He’s still very much a 30 homerun threat and has averaged 100 RBI in the past two seasons. He’ll find a job in less than a month.

unlike Bonds. Is it possible a 100+ OPS DH and unquestioned hall of famer could sign up with a contender for close to league minimum?

I also mentioned that he’s a cancer in the clubhouse. I’ll add that he’s on a par with Thomas in that regard. The Twins are trying to build something here for the long term. You don’t do that by bringing in bad apples to spoil the bunch. The guys they have in the clubhouse are still learning each other. When they do, they;ll play better together. Adding Bonds or scuttles any hope of that happening.

The truth is, all those stories are in archives that are only searchable in a limited way. Stats are easy to find. Clubhouse stories are difficult to find, partly because there’s a sign on every clubhouse entrance that says, ” What happens in here stays in here.”

Philosophically, I believe intangibles have an affect on winning and losing. But if you could prove it, it wouldn’t be an intangible. I’m not a skeptic or a reductionist. I believe reality is much more complex than what we can see through the lenses we create to view it. And I think we need to approach reality with the humility that our ability to understand things is limited. We don’t have all the answers. All theories are works in progress. We learn new things all the time that don’t fit our theories, and we adjust our theories as we go.

I don’t have a lot of time for people who act as though the theories we use to prove our points about baseball are definitive. They’re young theories. Baseball is a complex game. The theories represent the best we can do right now. And I try to use it as much as I can. But I’m not going to demand that this one perspective is the only valid one. Because the theories are works in progress, people have valid things to say outside of the theories—scouts for example. Why do players tend to have a different perspective than bloggers? Because they see things everyday that don’t fit the theories.

Why am I telling you this? Well, I don’t think everything we say needs to be justified by hard evidence, because sometimes we don’t have hard evidence even though what we say might be true. In cases where we can get the evidence (in principle), what is it worth to us to demand evidence in cases where the effort required to attain it far outweighs the value of the thing we’re trying to prove? That has objective and subjective elements. I’ll be the first to admit that the subjective outweighed the objective in my case.

In my case, I was working on my thesis, a book proposal, and an executive presentation in three other windows on my screen. The claim that Bonds is a cancer in the clubhouse is a moot point, so the value of proving it was overwhelmed by the effort it would take to prove it.

Right now I’m listing to a presentation and typing to keep myself awake, so this post is worth the effort for me. I hope it was worth the effort for those who actually got through it.