I don't want to read his artcle,I don't want to give him any hits. I'll assume that he's serious about his analysis about soccer destroying America. If he's a real academic I figure that maybe he would realise that American foreign policy is destoying America. Maybe the USA attacking and occupying Iraq and Afganistan is destroying america. Or it could be the Federal Reserve loaning the U.S. government money that is destroying america. Real smart man we're dealing with.
Well, that was what also made me read it another way--the part where he mentions that conservatives all over the country are playing the game. As I hinted before, I think what's sarcastically being implied is still pretty patronizing, which is that soccer is really "wholesome family fun" of the type that is good for upstanding American, Christian families (regardless of whether they know or respect the game).
Well... Professor of religion. Kind of like being a professor of astrology. No wonder his arguments carry no logic. True. Saying "hitting a baseball is the toughest thing to do in sports" is a dumb claim anyway. It's done dozens of times per game. That's not true. ERA is looked at just as often as W/L if not more by fans(especially for relievers). And people that matter (ie. scouts and managers) look at velocity, movement, location - in other words, they measure how difficult it is to hit their pitches.
No offense but win/losses and championships get you into the HOF, not ERA. Most if not all starters in the Hall are a 2.5 a game. Baseball measures win/losses greater then it does ERA. And scouts along with teams now a days care about how fast you throw; a Greg Maddoux type of pitcher sadly in this league is all but dead. As for making the dumb claim. True baseball's are hit a dozen times in a game but what matters if its in the H column. Baseball hitting is tough to do normally; now you got hit it between two solid lines and hope 8 guys out their don't catch it; only the best hit once every 3 times at the plate and must make sure it counts. We also see the best in the world play; put someone with reduced talent or hitting ability ala pitchers; and ask them to get up to the top level and swing. All these guys in baseball are their for a reason. And not to make their dope dealers rich (but sadly most do).
But don't you think that's because there is a strong correlation between W/L and ERA? Show me a pitcher with 200+ wins and a terrible lifetime ERA. Of course getting lots of wins proves that you can close-out games, but a strong ERA proves that you aren't just benefitting from a good offence that you have nothing to do with. If its true that championships get you into the HOF faster than a great ERA then I won't ever bother to visit Cooperstown. Even the best teams have crap players and vice versa. I agree with all of that but that doesn't mean its the toughest job in sports. Beating a goaltender in hockey or breaking serve in tennis for example can be tougher statistically speaking (depending on what level you're playing at).
Which is why people think of it as luck. These players are not aiming the ball with the bat at all, they are hoping when they make contact it either goes over the fence or falls to a place anywhere on the feild, that no player resides.
Haven't gone through the whole thread, but my buddy just emailed me the link to his opinion piece on WSJ, has anybody emailed this duesche yet?
Tell that to Ichiro Suzuki, who has about 6 different kinds of swings for where he wants to hit the ball.
Well he’s the exception. For the most part batters are just trying to make solid contact unless they’re way-up in the balls/strikes count. But that’s getting a bit off-topic. What bugs me most about the article is not the soccer bashing. It’s the elevating of superstition to religion to philosophical reasoning. Such a xenophobic argument would never be published in a respected newspaper unless it hid behind religion to make its intended point. This author wins the muppet-of-the-year award in my book.
One of the guys in on our board emailed the soccer coach as this guy's university. I'd say he did us proud.
What about golf? Hitting a straight golf shot with the proper distance, very hard. Tiger woods has better coordination than any baseball player, I guarantee it. Edit: It's proven, just Yandex it.
So I take it your not religious? This article says to me; its a joke. One guy who's brother personally knows Webb stated that in Ollie's blog. I think he wrote to the wrong forum and that's what hurt him. Ah the ability to speak freely and the consequences that come with it.
But the intially contact is the easy part. And remember a good golfer is never perfect; he's just very good at hitting the right shot for the right situation.
yea....... im sorry Pkauffma but Golf is nowhere near baseball in that regards. The Baseball player whether aiming or not have to hit a ball coming at them on average about 80MPH..............Golfers can stand around for 10 minutes to line up their shots............Golf is poor. And all this talk by ESPN people about Tiger Woods being the best in other sports, if hehad played them instead, is a joke.
No I'm not superstitious or racist. That article is both. And both interfere with the advancement of human-kind. I forgot what century I was in when I was reading that pile of trash! What does a Professor of relgion do all day? That's my next question.
- Goalkeepers save less than 1 in 3 penalty kicks. - Tennis players get aces less than 1 in 3 times. - Golfers getting a birdie is less than or 1 in 3. - Cricketers bowl someone out far less than 1 in 3. - Etc. It's difficult to get a hit, but is not the hardest thing in sports. It was said once and repeated so much it became true.
Theology is a legitimate study but what this guy says does not seem to represent the work of an academic. I have heard however that this article was a poor attempt at being cheeky.
This is my take on the Webb article. I got this as one of the comments to my post from someone at First Things. To which I replied: I never heard back, and I still don't get the target of the satire...if it is satire. I guess the soccer coach at Wabash didn't get it either.
Well first off, a penalty kick is supposed to be easy. That's the penalty part about it. I like the demensional analysis some guy came up with that showed how difficult it is to what thing. Proven it was harder to hit a baseball with a bat more then anything else in sports.
Well, it's not provable, for obvious reasons. But comparing golf to baseball and saying baseball requires more natural coordination is a joke. The contact point to hit a near perfect golf shot is about a centimeter in diameter. Sure the ball is stationary, but have you ever tried hitting a ball from a divot or the rough? Chipping in, putting, it requires an insane amount of touch, sort of like having mezmorizing touch with the soccer ball. That's why golfers take beta blockers during the final round of a tournament, it's because you have to remain extremely steady and strike the ball perfectly. Way more mentally taxing, by far. Baseball, all you have to do is make some form of contact in some form, and take steriods. When they say golf in 90% mental 10% physical, it's more or less true. Edit: This should probably be deleted, but it would be awesome if it wasn't
The fact of the matter is that it just isn't true. There are loads of things that are harder to do than hit a baseball with a bat. Plenty of things are achieved less often, even by top pros. It's just a question of how you frame it, and how you choose to exclude other sporting challenges. You, after all, rejected penalty saving as it's meant to be difficult. I'm sure you, or whover wanted to make a case for hitting a baseball being the most difficult thing to do in sports, would be able to find reasons to reject any other claim too. Someone earlier made a suggestion earlier that it's much harder to score past an NHL keeper, as they save around 90% of shots. What case can you make for claiming an act with a 30% success rate is harder than one with a 10% success rate? That it's meant to be difficult?
Right. And to add to that, hits on their own don't mean anything. The main goal is to get runs. Actually the goal is to get more runs than the other team. Which is roughly the objective of every sport, thus every sport is equally difficult.