Dan Shaughnessy: Taking a dump in your mouth one column at a time

[weeba]

Went looking for another thread on Dan Shaughnessy. Couldn't believe I couldn't find one.

Today's piece:

http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/reds...sensitive_area/

And more specifically, it's intro:

QUOTE
RT MYERS, Fla. - Cup or no cup? That is the question.

It’s a delicate issue regarding a delicate area. The punch lines are infinite, but it’s not funny when a guy gets hit in his testicles and he’s not covered by the triangular hard-shell plastic designed to protect a man’s private parts.


That's right. It's an article about Adrian Beltre's crotch.

 

[Phenom]

I especially enjoyed the article this weekend about the ever exciting topic of...uniform numbers!

Seriously, if he can't stir up controversy he chooses to write complete fluff? How about doing some research, and trying to add some perspective that hasn't been hard before? Alex Speier on WEEI.com does this on a weekly basis.

But no, it's either try to start a Mike Lowell controversy, or write about uniform numbers/Adrian Beltre's crotch. Nice.

 

[DukeSox]

QUOTE
RT MYERS, Fla. - Cup or no cup? That is the question.

It’s a delicate issue regarding a delicate area. The punch lines are infinite, but it’s not funny when a guy gets hit in his testicles and he’s not covered by the triangular hard-shell plastic designed to protect a man’s private parts.

I love that he uses euphemisms and politely skirts around the issue three times, but also just drops a "testicles" in the middle of the sentence.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

I didn't think that this or Sunday's article was that bad. It's either fluff pieces or trying to get guys into fights. I'd take this stuff every day.

QUOTE
How about doing some research, and trying to add some perspective that hasn't been hard before?


Not every story has to be a hard-hitting article filled with more numbers that an Intro to Stats class--and I know that you didn't come out and say this, but you implied it. Baseball is a game played by people. People have interesting stories and spring training is the best time to read those stories.

Lighten up.

 

[JimBoSox9]

You really didn't find that the least bit interesting?

QUOTE
“When I look down, after the game, it wasn’t a pretty sight,’’ Beltre said. “My testicle got the size of a grapefruit.


Looks like we have a new Saturn Balls on the team.


QUOTE
How about doing some research, and trying to add some perspective that hasn't been hard before?


Isn't that kind of what he did here? Have protective cups been overreported in your experience?

 

[Buffalo Head]

QUOTE (Phenom @ Mar 3 2010, 02:54 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2835253
How about doing some research, and trying to add some perspective that hasn't been hard before?

Freudian much?

 

[Phenom]

QUOTE (Buffalo Head @ Mar 3 2010, 06:11 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2835672
Freudian much?


Yes, I guess so...and I will elect o keep that freudian slip in the post as well.

Onto the previous point, I guess it isn't this article specifically that got me upset. It's just that guys like Shaughnessy continuously complain about there being "no drama," and act like it's the team's job to supply material of their columns. Sometimes, you have to dig a little beneath the surface.

Now, I guess this article on Adrian Beltre not wearing a cup would qualify as digging a little beneath the surface. It's just not a topic I find very interesting to read about, but to each their own.

 

[Phenom]

http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/reds...l_shy_about_it/ - This article is disgusting. Not funny, and serves no real purpose.

Shaughnessy paints some hypothetical scenarios in which Roger Clemens, Manny, Grady Little, and Carl Everett all retire as Red Sox. Definitely a column just to fill the week's quota.

The thing with Shaughnessy is, he's a talented writer. You don't become a multi-time best-selling author without having a lot of ability. As others have said, it's a shame he decides to mail in columns like this with the frequency he does.

 

[Guapos Toenails]

QUOTE (Phenom @ Mar 23 2010, 06:59 AM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2861181
http://www.boston.com/sports/baseball/reds...l_shy_about_it/ - This article is disgusting. Not funny, and serves no real purpose.

Shaughnessy paints some hypothetical scenarios in which the Roger Clemens, Manny, Grady Little, and Carl Everett all retire as Red Sox. Definitely a column just to fill the week's quota.

The thing with Shaughnessy is, he's a talented writer. You don't become a multi-time best-selling author without having a lot of ability. As others have said, it's a shame he decides to mail in columns like this with the frequency he does.


I would just like to say that I am not going to click on that link. Click the link, read the 'disgusting' article, Shaughnessy wins. Stop reading him, dude.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

I think Shank is at the "we really don't give a shit what he has to say" point. We've heard it all before.

Consigning him to irrelevance by ignoring his usual tripe seems the usual approach to him these days. That's why weeba had trouble finding a thread on this clown.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

Really? I thought that the article was actually kind of humorous. Especially the shoe-horned Lou Merloni quotes, for some reason they made me chuckle.

I've said it before, but I don't remember the last time I was offended at a Dan Shaughnessy column. He's pretty harmless now. Even when he does his best to infuriate, I take it with a large grain of salt. He's just not that relevant any more.

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

The Merloni parts were funny. The rest was boring. Usually he's not boring, he's annoying. But this was boring.

 

[MarkInLondon]

QUOTE (John Marzano Olympic Hero @ Mar 23 2010, 12:35 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2861220
Really? I thought that the article was actually kind of humorous. Especially the shoe-horned Lou Merloni quotes, for some reason they made me chuckle.

I've said it before, but I don't remember the last time I was offended at a Dan Shaughnessy column. He's pretty harmless now. Even when he does his best to infuriate, I take it with a large grain of salt. He's just not that relevant any more.


We haven't had a decent 'piling in' on Shaughnessy round here for ages - which suggests to me that he's just producing mundane crap now.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

QUOTE (MarkInLondon @ Mar 23 2010, 09:42 AM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2861295
We haven't had a decent 'piling in' on Shaughnessy round here for ages - which suggests to me that he's just producing mundane crap now.

Or that he's gone to the well so many times he's lost his ability to rile us up.

I hope this continues. The opposite of love isn't hate, it's indifference. I am indifferent to Shank now. I don't read his stuff because we've read it all before. He's become an irrelevant non-entity.

 

[Fratboy]

Yeah, I saw it this morning, and thought, "Oh, I get it! They got Nomar to retire as a Red Sock so they could retire #5," or at least that's what Shank seems to be implying. To this, I say

1) YAWN.

2) It really is time for the season to start, isn't it?

I didn't really read it, moving on to more pressing and interesting news, I suppose, but it seems there's no love lost between Merloni and Shaughnessy, eh?

 

[sfip]

In case anyone needs reasons to take SJH's advice...

 

[weeba]

Hey, you wrote that a day after I started this thread.


:whistling:

 

[PBDWake]

I used to get mad at CHB, but after I heard an anecdote from Jackie MacMullen, I decided it wasn't worth it. Jackie related that when she became a columnist at the globe, she mentioned to him that she was excited to follow in the footsteps of Gammons and McDonough, and hoped she could do them justice, to which CHB glibly replied "Jackie, you don't get it, we are Gammons and McDonough". Aside from the absolute arrogance of that statement, it was worth it for me, because where I used to get mad because I thought he was just stirring up stuff to get readers, now I just realized that he's off in his own little delusional world, where he's the greatest sportwriter of his generation. I pity him for it over getting mad at him now, because if his writing is what he actually believes, it's got to be a sad life, having found so little joy working in the field you dreamt about growing up.

 

[sfip]

QUOTE (weeba @ Mar 23 2010, 06:09 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2862115
Hey, you wrote that a day after I started this thread.


:whistling:

Wow, you're right!

Except that you're off by a year.

 

[weeba]

QUOTE (sfip @ Mar 23 2010, 08:06 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2862303
Wow, you're right!

Except that you're off by a year.



Dammit. I thought I frustrated you enough to blog about it. Oh well.

 

[sfip]

QUOTE (weeba @ Mar 24 2010, 08:35 AM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2862798
Dammit. I thought I frustrated you enough to blog about it. Oh well.

Unfortunately you weren't the first and won't be the last to give CHB publicity, but at least hopefully the blog entry can help reduce it.

 

[TheRealness]

Shaughnessy/Tanguay & Zolak just got into it with Kentucky writer Matt Jones. Pretty good exchange, actually, but Jones was awful. He just devolved into calling Boston a racist city, and insinuated that Rajon Rondo said that as well. When called to the carpet, he backpedaled so fast you could hear him fall over himself.

Shaughnessy admitted his article about the Cornell/Kentucky game was somewhat elitist, but it's a pretty big leap to call it racist.

 

[BigJimEd]

On the front page of boston.com this morning was a picture of Shaughnessy with a wildcat behind him. The headline for his latest column was Shaughnessy article incites Kentucky fans. I just had to laugh. Typical Shaugnessy always wanting to be the story.


No I didn't click on the linm or read the article.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

Honestly, and here I go again for the second straight day, Shank wrote a pretty standard upset piece yesterday about Cornell beating Kentucky while giving their coach (Calipari some well-deserved shit, IMO). I think that the Wildcats fans completely flew off the handle on this one.

This wasn't Shaughnessy trying to outrage a fan base (I'd be surprised if that's legitimately what he had in mind when he set out to write the story) but it was a typical story. And it was pretty much by-the-numbers.

EDIT: And seriously, a team that plays in the Rupp center has the stones to call anyone else racist? Give me a break.

 

[TheRealness]

Yeah, I agree JMOH, I didn't understand the outrage and Matt Jones ended up looking really ignorant and stupid. Amazing when you think about it, because he made Shank look reasonable.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

I read the piece again to see if I had missed something and the first six paragraphs are pretty much lists of famous people who played Ivy League hoops. And when he does get into Kentucky he calls one of their players "the best in the game" and another "a young (or small, can't remember) Wilt Chamberlain".

The only one he ripped was Coach Cal.

 

[Phenom]

Yeah, Shaughnessy was not out of bounds in that column. He just said that he's rooting for Cornell, because them beating Kentucky is a great story. There was nothing racist in it.

And on "Tanguay and Zolak" (or as the Kentucky blogger calls him, "Zorak"), the Kentucky guy came across as a blatant homer. He wanted to go on there and scream and yell, and didn't have much of a point. Shaughnessy came across much better. Especially on that point about Kentucky only having a 10% graduation rate.

 

[kelpapa]

I especially liked the point when Jones brought up SAT scores and either Zolak or Tanguay pointed out that guards for Calipari don't usually take the test.

edit: in reference to Wall's SAT score

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

QUOTE (kelpapa @ Mar 26 2010, 03:02 AM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2865651
I especially liked the point when Jones brought up SAT scores and either Zolak or Tanguay pointed out that guards for Calipari don't usually take the test.

edit: in reference to Wall's SAT score

Or Rose's

 

[kelpapa]

QUOTE (Lose Remerswaal @ Mar 26 2010, 07:15 AM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2865716
Or Rose's


Sorry, my edit meant to clarify that they were talking about Wall's SAT scores and then it was pointed out that guards for Calipari don't usually take the test.

 

[The Social Chair]

His article on SI.com on Duncan not being a Top 10 player of All Time is one of the worst NBA opinion pieces I've ever read.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/writ...purs/index.html



QUOTE
Off the top of my head I'd take Wilt Chamberlain (always No. 1, the guy averaged 50.4 points a game during the 1961-62 season), Bill Russell, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Shaquille O'Neal, Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Oscar Robertson, Jerry West and Bob Cousy ahead of Duncan. There's a quick 10 without as much as a three-second violation.

Nothing against Duncan, but you could also give me Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Julius Erving, Elgin Baylor, Hakeem Olajuwon, Charles Barkley, Karl Malone and Kevin McHale. Oh, and let's not forget Bob Pettit, Moses Malone, John Stockton and Isiah Thomas.


ugh

 

[lexrageorge]

QUOTE (The Social Chair @ Apr 3 2010, 07:46 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2875932
His article on SI.com on Duncan not being a Top 10 player of All Time is one of the worst NBA opinion pieces I've ever read.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2010/writ...purs/index.html





ugh


That doesn't seem to be all that bad. Seriously, which of those 10 players would you bump off the list to make room for Duncan? And, at least some of the guys on his second group have just as good of an argument to be the 10th player on the list as Duncan.

 

[mabrowndog]

QUOTE (lexrageorge @ Apr 3 2010, 10:47 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2876259
That doesn't seem to be all that bad. Seriously, which of those 10 players would you bump off the list to make room for Duncan? And, at least some of the guys on his second group have just as good of an argument to be the 10th player on the list as Duncan.

Agreed. I didn't read the entire piece (and won't as a matter of principle), but if the players he cited as >= Duncan are the only bitch, then this is a far cry than the worst argument Shank's ever made. The only thing I see that's remotely objectionable is his ranking Wilt the greatest of all time due purely to his scoring average when Russell ate him for lunch head-to-head and played far better overall defense.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

CHB took at shot at Fris in today's paper. Time for a P&G thread!

 

[JGray38]

Was just coming to post this. "Chuck certainly sounds like a party starter."

 

[Savin Hillbilly]

That column had me sitting openmouthed in front of my coffee, and I thought I was Shank-proof by now. It was like Unfrozen Caveman Sportswriter: "I'm just a simple caveman--your DERs and UZRs frighten me."

 

[MyDaughterLovesTomGordon]

I actually thought that Shank column in the supplement was half-hearted. I think they set it up as a two-sides thing with him and Bob Ryan, and even Shaugnessy couldn't really get behind his allotted role. He gives Theo like five paragraphs without actually criticizing him and basically lets him have the last word.

So, not only was it arguing a crappy and insupportable point, but it was lazily written and mostly aimless and finished without really addressing the opening thesis. I mean, why the hell is he talking about Bill Russell? Isn't he the classic example of a player whose traditional stats don't adequately address his greatness?

He's not remotely trying.

 

[David Laurila]

QUOTE (mabrowndog @ Apr 4 2010, 04:11 AM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2876292
The only thing I see that's remotely objectionable is his ranking Wilt the greatest of all time due purely to his scoring average


I didn't read the article, but Wilt is the greatest of all time purely because of his scoring average? One might also factor in that he led the league in rebounding a dozen times and in assists once. And the fact that multiple rules were changed in order to limit his dominance.

 

[Myt1]

QUOTE (JGray38 @ Apr 4 2010, 10:22 AM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2876474
Was just coming to post this. "Chuck certainly sounds like a party starter."


We need to invite Shank to the softball bash. I'd like to be half as cool at 31 as Chuck is now at howeverthefuckold he is.

 

[JimD]

QUOTE (Savin Hillbilly @ Apr 4 2010, 12:46 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2876608
That column had me sitting openmouthed in front of my coffee, and I thought I was Shank-proof by now. It was like Unfrozen Caveman Sportswriter: "I'm just a simple caveman--your DERs and UZRs frighten me."


Somebody needs to Photoshop an Unfrozen Caveman pic with Shank's Bozo hairdo on top.

 

[TFP]

QUOTE (Myt1 @ Apr 4 2010, 04:56 PM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2876982
We need to invite Shank to the softball bash. I'd like to be half as cool at 31 as Chuck is now at howeverthefuckold he is.

No shit. I wish you were half as cool as him too.

 

[ifmanis5]

Friggin' Shank...

QUOTE
It looks like those sun-deprived stat geeks eating pudding in their basement (the same nitwits who insist that homers and RBIs are overrated) outsmarted themselves in assessing this unit.


Nitwits? Really?

 

[Phenom]

QUOTE (ifmanis5 @ May 9 2010, 11:23 AM) index.php?act=findpost&pid=2956301
Friggin' Shank...



Nitwits? Really?


You had to see this was coming, though.

Shaughnessy has been chomping at the bit to get at Theo since he "aired out the dirty laundry" in 2005.

There is a lot of criticism to go around for how this year has gone. No surprise that because of that, Shaughnessy has decided to try to "even the score" a bit (as sad a commentary as that may be).

 

[bd11]

The home run comment is moronic. Stat geeks value hrs over almost every stat. An hr is the height of efficiency.

 

[wutang112878]

Between CHB and Cafardo an editorial head should roll at the Globe. Sure Dan, the sox suck right now, but making a personal insult about the GM & staff is not necessary to make your point, only to rile up fans to hopefully keep them watching and reading. Because it would much more work to do an article on the statistical methodology used by the team in its analysis, highlight what areas are struggling at the moment [starting pitching sucks], and project if returns to the expected norm might save the season. This is something Gammons might due but CHB simply isnt capable of

 

[Redkluzu]

As much as I hate CHB, I did agree with his lead in the Globe article today.:

QUOTE
Friday night the Bruins were like the old Red Sox. And now the Red Sox are the Bruins.


He also calls us QUOTE
Underachieving. The opposite of clutch.
and this one could argue. The bats mostly gave their all last night but IMO, it was the pitching that was hardest to watch.

QUOTE
The 2010 Red Sox sank to a new low last night when Jonathan Papelbon surrendered a pair of two-run homers in the bottom of the ninth in an excruciating 11-9 loss to the Yankees. The late-night implosion erased a noble comeback in which the Sox recovered from a 6-1 deficit (next bus to Lake Wobegon for you, Dice-K) to take a 9-7 lead on five home runs in the Bronx bandbox.


Frankly, the rest of his rant is pretty on target too --particularly the part about Dicey and our pitching woes.

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

Sounds like a typical CHB Mad Libs style column to me. I won't be reading it, mind you, because the chances of him saying something interesting and insightful are....remote.

 

[Trlicek's Whip]

Not a CHB article, but he's quoted in Howard Bryant's piece on Ortiz at ESPN.com. The profile walks us through Ortiz's last couple of years, and re-visits last year's steroid allegations/press conference:

QUOTE
...sources said Henry, team president Larry Lucchino and Werner called a meeting with key Red Sox employees and announced an edict: Ortiz was innocent. He had done too much, been too valuable to the team and the community, meant too much to the franchise for the Red Sox to not take him at his word.


QUOTE
"We looked ridiculous defending him to the level we did, especially because he said he was going to get to the bottom of it and he never did," a team source said. "But that came from John Henry. He pretty much told us directly, 'David is one of us. He said he's innocent, and I believe him.' That was it. No questions asked. That said how loyal John is to David."


And CHB's take:

QUOTE
"No one got off the steroid hook like he did," said longtime Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy. "No one had the union back them. He did. I wrote that we needed to have the facts about this, just like everyone else, and John Henry was so angry with me that we were finished. I said David Ortiz was dirty because his excuses were the same as everybody else's, and nobody believed them. And that was it between John Henry and me. He hasn't spoken to me in a year."

 

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

CHB crying about jouralistic integrity. That's fucking rich.

Shank is lucky JWH ever talked to him again after the Theo/Lucky GM fiasco story in 2005 that Shank wrote.

 

[CR67dream]

As I just posted in Radomski, the real sin here is the lack of coverage that was provided when it came out that Ortiz's 2003 test was "inconlusive". Shaughnessy is a waste of bandwith, and even moreso a waste of oxygen.