little difference in doing that compared to sitting in a noisy club for three hours, getting six drinks and paying 100 bucks for alcohol, cover, tip, and food.

Above I mentioned that poker is different (and it is) because you can actually control the odds so you are only putting money up when you get a bigger payout. For example, using the craps hypothetical above, what if the payout wa 100:1? or 50:1? or 37:1? or 36.1:1? Then you'd be foolish NOT to bet on that. If the payout was 37:1, then in 36 attempts, you would make 37 dollars, and pay 35 dollars. That's a total of 2 dollars, or roughly 5 cents a roll. You are make five cents every time someone rolls the dice.

First dice rolling question: What if someone offered the following job - I'll pay you five cents every time you roll these two dice, no matter what comes up? Would you take it? Assuming you roll once a second, how much money is that an hour? Answer below.

Second dice rolling question: Go back to the craps example where it pays 30:1 on a hard 12. If you take this bet and the dice are rolled once a second, how much money do you lose?

That's how it is in poker. Sometimes. In the simplest sense, you call a bet only when the pot pays you back larger than the odds that your hand is good. For example, let's say the odds of hitting a flush (which will surely win) are 1:4. Let's say the betting structure of the game is such that every bet is 1$. An opponent bets before you get your card on your 1:4 odds and the pot is 3 dollars. Do you call? What if the pot is $1,000? $100? $5?

To sum it up another way "I have never seen a rich gambler or a poor casino owner." Casinos can be fun, but they can also be sad depending on who you see at the tables. Sometimes it's people, who in reality are paying a small fee to sit and drink and smoke, throwing more money than they can afford into a system with a negative return.

*Answer to first dice question: if you get paid 5 cents a roll and roll it once a second, you make $180 an hour, $1,440 in an 8 hour work day, $57,600 in a 40 hour work week, and $2,880,000 in a 50 week work year. I would totally take that job, as long as they provided medical coverage for my carpal tunnel.

*Answer to second dice question: if you get paid 30:1 and roll the dice once a second, you lose $612 an hour, $4,896 in an 8 hour work day, $195,840 in a week, and $9,792,000 in a year. Sorry if you liked playing craps. But this is why casinos are in awesome and expensive hotels (most of the time).

Quotient Quotables

Update: I've edited and added some content.

I know one person who will find the title of this post funny, my friend Chad. Too bad he doesn't read my blog. One of my weird interests is the appreciation of quotes. I don't really collect them becauese a) it's near impossible, and b) the only thing I collect are shotglasses.

Nevertheless, I wanted to assemble some of my favorite quotes and discuss why I like some of them:

One of the funniest quotes of all time:

"Rosebud frozen peas. Full of country goodness and green peaness." - The Critic.

The Critic was a short-lived animated series where the main character, Jay Sherman, was voiced by Jon Lovitz. Jay wa a film critic and the series devoted most of its time parodying famous Hollywood figures and movies. The above quote was from an unaired Orson Welles commercial . It probably drew inspiration from this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utwLDgb3DSQ.

"There is the vegetarian Hot Pocket for those of us who don't want to eat meat, but would still like diarrhea. Diarrhea Pocket!" - Jim Gaffigan

Jim Gaffigan is one of the funniest comedians around. He is hotter than Hansel right now.

"I was drunk in a bar. They threw me into pub-lic. I don't want to be drunk in pub-lic, I want to be drunk in a goddamn bar, which is perfectly legal... arrest them!"- Ron White.

I'm not a big fan of the Blue Collar Comedy Tour, but this guy's funny.

Peter: Brian, look! My Alpha-Bits are sending me a message; it says "OOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Brian: Peter, those are Cheerios. - Family Guy

As hard as it is to select just one quote from Family Guy, I feel this one sums up much of the show's humor.

"The longest civic losing streak in North American major-league sports is now in jeopardy. The city of Cleveland last celebrated a major sports title on Dec. 27, 1964, when the Browns upset the Baltimore Colts in the National Football League championship game. In the more than four decades since, the Indians once took a lead into the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 7 of the World Series, while the Browns endured three of the more painful playoff losses in NFL history. But no major Cleveland professional team has won another championship. Those teams have played 123 combined seasons since the Browns' 1964 title, making Cleveland the hardest-luck sports town in the United States. On Sunday night in San Antonio, the Cavaliers lost Game 2 of the NBA finals and trails, 2-0, in the best-of-seven series. If Cleveland's streak is going to end this month, it will have to involve an upset as big as the Browns' victory over the Colts."
- David Leonhardt, on Cleveland's unenivable record, "IHT"

This quote does an almost perfect summary of how Cleveland sports fans have suffered over the years. If anything, I might say it doesn't describe in enough detail how painful those Browns and Indians losses were. I remember a deep state of depression after the 1997 Series loss, and I refuse to remember it to this day. It doesn't mention the underrated collapse of the Indians in the 1995 World Series or the painful playoff losses in 96, 98, 99, and 07 (the last one can be excused). And those Browns losses are historic. If you don't know much about football, but you recognize the name John Elway, the Cleveand Browns are the reason why. In a bad way.

"Here at the cross is the man who loves his enemies, the man whose righteousness is greater than that of the Pharisees, who being rich became poor, who gives his robe to those who took his cloak, who prays for those who despitefully use him. The cross is not a detour or hurdle on the way to the kingdom, nor is it even the way to the kingdom; it is the kingdom come." - John Howard Yoder, The Politics of Jesus

The finding of this quote was like discovering buried treasure. It concisely expressed ideas lurking in my conscience that surfaced upon reading. It also exposes many Christians for failing to understand what Jesus was talking about and for diminishing, warping, or ignoring what role the Cross plays. As greusome as it was, it was also beautiful and glorious. I only wish that there was something in the quote about the Resurrection.

"You don't have a Soul. You are a Soul. You have a body." - C.S. Lewis

"Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement." - C.S. Lewis

It's very hard to find a C.S. Lewis quote without just copying entire chapters of his writings. One of my favorite "quotes" is the last chapter of The Last Battle. Each of the main characters of the Narnia series discovers heaven and, for lack of a better explanation, the absence of the law of thermodynamics. Heaven is continuously increasing in its dimensions and intensity. It embodies all time ("This moment consists of all moments.") Not a single word is wasted in its description and its conversation. But to reproduce that here is incredibly cumbersome. That being said, the above two quotes represent more of my appreciation of concise, straight-forward writing sytle, than my appreciation for Lewis' theological insight. I may have to devote a post to that later.

"In order to become a Master at Hebrew, you must make at least 10,000 mistakes., maybe much more. So do not be discouraged, for every mistake I point out to you, you are that much closer to mastering the Hebrew language." - Fred Horton, my Intro to Hebrew teacher.

Never have truer words been spoken. Dr. Horton had figured out early on that when you make a mistake and learn why its a mistake and how to correct it, you will always remember that topic. However, if you do soemthing right all along by luck and never know why, you deprive yourself of the understanding of what you are doing.

"No. Xena is gender equity." - James Powell, my Greek teacher.

While there are many things Dr. Powell has said that reamin in my mind, this one makes me laugh the hardest. To fully appreciate the humor in this, you probably need to know Dr. Powell. He teaches Greek and Latin at Wake Forest and is a conservative, gentle, humble, and meek human being. He is the living incarnation of integrity, patience, polite human behavior, humility and service. He has dedicated his life to teaching students the classical educational values and has countlessly served the University in many capacities. To hear him respond to a student (without pause) and a pop culture topic (he doesn't own a TV) with such an opinionated, accurate, and witty statement had the entire class in tears after a semester of lectures on Greek Mythology. What added to this quote was his blank expressionless stare as he watched us laugh and the quiet shrug of his shoulder as he silently said "Well, it is."

"Ultimately, the discussion of what would happen had Adam not eaten the apple becomes pointless. God, simply, would have found a way to redeem Eve." - Ley Brown.

My high school english teacher sure had his moments. The above was stated in such a way that it actually made a teenager realize for a second that he doesn't know everything (then of course, the teenager went back to thinking that he did.) And yet, the statement is so remarkably simple. While volumes and volumes have been written about Adam's choice to take the apple from Eve and whether she bewitched him or whether he thought nothing of it (most plausible to me) or whether he intentionally ate of it to remain with Eve (both very plausible and very implausible), it is all meaningless to pursue past a certain degree. What is really going is the response of God to the fallen state of His creation. The focus shouldn't be on Adam's choice but on God's plan for those who eat the apple.

"Now that you have been delivered from the land of slavery, how do you want to act?" - Rick Downs.

Rick Downs is a Presbyterian pastor at Christ the King in Cambridge, MA. He was the pastor at Covenant Presbyterian Church in Winston-Salem, NC (where Wake Forest is). I heard Rick prech my freshmen year of college and it was his sermons that were one of two factors that convinced me to be a Religion major. I listen to Rick's weekly sermons via Christ the King's podcast on iTunes.

The above quote was stated at the outset of an eleven week course on the Ten Commandments. During the first week, Rick discussed the appropriate use of the law and gave the explanation behind Deutoronomy 5:6: "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery." Deutoronomy 5:7-21 consist of the Ten Commandments. As Rick explained verse 6, he told a story about Martin Luther and how the purpose of the Law of God was not to give human beings a guide to becoming righteous on their own. Instead, it pointedly expresses 1)the inability of human beings to live up to the law, 2)our need for a Savior, 3)the character of God, and 4)how you can live a life that will provide benefit and wisdom. What is beautiful about verse 6 is that immediately before we get the Law of God, we get a statement about the grace of God. I will explore this in greater detail later; for now, I'll give you the story about Luther:

Martin Luther got into a debate with one of his students. Luther was discussing how he would recite the Ten Commandments every morning. Luther also stated he would not let the law "rule in his conscience." It can instruct his conscience, but it cannot rule there. One of his students stood up and yelled at him "you're saying that we can act any way we want to!" Luther said to him "Sure, that's exactly what I'm saying."

Now that you have been delivered from the land of slavery, how do you want to act?

-G

Don't look now, but I'm on a hot streak

My second post in two days. Hoo - ray. The following is about football. If you don't care about football, I recommend skipping to the words in bold.

Four awesome NFL games are on this weekend. I'm picking Pats, Colts, Giants and Packers. My Titans lost to the Chargers last week in a hard fought battle. Jeff Fisher truly is a great coach. His team suffers numerous injuries, but he has the coached enough to come out looking stellar. If three plays are different in that game, the Titans win:

1. the Vince Young scramble right on the first drive. This was a busted pass play. If it had been a designed run, VY would have either gotten the first or scored a TD.

2. Lendale White's fumble. Great hit, bad luck on the bounce, if we recover, we score another TD.

3. Vincent Jackson's first long catch. DB slipped and moved the wrong way. if Jackson doesn't catch it, we're up by 17 and frusturating their entire offense.

Oh well, I'm still very satisfied with the way their season ended. With Wake Forest, too. Jim Grobe had me scared for a minute when I thought he was leaving to go to Arkansas. They showed tremendous resolve in the bowl game. Hopefully they will just get better and better with each year. I'd like to see them win another ACC Championship in my life time.

Onto the NFL games. Everyone in the country is being trendy and picking the Jags. Uh, the Pats went 16-0. yes, they did not look good in recent weeks. yes, the jags have a good team. But there's now way Belicheck lets his team go 16-0 and then doesn't make it to the AFC Champsionship game. And secretly you know that for the 16-0 to be validated, the Pats and Colts have to meet in the playoffs.

Colts. They are healthy right now. A few weeks ago, Bill Simmons went on one of his Boston hoser rants about blah blah blah Patriots, blah blah blah and someone called him on it and said "you've got an unstoppable juggernaut offensive team with a weak def against the run (Pats) vs. a good balanced team who quietly struggled becasue of injuries but is now peaking (Colts). Sound familiar?" You bet it does, look at Pats v. Colts in 03/04. The Colts may be better in this year's playoffs than they were in last years.

Packers. I do not have any confidence in the Seahawks. Yes, Matt Hasselback is good and has had a good year, and yes the defense is very quick and very good, but it's hard for me to pick a team with a bad running game. Shaun Alexander doesn't fight for yards. I can't name one receiver on the Seahawks (Darrell Jackson??? i think he left). And the Packers offense looks like it did in the 96-98 years.

Giants. I can't pick all the number one seeds, one of them has to lose. We have two forces here that may collide. TO's absence and Jessica Simpson. TO has a high ankle sprain (as opposed to a low anke sprain, of which I have never heard). Although TO has shown remarkable recovery from injury for the playoffs before (see '05 Super Bowl with Eagles), I don't think he will be able to help. And they mailed in the season finale against a hated rival. Combine that with Jessica Simpson. She's dating Tony! and like, ohmigawd, they totally went to Mexico for a week because Tony needed to get away from pressure and Jess was all ike oo baby i love you so much and he said ya im into you too and she was all like wutz chicken of the sea and he was all like your my chicken of the sea isntthatsocoolomigodtheyregoingotgetmarriedmarriedmarried.

And that is why I'm picking the Giants.

-G

Not Even The Illusion of Effort

New Year's Resolutions are awesome. I make them every year. I break them every January 4th. In the past, my resolutions have been to keep a journal, read the Daily Bible or just work my way through it, read CS Lewis Daily Readings, workout, lose weight, gain weight, blah blah blah. Additionally, I abandon those resolutions on January 4 of every year, and abandon the illusion that I will pick it up again on January 10.

Don't believe me? In my parents attic I have four Mead journals dated 1/1 - 1/3 for 1997-2000. I've read Genesis 9 times. At least last year I joined a gym. In May.

What were my resolutions this year: Read Daily Bible (haven't taken it off the shelf). Blog more (try for once a day), stick to my workout schedule, and pray more. How am I doing? well, i didn't blog for 9 days (and really, like 60 days before that, sorry, I missed you, too.) I've driven past another gym I don't belong to when I picked up dinner the other night, and let's just all agree that I always need to pray more.

What am I surprised by? This year, I put no illusion of effort. I literally woke up on January 1 and said, "f**k it. I'll start it before January ends, but I'm reprioritizing everything. Number one, pray more. The rest should probably follow."

So here we are on Jan 10, or Abandon Fruitless Efforts Day on my calendar. And I'm blogging. Part of the reason for me to read stuff daily this year was to fill my blogs with substance. In that perspective, what have I frequently filled my day with that can provide sustenance to my blog? I've watched three episodes of Rome. That's more or less it. It's really good.

[Well done, Greg.]

-G