Dashiell Hammett - The Thin Man

Okay so this was Denver's mayor's choice for the city's book of the year and I really can't figure out why.  I mean it is your standard pulp mystery fiction. Standard 1-D characters.  I think the main reason he picked it was the nice description of Alfred Packer and his desire for human flesh that must have sealed the deal.  I mean come on the University of Colorado's student dining facility is called Packer's Grill whose tag line is, "Have a friend for lunch.."  Ha Ha.  Anyway decent read not alot to talk about it.

Rox Talk

"We just sit around talking about the old times, she says when she feels like crying she starts laughing thinking about glory days..." - Bruce Springsteen

Yup talking about the last season of Rox's baseball seems that we really just don't want to forget the 2007 season. I mean 90 wins, NL pennant, a shot at the Series...but now we have a bitter aftertaste that is the 2008 season.

So what the heck is this? Well it is a plot of 4 things; 1) dark blue line is projected wins, 2) yellow line is runs scored as a percentage of men on base, 3) light blue line is men left on base per plate appearance, and 4) pink line is runs per plate appearance. I plotted these in 2007 and then plotted again based on 2008 data. Put them together and the plot above is what you get.

Obviously these are cumulative.   Projected wins settles in around Game 60.  In 2008 the Roxs were projected to win about 84 wins throughout the season and only got to 90 based on their unbelievable finish.  2008 they reached a highpoint of about 76 games with 20 to play.  The next graph is the yellow one or runs scored as a percentage of men on base.  This value takes the runs scored divided by the amount of men that made it to a base (it doesn't subtract men who are then picked off, caught stealing, or doubled up).  So in 2007, 36.9% of the men put on base crossed home plate while only 34.6% did in 2008.  What was interesting was that if you look at the 2007 graph the Roxs got better through the season while in 2008 we basically plateaued. 

The third graph is the light blue line and this is men left on base per plate appearance.  The amazing thing about this graph is how constant 2007 and 2008 were.  In 2007, 19.3% of men were left on the table and in 2008, 19.1%.  It seems that 8 men left on base is the Rox's norm. Finally the pink line is the amount of runs scored per plate appearance.  Again it should be noticed the upward trend for 2007 and the plateau that was 2008.  13.2% scored in 2007 while only 10.6% in 2008 (6,498 plate appearances in 2007 versus 6,312 plate appearances in 2008). What can we conclude from all this?  Well 2007 saw the Roxs score 860 runs and in 2008 we eeked out 747 runs!

Did this exercise last year but here are the breakdowns by month for 2007.

AVERAGE	G	PA	AB	R	H+BB	HBP+RE	LOB
April	26	40	34	4	13	1	8
May	28	38	34	4	12	1	7
June	27	40	36	6	14	1	8
July	24	39	34	6	13	1	7
August	29	41	36	6	14	1	8
Sept	29	41	36	6	14	1	8

2008

AVERAGE	G	PA	AB	R	H+BB	HBP+RE	LOB
April	28	41	36	4	13	1	8
May	28	38	34	4	12	1	7
June	27	38	33	4	12	1	7
July	27	40	34	6	14	1	8
August	28	40	34	5	13	1	8
Sept	24	37	33	4	11	1	6

It would seem to me if the Roxs could average 6 runs a month they tend to do pretty good. Again I am somewhat amazed by the consistency between the 2007 and 2008 years at the plate especially the left on base.

College Football

Absolutely no comment about last weekend.  That makes 6 in a row...what is up with that?  Let's hope we get the mojo back against the cellar dwellers that is San Diego State (who I think has never been to a bowl game, ever!).

Last week's games of interest included Florida State winning over Miami in an offensive shoot out (gee what happened to the good defense?),  Vandy beating Auburn (??? doh gotta love college football), and the battle of Louisiana between Lafayette and Monroe had Lafayette pulling it out.  This week's adventures include Wash St and Oregon St (which is bigger UW vs Oregon or the battle of the states?), LSU and Florida (wow I had no ideal with the OU Texas match up this weekend), and Toledo and Michigan (think Michigan can beat this Ohio school?).

This Week in Comics

Uncanny X-men #503

Great cover! Is it any wonder that with Land on board doing this run that the preponderance of babes in the book is skyrocketing? So it would appear that Maddie is back to haunt Scott. Scott and red heads just don't mix. Inferno part 2 is starting this winter so I wonder if they aren't wrapping this into it all. Interesting to see this play out but if Emma really can read minds how the heck can she not see that Scott wasn't all that faithful?

Flash Gordon #2

It is nice to see that good quality comics can be done outside of the marvel/DC realm. Not for sure about the whole reboot but the character and stories are intriguing which is always good. Love the art and excitement. Sometimes comics can get bogged down with the story...publishers should remember that comic story telling is a visual medium.

Invincible Iron Man #6

First story arc is complete. Not too shabby kind of weak finish but it is the first story out of the mix so Fraction does get a free pass. Throw in that this is suppose to feed off the movie and you get the story that is pretty basic. You know what I am missing is the 80s newspaper print gritty art. The art today is just too picturesque.

Haiku Wednesday

Apples Succulent goodness It's the fruit that tempted man Knocked Newton's noggin

Lego Batman - Video Game

Fourth installment of a lego video game. Loving the games although where will lego go now? Too bad they can't get the spider-man or marvel license back.  Love the dual nature of being able to play levels as batman and as the bad guys.  The suit upgrades are great.  This is by far the best of the games.  Maybe a Clone Wars lego game will come along?  Hmmmm

Rox Talk

Well after a 74 - 88 finish how did this all look based on some preseason predictions? Well looking back to April, Vegas O/Us for the division was the D-backs at 87.5, Dodgers at 86.5, the Padres at 84.5, and the Roxs at 83.5. Based on returning Win Shares and adding in their off season additions the D-backs were at 78, Roxs at 81, Padres at 68, LA at 83 and the Giants at 71. So what was the final tally?

So for last year based on the team's final standings

	W	L	RS	RA	Ex - W	WS Factor
Arizona	90	72	712	732	79	0.88
Colorado	90	73	860	758	90	1.00
San Diego	89	74	741	666	89	1.00
LA	82	80	735	727	82	1.00
SF	71	91	683	720	77	1.09

2008 Standings

	W	L	RS	RA	Ex - W	WS Factor
LA	84	78	700	648	87 (83)	1.04
Arizona	82	80	720	706	82 (78)	1.00
Colorado	74	88	747	822	74 (81)	1.00
SF	72	90	640	759	68 (71)	0.94
San Diego	63	99	637	764	68 (68)	1.08

Well Vegas did awful but the Win Share method did fairly well.  Boy the Dodgers really helped their cause with pitching.  And well the Roxs just couldn't score.  Based on early projections based on Chone, ZiPs, Pecota, and Marcels the Roxs had a spread of wins from 77 to 93.  The average was 84 wins.  I predicted an 85 win season finishing second to the Dodgers.  Looking at expectations the injury bug certainly hurt the Roxs with Helton and Tulo missing considerable games.  The big hole was 2B where we had 84 runs scored last year thanks to Matsui and this year the patchwork at the 2-hole only produced 65 runs. The lowest predicted run score was 770 runs!  

Looking at the pitching performance

For as much griping as there was for the pitching staff this year, I really think it was the offense that really underperformed. Had the Roxs scored 800 runs they would have won 4 - 5 more games. Oh yeah and if the Roxs weren't 3 - 15 against the D-backs we might have been a bit more respectable too.

College Football

Big game for the Falcons tomorrow.  Time to sink Navy!  Navy currently holds a 5 game winning streak against Air Force.  I thought with Calhoun coming in last year he would fire the team up and smash that 4 game win streak.  Navy is 3 - 2 and Air Force stands 3 - 1.   I wouldn't expect a lot of passes in tomorrow's game in fact it should be a pretty quick ground control game.  I think the Falcons will win game one of the commander's chief trophy.  I predict a battle but AF coming out on top 17 - 14.

Games of interest include Florida State and Miami (boy that would have been interesting 20 years ago...),  Auburn and Vandy (huh??? two ranked teams?  wow), and the battle of Louisiana between Lafayette and Monroe.

Neal Stephenson in Person

Saw Mr. Stephenson for the second time. First heard him during his book tour after writing Cryptonomicon. Not for sure if he toured during the release of his Baroque tour de force. I would think he needed time to rest his hand after long writing that story! Obviously he was touring and reading from his new release, Anathem. Most of his books are quirky and this one takes place on an alternative (?) world where the scientist are secluded away and only allowed to come out for set time periods. 

His overall Q&A was good. I always get irked by the author's reading their own material. I'd much rather talk about the process, the ideals, the writing, the edits and what not. But I guess every author is required to read a portion of his new book...

Haiku Wednesday

Leaves

For One Month Only
See Extravagant Aspens
Praise those Evergreens