Say It Ain't So

With games nearly every day, and reporters in their face before and after nearly all of them, the potential for a baseball player to say something completely absurd, foolish, and laughable is enormous. With that said, I usually overlook most of the borderline quotes, especially given the disgustingly low education level of major league baseball players.

Even so, every now and then someone says something so ridiculous and inane that one can't but help to comment on it. And once again, over the course of a long season, the amount of these quotes are sure to be staggering. As true as this may be, our dear Bill Hall has eliminated any other quotes from contention with one simple sentence. This hilarious quote from Bill Hall stands alone as the most hilarious quote of, not only the season thus far, but perhaps my entire existence as a literate human being. I know, I've built this up so much that whatever follows cannot possibly live up to your expectations, right? Wrong. The quote in question?

"I STILL CONSIDER MYSELF THE BEST THIRD BASEMEN IN THE LEAGUE"

Holy fuck everyone, Bill Hall has gone batshit crazy. This statement has my mind spinning so much I am actually getting dizzy. First of all, when did anyone ever consider Bill Hall to be the best third basemen in the league? Is he under the impression that he, Bill Hall, is the sole third basemen in the league?Does he live in some sort of parallel universe where Evan Longoria, Alex Rodriguez, David Wright, and anyone else who is actually good at third base do not exist?

It's actually ironic that Bill Hall considers himself to be the best third basemen in the league, because I consider him to be the fucking worst. Even in 2006, when he hit 35 home runs, he was still not the best third basemen in the game. And since his talent has continually regressed since that anomaly of a year, how the hell does he figure he has improved his ranking among third basemen? Some of what follows will be slightly redundant, as I briefly touched on Bill Hall in a previous post,but I'll try my best to keep it fresh.

Games Played: 65

Apparently, 65 times this year we decided to make it easier for the other team to win. Probably an idea courtesy of the charitable Jeff Suppan.

OBP: .265/League Average: .338

Yep, you read that one right. Bill Hall makes an out, and hurts the chances that the Brewers have to win, 73.5% of the time he is at bat. THE. BEST. IN. THE. LEAGUE.

OPS: .595/League Average: .757

THE BEST OF ALL TIME????

OPS+: 57

Second worst on the team, right behind Jody Gerut. When Jason Kendall is considered a better offensive weapon than you, as he is in the case of OPS+, you should consider yourself lucky to have a job before you consider yourself great.

Offensive Winning Percentage: .225

In layman's terms, paraphrased from Baseball Prospectus, is the percentage of games that a team could expect to win if the output of a given player were replicated by all 9 players. The rate for a standard, run of the mill replacement player was set by Bill James at .350, which means that over a 162 game season, a team of replacement players could expect to win 56 games. The Bill Hall Living Legends Roadshow, however, would only win 36 games. A TEAM OF BILL HALLS WOULD LOSE TWENTY MORE GAMES THAN A TEAM COMPRISED OF MERELY AVERAGE PLAYERS!!!!

Positional MLV: -13.1

Described verbatim from BP as "runs contributed by a batter beyond what an average player at the same position would produce in a team of otherwise league-average batters". In a team of average batters, Bill Hall costs the team 13 runs. Outstanding.

There is not a single fucking statistic that justifies the title of "League Average Third Basemen", much less "Best Third Basemen in the Game". In fact, every time Bill Hall appears in the game for the Brewers, he dramatically impinges their chances of winning. Congratulations Bill Hall, you are not only unproductive, but an idiot as well.