ABOUT THE AUTHOR, ABOUT THE BLOG

I keep score at baseball games. I tell people "It's just something to pass the time, you know how boring baseball can get," but that couldn't be further from the truth. Baseball is only boring if you're bored. But, more importantly, it’s who I am.

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I’ve been around sports my whole life – playing, watching, coaching, or some combination of the three. I’ve been tracking my effectiveness as a player since I was very young by keeping stats in my head - for baseball and ice hockey.  I was completely fixated on improving my game on paper. My thought process was: It’s easy to say ‘good game’ after the final whistle blows, but was it actually that good? What made it good? Where can I improve?

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That curiosity carries over to watching sports. I have found that a neatly kept scorecard tells the story of a ballgame better than any picture can. The minutiae that make baseball interesting are all there, waiting to be remembered. Something as pedestrian as a walk (haha) means more than four bad pitches. The question is: what does that mean, exactly? An impossible question to answer fully, but it’s one that makes baseball a real mental exercise. And, as it turns out, baseball isn’t the only game full of impossible questions.

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In April of 2020, ESPN aired The Last Dance, a docuseries chronicling the Chicago Bulls’ 1998 campaign. I loved watching it, but something stuck out to me: for all the statistical evidence that support MJ and Pippen’s greatness, there is no formula for what players are worth on the court, in terms of salary. But Mike – and pretty much everyone else – thought that Scottie was underpaid. So, I asked: How much was Scottie Pippen worth to the Bulls, in dollars? So, I did the math, with the help of an Excel spreadsheet and numerous cups of strong coffee. I somehow turned my lunatic ramblings into an essay. Now, I'm turning that essay into a habit.