Hypocritical Mass

I enjoy listening to WEEI, a.k.a. Sports Radio, a.k.a. 'Nitwit Radio'. During today's AM 'drive' (I live close to work), the only thing I heard was commercials. The only one I remember was an advertisement for a hospital. Maybe that's appropriate for the Red Sox these days, with Jason Varitek hurt and Trot Nixon, too.

Of course, this afternoon, the PM nitwits, including sportswriters, were insisting that the Red Sox should have given up the young pitching for Andruw Jones. who is signed with Atlanta through 2007. Undoubtedly, these same baseball geniuses would be lambasting the Red Sox for losing too many 9-7 games after the departure of the kids. But that's their game, right?

I'm trying to recall the number of successful baseball GMs who had previous careers as prominent sportswriters. Help me out here. What's not to love about Red Smith, Peter Gammons, George Frazier, and Thomas Boswell? Sports journalists leave indelible marks on their community. But that isn't synonymous with drafting, developing, and maintaining a successful franchise. So you think I'm offering a blank check to Theo Epstein? Hardly.

In baseball, as in investing, you have to think about the "other side of the trade." The same argument emerged from Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Does the other guy know something that you don't? Is evaluating talent, signing, and deploying it the same as writing about it?

While on that subject, at least Melrose's Chris Snow got the job as Director of Hockey Operations for the Minnesota Wild. I'm not a hockey krishna, or even a hockey fan, but there's one sportswriter getting close to actually getting behind the wheel.

Sportswriters often feel a certain bluster, as in the Ron Borges (Boston Globe) and Bill Belichick relationship, something akin to the Hatfields and the McCoys. Perhaps a real history exists, but you'd have to expect that by now, it's strictly personal. To quote Cold Hard Football "

Borges implied that he has some dirt on Belichick that nobody else knows about:

"This fellow (Belichick) has cornered the market on convincing people with the help of his friends that no one has ever worked harder than he does and he's out, uh, you know, when everyone else is sleeping, he's working, when everyone else is eating, he's working, uh, I could say something, but I won't ... about uh, how at least some of his time is being spent... ”

Do I really care how Belichick (or Theo Epstein) spends his free time. If your team has a self-absorbed, obsessed management about improving their team and your prospects, then all the better for you, and unfortunately all the worse for them.