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This inspiring story about the love of two brothers had NBA superstar LeBron James on the verge of tears, as you'll see in the video. Very emotional and so good in so many ways.
Conner and Cayden make up Team Long Brothers and were recently named Sports Illustrated's 2012 SportsKids of the Year. Cayden, 5, is diagnosed with spastic cerebral palsy and can't speak or walk on his own. But, in the summer of 2011, Conner, who was seven at the time, decided to compete in the Nashville Kids Triathlon, pulling his younger brother behind him.
They finished together, in last place, but in the process became role models of what is possible and the power of love. When I think about this family, I think of Andrew Solomon's phrase of "horizontal identities" and what we would miss as people and a community if we didn't encounter these special people in our daily lives. It's Conner who says it best:
"The one thing that makes me really made is when people walk down the road and say… the 'r' word, if you now what that is. I just tell them that like it doesn't matter what it looks like on the outside, it matters what's on the inside. He still has regular feelings like we do. And he understands what you say about him.
If people could race with people that can't walk or talk or can have any kind of autism, it might open eyes of people that don't really care about it. And, maybe, the people that don't care in the past will care in the future and actually do it with somebody."
That's way too much earnestness for the ironic. It's way too much idealism for the cynical. And it's way too much selflessness for the self-absorbed. In short, people aren't upset at Tebow's God talk. They're upset that he might actually believe it.
—Daniel Foster ends with this provocative thought in the National Review Online regarding Tim Tebow's response to Detroit Lions linebacker Stephen Tulloch mocking his style of prayer after sacking the Denver Broncos quarterback: "He was probably just having fun and was excited he made a good play and had a sack. And good for him."
The commentary is well worth reading. What do you think?
Photo by Justin Edmonds/Getty Images.
~Trent Gilliss, senior editor
If I'm facing Andy Pettitte on the Yankees and I'm praying for a home run, and he's praying for a strikeout, I don't think the result is going to show who has greater faith…
—Mike Sweeney, designated hitter for the Seattle Mariners
Hey sports fans, CNN recently compiled a dozen photos showing athletes "in prayer" and asking, "When did God become a sports fan?" The article focuses primarily on this as a Christian question, but the image of former Muslim NBA star Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf (born Chris Jackson) made me more curious about how athletes of other faiths invoke God in their sport. This 2007 profile of Abdul-Rauf, "The Conversion of Chris Jackson," gives more depth to the question.
Colleen Scheck, senior producer
Backing the Springboks
Colleen Scheck, senior producer
This week, ESPN's acclaimed 30 for 30 documentary series continued with "The 16th Man." This doc chronicles the role of rugby in helping unify blacks and whites in post-apartheid South Africa. It's centered around Nelson Mandela's risky "magnanimous gesture" to host the 1995 Rugby World Cup and back the majority white South African Springboks, culminating with their improbable victory and its unifying symbolism for a nation starting a healing process.
It features interviews with players, including Afrikaner captain François Pienaar, alongside an interview with political activist Justice Bekebeke, who doubted Mandela's actions, and a few brief comments from Desmond Tutu that echo his belief in a "God of surprises."
The film's director quotes Mandela's post-victory words: "Sport has the ability to change the world. It has the power to inspire, the power to unite people that little else has … It is more powerful than governments in breaking down racial barriers." Often sports documentaries seem to exaggerate this sentiment; in this case, the documenting feels very authentic, even without knowing how long the impact lasted for the people of South Africa.
My decision today is not based on a finding that you violated Georgia law, or on a conclusion that differs from that of the local prosecutor. That said, you are held to a higher standard as an NFL player, and there is nothing about your conduct in Milledgeville that can remotely be described as admirable, responsible, or consistent with either the values of the league or the expectations of our fans.
—NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, in his letter to Ben Roethlisberger, quarterback of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Goodell handed "Big Ben" a six-game suspension in his most recent action against a player violating the National Football League's personal conduct policy. Goodell called it "early-intervention."
Is he raising the ethical bar for professional athletes?
Swimming at the Top of the World
Trent Gilliss, online editor
A thoroughly inspiring lecture from a man who has been called the human polar bear. Lewis Gordon Pugh has swum in unimaginable places, including long-distance swims in all five oceans, in order to call attention to climate change.
Here, he talks about his most recent feat: swimming one kilometer (nearly 20 minutes) in minus 1.8 degrees Celsius water at the North Pole in order to raise awareness of the melting polar ice cap and rising water levels. For every one hour he spent training in cold water, he spent four hours in "mind training" — visualizing himself at every phase of the swim and willing his brain to raise his core body temperature.
If you only have a few minutes and can't watch all 19, I recommend dropping in at the 10:25 mark to watch a short film about his journey. It's quite moving.
(via Mashable)
"Brain Game"
Trent Gilliss, online editor
Malcolm Gladwell's article has been garnering a lot of attention in the media lately for his comparisons of football players and dogs fighting in the ring. It's a fine piece, but Jeanne Marie Laskas' investigative work that appeared earlier in GQ is better. A bold statement for me considering how much I enjoy reading Gladwell's work.
Laskas focuses on the human toll of those forgotten players who suffer in solitude, the ethic of a multi-billion dollar industry who buries its head in the sand, and the fight of an outlier to seek truth according to his personal morality and his religious convictions. Laskas' article is a blue-collar testimony to great journalism. She puts the human being and the moral dilemma at the center of the story, which, I hope, moves powerful interests to act for the good of those former NFL players who are suffering and have little means to live the rest of their days in relative comfort.
(photo: "Headless" by Albert Cesario)
One of your colleagues had me in the papers with horns and a tail, red horns and a tail. That's a sign of the devil. I'm a Christian man. I don't like those things. I take those things very serious. Those are the kind of things that the fans actually get used to seeing, and actually sometimes influence those people to believe that you are a bad person, that you are like an ogre.
—Pedro Martinez, speaking to reporters at Yankee Stadium the day before his debut as the starting pitcher for the Philadelphia Phillies in Game 2 of the World Series.
Trent Gilliss, online editor
Skeptical, But Hopeful, on Vick's Return
by Colleen Scheck, producer
From my peripheral vantage point, it's been an interesting summer to consider the character(s) of sport. Roger Federer finally won the elusive French Open, prompting reviews that "nice guys can come first." Now that the Tour de France is over, media attention has turned to the "drivel" between Lance Armstrong and this year's champion Alberto Contador. I'm still pondering how Tom Watson must feel after coming so close to winning the British Open, just missing setting a record for the oldest player to win a major championship. Hailed as one of the classiest players in the game, Watson drew praise and respect while the tournament temper of the most beloved player, Tiger Woods, was not overlooked in the media this time. (I'll skip the continuing saga of steroids and baseball - see Mitch's post.)
A nine-year-old boy shows his support for Michael Vick outside federal court in Richmond, Virginia in 2007. (photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images)
And now comes the annual return of the NFL. As training camps open, I find myself monitoring the future of Michael Vick now that the NFL has reinstated him post-dogfighting conviction, and reflecting on how forgiveness and second chances take the field in the elevated world of professional athletes. I'm a dog lover, you may recall, and so this one tugs at me closely. I've heard several reports that Vick is "a changed man" and sincerely sorry for his participation in dog-fighting rings. He's returning to the NFL under the mentorship of former NFL coach Tony Dungy, a magnanimous sportsman, who said of Vick:
"I think Michael deserves the chance to show people he has changed and learned from past mistakes, but my true hope is that he will make sound decisions about his future and, at the same time, let people know more about the person that I've come to know recently. I know the public will be skeptical, but I think, over time, people will find there's a different side to him than what they've seen so far."
Marc Morial, president of the National Urban League, added:
"We support the principle that one should not only be allowed, but also encouraged to return to their chosen profession after fulfilling their debt to society. Michael Vick's offenses were tragic and wrong and he has paid a debt through both prison and public ridicule. Now [Vick] can demonstrate that he can and will serve as a role model for young men in communities across the nation."
I think that's the best possible outcome for this situation. Eventually a team will select him, so, a la Michael McCollough, I'm inclined to calm my revenge instinct (he should not be allowed to play or make big bucks in the NFL) and embolden my forgiveness intuition (give him a chance to prove himself and return to his profession). I'm skeptical, but I will hope Vick sets a new example and writes a redeeming chapter for modern professional sports.
The Ploys of Summer
Mitch Hanley, senior producer
This week reports came out about baseball's ongoing steroid scandal, citing lawyer's statements that both Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz tested positive for steroid abuse in 2003. In 2004, these two led the Boston Red Sox to a World Series victory over the St. Louis Cardinals, crowning Ramirez the World Series Most Valuable Player and Ortiz the American League Championship Series MVP.
This is the second time this year that Ramirez has been tied to steroid use — the previous occasion back in May resulted in a 50-game suspension. Earlier this year, famed sluggers Alex Rodriguez (572 career home runs) and Barry Bonds (all-time home run leader at 762, Hank Aaron 2nd at 755) were outed by the same 2003 report as having used steroids.
Although I do applaud the league's enforcement of their rules and the suspension of Ramirez for the current year's infraction, where is the outrage on behalf of the fans? The affects of these damning reports seem to suggest that the fans don't have a problem with players using steroids. Fans may not like it, but, by and large, they do not go so far as to boycott games. In fact, a report issued in May had indicated just a 4.4 percent drop in attendance from last year for games played in April. But the decline is attributed to the economic downturn.
And after a nearly year-long financial crisis that outed the financial industry's cheaters and the regular outing of politicians who either cheated on their wives or cheated on their taxes, is there no outrage left in us? Have we established ours as a culture where it is OK to cheat as long as you don't get caught, and, if you do get caught, just wait for it to blow over? What about those who are out on the diamond playing their hearts out, who are not using steroids. Don't they deserve our outrage? And when it comes to something as trivial as baseball or as important as an election, what is the best way to communicate our outrage?
So what does this mean for our society? Is this the American way? Do we expect our leaders to cheat in order to be leaders? What do you think?
(photo: Alex Rodriguez, David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez at the 2008 MLB All-Star Game. Getty Images/Jim McIsaac)


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Enjoy this honky-tonk of a good time with the October Afternoon Sasparilla collection. Why out here in the ol' midwest, we round up 'em scrapbookin' folk and craftin' kin alike for a rootin' tootin' good time. So grab dem choppers, paste, and this here Sasparilla collection and we will throw a crafternoon hoe down and put our rambunctiousness and misdemeanoring behind us. Ain't that sound like a swell idea?
Collection Kit
- 10 sheets patterned paper 1 each of 10 designs
- big sky
- cattle drive
- dash dalton
- giddy up
- gold rush
- high noon
- pony express
- tumbleweed
- wagon train
- wide open spaces
- 1 12x12 alpha sticker
- 1 pkg chip n' stick
- 1 pkg flower sack
- 1 pkg journaling cards
- 1 pkg little flyers
- 1 pkg word stickers
- 1 pkg wrap pack
8x8 Paper Pad
- 46 sheets
- single-sided

subset: commoncrawl


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By Mr. Scaccia of Boston, a petition (accompanied by bill, House, No. 2428) of Angelo M. Scaccia for legislation to prohibit decreases in permanent position accounts by the state system of higher education for the purpose of contracting out services. Public Service.
Sponsors: | |
Status: | Referred to Joint Committee on Public Service |
Petitioners: Angelo M. Scaccia


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Killer Whirlpool Swallows Anything That Gets Close It goes straight to China! 4/23/2013 12:34:23 PM 26,600
Pregnant Woman Tapes Husband Getting Tased A man in Delaware was tased approx 7 - 10 times and brutally kicked in the head twice all while his pregnant wife looks on. Did the cops use excessive force? You be the judge. 4/16/2013 9:52:51 PM 21,210
Cat Gets Into Defensive Move This cat is ready to defend itself in style. 4/16/2013 10:34:49 AM 5,635
Woman Smacks a Cop and Gets Smacked Back She looked quite surprised when the cop smacked her back! 4/12/2013 10:58:07 AM 51,023
Beaver Attacks Guy Who Gets Too Close You should beavery careful when approaching a beaver because they don't give a dam. See what I did there? 4/11/2013 11:01:54 PM 22,366
Black Guy Gets Tazed and Takes It Like a Boss This black dude gets tazed and doesn't even flinch. He's got some angry words for the chick that called the cops on him. 4/8/2013 11:06:16 PM 71,455
Cheetah Gets Up Close and Personal That guy must have been ready to piss his pants. 4/8/2013 10:40:33 AM 18,359
Guy Gets Revenge on His Cheating Girlfriend Normally it's the chick that freaks out on the guy but in this situation it's the guy getting revenge on his girl for cheating on him. 4/7/2013 11:10:26 AM 57,160


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Results 1 to 5 of 5
Thread: Heater Fan
- Join Date
- Mar 2010
- Posts
- 3
Heater Fan
My heater fan has stopped working on speed number 1 & 2. 3 thru 5 works fine . Where is the speed control unit located on a 2001 2500HD, 8.1l gas?
12-25-2012, 11:59 AM #2The speed control resistor assembly is usually mounted very near the blower motor, try under the dash, behind the glove box.
If you have the manual controls, there are usually two fuses for the blower motor. One fuse is for speeds 1 thru 4, the other is for speed 5 only (the auto systems usually only have one fuse). If you find the 1 thru 4 fuse is blown, the resistor pack is probably the problem and it will eventually need to be changed.Ray
'09 Avalanche LTZ - Black
'05 Envoy XL (sold)
12-25-2012, 01:48 PM #3The resistor is located under th dash and no need to pull the glove box. Sou fd like a bad resistor and its vet common for these connectors to melt. What ur looking for is a connector with like 7 wires all in a line that goes to the resistor. The resistor will also have a red and a black wire that goes to the motor too
12-26-2012, 02:39 PM #4I replaced this on the 2000 siL. the location is next to the blower motor under the dash behind the glove box. the air cabin filter is also located there. I would pull uut the blower clean and debris , replace the cabin filter and also the air box that you can get at. the resistor is also the relay parts. the resistors stick into the air box.
do not get the OEM design purchase the lifetime warrantee part from autozone. it has been a few years now and this part still works great. the OEM resistor became damaged from the mositure in the air box circuit/resistors not protected very low design quality.
12-26-2012, 06:51 PM #5Look it up on youtube. Took 15 minutes to do the job. Bought a new one @ Advanced Auto parts for around $30.00
You're driving is WAY more offensive than my swearing, assjack!!!
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A simple, yet effective logo for a local library that uses colour to make an impact.
Posted in Branding → LogoThe mark in my latest iteration of the RelateIQ logo. Meant to represent a high five to evoke teamwork and collaboration, and when flipped upside down, a wave that represents fluidity and forward movement.
Posted in Branding → LogoA superb interface design for an iPhone app that takes a fresh and different approach. I love the colour design and the excellent use of icons.
Posted in Interface → iPhone AppA collection of unique glossy navigational arrows.
Posted in Interface → ElementWedding Planner for iPad is a great new iPad app aimed at taking the stress out of organising your big day. Designed specifically for the iPad's large touch screen, managing every aspect of your wedding plans is incredibly easy and a pleasure thanks to the simplicity and attractive interface design of the app.
Posted in Interface → iPad AppA superb site for a company that turns your creative ideas into actual things. I like the clean layout and the minimal approach to framing each section.
Posted in Web Design → DesignA simple logo that uses colour effectively to make an impact. I like the use of triangles and whitespace to create a memorable mark.
Posted in Branding → LogoAn excellent example of an icon that's clear and perfectly executed. I love the use of bright yellow to mark it out and the simple utilisation of shapes.
Posted in Interface → ElementRockable produce practical books for web and creative professionals to learn new skills and get good at what they do! This is an all-new responsive design.
Posted in Web Design → CorporateA great logo concept for a boutique furniture store that does custom furniture painting and refinishing. I love the lettering and the subtle use of texture.
Posted in Branding → LogoAn almost unbearably bright and bold icon for an iOS app. The colours immediately take your mind to the cinema, as does the detailed and eye-catching popcorn design.
Posted in Interface → iPhone AppA stunning site for a brewery that makes a bold impact through its use of impressive typography. I love the colours of the background and the restrained use of text, you're intrigued to see what the next slide will be.
Posted in Web Design → Food


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Intestate succession under German law - what happens if someone dies without a... What happens if someone dies in Germany without a will? Who will inherit? This article provides a brief introduction to intestate succession under German law…more
Settling an Estate in Germany - The Erbschein Settling an estate under German law is a daunting task even for those who speak German or grew up in the country. The so called Erbschein is probably the most important document you need if you inherit property in Germany. …more
Dual Citizenship for German Nationals in the US (Beibehaltungsgenehmigung) Germany does not favor dual citizenship. German citizenship expires by operation of law at the moment the citizenship of another country is accepted. This rule deprived many Germans living in the U.S. of German citizenship. If…more
German Law: can I inherit debts in Germany? Under German law you may inherit decedent's debts unless you disclaim the inheritance. Read more on how to disclaim an inheritance in Germany…more
German Tax Law: Estate Tax, Inheritance Tax, and Gift Tax in Germany Information on estate tax and inheritance tax in Germany. Calculate your tax liability if you inherit money or property in Germany. Easy to follow explanation in English from a German lawyer in the United States…more
Probate and Inheritance in Germany Introduction to German probate and inheritance law from an attorney licensed in Germany and the US (California)…more


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Key Related GAO Products
In January 2003, GAO issued its Performance and Accountability Series: Major Management Challenges and Program Risks. This series, first issued in 1999 and updated in 2001, consisted of separate reports on cabinet departments, major independent agencies and the U.S. Postal Service. The reports in that series also identified any areas that had been designated as high-risk within those agencies. GAO continues to identify areas at high risk due to either their greater vulnerabilities to waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement or major challenges associated with their economy, efficiency, or effectiveness. These high-risk areas are discussed in the January 2005 report, High-Risk Series: An Update (GAO-05-207). We also have compiled a list of GAO products issued since January 2003 related to the major management challenges identified in the Performance and Accountability Series. Click on any agency, below, to access that listing of reports.


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Published February 22, 2012, 05:33 PM
NDSU students gather at Memorial Union to remember friends
Fargo, ND (WDAY TV) - NDSU students grieving the death of their friends had a place to pray.By: WDAY Staff Reports, WDAY
NDSU students grieving the death of their friends had a place to pray. Candles and a cross were set up in the Memorial Union to remember the lives of Jordan Playle, Danielle Renninger, Lauren Peterson and Megan Sample. The girls were killed Monday in a car crash near Alexandria. Mourners inside kneeled in prayer, bowing their heads, and wrote in journals. A candlelight vigil will be held in front of the Union at 10:00 tomorrow night.


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Ruben Latre
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Spotted around the media universe
Tuesday Odds and Ends - Posted July 23, 2013
-Cut+Run has added San Francisco-based editor Peter Koob to its Bay Area roster.
-Tommy Hilfiger, with the help of Laird + Partners, has launched its fall 2013 ad campaign (one example above).
-EP ... [TVNewser]


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CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- The labor strife between the NFL's players and owners wasn't lost on free agent quarterback Chad Pennington, even if the former Marshall University star won't play this season.
Pennington spoke in front of more than 150 fans, friends and family during the Fellowship of Christian Athletes banquet at St. Timothy Lutheran Church on Thursday.
The first-round pick of the New York Jets in 2000 is spending part of the summer vacationing in a motor home, opting out of flying to his engagement at the Lawndale Lane location.
In fact, he was caught in traffic in Bluefield, but arrived in plenty of time for the 7:30 p.m. dinner.
"I'm actually going to take this year off, get healthy and do some work for Fox Sports," said Pennington, the NFL's only two-time Comeback Player of the Year.
"I'm going to evaluate things and see where I am physically."
He's had four shoulder injuries, a fractured hand and an ankle sprain - all suffered in games, during his 11-year NFL career. He began the 2009 season as the Dolphins' starter in his second year in Miami, but tore his shoulder capsule in the third game of the season on Sept. 27. His 2010 season was ended on the first play of the first game when he suffered a severe shoulder injury.
"It seems like I majored in that (injury comebacks)," said Pennington, who will turn 35 years old on June 26. "I'm trying to get away from that. It seems to follow me around."
His latest affliction came off the field - while playing pickup basketball - but was a microcosm of his post-Marshall career, during which he broke records for passing yardage (13,143), completions (1,026) and attempts (1,619) in four seasons.
In the NFL, he has thrown for 17,823 yards with 102 touchdowns and 64 interceptions, but has played only two full seasons - 2006 and 2008 when he was Comeback Player of the Year - and averaged only eight games per season during his career. He's the league's all-time leader in completion percentage (66 percent) among quarterbacks with a minimum of 1,500 attempts.
"(Playing basketball) was just a dumb decision," Pennington said. "I was in town in March, doing some (1st and 10) Foundation work and decided to play in a pickup basketball game and tore my ACL. I haven't played (football), I wasn't training real hard at the time because I was doing some shoulder rehab, and my legs weren't ready to play basketball, so it was just dumb.


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Slow Food is organised by local groups called Convivia. You can visit the Local Convivia section to see a list of current groups. Slow Food Ireland is an entirely voluntary umbrella group that co-ordinates such things as the provision of information, membership campaigns and publicity, as well as supporting a number of nationwide initiatives, such as Edible School Gardens. | While we actively encourage people to join Slow Food, non-members are also welcome to attend Slow Food events. Most local groups advertise their events and welcome non-members. Of course, members always get a discount. |
Join or Renew Membership Now | |
SPECIAL OFFER: UNDER 35'S JOIN FOR €12During the summer of 2012, Slow Food Youth Ireland were able to negotiate a special rate of €12 for young people in Ireland to join Slow Food. This special rate will only be available until the end of this year; if we get 100 members (from the time when they introduced it) they will extend it. At €12, you'll receive the same benefits as a regular (€50!) member, including updates about events and activities taking place nationally and internationally, discount to events, the monthly newsletter, and the option to participate in the organisation of a newly founded youth lead division of Slow Food. As young people, we are the future leaders of Slow Food; Italy has given us autonomy to develop structures which suit young people, and together we are developing a global youth lead Slow Food movement. Join us, get involved, meet like-minded young people, help to organise national and international Slow Food Youth events, come, eat, drink and have fun! Check out this short video of Slow Food Youth at Salone del Gusto / Terra Madre 2012 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOs2DuaIBh0 To join us for only €12, simply click here and select Young Membership | |


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Just like the effects artists use in Hollywood. These prosthetics have feather-thin edges that allow an even blending line into your skin for that totally natural look. All are pre-painted and can be easily attached with spirit gum or latex.
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text: 0 notes October 18, 2011 Generation X is used to being ignored, stuffed between two much larger, much more vocal, demographics. But whatever! Generation X is self-sufficient. It was a latchkey child. Generation X Doesn't Want to Hear It Filed under Mat Honan Noreen Malone Emptyage New York Magazine Generation X Generation Y


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Tough-minded real estate developer Donald Trump asked 150 of the world's most successful real estate experts to tell him the best real estate advice they ever received. The answers are insightful, practical, and particularly helpful for anyone wanting to profit from the current uncertain real estate market, whether commercial or private. Hide synopsis
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The Fifty-Megaton Elephant in the Room
Why aren't America and China talking about their nukes?
Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has been in Beijing this week for a round of meetings with senior Chinese officials, including presumptive paramount leader Xi Jinping. One topic that will most likely not be on the Panetta-Xi agenda is nuclear weapons. Which is weird.
Oh sure, every now and again the topic makes it onto the agenda, such as in 2006, when Presidents George W. Bush and Hu Jintao agreed on the importance of nuclear dialogue, or in 2007, when the topic was placed on the agenda for the annual Defense Consultative Talks. But these instances are, by and large, the exception.
Anyone who has attended a nongovernmental U.S.-China dialogue on nuclear issues will recognize a familiar pattern. The Chinese usually note that until the United States joins China in promising not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons first, there isn't much to say. The U.S. response is usually that such promises are worthless, and in any event, the Chinese are not transparent enough for us to believe their pledge. The Chinese response is to ask what sort of rocket scientist would be transparent when being threatened with nuclear weapons. Everyone breaks for tea, then has at it again. There is little reason for Panetta and Xi to waste everyone's time re-enacting this particular scene.
Whether you like the phrase "no first use" or not, the Chinese have a point about starting this discussion without nuclear threats.
If you know one thing about nuclear weapons, it is probably the eminently sensible moral from the movie WarGames: Regarding thermonuclear war, "the only winning move is not to play." Well, that's Hollywood. As recently declassified documents on the Carter administration's nuclear strategy make clear, the illusion of the winning move has been a reliable part of U.S. thinking about nuclear weapons. As long as the United States holds out the prospect of fighting and winning a nuclear war against China, the dialogue is going nowhere.
There are some voices suggesting that the administration should find a way to make clear to Beijing that China's small stockpile of a few hundred nuclear weapons is plenty and that we aren't likely to start any nuclear wars, at least not unless we really have to. Last month, the secretary of state's International Security Advisory Board (ISAB) began circulating draft copies of a report, "Maintaining U.S.-China Strategic Stability," that recommended "mutual nuclear vulnerability should be considered as a fact of life for both sides."
If you do not closely follow the arcana of U.S. nuclear weapons policy, this statement might seem blindingly obvious. After all, China holds some $1.2 trillion in U.S. Treasury securities. Looking at the ways in which the United States and China are economically interdependent, it might be easier to count the ways in which we are not mutually vulnerable. But just four years ago, a very different ISAB report was leaked to the Washington Times. That report, drafted under Paul Wolfowitz's name, advised that "Washington should also make clear that it will not accept a mutual vulnerability relationship with China" -- before making a series of bizarre assertions about Chinese foreign policy right out of The Manchurian Candidate.
There remains a school of thought, popular among those that might populate a Romney administration, that the United States should maintain at least the threat of nuclear annihilation to keep the Chinese in line. American policymakers remain divided over a question that can be put this way: Is China a little Russia to be deterred or a big North Korea to be defended against?
Now, being churlish, I often insist that China is an inscrutable France. People seldom laugh. Perhaps the joke isn't funny. (True story: The only place that line got a laugh was actually in France.) Or perhaps I underestimate the seriousness of this business of stuffing China into the intellectual boxes we've created for Russia and North Korea -- as though those policies have turned out so well.
This debate was not settled in the 2010 Nuclear Posture Review, despite its sensible observation that "maintaining strategic stability in the U.S.-China relationship is as important to this Administration as maintaining strategic stability with other major powers." Although that would seem to cement China's status as a "little Russia," a close reading -- the sort of close reading that gets done in Zhongnanhai -- reveals reasons for caution. The NPR is actually quoting a previous document: the 2010 Ballistic Missile Defense Review. Barack Obama's administration could not agree to language on China, defaulting to a vague reference to "strategic stability" that raises more questions than it answers. More expansive language on the subject of the U.S.-China nuclear relationship was left on the cutting-room floor, victim to a persistent divide within the U.S. government.
Although the "little Russia" quip implies the United States accepted mutual vulnerability with Russia, the reality throughout the Cold War to the present day is more complex and contested. In the ashes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we find an argument that there would be no winner in a nuclear war. With the advent of even more powerful thermonuclear weapons, it became common to imagine that following a nuclear war with the Soviet Union, the living would envy the dead.
But there was another side to the debate, led forcefully by Herman Kahn and his cronies at the Hudson Institute, based on the notion of "victory" in a nuclear war. The basic idea enjoyed the full cinematic treatment in my favorite scene from Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove -- the one where Gen. Buck Turgidson presses the president to follow the unauthorized attack with a much larger effort to catch the Russians "with their pants down."
Turgidson: Mr. President, we are rapidly approaching a moment of truth both for ourselves as human beings and for the life of our nation. Now truth is not always a pleasant thing, but it is necessary now to make a choice, to choose between two admittedly regrettable, but nevertheless distinguishable, postwar environments: one where you got 20 million people killed, and the other where you got a 150 million people killed.
President: You're talking about mass murder, general, not war.
Turgidson: Mr. President, I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed. But I do say, no more than 10 to 20 million killed, tops. Uh, depending on the breaks.
The amazing thing about this comedic dialogue, as well as much of the film, is that it comprises actual quotes attributable to Kahn and other Cold War strategists. The phrase "two admittedly regrettable, but nevertheless distinguishable, postwar environments" for example, is lifted almost verbatim from a chart on page 20 of Kahn's tome On Thermonuclear War. And Turgidson's reference to casualties takes surprisingly few liberties with Kahn's argument that "If, on the contrary, by spending a few billion dollars, or by being more competent or lucky, we can cut the number of dead from 40 to 20 million, we have done something vastly worth doing!"
Some policymakers sought to impose some sort of limitations on the nuclear arms race, which seemed to be spiraling out of control by the early 1960s. In 1963, then-Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara championed a thought experiment to size U.S. nuclear forces. Imagine the United States has a force of 1-megaton nuclear bombs that we begin dropping on the Soviet Union, starting with Moscow. (Of course the United States did not have a force of uniform 1-megaton bombs, nor do we target cities. This was a thought experiment.) McNamara's Whiz Kids observed that the damage to the Soviet Union started to level off around the 400th bomb. McNamara didn't know whether 400 1-megaton bombs would deter another Joseph Stalin, but it was damn clear that if 400 didn't do the trick, flattening Perm with number 401 was a fool's errand.
The resulting policy was called "assured destruction" -- the idea that once the United States had a survivable force capable of about 400 equivalent megatons that could kill much of the Soviet Union's population and destroy its industry, there wasn't much point in making the rubble bounce. Say what you will about the tenets of assured destruction -- at least it was a ceiling.
Kahn and others did not like "assured destruction" because it did not hold out the possibility of prevailing in a nuclear war with the Soviet Union, something they believed was possible with bomb shelters, missile defenses, and hard hearts. (Decades later one proponent of victory summarized the argument by saying, "If there are enough shovels to go around, everyone will make it.") They went after assured destruction.
Donald Brennan, Kahn's colleague at the Hudson Institute, famously added the word "mutual" to "assured destruction," creating the acronym MAD, as though it were American policy to accept destruction in a nuclear war. Instead, Brennan and others urged the United States to fight and win a nuclear war. (Liberals tried to fight back by calling Brennan's approach "nuclear utilization target selection," or NUTS, but the left seemed to have permanently misplaced its funny bone until Jon Stewart found it a few years ago.) MAD lost some of its original bite by entering into mainstream discourse -- apparently nuclear strategy is so bizarre that parody can be mistaken for policy. Brennan then picked up the pejorative phrase coined by Steuart Pittman, who called the policy "assured vulnerability" instead of assured destruction. After all, who is for vulnerability?
This debate proceeded through the Cold War with surprisingly little modification. Over time, hawks did subtly improve the argument by asserting -- on the basis of no evidence at all, I might add -- that the Soviet Union planned to fight and win a nuclear war, leaving the United States with no choice but to jump off the same bridge. It is this contested history that explains the current battle over whether to admit what many people believe is obvious: The United States and China are mutually vulnerable.
By the 1990s, the phrases "mutual assured destruction" and "assured vulnerability" had merged into the compound calumny "mutual vulnerability." In a way, the debate within hawkish circles had become entirely self-referential and disconnected from the world around it. George Orwell would have had something witty to say about the transition from "assured destruction" to "mutual vulnerability" -- especially the pejorative use of vulnerability to perpetuate a state of affairs in which billions of people remained indefinitely vulnerable to the danger from nuclear weapons.
The language of this debate is revealing. The proponents of assured destruction are willing to accept the pejorative phrase "mutual vulnerability" for the purposes of debate. It illustrates the simple strength of their argument: No matter how bad you make it sound, it just isn't something one gets to choose. "Mutual vulnerability is a fact of life," wrote a Council on Foreign Relations task force, chaired by Bill Perry and Brent Scowcroft, "to be managed with strategic stability." It sucks, but what can you do?
We could plan to destroy all of China's small number of nuclear-armed missiles in a first strike, but China can always build more until that's no longer plausible. Over time, China has deployed mobile ballistic missiles that can be put to sea and into the field. China is also developing capabilities to target U.S. space capabilities and sophisticated countermeasures to penetrate missile defenses. American officials express alarm about the growth of Chinese defense spending, but it has held constant between 1 to 2 percent of China's GDP. The United States, by contrast, spends about 4 percent of its GDP on defense. In other words, China could sustain much larger defense expenditures. Heck, it could run a very creditable arms race using those $1.2 trillion in U.S. Treasury securities.
The requirements for preserving China's deterrent are not high. Although nuclear weapons aficionados like Kahn throw around losses in the tens of millions of people like the card game Nuclear War -- Anybody have change for a 100 million people? -- real-life politicians are far more likely to be sensitive to the destructive power of nuclear weapons. As McGeorge Bundy noted, "Even one hydrogen bomb on one city of one's own country would be recognized in advance as a catastrophic blunder; ten bombs on ten cities would be a disaster beyond history; and a hundred bombs on a hundred cities are unthinkable." Even after all the screaming about China's modernization of its nuclear forces, China has fewer than 50 nuclear weapons that can reach the United States. Judging by the near panic in the Washington Free Beacon every time China tests a missile, 50 is plenty.
Those who assert that there is some way to simply build our way out of vulnerability with China are in deep denial, about both technical and political realities.
This denial comes at no small cost to U.S.-China relations. Every administration in my professional lifetime -- Clinton, Bush, and now Obama -- has made it a priority to engage China on strategic stability. Each has failed largely because the United States gives the same answer when the Chinese ask whether we plan to coerce China with nuclear weapons: crickets. The result is a stunted dialogue on nuclear weapons. The Obama administration, for example, is justifiably proud that China is leading a multilateral working group to draft a glossary of key nuclear terms. This is a big step, one that builds on important work by the National Academies and its Chinese counterpart, but the symbolism couldn't be clearer. Forget dialogue; we're still arguing about vocabulary, with the French holding our hands.
I don't object to having the same stale conversation over and over again. After all, it means foundations keep paying for me to travel to China -- and I love Chinese food. But the pathologies that undermine nongovernmental dialogues plague official discussions as well and could, in a crisis, prove quite dangerous. I think it is highly unlikely that a U.S. or Chinese president would ever willingly choose to fight a nuclear war. But either might very well blunder into one, through misunderstandings based on stereotypes and suspicions. Chinese textbooks prepared for missile officers talk about sending signals to the United States to stop what they perceive as coercion in crisis by placing forces on alert or "lowering the nuclear threshold." Whether an American president would understand the signal seems pretty iffy to me. The United States and China have experienced a number of crises over the years, including the 1999 bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, the 2001 midair collision between a Chinese fighter jet and a U.S. EP-3E reconnaissance aircraft, and the March 2009 incident at sea involving five Chinese vessels and the USNS Impeccable. This record is hardly encouraging.
Our refusal to recognize that vulnerability is simply a fact of life essentially blocks a productive dialogue with Chinese leaders. Among the many reasons it would behoove us to reassure Beijing that we don't intend to use our nuclear weapons to coerce or humiliate them is that we don't intend to use our nuclear weapons to coerce or humiliate them. It isn't in our interest for them to be confused about that. If only we could find the right words.
Maybe Hollywood was on to something. The United States faced the same problem with Gorbachev's Soviet Union, which sought a similar reassurance. President Ronald Reagan -- no stranger to Tinseltown himself -- had a phrase he liked that evoked the sensibility of WarGames: "A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought." Reagan made the statement several times in his presidency, ultimately inserting it into a 1988 joint communiqué with Gorbachev. I don't know whether this is a better phrase than "mutual vulnerability is a fact of life" or whether either phrase would have the desired effect in Beijing. But the notion that Leon Panetta and Xi Jinping can't reasonably have a conversation about our nuclear arsenals is bizarre and unsettling. They ought to be able to say something.
TEH ENG KOON/AFP/Getty Images


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By David Faris
08/02/2013 | 0 Comments Posted
Picture this: It is November 2008. The Philadelphia Phillies (the Philadelphia Phillies!) are the toast of the town. They have silenced the Eagles chants that used to drift through the stands like beachballs on stifling late summer afternoons. They have brought to the tortured Philadelphia sports fan the championship that improbably eluded all four major sports franchises for 25 long years. Their jewel of a ballpark will be stuffed to the bleachers for the foreseeable future with sellout crowds full of casual fans, pink-hatted girls and kids wearing Hamels jerseys. They have achieved the very rare feat of stocking their beloved roster primarily with elite players that they drafted and developed themselves. They are the World Fucking Champions. They are regularly referred to as one of the juggernaut franchises of major league baseball, along with the Yankees, Red Sox and Dodgers. Pat Gillick, the longtime baseball wizard and architect of the early '90s Blue Jays and the General Manager who put the finishing touches on a core assembled by the much-reviled Ed Wade, has just handed the reins of this suddenly elite franchise to the dashing second-in-command, former major leaguer and longtime Phillies office-hand Ruben Amaro, Jr. I went to dozens of Phillies games in 2007 and 2008, and there was indeed no better time to be an obsessive fan.
Those days, when you could bike down 10th street and hear the roar of the sellout crowd from Oregon Street an hour before the game, seem increasingly remote. In case you hadn't noticed, the Phillies are kind of bad. And as the Phillies owners and fans ponder the seemingly shocking implosion of the team and the bleak future that awaits them over at least the next few years, they should look no further than the disastrous moment when Amaro was given total control over the decision-making following the 2008 world championship. Within four short years, Amaro took a club that was minting money, whose farm system was consistently ranked among the best in the game, and whose major league team was the undisputed king of the National East, and turned it into a hot, expensive mess that will almost certainly spend the next several years looking up at the rest of the division.
This is how it happened.
Ignore The Metrics
Pat Gillick was an old school baseball man (and Hall of Famer), one of the last successful executives who genuinely didn't give a shit about Moneyball and OPS and xFIP and all of the other advanced metrics that have revolutionized baseball management. Gillick put together the Blue Jays team that dominated the AL East in the late '80s and early '90s and won two straight titles in 1992 and 1993. It might be a coincidence, but Jack Morris, one of the most polarizing players for Hall of Fame voters, played for Gillick's back-to-back World Champion '92-'93 Blue Jays. Advanced metrics of the sort Ruben Amaro never looks at indicate that Morris was barely a league average pitcher most years, and benefitted from playing on good clubs like the '84 Tigers, '91 Twins and the Jays. But Morris is beloved by traditionalists who look at his win totals (254) and his post-season heroics (mostly his thrilling 10-inning, 1-0 Game 7 victory over the Atlanta Braves in the '91 World Series) and make vague assertions about how he was "feared" by opponents and did things like "pitching to the score" — yielding runs in games where his team was way out in front but locking it down in close games. Statisticians have looked into these kinds of claims over and over again and found absolutely no evidence for them, but the old school guys, they don't care. They know what they saw. Like Dick Morris and the GOP pundit class on the eve of the 2012 election, they don't want a bunch of punk-ass numbers crunchers using fancy math to attack their cherished notions.
Gillick brought the Phillies a championship, but his success was fueled largely by a core drafted by the Wade regime, and the good fortune of picking up castoff outfielders Shane Victorino and Jayson Werth, both of whom were tossed away by their teams and both of whom would play key roles on the '08 championship team. Those moves helped mask the reality that his tenure was punctuated by some pretty terrible decisions, one of which still haunts the team today. The first was trading Gio Gonzalez and Gavin Floyd to the Chicago White Sox after the 2006 season in return for Freddie Garcia, a former flamethrower whose lucky 17 wins in '06 masked declining velocity and effectiveness. Garcia would pitch in just 11 games for the Phillies, going 1-5 with a 5.90 ERA before getting hurt. Gonzalez has blossomed into a top-of-the-rotation starter and even Floyd won 70 games for the White Sox before blowing out his elbow this year. In that same offseason, Gillick bestowed a 3-year, $24.5 million contract on a pitcher named Adam Eaton, who had been drafted by the Phillies as a first-rounder in 1996 but had been a below league-average performer for most of his career and was coming off a season in Texas where he put up a well-deserved 5.13 ERA. The signing was met with shock and ridicule across the industry even before Eaton turned in a historically awful 2007 season for the Phillies, in which he compiled a 6.29 ERA across 30 starts. Eaton was left off the 2007 and 2008 playoff rosters and mercifully released before the 2009 season, with the team eating the $7 million and change still owed to him in 2009.
In any case, Gillick's Phillies won a ring, and so Eaton and Garcia were erased from history amidst the good feelings and general revelry. Ruben Amaro, Jr. inherited Gillick's team and his vision for baseball success without any of his apparent good fortune. Almost immediately Amaro set about handing out contracts that would eventually blow up in his face and which were met with facepalms in the analyst community. There were two essential elements to any Ruben Amaro signing: the player would be on the wrong end of baseball's well-known aging curve, and the player would also fare poorly in evaluations using advanced fielding metrics, or even basic statistical analyses that looked at things like platoon splits. Of course, the team Amaro inherited was not without its flaws — the '08 Phillies were a good ballclub, but they are never going to make anyone's list of the decade's best teams. The champs were an offensive juggernaut, but they lacked pitching depth beyond their homegrown ace, Cole Hamels. Their second-best starter in '08 was 45-year-old Jamie Moyer, who was a great example of a guy the Phillies should have allowed to walk away but instead signed to a truly demented 2-year, $15 million extension.
But most of all the Phillies had a gaping hole in left field. Team evaluators (correctly, it must be noted) surmised that incumbent left-fielder Pat Burrell — another homegrown talent and fan favorite who led the delirious '08 championship parade down Broad Street driving a pair of Clydsedales — was a statue in left who didn't have much left in the tank, and let him walk away to Tampa Bay, the team the Phillies had just vanquished in the Series. The team had no internal options and turned instead to the free agent market, and to Raul Ibanez. Ibanez, who also quickly became a fan favorite when he began the '09 season on a mortal roll, was a Seattle outfielder and a late bloomer who had just put up a sensational offensive season for the Mariners, hitting 23 homers and driving in 110. But Ibanez would play the '09 season at age 37, and to say that evaluators were skeptical of his defense would be a world-historical understatement. But Amaro shocked the industry (this would become an unfortunate pattern) by giving the aging Ibanez a 3-year contract worth $30 million. ESPN's blunt analyst Keith Law (a former front office assistant for the JP Ricciardi regime in Toronto) called the move "absurd" and argued that "by 2011, there's a good chance Ibanez will be just an albatross, both financially and defensively."
Amazingly, the '09 team went to the World Series, with a big assist from Amaro's one genuine stroke of genius as GM — the midseason acquisition of Cleveland lefthanded pitcher Cliff Lee for a package of four prospects that have never amounted to anything for the hapless Indians. Lee was coming off one of the greatest pitching campaigns in modern history, having gone 22-3 for the 2008 Indians, winning the Cy Young and leading the league in both traditional and advanced metrics. Lee went 7-4 for the Phillies, who were adrift at the time of acquisition, and led them all the way to the NL Pennant and to a heroic but doomed quest to beat the Yankees — a much better team — in the Series. Lee was 4-0 in the '09 postseason and secured both of the Phillies victories in their 6-game loss to the Yankees.
And so obviously Amaro figured that the thing to do with this pitching machine who caused women to swoon across the mid-Atlantic and who had almost single-handedly led the Phillies to the doorstep of another championship, was to flip him to the Seattle Mariners for a package of four prospects that, in almost the mirror image of his heist of the Indians, have never amounted to a damn thing. Rival GMs complained that Amaro hadn't even properly shopped his ace. The ostensible reason for Amaro's dumping of Cliff Lee was that he had just made another big splashy trade, this time for Toronto Blue Jays' ace righthander Roy Halladay — an iron man who at the time was probably the consensus best pitcher in baseball. Acquiring Halladay's services cost the Phillies most of their top prospects, including flamethrowing pitcher Kyle Drabek and catcher Travis d'Arnaud. For a few brief days it seemed the Phillies might spend 2010 running one of the greatest rotations of all time out onto the field. But Amaro, deciding he had to restock the farm system after acquiring Halladay, traded Lee for a package that was immediately regarded by analysts, as completely devoid of elite talent, which it has since proven to be. And while no one from the package the Phillies sent to Toronto has had much of an impact in the majors either, at least they were highly regarded.
Howard the (Lame) Duck
For most of his tenure, Amaro has seemed to take great joy in confounding the community of statistical analysts that continues to ridicule his every move. He is part of a long-running battle between traditionalists and a group of writers and enthusiasts known as sabermetricians, or "statheads", brought most vividly to life by Michael Lewis's 2003 bestseller Moneyball, which chronicled the success of Oakland Athletics general manager Billy Beane. In Moneyball, Lewis detailed how the A's had supposedly turned themselves into a juggernaut by finding nuggets of value in facets of the game that were largely ignored by traditionalists and traditional statistics. For instance, Beane and the A's believed that other teams did not correctly value players got on base a lot via walks. After all, the runs scored by players who draw walks count the same as those scored by players who hit infield singles. But traditionalists viewed these kinds of players as one-dimensional. Beane, though was hardly a trailblazer and was largely following a playbook written by the pioneering analyst Bill James and forced on him by financial necessity. Beane had support from a community of writers who, since the mid-1990s had been yelling into chasms about how many common ways of measuring player value — things like the Run Batted In (RBI), the pitcher Win, and batting average — were actually terrible ways of evaluating a player's real contribution to team victories. A batter's RBI totals, for instance, were highly dependent on runners being on base for them in the first place — something that players obviously can't control. Even batting averages — the way you win baseball's hallowed "batting title" every year — they argued, were frequently driven by short-term and largely random variation in luck on the placement of batted balls. Some even argued that beloved baseball strategies like bunting were mostly worthless maneuvers outside of a small number of situations, and they backed these assertions up with thousands of data points across baseball's rich history.
These writers, who had their own blogs, or who later wrote for online outfits like Baseball Prospectus (where subsequent New York Times wunderkind Nate Silver got his start in writing) developed new metrics of player performance — things with weird acronyms like WAR (Wins Above Replacement) and FIP (Fielding-Independent Pitching) and BABiP (Batting Average on Balls in Play) that over a period of many years they have managed to heroically introduce into a public discourse that was thoroughly fixated on the traditional stats.It should be noted that a lot of these writers are brash, and a few of them are annoying (former ESPN columnist Rob Neyer once infamously attacked Willie Stargell's career in a column days after the Pittsburgh legend died), but most of all they are relentless. If baseball were an authoritarian country, someone in Kansas City would long ago have capped Rany Jazayerli, a blogger who has spent the better part of two decades eloquently savaging the strategies of the team's ownership in 3,000-word blog posts– whose front office still appears to be a bastion of traditionalist thinking in a market that desperately cries out for visionary management. But a funny thing happened — over time these once-crazy ideas were accepted by a number of front offices as the new received wisdom. Owners started hiring young eggheads like Tampa Bay's Andrew Friedman and Boston's Theo Epstein to run their teams– guys who had never played ball professionally and who were obviously viewed with deep suspicion by the traditionalists. They didn't all succeed, but by 2010, even the writers — long dominated by staunch traditionalists — gave the Cy Young to Seattle's Felix Hernandez, the darling of the sabermetrics crowd who had won only 13 games in the regular season but who clearly would have won many more games with better run support.
In Philly though, it might as well be 1980. The team is allegedly one of the last in the sport not to employ a full-time statistical analyst (I say 'allegedly' because the Phillies front office is a Stalin-era informational black box and because no one seems to know for sure). And from the moment Amaro took office, it showed that he and his team had learned basically nothing from decades of baseball research. Nothing epitomized this head-in-the-sand attitude better than the truly disastrous contract extension given to slugger Ryan Howard early in the 2010 season. Howard was actually one of the team's great success stories — drafted in the fifth round by the legendary scouting department led by Mike Arbuckle in 2001, Howard slugged his way through the minors and forced the Phillies to dump veteran first-baseman and future Hall of Famer Jim Thome, who had been their big, splashy free agent acquisition in 2003. After winning the Rookie of the Year award in 2005 by slugging 22 homers in barely half a season, Howard unleashed holy hell on the National League in '06, hitting 58 homers, driving in 149 and winning the MVP. He followed that up by hitting 47, 48 and 45 homers the next three seasons. Also: Ryan Howard is a genuinely nice guy, with a million-dollar smile, who never complains, plays his ass off and helped bring this town a championship. There is no question that Ryan Howard in his prime was a valuable player, and frankly you'd have to be kind of a dick to have watched him play in those days and not enjoyed it. If I ever see Ryan Howard in a bar, his drinks are on me, because he helped bring me what remains the only moment of genuine joy I've ever had as a Philadelphia sports fan.
But his graceful moonshots and his RBI totals masked serious weaknesses that analysts had been harping on ever since his hotly-disputed MVP win over Cardinals first-baseman Albert Pujols in 2006. The first and most obvious and most important is that Ryan Howard can't hit lefties worth a lick. You can be forgiven for not understanding this, because in his MVP season of 2006, he was actually terrific against lefties, sporting an OPS+ (a combination on-base percentage and slugging percentage adjusted for the effects of home ballparks and other league players at that position. The league average player has an OPS+ of 100 and each 10 points above or below represents a 10% increase or decrease in production from the league average. An OPS of 110 is solid; 130 is an All-Star) of 156 against them and slugging 16 homers. He wasn't as good as he was against righties, but he was good. But things went south from there. In '07 he hit .225 against lefties. In '08 it was .224. I think you get the picture. To date, over nearly 1,700 plate appearances against left-handed pitchers, Ryan Howard has hit .224 and compiled an OPS+ of 62. To give you an idea of how bad this is, shortstop Mario Mendoza, who is the kind of legend that you don't want to be and who is widely regarded (perhaps unfairly) as the worst major league baseball player of all time, had his best season in 1980, hitting .245 with a .286 OPB and 2 homers in 305 plate appearances. His OPS+ that year? 63. Ryan Howard is not merely bad against lefties — he is unplayable. The funny thing is, you don't need Keith Law or Rany Jazeryeli or Nate Silver to tell you that Ryan Howard can't hit left-handed pitchers. This is freely available basic baseball knowledge of the sort that has been compiled since Cleveland had a baseball team called The Spiders and William McKinley was president.
You could also see this if you actually watched the games, because teams started employing a radical shift against Howard — when he came to the plate, teams would move their shortstop to a position where the second baseman would normally be, their third baseman to a shortstop position close to second, their second baseman to a deep first base, and the first baseman up the line from the bag. It was like a hockey team pulling the goalie. Because Howard so frequently and relentlessly banged batted balls to the right side of the field, teams were able to rob him of dozens of hits, particularly because he simply never adjusted to the shift. I watched a lot of Phillies games in those years, and it grew enormously frustrating that Howard could not be bothered to hit the ball to the opposite field or even to drop the occasional bunt down the third base line. It wouldn't have taken much to stop teams from doing this.
But other harbingers of Howard's doom were not so apparent to the naked eye. New defensive metrics developed by analysts, things with names like UZR (Ultimate Zone Rating, which looks at how many batted balls a fielder reaches, rather than at how many of the ones he gets to that he fields cleanly, like the traditional statistic of fielding percentage) also took a dimmer view of Howard's contributions on the field. Savvy analysts now view a player's contribution to his team's bottom line holistically — the sum of his offensive and defensive contributions. While there is some disagreement between the leading defensive metrics, the verdict is unequivocal: Ryan Howard was, even in his prime, a bad defensive first baseman, who routinely cost his team runs on defense and who was unlikely to ever improve. Over the course of his career, Ryan Howard's defensive Wins Above Replacement is -11.8. You don't need to understand the fancy math that goes into calculating dWAR to understand this: Howard has cost his team nearly 12 wins on defense alone above and beyond what you might expect from a warm Darin Ruf-like body fished out of Lehigh Valley. And beyond defense, there is the very simple matter of aging — baseball players typically peak in terms of performance between ages 26 and 30 and then go into decline, sometimes precipitously, sometimes slowly, but with very few exceptions. Howard was 29 when he signed his extension — at the tail end of his peak. He is a big man, precisely the kind of lumbering corner infielder — like Cecil Fielder or Mo Vaughn — likely to suffer a big injury in his early 30s and to never really recover from it.
But in Amaroworld, the only relevant facts were the home runs and the RBIs, and in the spring of 2010, Amaro once again created chaos in front offices across the land by signing Howard to a contract extension for 5 years and $125 million — an extension that wouldn't even kick in until the 2012 season, with Howard already under contract for 2010 and 2011. This act of fiscal lunacy and franchise suicide made Howard the highest-paid first baseman in baseball with a contract that would only begin after he had turned 31 — the age that most players begin going into terminal decline. The decision was astounding not just because Howard's weaknesses were well known in the analyst community, but also because Amaro was negotiating against himself for a player he already had under contract for two more seasons and didn't even get a discount. And it threatened to cripple the Phillies for years if Howard aged the way most similar players have aged in the past. Traditional writers, especially those who wrote for Philly-based outlets, defended the move as a wise investment in a "proven run producer." In a column that didn't cite a single advanced metric and laughably compared Howard favorably to Albert Pujols, Inquirer beat writer Bob Brookover lauded the contract, saying that Howard "has a chance to continue to get better as a hitter." ESPN columnist and longtime Inquirer writer Jayson Stark asked, "if the Phillies waved goodbye to Howard, how exactly were they going to replace him?" Meanwhile, the analyst community went ballistic. Keith Law wrote that the contract "made me laugh when I first heard about it." ESPN's Dan Syzmborski, who designed one of the pioneering player projection systems, called ZiPS, wrote that the deal was "an enormous risk" — and that was with projections that turned out to be crazy-optimistic. For instance, when the deal was signed Szymborski's system predicted that Howard would hit .257 with 40 homers and 133 RBIs in 2013. Wouldn't that be nice? Needless to say, the analyst community has had the last laugh on this one.
But for almost two years, it almost looked like Amaro was going to get away with his bad decision-making. In spite of spinning Cliff Lee away to the Mariners, the 2010 Phillies were even better than the '09 version. Roy Halladay won the Cy Young by throwing 4 shutouts and winning 21 games, and Cole Hamels recovered from a rocky 2009 to post the best ERA of his young career. In one of his signature deadline deals, Amaro acquired Houston righthander Roy Oswalt from the Astros for pitcher JA Happ and prospects Anthony Gose and Jonathan Villar. Oswalt finished the year on a roll, going 7-1 with a 1.74 ERA. The Phillies won 97 games, and for the first time in their playoff run, they ran away with the division, finishing six full games ahead of the Braves. The Phillies routed the Reds in the first round of the playoffs, but then fell unexpectedly to the San Francisco Giants — the eventual World Champs — in 6 games. In a sad harbinger of things to come, Ryan Howard ended the Phillies playoff run with runners on first and second by looking at a called third strike from Giants' closer Brian Wilson. But hey, as every stathead will tell you, the baseball playoffs are a statistical crapshoot, and the Phillies just happened to roll snake-eyes.
The Peak Before the Valley
After the 2010 season, Amaro and his team could still feel pretty good about what they had done --- the team had increased its win total in both 2009 and 2010 and looked primed for a long run atop the National League East. The Mets were in disarray, the Marlins were still a year away from opening their new stadium, and the Braves had fallen far from their glory days of the late 1990s and early 2000s. Only the Nationals really seemed like a serious threat at the time, as they were stockpiling early draft picks as a result of their dreadful regular season campaigns in 2008, 2009 and 2010. The following season, 2011, was therefore the apogee of the Phillies' run and also the year that demonstrated the ultimate limits of Amaroism. By the end of 2010, the Ibanez contract was indeed looking like the albatross that Law and many others said it was going to be. After a scorching first half in 2009, Ibanez suffered a sports hernia, tailed off during the second half and slumped to 16 homers and 83 RBIs in 2010. He also suffered from a pronounced and predictable platoon split that saw him drop to an 83 OPS+ against lefties. This is nothing for Ibanez — a seasoned professional whose career should be respected and admired — to hang his head about. He was simply getting old. And he wasn't the only one. Before the 2010 season, Amaro had signed aging infielder Placido Polanco to fill the void left by third baseman Pedro Feliz, giving him a 3-year, $18 million contract. Polanco, a former Phillie once sent to Detroit in an ill-fated trade for attempted axe-murderer Ugueth Urbina, was a nice player in his prime, but by the time he joined the Phillies he was in the midst of a 3-year decline that had taken his offensive production below replacement level. The Phillies were once again banking on a player reproducing his glory years in the decline phase of his career. Needless to say, Polanco did not produce as anticipated.
Almost on cue, Amaro wiped away the winter gloom with one stroke of his pen. Cliff Lee, only just exiled to the Mariners and then to the Rangers in a midseason trade, was a free agent. The Phillies lurked at the edges of the negotiations until the last moment and then swooped in. Lee loved his time in Philadelphia, had been blindsided by the trade that sent him to Seattle after the 2009 season and harbored a not-so-secret desire to return. With a generous helping of Phillies glory-years cash, Lee was enticed back to Philadelphia on a 5-year, $120 million contract that made him one of the richest players in the game. The team finally had Lee, Halladay and Hamels together, as well as Oswalt and the quickly aging core of the '08 championship squad — Howard, second baseman Chase Utley, shortstop Jimmy Rollins, catcher Carlos "Chooch" Ruiz and centerfielder Shane Victorino. Even the analysts loved this signing, since Lee was more of a finesse lefty who could stand to lose some fastball velocity without completely torpedoing his game.
And the team didn't disappoint — the Phillies stormed out of the gate and never looked back, obliterating the division on their way to a 102-60 regular season record, without question one of the two or three greatest regular seasons in 100-plus years of largely desultory Phillies baseball. Halladay and Lee were unbeatable. Howard's numbers were down, but not so much (yet) that he was a liability. The team's only flaw was a lack of right-handed power, and in July, Amaro made yet another trade with soon-to-be-deposed Houston GM Ed Wade, acquiring rightfielder Hunter Pence for what remained of the Phillies farm system — headlined by first baseman Jonathan Singleton and pitcher Jared Cosart, both highly regarded prospects who are now considered integral parts of the Astros' future. They were considered a steep price to pay, but Pence tore up National League pitching upon arriving in Philly, and the team seemed unbeatable heading into October. Even then, though, a wiser GM might have looked at the Phillies insurmountable lead in the NL East, and the basic randomness of the MLB playoffs, and hoarded that talent for another day. But Singleton was expendable in the wake of the Howard contract, and boy did the scrappy Pence look neato in a Phillies uniform.
In the final series of the regular season, the Phillies swept the Atlanta Braves out of the playoffs, long after the Phillies had absolutely nothing to play for. It was a very Bill Belichick, New England Patriots boot-on-your-neck statement, and it allowed the St. Louis Cardinals to slip into the playoffs as the wild card and wouldn't you know it, as the Phillies first round opponent in the National League Division Series. And therefore the final series of the 2011 regular season has been just about the last good thing to happen to the Philadelphia Phillies since. The Cardinals, almost an afterthought in the playoffs, took the Phillies to five games, with St. Louis ace and postseason hero Chris Carpenter matched up against Cy Young award winner Roy Halladay. But it was Carpenter who pitched a shutout, as the Cards scratched out a run against Halladay. On the final play of the season, and what will always be thought of as the final play of this Phillies team's playoff run, Ryan Howard grounded out weakly and tore his Achilles tendon on the way to first base. He would miss the first three months of the 2012 campaign, the first year of his 5-year, $125 million extension, and by all indications, he will never ever be the same.
…And the Wheels Come Off
There was certainly an atmosphere of doom during the 2011 offseason. That Phillies team was meant to win it all. Amaro knew it. The fans knew it. But some cold realities of Amaro's tenure were starting to set in. Amaro was like a losing gambler making ever-bigger wagers to cover his losses. Because of all the deadline deals, and particularly because Amaro got nothing back when he traded Cliff Lee to the Mariners, the team was suddenly devoid of high-end talent at the upper levels of the minor leagues, meaning that the major league team was dangerously thin and lacking reinforcements. They had sacrificed first-round draft picks under baseball's rules by signing Raul Ibanez, Jonathan Papelbon and Cliff Lee, and had picked late in drafts anyway because of their impressive finishes from 2007 to 2011. Polanco was at this point a hollow shell of the player he once was. Chase Utley, a grinder who was the most valuable player on the team and perhaps the second most valuable player in the whole National League from 2006 to 2010, had missed the beginning of the 2011 season with knee troubles that would rob him of several months in 2012 as well. Howard was out, perhaps until late June. The anemic offense that showed up for the Cardinals series in October 2011 was what the Phillies were stuck with in 2012 too.
Amaro, though, instead of addressing the team's offensive shortcomings or dangerous lack of bench depth, decided that the team's biggest issue was at closer. He let incumbent closer Ryan Madson walk away to the Reds (Madson would blow out his elbow that spring), instead targeting Boston Red Sox flamethrower Jonathan Papelbon, and signed him to a shocking 4 year, $50 million contract. Papelbon was a solid reliever, but Amaro's decision-making here once again ran afoul of the findings of baseball research, which indicated that teams overpaid wildly for closers, who tended to flame out after a few years, and furthermore, that the save statistic had warped the strategy of field managers, who let pitchers like Papelbon come in with no runners on base and two or three-run leads in the 9th inning and earn a 'save.' The trouble was that statistically, teams tended to win more or less the same number of games that they led entering the 9th inning no matter who was pitching. Paying closers, who pitched 50 or 60 innings a year, as if they were elite starting pitchers who tossed 200 or 250 high-value innings, was a form of madness foisted up baseball by the save statistic itself. Papelbon was also — you guessed it — on the wrong side of 30, with a lot of mileage on his arm. And I don't think I need to bore you with the predictably hostile reaction of the analyst community to this signing.
With Papelbon on board, the Phillies were an extremely expensive team. Unfortunately, they were not an especially good one. With Utley and Howard sidelined, the team struggled to scrape runs together, an inversion of their 2008 championship formula. Cliff Lee stumbled out the gate and, victimized by non-existent run support, turned in one of the more improbable seasons in baseball history, going 7-9 with the peripheral statistics of an 18-game winner. When Howard returned in June, he was a pale shadow of his MVP self, and hit just .219 the rest of the way, his platoon splits worse than ever. You only needed to watch a few games of Phillies baseball in 2012 to see that Howard had gotten old, fast, and that the franchise was in serious trouble as a result. Utley returned but also looked like his best days were behind him, and even shortstop Jimmy Rollins, who had been re-signed to a 3-year deal before the season, looked increasingly league average. By the All-Star Break, the Phillies were listing badly, and in a rare admission of defeat at the deadline, Amaro spun Pence and Victorino off to contenders in exchange for some pretty marginal prospects. An August hot streak fell short, and the Phillies finished the season at 81-81, a massive, $170 million disappointment. The team even dangled Cliff Lee during August, putting him through waivers only to mysteriously pull him back.
If Philles brass was uncomfortable with the direction Amaro had taken the team, they gave no indication of it publicly. Prognosticators gave the Phillies little chance to unseat the reigning division champions, the Washington Nationals, or even the Atlanta Braves, who won the 2012 wild card, but in Amaroland, the Phillies were just a few breaks away from another run to the championship. Amaro tinkered with the roster around the edges but made no major moves. He traded for Texas Rangers' third baseman Michael Young to replace Polanco, whose contract mercifully expired after the 2012 season. Young was, it is important to note, considered by most statistical analysts to be close to the single worst position player of the 2012 season, with his combination of declining offense and singularly terrible defense. To Amaro, though, Young was a proven run producer who would give the Phillies a dynamic infield offense. If anything, the disconnect between objective analysts and the Amaro front office was more pronounced than ever.
The Young acquisition wasn't his only move, though. For years Amaro managed not to really say anything that betrayed the depths of his misunderstanding of contemporary baseball — until this past offseason. To plug the gap in right field left by Hunter Pence (who Amaro traded to San Francisco before the 2012 in-season trading deadline), Amaro made a relatively minor signing of veteran outfielder Delmon Young, who had played the past several seasons for the Detroit Tigers. Young was a former 1-1 — the first overall pick in the 2003 amateur draft who had compiled a few passable seasons in the big leagues but who came with three massive drawbacks. One, Young had never learned how to draw a walk, and didn't hit enough to make up for it, and two, he was considered such a wretched fielder that the Tigers mostly hid him at DH in 2012. Finally, Young was a well-known and quite towering prick, who has both thrown a bat at an umpire during a minor league game and who was once arrested for drunkenly tackling a man after accosting him with anti-Semitic slurs. Upon signing Young, and apparently anticipating the totally predictable shitstorm of criticism that he was about to get from analysts, Amaro proudly told the media, "I don't care about walks, I care about production." This is the kind of statement that would have been met with a room full of nodding heads in 1980, but that in 2012 was just preposterous. "Yo Rube," the analysts cried out, "walks are production."
Even the team's minor moves have turned out pretty disastrously. Pitcher Joe Blanton, who helped win the Series in '08 and was serviceable in '09, was signed to a preposterous 3 year, $24 million extension before the 2010 season. Blanton was mediocre in 2010, hurt in 2011 and so ineffective last year that Amaro had to basically give him away to the Dodgers. Ben Revere, the speedy young outfielder acquired from the Twins before the 2013 season, displayed his singles-only game for half a season before breaking his foot in July. Ty Wigginton, acquired before the 2012 season as a bench bat and infield insurance, flamed out with an 84 OPS+. But by far Amaro's biggest blind spot has been relievers. Before the 2010 season, Amaro signed journeyman reliever Danys Baez to a genuinely inexplicable 2-year, $5.25 million contract. Baez, who spent a few middling seasons as the closer for Cleveland and Tampa Bay in the mid-2000s, was coming off a season in which he compiled a 4.02 ERA in 71.2 innings for the Baltimore Orioles, with a strikeout rate that augured near-term and spectacular disaster. And disaster is what Amaro got — for the $5.25 in Phillies glory-years cash, Baez was worth -1.3 Wins Above Replacement over his two pitiful years in Philly. Mind you: This is an extraordinarily large loss for a reliever to inflict on a team. Amaro, who had watched bullpen mainstays Brad Lidge (the 2008 hero), Clay Condrey, Chad Durbin, and JC Romero flame out after once being brilliant, should at least have sensed that relievers are extremely volatile. Amazingly, this memo has still not reached Amaroland. Before the 2013 season, Amaro signed pitcher Mike Adams to a two-year, $12 million contract. It was like an Amaropalooza: Wrong side of 30? Check. Middle reliever? Check. Coming off a major injury that tends to end the careers of 34-year-old relievers? Check. Bemused laughter coming from every other front office in baseball? Check. Adams pitched ineffectively in 28 games before tearing his shoulder in three (!) places. He will likely be out until the end of time.
The Phillies entered the 2013 season as no one's favorites. They were old, and injury-prone, they couldn't hit, and they sported an outfield better suited to the independent league Camden Riversharks than a major league baseball team. To make matters worse, Roy Halladay had broken down with a shoulder injury toward the end of the 2012 campaign and entered 2013 as a question mark. Despite the long-awaited emergence of onetime top prospect Domonic Brown into an All-Star (hey I still love the Phillies, and I love watching him play), the team has been dismal, with one of the worst run-differentials (which is merely a stone-age calculation of the difference between runs scored and runs allowed that apparently is yet another thing that is poorly understood in Amaroland) in the league. Papelbon's predictable decline has accelerated, and there is not a single team in baseball that the Phillies can even give him away to, for nothing more than the cost of his contract. Both Ryan Howard and Chase Utley started the season healthy for the first time in three years, but Howard was mostly ineffective before suffering another knee injury and having another surgery, and ESPN analyst Dan Szymborski recently wrote that the Howard contract is likely to end up as the worst in the history of professional baseball, with the Phillies now projected to take a stunning $94 million bath in terms of value returned. Utley has performed well but also missed a month with an oblique injury — the sort of problem that tends to nag older players. Halladay, an old-school workhorse, fought ineffectively through his injury for seven starts before finally succumbing to shoulder surgery. They entered play on July 30 49-56, after losing 8 straight games just after the All-Star Break. They will not make the playoffs, and players like Lee and Papelbon are unsubtly clamoring to get out of town and obliquely criticizing the front office for not helping them pack their bags. Amaro, strangely, made no moves at the deadline, meaning the Phillies intend to bring this sad bunch back around for another go at it in 2014.
Through it all the one constant has been the team's General Manager, convinced of his outdated traditionalist dogma, hiding behind his sunglasses and frittering away the franchise's financial and public relations capital on a series of increasingly disastrous moves. It's not that he has done nothing right, but rather that the things he has done wrong — the Howard and Papelbon contracts, the looting of the farm system, the sacrifice of top draft picks for mediocre players — have cumulatively made the team substantially worse, much more expensive and nearly impossible to fix in the short term. He is the Mitt Romney campaign that never ends. Amaro recently responded to critiques of the team's farm system by attacking the farm system rankers, saying "….there's just a lot of those lists that come out that make me laugh" — a desperate act of redirection that fooled no one. The truth is that the lessons that Amaro refuses to learn have now cost the Phillies their sellout streak, their place in the postseason, and probably their perch as one of the sport's marquee franchises. They are likely headed back into a prolonged dry spell, when they will find out that even the lovely Citizens Bank Park can be half-empty if the team is terrible, a lesson they should have learned back in the leaner days of 2004-2006, when disgraced Daily News columnist Bill Conlin habitually referred to the gleaming new park as "the money pit."
Conlin was wrong about the stadium. But Ruben Amaro has dug the team a new, deeper and more insidious money pit, one that would take even the best of baseball's new geniuses years to climb out of, if only the Phillies would hire them. The $75 million they will still owe the diminished shadow of Ryan Howard after this season is just the beginning. Yet there is no indication that Amaro, or the Phillies ownership that still mysteriously employs him, has any intention of doing anything other than buying bigger and more expensive shovels to bury themselves with.
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