Defending the Big Moose

You may have heard recently about Dave Kaplan's attack on Carlos Zambrano, calling him a "piece of garbage" and the most over-paid player in baseball. He's not an ace, Kaplan tells us; he's only averaged 14 wins a year, he hasn't been healthy, the Cubs need to get rid of him. First of all, this is clearly a work. Kaplan does not have strong feelings about Zambrano, and he certainly doesn't hate him. He does not think that Carlos is a "piece of garbage." What he does have, however, is a blog with a lagging readership and a radio show where ratings are the end-all-be-all. Kaplan is voicing a loud, obnoxious opinion about Carlos Zambrano for one reason -- to drum up readers and listeners. And so far it's worked. He's had more comments in his one anti-Zambrano post than he did in all other posts currently on his home page combined. This, my friends, is the definition of a "work." For examples of that on GROTA, see pretty much a...