“I don’t want to call them(stats gurus) propeller-heads,”

It would explain why he hates the Giants so much.

I find this to be a fairly encouraging article—-compared to the other stuff we’ve been reading and complaining about, at least.

With the proper balance, so would he, but Bochy also believes that certain Giants need to learn the difference between being selective and being tentative.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/10/06/SP7L1A1E30.DTL#ixzz0TBCy4nPW

LOL FRED!

“They’ve given me these statistics that show you actually score more runs without bunting,” he said. “It’s a little different if you’re looking for one run late in the game. But you’re better off playing for a bigger inning, especially early or in the middle.”

One of Bochy’s best qualities is that he understands this. I hate that people think this has anything to do with the offensive struggles.

Gwen……you are totally wrong about Bochy….he is very personable and charismatic…….and intense……maybe you only react to the big blowhards who yell and wave their arms around……Bochy is calm and even-keeled, and he makes sure that his team is also confident and centered……..take your hatchet somewhere else….

“Is it really that hard to find a writer who understands even the simpler concepts of baseball statistics?” Sorry, I don’t get this. Who cares about Knapp? She doesn’t manage the team. What’s important is that Bochy is entirely correct as to the concepts of baseball statistics. To take the limit example: “In the ninth inning of a close game, below average hitters should bunt most of the time … average hitters should bunt about half the time” (The Book, 286). Even when run expectancy is greater without the bunt, the team should have the bunt as a strategy option so that the infield will be drawn in as a precaution, thereby making swinging away more effective (343). If so, of course the team ought to work on bunting, and other forms of small ball execution, so that they are strategy options rather than occasions for a weak foul, a pop up, or a dribbler to the mound. Instead of finding this recognition of Bochy’s heartening, Angel fusses. In the light of the team’s hacking and abysmal OBP, I am also heartened by Bochy’s recognition that walking Bonds led to more runs than letting him swing away.

First, I think that the fanbase has a mindset whereby if you win, that’s good, and if you don’t, that’s bad. I don’t think they look beyond that, or want to. For that matter, look at the gross contradictions even on this site (play the youngsters vs. sign up late-30s vets like Cameron and Dye, for example), often from the same posters at different times. I don’t see a real adherence to principled strategies even from fans as savvy as those on MCC, let alone the opinionated, arrogant idiots on The Splash or Baggs’s comments section.

I agree with you absolutely that the writers ought to be, much more than they are, on Bochy about OBP, his unrelentingly playing dreary Winn this year, etc. In fact, though, to my pleasure, not only writers but also the TV and radio announcers started to be on their case about OBP in the second half of the year; and both Sabean and Bochy have made a point of mentioning it this past week.

As to lousy execution, finally, I don’t see that the buck gets unfairly passed to the players, though they are very much responsible for it. As in Knapp’s column (though annoyingly pussy-footing and kissy-kissy) blame does and should also go to an FO or a coaching staff that tolerates hacking at-bats and sloppy bunting or inept hitting behind the runner. In various crucial ways, which MCC eagle-eyedly points out, the players aren’t being taught or encouraged to make the most of whatever talents they have. Do you think that Neukom can’t see faults that seem pretty obvious to us, even without reading Tom Tango, Bill James, and Fangraphs?

“look at the gross contradictions even on this site (play the youngsters vs. sign up late-30s vets like Cameron and Dye, for example), often from the same posters at different times.”

This sounds like a load of simplified BS.
I don’t buy that people here would complain about not playing the youngsters, only to turn around and talk about how Jermaine Dye should go to the Giants.
If anyone has said that, it was likely to the extent of “I wouldn’t mind a 1 or 2 year deal for Jermaine Dye or Mike Cameron”.
And even that seems unlikely when talking about Jermaine Dye specifically.