Your “Stupid Poindexters” Saturday Evening Open Thread

I can’t remember where I read it yesterday, and I’m too lazy to look for it, but it seems to have held true through three games of the World Series: four-hour games are the result of analytics. Because everything can be broken down into statistics, managers are using numbers to determine when pitchers are pulled at specific points in the game. NOT LIKE IN MY DAY when he’d simply walked the bases loaded or wasn’t considered man-enough to pitch his way out of a jam. No sir – the second the stats say so, he gets pulled and in comes a fresh pitcher for as few as one at-bat. This is all Billy Beane’s fault.

MLB is confused as to why people stop watching their product? NFL games might be long, and the rules somewhat arcane, but football is positively scintillating when compared to the drudgery that is trying to follow a four-hour, nine-inning game these days.

And I say this as a guy who loves baseball & makes a goodly sum of money off it each summer.

But as long as the Not-Expos lose, then I’m a happy boy.

Tonight’s sports:

• MLB:
  • Game 4: Astros at Not-Expos – 8:00PM | FOX / Sportsnet
• NHL:
  • Leafs at Habs – 7:00PM | CBC / Sportsnet1
  • Blues at Bruins – 7:00PM | NBCSN
  • Flames vs. Jets – 10:00PM | CBC / NBCSN
    • the outdoor Heritage Classic from Regina (“rhymes with ‘fun’”), SK
• CFL:
  • Roughriders vs. Eskimos – 7:00PM | TSN3
• NCAA: (games of note)
  • Arkansas at Alabama – 7:00PM | ESPN / TSN2
  • UCF at Temple – 7:00PM | ESPN2
  • Texas Tech at Kansas – 7:00PM | FS1
  • Notre Dame at Michigan – 7:30PM | ABC
  • Colorado State at Fresno State – 7:30PM | ESPNU
  • California at Utah – 10:00PM | FS1
  • Washington State at Oregon – 10:30PM | ESPN
• Rugby World Cup
  • Semi-final:
    • Wales vs. South Africa – 5:00AM | NBCSN / TSN

Please enjoy the rest of your weekend. I’m having company for the games tomorrow – all my friends who tried dying during the summer. There’s the guy I went to Ohio with that has cancer, and the old beer vendor from Nat Bailey Wakezilla might remember – he had an octo-pass in August. If I can get them out to a bar later on, I’ll look like the best catch of the bunch!