Lincoln Mitchell

Blog

This page contains links to recent blogs by Lincoln Mitchell

Are Fans Losing Interest in Steroids?

The point here is not that steroids do nothing or that PED use should be legalized, but that the discussion itself may be approaching, or already reached, a tipping point where many fans simply do not care so much anymore. Steroids may be moving towards becoming an issue like gambling, against which baseball also has rules, but is not something fans spend a lot of time debating. The question of whether or not Jhonny Peralta should, in some abstract moral sense, be allowed to play in the ALCS may simply not very interesting to most fans. Perhaps fans would rather discuss the resurgence of Justin Verlander, or the question of Miguel Cabrera's health. These are more interesting questions for the millions of Americans for whom baseball is a hobby or passion but not a question of morality or good and evil.

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What Does Carlos Beltran's Great Post-Season Play Mean?

Supporters of Beltran will argue that his post-season performance should inform his candidacy. That notion is also relevant for players like Andy Pettitte who started more than a full season's worth of games in the post-season. Beltran's post-season record probably should be taken into account, but so should everybody else's from this era. However, this record should not only be taken into account, but should be viewed in its proper context. One striking line from Beltran's post-season resume is that he has played in 38 post-season games, but none in the World Series. The great post-season performers from previous generations either played all their post-season games in the World Series like Babe Ruth or Mickey Mantle, or, like Reggie Jackson and Steve Garvey, played a good proportion of their post-season games in the World Series.

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Contempt for President Obama is Behind the Shutdown

The government shutdown is not driven by a Republican desire to overturn the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Nor is it about trying to reign in government spending or limit the national debt. It is, at its core, the latest act in an effort by the far right of the Republican Party to delegitimize the presidency of Barack Obama.

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Platitudes and Tautologies in Post-Season Baseball →

The advantage of platitudes is that they do not have to be accurate, as they are generally untestable. Asserting the winning team has good chemistry might be true or it might not be. A fight in the locker room, for example, can be attributed to bad chemistry if the team goes on to lose, or just the right thing to motivate the team if they go on to win. The team that wins the World Series will likely have the right mix of veterans and young players because all teams have a mix of these types of players. David Ortiz, Tori Hunter, Brian Wilson, Bartolo Colon, AJ Burnett and Carlos Beltran and several others on post-season rosters are all capable of providing veteran leadership and will likely be credited with doing just that if their team wins.

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The Republicans Finally Took Their Ball and Bat and Went Home →

Recent Republican actions have made it clear that too many in that party are unwilling to accept defeat and plan for the next fight. The Republican Party is like that annoying kid many of us knew growing up who would threaten to take his ball and bat home if he does not get to pitch and bat cleanup. For Republicans this is now a guiding principle of policy making not just the petulant and destructive behavior of a spoiled child.

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Red Baiting is the Last Refuge to which Joe Lhota Clings →

Lhota's argument that New York does not need a Stalinist mayor is probably true, but not exactly pertinent, and amounts to little more than name calling. However, if one is going to play the guilt by association game, it is considerably more relevant to raise the question of whether New Yorkers who came to this city from other parts of the US or the world to escape religious persecution, homophobia, racism or fanaticism needs a mayor who represents a party which continues to reflect those values-not 25 years ago, but today. It is hard to miss the irony that Lhota's campaign is shaping up to be framed on the one hand by an attempt to tar de Blasio for positions he took, which were good and defendable ones, a quarter century ago, and on the other hand by running from the extremist reputation of his own party.

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And Then There Was One →

If this were another player, the Yankees would probably try to move him to another team or persuade him to be more flexible, but the Yankees have invested hundreds of millions of dollars not just in Jeter the player, but in Jeter as the face of the franchise. They cannot risk damaging that now by either having an acrimonious fallout with the future Hall of Famer or seeing him spend a year in the uniform of another team.

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Still No Movement on Gun Regulation

It is the nature of progressive change that it often seems natural and inevitable in retrospect. This sometimes makes it easy to forget how much hard work it took and how much uncertainty there was in the middle of the struggle. This week provided evidence of how far we are from progressive change in other areas. The horrible shootings in both Washington DC and Chicago are a reminder, although it is not clear why anybody would need one, that gun violence remains a serious problem in the US. Both of these shooting took a terrible human tool killing a total of 13 and wounding at least that many.

These tragedies have led, not to any discussion of gun regulations, as few in Washington think there can be any progress at this time in that area. Rather, they have led to a strange kind of meta-narrative in which the theme seems to be that nobody is talking about gun regulations after these shootings. This is, of course, a way of talking about gun regulations, albeit one that is not very confrontational, nor very hopeful.

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Mariano Rivera Was Not Perfect, But He Was Resilient

Legendary New York Yankee closer Mariano Rivera is winding down an extraordinary career. Rivera who is universally understood to be the greatest closer ever will soon jog in from the bullpen one last time. Rivera first became a dominant closer and a fixture of the New York sports world when Rudy Giuliani was mayor, September 11th was just another day on the calendar, and sending an attachment by email was still considered high tech by many. In this, his last year, he is still one of the best in the game at what he does.

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Third Term Problems for Bloomberg and Quinn →

In October of 2008, Mayor Michael Bloomberg successfully persuaded the City Council to change the law governing term limits so that he could run for a third term in 2009. The speaker of the City Council at that time, without whose support the change would not have been possible, was Christine Quinn. This law did not make national news and barely resonated beyond the political elite in New York as most New Yorkers who were thinking about politics in late October of 2008 were paying more attention to the prospect of the presidency of George W. Bush coming to an end, and the likelihood that an exciting Democratic Senator for Illinois would get elected president in early November.

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What is a Pitcher For? →

On August 25th of this year, Matt Harvey the star pitcher for the New York Mets, suffered an injury that will require Tommy John surgery and cost him the rest of this season and most of the next one. This is a great disappointment, not just to fans of the star crossed Mets, but to anybody who likes exciting young pitchers. Since being called up late in 2012, Harvey has been one of the game's best pitchers, posting a combined ERA+ of 153 and averaging 9.9 strikeouts, and only 2.2 walks per nine innings. Harvey turned 24 at the very beginning of this season so, if he is able to fully recover from the surgery, as many pitchers do, he may still have a great future.

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Georgia Is Not Ukraine and Must Be Given the Chance to Prove It →

The surface similarities between the arrests of former Georgian and Ukrainian prime ministers Vano Merabishvili and Yulia Tymoshenko should not be used to undermine attempts to support the rule of law in Georgia, argues Columbia University's Lincoln Mitchell.

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Syria and the Foreign Policy Echo Chamber →

If an app existed that could maximize the number and breadth of strong arguments against a policy decision as well as the potential damage that policy could cause while minimizing the possibility that the policy in question could accomplish anything, it would produce the administration's proposed strike against Syria.

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Is Hillary Clinton in a Weaker Position Now? →

Hillary Clinton has not yet announced whether or not she will be a candidate for president in 2016, and already there is a PAC aimed at thwarting her candidacy. The creatively named Stop Hillary PAC is committed to trying to destroy Clinton's aspirations by running negative ads and otherwise seeking to portray her in the worst possible light. Clinton remains the front-runner for her party's nomination, should she run, but it is possible that the right is making a mistake by attacking Clinton.

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Baseball, Steroids and Cowardice →

Ryan Braun's recent statement regarding his use of PEDs likely convinced nobody of anything. Those who were predisposed to like Braun and want to move beyond the PED issue were probably satisfied with his statement. Those who either don't like Braun, or are absolutists regarding PED use were equally likely to be displeased and dissatisfied with Braun's statement. Ryan Braun, it seems, is just another rich man caught breaking the rules who exacerbated his problem by denials and obfuscation before finally offering an unconvincing apology. Perhaps if baseball does not work out for him, he could run for mayor of New York.

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The Giants Could Contend in 2014 →

The Timmy-Cain-Panda-Posey-Bumgarner Giants may never win another championship, but keeping that nucleus together is smart economic thinking and good for the Giants. If the Giants resign Lincecum and Pence, they will be poised to be a strong contending team in 2014, especially if they are able to add an above average hitting outfielder or a league average starting pitcher. It is unlikely that any trade of those two players would have left the team a similarly strong position for 2014.

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A Lifetime Ban for A-Rod Would Be Bad for Baseball →

A few weeks ago a former MVP who, is still one of the best and highest profile players in the game, was suspended for the duration of the 2013 season. However, nobody is talking about Ryan Braun anymore because this story has been completely eclipsed by the possible lifetime ban now facing New York Yankee slugger Alex Rodriguez. The issues around this possible suspension are complicated because while most people recognize Rodriguez has been a user of PEDs, he has not failed a drug test since 2003. Rather he has been linked to Biogenesis, the medical lab which distributed PEDs to many players. More significantly, the discussion of Rodriguez's possible punishment appears to be somewhat capricious rather than grounded in policies or specific rules.

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Anthony Weiner Could Create Problems for Hillary Clinton Too →

Even if Weiner and Abedin had no connection to Clinton, it would be hard to watch Abedin's support for her husband and not think of Hillary Clinton's support for President Bill Clinton during the various sex related scandals during and before the Clinton presidency. Hillary Clinton has a long record of accomplishment since she and her husband left the White House. Should she run for president, that is the record she will want to highlight. Anything that brings attention away from that record and back to the worst periods of the Clinton presidency is bad for Hillary Clinton. That is precisely what this scandal is doing now.

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If A-Rod Plays Well What Will the Yankees Do? →

The toughest question facing the Yankees may be what they will do if Rodriguez comes back and plays well. While Rodriguez is a shadow of the player he was from 1996-2007, and is older, injury prone and overpaid, he is still a valuable player when he is on the field. Last year he managed to post an OPS+ of 113 while having a WAR of 2.3, batting .272 with 18 home runs in only 122 games. These are not great numbers, but they are useful, particularly for a team this is desperate both for a third baseman and a right-handed power hitter.

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Anthony Weiner Is a Caricature of a Politician →

Weiner entered this race knowing there would be more revelations about his online conduct while simultaneously arguing that since he has reconciled with is wife, we the voters should forgive him too. The initial coverage of Weiner reflected this angle which, along with his name recognition, contributed to his impressive poll numbers. This was a mischaracterization of why Weiner's conduct is so troubling. This scandal was never primarily concerning Weiner's personal life and relationship with his wife. The real issues in the scandal are Weiner's serial dishonesty, unwillingness to take responsibility for his actions and extraordinary self-absorption. Again these are characteristics that are not exactly in short supply among politicians, but more extreme in the case of Weiner.

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