I agree with every word in this article. Let's just start with that premise. But writing articles about how the MSM does not understand the received wisdom of the sabermetric community is also a lazy way to fill storyline space and make deadline. Whether it's season-end awards or some space-filling quote about experience, tearing these totems down is getting dull and repetitive. I love Joe and his writing, but this is a really weak effort.

Keep tilting at those windmills, Joe. We hear you, but you're preaching to the choir here.

Obviously experience is not nearly as important as fandemonium, Joe. Exhibit A: Had Hendry any sense he would have outfitted every man, woman, and child with noisemakers and Black Cats. Wrigley would be like a Chinese New Year's parade on HGH. Lack of foresight doomed the Cubs defense, hexed their bats, and so forth. QED.

The radio commentators for the Phillies/Brewers game last night (I assume ESPN radio, since I am in N.Cal), made a big deal about how the Phillies experience last year (three and out) made them "hungrier" this year ... along the lines of they realize that just getting there is not enough.

Meanwhile the Brewers, making their first apperance in 26 years, were "just happy to be here" and could already consider their season a success. Meaning what, they did not want to win as much as the Phils, or that they had a psychological excuse for losing?

It's enough to drive you nuts.

While I'm watching the games, my wife keeps telling me, "You don't have to put on music for me, you can listen to the game." I say, "It's not for you."

I think Mr Sheehan does need to keep writing these articles. Yes, the Bill Jaems disciples and long time readers are "the choir", but yet we still hear the same crap over and over again on TV and radio. Baseball Prospectus continues to get more and more popular, and that message needs to continue to be spread to new readers. I, for one, realized these things long ago, yet Ii still enjoy reading the articles.

I think the reason sports writers and talking heads and guys like that will probably be saying stuff like this for a long time is they feel they must come up with answers to questions that are kinda complicated. And complicated answers sound wishy washy and the public won't stand for wishy washy answers.

They feel they must have an answer to the question of why the Cubs lost their first two playoff games at home. So they say it's because they weren't hungry enough or they didn't play with intesity and swagger and that kind of jive. Playoff experience fits in with these types of answers.

Answers like that are easy and simple and impossible to disprove. But they are just made up and don't mean anything either.

The real answer is we don't know a lot of stuff for sure. But we have data and history and knowledge of why teams win and why teams lose. And experience and swagger and intensity and hunger are easier concepts to spout off about than what studies show.

The fact that a lot of former players repeat this stuff doesn't help. Former players like to think they won becasue they had great heart and guts and were just better people than the guys they beat. They don't want to say that luck and ebb and flow and secret sauce and other things had a lot more to do with it than which team had more swagger and guts and playoff experience and stuff like that.

So the writers and talking heads feel they must have an answer to those questions. And the answer can't be based on some kind of study of the issue. It must be something simple that you can rattle off quickly and most of your audience will nod their heads and say "that's right."

Thanks Joe. I wish someone would just ask a fellow broadcaster, "Yeah, but doesn't everyone start out with zero post-season experience?"

I agree about 97%. The difference is that I've heard more than one player, particularly pitchers, say that they go out there really amped up and overthrow for a few innings. I've always gotten the impression that these guys are thinking "Wow, it's the playoffs/World Series." I know that at least a few guys have said as much. But all that wears off after a batter or two, or at the worst a couple of innings, and I honestly can't remember hearing anyone say that it kept juicing them up year after year. (Maybe they wouldn't be willing to share that even if it were true.)

All I can say is that I'm glad the Rays are beating the White Sox--if only because it means I won't have to listen to Harold Reynolds yammer about "speed" and "intensity" any longer.

remember that a lot of Joe's columns end up on SI.com these days, so his audience is more mainstream than it used to be.