You play to win...what?

I'm a bit late on this, but it's something I've been chewing over for the last couple of weeks and finally I decided it's worth spewing on. You may recall that a little while back Nick Saban, coach of the Dolphins, got in some trouble for saying words to the effect that the win-loss record doesn't really matter at this stage (being, as the Phins are, in reconstruction mode); what matters is whether the team is progressing. Only he said it, if it were possible, even less convincingly than I did just now.

So the PTI guys, naturally, decided to gab about this for 90 seconds or so. First, though, they played the old tape of Herm Edwards yelling at reporters, "You play to win the game! Period!" They cited this favorably and then contrasted with Saban. Well, sure, they averred, of course your long-term objective is to improve the team. But what about those season-ticket holders? ("Will somebody please think of the season-ticket holders?!") They want to see their team win! And so Wilbon ended up issuing one of his favorite pronouncements on sports celebrity misstatements: It may be true, but you can't say it.

Wilbon is constantly saying stuff like this. "It may be true, but you can't say it." This bugs me. Because it implies that people are stupid. Wilbon, in this case, evidently thinks that Miami Dolphin season-ticket holders are stupid. Does he honestly think that the average Dolphin fan willing to plunk down more than a grand for 8 seats not on the beach actually thought that the Phins were going to win the Super Bowl this year? Or even make the playoffs? Okay, sure, fans are inveterate optimists, and they might have thought, You know, based on our schedule, I think we've got a shot at the playoffs! Great, so they play 17 games instead of 16. Big deal. No, what they're really thinking, in the furthest recesses of their minds, is that Nick Saban is going to lead the Phins back to the promised land, just as he led LSU to a shared deed of their promised land.

Fans understand this. Fans understand that teams need time to develop. They're impatient, sure, but so long as each year the team is better than they were last year, they're willing to bide their time. Not infinitely long, of course, but certainly one year--and this is Saban's first.

In fact, in reality, nobody really buys the Herm Edwards Axiom that you play to win each game. Not even Herm, I'm certain. If they did, then they would bring every player back from an injury too early, on the off chance that they could contribute to that one game. Baseball managers would coach every game like it was the 7th game of the World Series, bringing their #1 starter off the bench to pitch the 9th inning. Okay, so now he can't pitch tomorrow, but hey, we won today, right?

Last year the NY Giants were sailing along just fine with Kurt Warner at QB, when suddenly halfway through the year Coughlin put Eli Manning in. The result was disastrous. Pre-Manning, the team had a chance to get to the playoffs. With Eli, they won about 1 game the rest of the year (yeah, I'm too lazy to look it up). So 2004 was screwed, but Eli is almost certainly better in 2005 because of it. True, I would still say that they'd be in at least this same position had they simply stuck with Warner, but the team is clearly building for the long-range future, and it's an absolutely defensible decision.

There's nothing wrong with throwing in the towel on a losing proposition. Cut your losses for a better chance next year. I was amazed at how long the media debated whether Donovan McNabb should have surgery. Of course he should! The Eagles' season was over a month ago! And I repeat: the fans understand this. Okay, ESPN will be able to find a few loudmouths who profess not to, but the majority are not that stupid.

In this I find myself in the awkward position of agreeing with the Daily Idiocy. Today he explicitly refuted the Herm Edwards Axiom: "Hello?! You play to win the championship."

The is true, although I would add a slight caveat, which is that yes, you play to win the championship, but if you don't in fact win the championship that doesn't mean you're an abject failure. There is much to be said for trying your best, turning your team into a winner, getting far into the playoffs, etc. Accomplishments made along the way while trying to reach the goal of the championship are worthy of praise.

So Nick: blab away! We can take it!

Postscript: Fortunately, I can keep my anti-Daily Idiocy bona fides intact for the day by simply citing a different quote from the same column. This one concerns an early preview of the 2006 Heisman race:

If Vince Young and Brady Quinn both return for their senior years (and right now, both are expected back), that will be one of the best 1-on-1 Heisman battles in a long time. Young and Quinn's styles aren't simply different; they'll represent an allegory of the contemporary sociological divide between perceptions of what makes a "classic QB."

Boy, Shanoff sure has the lingo down, doesn't he? The guy oughta write for the New York Times.

Simmons Concedes

Every once in a while, in the face of overwhelming evidence, Bill Simmons is forced to admit that "I'm an idiot." (The "I" in the quote, of course, is Bill referring to himself. This is not me, the humble purveyor of SRAM entries, saying "I". SRAM would never admit to such a thing.)

But you have to be on the alert for these admissions, because they pass by quickly, and then Bill's back to his usual arrogant, wise, all-knowing, Sage of Boston Transplanted to Warmer Climates self. Interestingly, the admissions also came fewer and farther between when the Red Sox and the Patriots were winning world championships, as if their winning validated Simmons' own Smarter-Than-Thou status. But this, of course, is a given among sports fans.

The city of Boston's memorable 2004 not only inflated BS's ego, it also enabled him to ignore the primary quantifiable metric of his all-knowingness: his pick-against-the-NFL-spread percentage, which ended up at around 50.000001% last year. (Okay, a little better than that--but not a statistically significant margin above a coin flip.) Above all, BS was vindicated in his bad-mouthing of Peyton Manning, greatest QB of the current, unnamed decade, when Manning's team laid an egg in Foxborough last January. All in all, a good year for Bill.

2005 has not gone as well for the Sage; neither his teams, nor his anti-Peyton bias, nor his weekly picks (once again) are doing particularly well for him. And in a surprise (some may say shocking) move, he acknowledged as much in last week's NFL picks column.

First he starts by finally giving some props to Peyton Manning, about 5 years too late and at least 1 year after pretty much every other inhabitant on the planet:

Can we all stop with the "Plummer for MVP" crap? His coach wouldn't even trust him to throw the ball on third down with two minutes left in a tie game last week. Come on. Manning is the MVP this year. Even I admit it. He's been awesome to watch these last few weeks. Just awesome. I will now intentionally trip and hit my head on the side of a coffee table.

Stunning! But here's the thing: he wouldn't admit it until (a) the Colts were 11-0 AND, just as importantly, (b) the Patriots had a lousy year. Simmons has no hope that the Pats will beat the Colts in January (having already been thrashed by them in November, of course), so he can't pull the same trick that worked for him so well last year: deny the overwhelming evidence of Peyton's greatness by saying that the only games that matter are in January.

But here's the thing: Peyton is no better this year than he was last year. One could argue, in fact, that he was better last year. (I wouldn't, personally, but "one" could.) The difference, as every other inhabitant on the planet knows, is the defense. But Bill doesn't want to admit this, because that would discredit Tom Brady's three Super Bowls.

Still, a strong step in the right direction, Bill. How do you feel? Great.

BS then goes on to admit that his Pats just aren't that good this year.

Playing the role of the beaten-up star QB who took way too much punishment over the first 10-11 games and is slowly breaking down ... ladies and gentleman, Mr. Tom Brady!

(And yes, the AFC East is the worst division in football. I agree. You can stop sending me that e-mail. Seriously. I'm with you. Heard you loud and clear. Gotcha.)

It's the AFC East admission that's the important part, but I included the part about Brady to point out that this one really isn't that big a step for old BS. What he's really doing--with all of this, really--is circling the wagons and protecting his two Sacred Cows [I'm going to go ahead and allow this one, because you probably had cows going along with wagon trains all the time; and maybe there were a few Asian Indians along for the ride. -Ed.]: Bill Belichick and Tom Brady. Regardless of what happens in this disastrous NFL season, two things must be preserved at all costs: Belichick's genius and Brady's immortality. So Simmons has been playing the injury angle for all its worth this year.

(Injuries? But I thought Belichick was a genius! Didn't they have injuries in 2004, and Coach Bel converted a receiver to CB? Why doesn't he just win one game 16 times again this year? Doesn't seem that tough to me.)

And finally, in what in my opinion is the most shocking admission of all, he actually comes out and admits that his much-ballyhooed (by himself), highly complex and continually refined system for picking NFL games against the spread, is, well, pretty much worthless:

One of the sad things about parity: All my rules from my world-famous Gambling Manifesto have been washed away. You can go against Buffalo, Kansas City and Green Bay at home. You can take a crappy team like the Titans giving more than 7 points. You can take a crummy QB like Gus Frerotte on the road. You can wager heavily against Brett Favre. You don't have to be afraid of a road favorite like Denver in this one. Basically, wagering on NFL regular season games is like playing craps. There's no rhyme or reason to it. I find this mildly depressing.

Again, for anybody else this would hardly be a surprising concession, given that his record against the spread the last couple of years (this year he's 96-92-3) is insignificantly higher than that of an inanimate object. But remember, Bill is pretty heavily invested in his picks as the one quantifiable measure of his superiority to the rest of the world. He actually has readers who place money based on his advice. (Apparently these readers haven't figured out the "Scroll Down" feature on their browser so's to gain access to the guy's season record.) So this is a big deal. Sure, sure, he hedges with the whole "parity" bit, which obviously is pretty bogus (Huh? How does overall parity affect the picking of a given game? And when, exactly, did this "parity" start? 2004? 2005? 1895?), but we take what we can get.

Above all, SRAM is here to pre-emptively declare victory. If the Pats make a surprise playoff run, and/or the Colts lose in the playoffs, let the record state that none of this was foreseen by the Sports Guy.