Thank You, Dan LeBatard

...For talking some sense into your fellow Sports Reporters.

This morning, the panel (LeBatard, John Saunders, Mike Lupica, Michael Kay) was sitting around an expensive set, wearing suits, and using vague cliches framed to project rare insight on sports subjects. More specifically, they were talking about the Detroit Tigers' sweep of the Oakland A's, attempting to provide analysis of a situation that merits none.

So naturally, guess where they focused most of their attention. "Jim Leyland?" Right--Jim Leyland. Why? Because they're lazy sports journalists who'd rather assign cause-effect to reasons sweeping, inscrutible, and subject to their own imagination rather than those which are pertinent, factual, and subject to hard scrutiny.

Mike Lupica and Michael Kay actually went so far to argue that Jim Leyland has transformed Kenny Rogers from a playoff "choker" to a playoff ace with his rare ability to make his players "believe they can win."

But one of the bunch, LeBatard, was brave enough to call out their laziness and embrace the truth--that there are many, many, many reasons to assign to the Tigers' success before we think about bringing up Leyland's contribution. And he also (again--thank you, thank you, Dan F.-ing LeBatard) acknowledged--unlike almost any other sports journalist--that this team is not at all by any stretch of the imagination whatsoever "the same team that lost 121 games three years ago" because the players on their current roster were either struggling first- and second-year guys, minor-leaugers, or members of another major league roster. Why does no one besides Dan LeBatard seem to acknoledge this super-obvious and ultra-important fact??

I'm sorry--anyone who thinks that three years is a short time span for any sport is pretty much clueless.

Lupica rebutted with these three consecutive sentences:

But come on, Dan...He believed in Curtis Granderson.

Leyland started Curtis Granderson because he was the best option for his position among the players on his roster.

He knows how to deploy his troops.

Meaningless war metaphors are neither insightful nor apt in most cases. I also find them sort of offensive.

He made these guys believe they can win.

Kenny Rogers is practically the same age as Leyland. (Ok, fine, not really. But that's only because Leyland is so old himself.) Does Mike Lupica actually believe that Leyland has such incredible psychological motivational techniques that he can somehow tap into some deeper inner-strength of a 15+-year veteran that's seen basically everything there is to see in major league baseball for himself? And as for the young guys, how much do they really listen to their coaches anyway? After so many years as a sports journalist, I can't believe Lupica would still believe in this feel-good nonsense.

As for Dan LeBatard, I applaud him for taking a stand as the one non-lazy, skeptical, critical journalist of the bunch. He was shot down by the company sitting around him, but he spoke up for higher-level thinking.

(For more on managing from Dan LeBatard...)