Love in the Time of Cholera.

I’m a big fan both of Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez’s work and of magical realism in general, so I was excited to pick up Love in the Time of Cholera , which promised to take Garcí­a Márquez’ style and apply it to an epic romance. The result is more the story of a man who refuses to grow up, and in the end, is rewarded for it.

The plot of Love in the Time of Cholera revolves around the long-suffering Florentino Ariza, who falls in love with Fermina Daza when the two are teenagers, only to see her reject him and marry the wealthy young doctor, Juvenal Urbino. Florentino decides that he must wait for Dr. Urbino to die, at which point he can resume his pursuit; in the meantime, he will get his rocks off with almost every woman who crosses his path (the novel claims he has 622 affairs over the 51 years of Fermina’s marriage, not including one-night stands, seemingly a mathematical impossibility for a man with a full-time job, even granting that Florentino conducted some of those affairs simultaneously), with a particular jones for widows. (I’ll give you all five seconds to glean the significance of that. Got it? Excellent. Let’s move on.)

It seems that this is intended as a soaring romantic tale of a love that wouldn’t die, that transcended the years, and so on, but that feeling disappears from the novel the moment Fermina rejects Florentino until after Dr. Urbino dies. Garcí­a Márquez (GGM, from here on out) tells us Florentino’s emotional state is due to his immense ability to love, but it seems to me that Florentino was suffering from a case of arrested development. When he approaches Fermina just hours after her husband has died to reiterate his undying love for her, he’s not being romantic – he’s acting like a self-centered teenager, tone-deaf to the emotions of the people around him. It is as if he has caught a disease and doesn’t wish to be cured.

That ending is one of the book’s brightest spots; it’s a clever and unexpected resolution to a plot that looks to be headed toward a predictable, Hollywood-style ending (they get together, one of them dies, the women in the audience cry and see it over and over again), and it includes some of the book’s best writing. GGM does have an incredible gift with prose, and uses it to great effect in parts of the book about love and sex, fear of aging and death, and familial relationships:

But in her loneliness in the palace she learned to know him [her son], they learned to know each other, and she discovered with great delight that one does not love one’s children just because they are one’s children but because of the friendship formed while raising them.

One negative aspect I’ve noticed in other GGM works shows up again here – his obsession with bodily functions. For example:

Even when it was not the season for asparagus, it had to be found regardless, so that he could take pleasure in the vapors of his own fragrant urine.

Wow. Thanks for sharing. Good thing this wasn’t a scratch-and-sniff edition. One of the fantastic things about GGM’s masterwork, One Hundred Years of Solitude , is that it transports the reader into a sort of dreamstate, where closing the book results in a brief moment of confusion that’s akin to waking up in the middle of a vivid dream. Yet Love in the Time of Cholera continually interrupts any of its own attempts to create that immersive, dreamlike feeling with verbal tritones about urine, feces, vomit, or semen.

By tying up the romance story and fading out the various little subplots one by one, GGM leaves the reader with a satisfying ending that’s not unrealistically happy (one of the subplots ends very badly, although it’s brushed off a bit in the broader context). The problem is the meat of the book, where the reader sees Florentino and learns he’s not a romantic hero but a juvenile antihero unworthy of the exaltation that the ending seems to give him.

Compelling arguments.

A little hit-and-run on yours truly in today’s Canton Repository:

SAY WHAT? Scouts Inc. analyst Keith Law said during a Jan. 2 chat on ESPN.com that he does not agree with the line of thinking that says Omar Vizquel should be considered for the Hall of Fame because another great defensive shortstop, Ozzie Smith, already is there. “The difference here is that Smith was a far, far better defensive player than Vizquel is,” Law said. Indians fans who saw Vizquel play every day would beg to differ.

Let’s just question someone’s credibility without providing any evidence to back it up. But hey, I’m sure those Cleveland fans who saw Vizquel play (but almost certainly never saw Smith) are unbiased, expert sources.

Raines vs. Rice.

So I had an email exchange with a Hall voter who voted for Rice but not for Raines, and I thought it might be worth sharing. I’m withholding the voter’s name and am not saying whether or not his ballot was published. Anyway, I asked why he didn’t vote for Raines, and he wrote:

for a guy who played that many seasons, he should have well over 3,000 hits, or a .320 average. The steals are a plus, but on non-contending teams you can run every time you get on base after the all-star break, as henderson did in 1982.

Rice had a higher average, and he was a power hitter – and he didn’t play 10 years on artificial turf.

Here’s my reply; as I look at it now, it’s a little half-formed, but I’ll present it without edits. I was trying to rebut specific arguments rather than presenting a global case for Raines:

Batting average is inferior to on-base percentage in every way; batting average pretends that walks, hit by pitches, and (weirdest of all) sacrifice flies don’t exist. In fact, a walk is worth somewhere between 80% and 90% as much as a single is [KL: I guessed on this one, but if someone has a hard coefficient for BB wrt a single, I’d love to see it.], because most of the value in either event is in not making an out. So penalizing Raines for not hitting .320 in his career ignores the fact that his career OBP is one of the 100 best since 1900, higher than Willie Mays’.

Raines reached base safely 3977 times in his career. That’s more than Tony Gwynn (3955, in almost the same # of plate appearances), Lou Brock (3833, in 1000 more PA), and way more than Rice (3186, in about 1000 fewer PA), and just a shade behind Rod Carew (4096, in 200 more PA).

As for running every time after the All-Star Break on non-contending teams, Raines stole more bases in the first half in his career (405) than in the second half (403). Also, the Expos finished in first or within ten games of first in 1981, Raines’ first season; 1982; 1983; 1987; and 1990. He went to Chicago in 1991, and they finished in second, 8 games out; in 3rd in 1992, ten games out; and of course they won the division in 1993. He then won two rings as a part-time player in New York. Raines spent at least ten of his twenty full years on good clubs.

Rice, on the other hand, got more benefit from his home park than any Hall of Fame candidate I can remember. He hit .320/.374/.546 at home with 469 extra-base hits, and just .277/.330/.459 on the road with 375 extra-base hits. I compared him in my ESPN.com chat session yesterday to Dante Bichette, an OK player who looked like a star because he played in a great hitters’ park. So if you want to downgrade Raines for playing on turf for part of his career, you would need to downgrade Rice more for playing in a friendly stadium for his whole career.

The Mailbag of Malcontent, part 2.

Received today in the ol’ ESPN mailbag, from a reader who didn’t provide his name or an email address:

just because u have some big degrees and use the words ‘above average” u think u kno so much. if u did u would not be a blog writer. u are the stephen a smith of baseball. someone that nobody in the industry respects and like u said u took this job for face time. u are an arrognat person that b/c of their degree belittles others b/c of ur credentials. u could not cut it in toronto (that should prove ur an idiot) and feel u are an expert. i only read ur blog b/c u discuss some minor leaguers, but u wonder why ur so unpopluar. i will pay u any amount and out analyze u on any position player. u make the most obvious observations-like rob deer strikes out. and by the way any asshole who gets into harvard (much easier in ur day) gets an A…look at the stats

This would not seem to require any further comment by me.

Pozcars results.

For those of you who don’t already read Joe Posnanski’s blog – I’m assuming most of you do – he posted the results of the Pozcar Hall of Fame voting yesterday. No big shockers here: Gossage, Blyleven, and Raines got in. That’s my ballot, without McGwire (held down by scandal) and Trammell (a borderline choice, but one on which I’ve decided to put my imprimatur).

Some interesting observations:

Brady Anderson received 1.18% of the vote.

One of the three people who voted for Brady Anderson — former major league pitcher Al Fitzmorris. Why? “Because of Brady Anderson, I got to meet Ashley Judd.” Now THAT’S a Pozcars voter.

I would vote for Darin Erstad for the Hall of Fame if he introduced me to Ashley Judd, so I can understand this. Heck, if Erstad got me a night with Ashley Judd – who has been #1 on my theoretical laminated card since roughly 1996 – I’d hand-carve his plaque.

Pete Rose received 46.85% of the vote.
Joe Jackson received 52.76% of the vote.

It did surprise me that quite a few Pozcars voters gave Jackson the vote but not Rose. I’m only guessing, but I suspect it came down to three things: The movie portrayals of Jackson as the innocent (or as the Michael Landonesque angel who saved James Earl Jones and brought Kevin Costner and his Dad together); the fact that Jackson’s been dead for more than a half century while Rose signs autographs in Vegas; the fact that Pete Rose lied.

I think Joe’s right on. The media portrayals of Jackson as an innocent rube who still played his heart out (but who, in reality, was more than happy to suck when the gamblers wanted him to suck) have altered the perceptions of a lot of casual fans of his role in the scandal, and the horror of what Jackson and the Black Sox did has faded with time, while Pete Rose – as unsympathetic a knucklehead as you can find – just keeps making a colossal ass of himself at every opportunity.

Anyway, read the rest. The end of his Trammell comment is particularly funny.

Chat today.

Just a heads-up that I have a chat today at 1 pm over at the Four-Letter.

Cards Q&A.

I did a Q&A with Erik over at Futureredbirds, mostly on the state of the Cardinals’ farm system.

Hey, kettle.

From Mike Fine’s lament on the BBWAA’s failure to elect Jim Rice through last year:

Suffice it to say that Rice’s offensive accomplishments were rather remarkable, but he still continues to be less than unimpressive amongst the voters. Maybe that’s the beauty of baseball-that statistics can be manipulated and debated and interpreted in so many different ways.

Or maybe there should be some guidelines for voters rather than to rely on subjectivity and personal feelings.

Rice is paying the price for the lack of guidelines, and he doesn’t deserve it.

This comes after he quotes a number of stats from Red Sox PR hack Dick Bresciani, the King of Selective Endpoints, who has been campaigning for Rice for at least a decade. So subjectivity is now hurting Rice? Where’s the objectivity in all this nonsense about how “feared” he was?

UPDATE: Okay, the spread of the Dick Bresciani bullshit is really getting under my skin. Let’s look at how badly he’s abusing statistics in Fine’s article:

The retired players with career home runs and average as high as Rice are Hank Aaron, Jimmy Foxx, Lou Gehrig, Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Stan Musial, Mel Ott, Babe Ruth and Ted Williams, all members of the Hall of Fame.

Talk about cherry-picking. Look, Rice had a pretty good and very limited peak, but compared to those guys, he’s a midget dwarf. Look at how many times each player on that list posted an OPS+ of 130 or better in his career, counting only full seasons:

Aaron 19
Ott 18
Musial 17
Ruth 17
Mantle 16
Mays 16
Williams 16
Foxx 13
Gehrig 13
Rice 6

Oh, but it gets better:

Seventeen players with 350-plus home runs and a .290-plus average have been on the Hall of Fame ballot, and all but Rice are in the Hall of Fame: Aaron, Cepeda, Joe DiMaggio, Foxx, Gehrig, Al Kaline, Mantle, Mays, Johnny Mize, Musial, Ott, Frank Robinson, Ruth, Snider, Billy Williams and Ted Williams.

Same criterion (full seasons with OPS+ >= 130), more players:

Aaron 19
Ott 18
Musial 17
Ruth 17
Robinson 17
Mantle 16
Mays 16
T Williams 16
Foxx 13
Gehrig 13
Kaline 13
DiMaggio 11
Mize 11
Snider 11
Cepeda 9
B Williams 9
Rice 6

Bresciani is counting on one simple thing: Voters will be so impressed by the names to whom he’s comparing Rice that they won’t bother to check his math. The worst player on that second, longer list had 50% more seasons of 130 OPS+ or better than Rice did. And I’m not saying that a 130 OPS+ is even a Hall of Fame season per se – it’s merely a good season; Frank Robinson posted a 150 OPS+ or better thirteen times in his career. That’s a Hall of Famer. Rice? He was a good player who now has a good PR guy. If you really think he belongs in the Hall, Dick, stop playing games with his stats to prove it.

Bad votes.

I think many of us in the sabermetrically-inclined crowd tend to discredit older sportswriters as less likely to consider strong statistical arguments and more likely to use specious reasoning to justify their award or Hall votes. I haven’t found that to be true while collecting Hall ballots, and here’s some proof that younger sportswriters can be just as specious:

1. [Tim Raines] admitted sliding headfirst the year he used because he kept coke in his uniform pocket and didn’t want it to fall out — which is an act as disrespectful of the game as you can imagine.

I presume Buscema will be leading the “recall Mickey Mantle” campaign, since we know Mantle showed up drunk for games on multiple occasions. And, of course, his last phrase is pure hyperbole, since I can imagine many more disrespectful acts, like throwing games for money. Except I don’t have to imagine it at all.

Raines had an addiction. He admitted it, sought treatment, has been clean for something like twenty years, and became a model citizen and good clubhouse guy for the second half of his career. His cocaine problem is a non-factor in discussing his Hall candidacy.

2. As a player whose key Hall of Fame attribute was his speed, I want to examine a little further whether the use of a stimulant could have enhanced his performance whether he used it for that purpose or not.

That’s just pathetic. Cocaine is now a performance-enhancing drug? Perhaps cops should take a sniff of coke before setting off to chase down suspects on foot. The perps wouldn’t stand a chance against those juiced-up cops!

And how is Buscema going to examine this further? Will he review the peer-reviewed studies on the effects of cocaine usage on athletes?

3. He wasn’t a surefire Hall of Famer without that issue by any means; in fact, I had only seriously considered him after several compelling columns turned my head.

This is perhaps as damning to me as the first point. Here we have a first-time Hall voter who, at certain points in his article (such as explaining why he didn’t vote for Dawson), shows awareness of stats like OBP. And yet when presented with Raines, whose .385 career OBP sits comfortably aside Hall of Famer Tony Gwynn’s (.388) and eventual Hall of Famer Derek Jeter (.388), Buscema needed other writers to point out to him that Raines is a surefire Hall of Famer … and still isn’t convinced.

When you only use statistics that support the point you already wanted to make, or you weigh statistics that support that point more heavily than those that don’t …

Bert Blyleven … but ultimately I still would have liked to have seen at least a little better winning percentage and/or more Cy Young votes, an ERA title and more than one 20-win season in 22 years.

… you raise a question, at least to me, of whether you understand the statistics at all. If we’re still talking about Blyleven’s win total – and acting as if that’s unconnected to Cy Young votes – then we’re still running uphill.

One ballot doesn’t prove the point that we may be discriminating a bit too much by age when talking about voter tendencies, but based on the 80-odd ballots I’ve got, I haven’t seen anything to convince me that the voter’s age is a major factor in affecting his Hall choices. Buscema was just kind enough to display his logic in public.

Thank you.

As the year comes to a close, I wanted to take a moment to thank those of you who’ve chosen to visit this blog, whether it’s to lurk, to comment, or even to buy something by clicking through to amazon.com. I started the blog as an outlet for some food-related writing for which I didn’t have a proper outlet, and it’s grown in scope and audience beyond anything I expected. I’ll end December with over 10,000 unique visitors and over 150,000 hits for the month, and I can’t tell you what it means to know that I’m reaching that kind of audience.

So thank you all for coming, talking, buying, critiquing, suggesting, and cooking. The more you visit, the more it drives me to write. I wish all of you a happy, safe, and prosperous New Year.