Apparently Sen. John Kerry is taking up the crusade against the DirecTV deal.

"I am opposed to anything that deprives people of reasonable choices," Kerry said in a statement. "In this day and age, consumers should have more choices -- not fewer."

While I'm pleased that the issue is getting some serious attention, I'm not sure Kerry is going about it the right way. He's emphasizing that it should "serve the public", which really isn't the issue. He's treating the availability of the package as some sort of right that people have. I'm not so sure that's a smart way, or a correct way, to effect change.

Over at The Pastime, I've asked a few of my friends to share their views on five questions I think that are on the minds of A's fans coming into this season. I got a great response, and I think you're going to find what they had to say pretty fascinating.

Some of the folks to weigh in were Marc Normandin, Ken Arneson, Jeff Sackmann, and other great A's bloggers and baseball writers.

Check it out. I think you're going to enjoy reading what they have to say.

The first question I asked of them was this: "In your opinion, what is the key factor that the A's season will hinge on in 2007?"

In the past, I've attempted to evaluate umpires based on the statistics that the pitchers on the mound are putting up. I made some tables, saw a few trends, and that was that.

Given my proclivity for putting things into graphs, I don't know why I haven't tried this before.

What I did was simply take the umpire data I pulled from Baseball Prospectus's statistics, set up a few parameters, and graph the heck out of it.

You might be surprised at how varied the umpires actually are.

In 2002, Billy Beane obtained, in a typically Beane-like four-way deal, what he had been calling his "holy grail".

Of course, I'm talking about none other than Erubiel Durazo, aka "Alligator Arms", aka "The Grail".

Like the Grail of old, he was lost for a time. In 2005 and 2006, Durazo effectively vanished from the face of the baseball world.

2005 was a down year, as the Grail posted a meager .673 OPS, and then tore ligaments in his elbow that required Tommy John surgery; odd for a DH.Durazo spent 2006 shuffling between the minor league affiliates of the Rangers, Twins and Yankees. He found moderate success, but not enough to stick with a team, or warrant a call-up.

The recovery from Tommy John took a while, sapping his power and limiting him to just 5 home runs. His plate discipline was still there, though, as he hit .286 and posted an on-base percentage of .389.

This winter, in the Mexican League, Durazo has impressed. His line of .345/.454/.641 with 17 HR through 57 games looks very good.

So, he's been invited to spring training with the A's.

[click through the link for the full article]

Buck O'Neil may have been snubbed by the Baseball Hall of Fame, but he was inducted into another pretigious group this year. O'Neil was posthumously awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom by George W. Bush, possibly the only thing Bush has done lately that everyone can agree on, regardless of political views.

I've been advocating for O'Neil to get the recognition he deserves for a while now, and while this doesn't carry the gravity in the sports world of a Hall of Fame induction, it's every bit as notable in the real world.

I like that the ability to quickly glance at something and be able to tell just what kind of hitter someone is. I've been looking over rows of numerical stats for long enough that I think I can get an idea by just the numbers. But I'm sure not everyone can. Therefore, I came up with these graphics.

The brilliant folks over at Timothy McSweeney's Internet Tendency have dug up some interesting clauses in the new contracts handed out to free agents this winter.

I think Royce Clayton's might be my favorite one:

If he finishes the season with a batting average above .220, the Blue Jays pay him an extra $1 million. Finishing between .221 and .230 gets Royce a handicapped sticker on his car and the key to every bathroom in the city. If he does the impossible and hits above .231, Royce gets to choose any three people, players or citizens, to get beaned by B.J. Ryan fastballs.

I've seen the future, and it has armpit stripes.

The new batting practice jerseys for next year are out, and I've got to say… I'm glad they're just BP uniforms.

After reading Donald Fehr's comments about Mark McGwire and Hall of Fame voting, I couldn't stop thinking about what he said, and what it meant.

Why should people vote in, or more to the point, not vote in a player? Is it fair to consider aspects of that player outside of what they did on the field?

That's the question that every writer with a Hall of Fame vote (and many without) is asking themselves. I, of course, have no vote, but I do have an opinion and a theory about the matter.

The use of steroids (or any performance enhancing drug, PED) is reprehensible both morally and professionally. It overlaps the line between personal vice and professional ethics. To be as clear as possible, I believe that the use of any PED is simply wrong. It contaminates the game and affects the historical record.

But when there is no proof of PED use, and no precedence of excluding players based on suspicion or evidence of "cheating", you have to fall back on the decades of precedence that are there.

[click through the link to read the full article]

I don't usually engage in rumor-mongering like so many others tend to do when the snows of winter suspend the actual playing of baseball and encourage chatter about rosters and trades.

I'll make an exception this time, though, for no better reason than that I'm bored, and I think I've found a reasonable target for the A's, and one that's actually being mentioned in legitimate trade talks.

With Jay Payton signing with the Orioles for a surprisingly reasonable contract in this off-season of inflation, the A's have a hole to fill.

So how to replace the versatile and useful Payton? Fill the void with Ryan Church, I propose. Ryan Church is a soon-to-be 28 year old LF/CF from the Nationals.

[click through the link to read the whole article]

According to the A's official website, Alan Embree is now the designated LOOGY for Oakland. He signed a two year deal, and it's not clear how much he's earning.

I like this signing for two reasons. Most directly, he's a reliable leftie who is effective against both righties and lefties, though he has a reputation as just a LOOGY.

Since 2002, Embree has had a ERA+ numbers of 204, 111, 118, 58, and 129. The 58 is a one year abberration that he spent with Boston and New York. Last year in San Diego, Embree posted a 3.27 ERA and struck out 53 in 52 1/3 innings.

Secondly, the indirect benefit is that it frees up Joe Kennedy to compete for one of the open spots in the rotation, so the A's don't have to look for a starting pitcher on the wild free agent market.

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Also being reported is that Mike Piazza has agreed to a one year, $8.5 million deal to be the DH in 2007 for Oakland. Considering the market, and Piazza's age, I'd consider it a good deal.

Bill James has projected Piazza to hit .267/.344/.467 with 16 home runs, but that's only over 315 at-bats. Only once in his entire career has Piazza had that few at bats. If you scale his numbers up to the 450 he's been averaging over the last few years, you get about 23 home runs.

[follow the link to read the rest of the article]

While writing earlier about the ever-increasing amounts of money being doled out to free agents this year, something occurred to me. This market inflation will serve to hurt small market teams in more ways than being priced out of the top end players-for-hire, as usual.

Not only will they not be able to retain their top players once they reach free agency, but arbitration is going to likely become a more popular option for players still under the team's control.

With the huge contracts handed out to mediocre-to-above-average players, the comparisons for arbitration eligible players will be very favorable for them. Many teams will find it difficult to work out reasonable contracts with players to take them through the arbitration eligible years.

As the free agent signings keep rolling in early this winter, I keep shaking my head at the escalating prices. I realize that, for the most part, teams have more money to spend this year. Revenue sharing, new TV deals, and the XM radio deal bring in money to everyone. But it seems to me that the market may be inflated beyond reason.

I attempted to gauge that by comparing their production to the dollars they got. Since most contracts are based on past performance, it should correlate.

Follow the link to see what I discovered.

Justin Morneau won the AL MVP, but wasn't picked to be on the 2006 AL All-Star team. So how many times has the MVP not been an All-Star?

Only 10 times, since the inception of the game in 1933.

Who are those players, and why weren't they picked as All-Stars in the seasons they were MVPs? Follow the link, and I'll tell you all about it.

As I was poring over 2006 stats for the A's, something hit me. The lines of numbers that I was looking at weren't really giving me an easy visual comparison. I wanted to know how the hitter's numbers stacked up against his teammates, and the league averages. It wasn't easy to just glance at the numbers and see it right away.

So I came up with this system.

[follow the link to see the image]

UPDATE

Here's a new look for the graphic

http://thepastime.net/2006/10/statline-graphic-update.html