I wanted to take a moment to respond to the piece by Sam Page, A Study in Unintentional Hilarity, making fun of Marty Noble’s recent Inbox column. Full disclosure: I am the Poet Laureate at Amazin’ Avenue and a fan of both Sam and Marty. In terms of player evaluation, I tend to agree with Sam a lot more.

I won’t recount in great detail, as Sam did, how Marty’s approach differs from many of the sabermetric community’s evaluation techniques. Suffice it to say that he leans more heavily on some of the traditional metrics, and comes to different conclusions about player value than Sam does.

But I think conformation to sabermetric orthodoxy is such a narrow lens through which to view Marty Noble, given his ample talents in the areas critical to a baseball writer. If you are a Mets fan, and you are not reading what Marty has to say, you are missing both the wit and historical perspective that is largely unequaled among baseball writers around the game.

When I leave Citi Field after an assignment- usually a feature, rather than a game story, given my position- I am sure to check Marty’s preliminary lead on my cell phone. These are, almost without fail, verbal gems that capture the moment of the game I just witnessed.

Here’s a great example, following the 4-3 loss April 29 to the Marlins, or as many know it, “The Omir Santos Pinch-Hits for Ramon Castro Game”. Noble writes:

“All losses are equal” is how the saying goes. “Some losses are more equal than others” is how it is. This loss, 4-3 to the Marlins, has the same numerical value as the 11 that preceded it this season. But for now — and probably until the Mets take a bus to Philadelphia on Thursday afternoon — it warrants boldface type and an underscore. And some whispered words of four-letter length.

Noble captures it perfectly. He can do the same with a victory, of course. Take a look at his treatment of the June 10 6-5 victory over the Phillies- in retrospect, perhaps the last good night the Mets had until September.

The race for the National League East championship has had its bags packed for some time now, ready to move out of Citi Field as soon as it can reserve a seat on a flight to Atlanta or maybe even Miami. It had begun packing when Carlos Delgado went down, locked its suitcases when Jose Reyes tore his hamstring and zipped up its garment bag when J.J. Putz was betrayed by his elbow. And the race may yet depart before September’s arrival.

Not today, though, not after Tuesday night, not after the Mets applied the three R’s — resolve, resilience and resourcefulness — and mixed them with an ingredient in abundant supply since Opening Day, relief. Not after they defeated the Phillies in the most rousing game in Citi Field’s 28-game history. For now, the race is maintaining its New York apartment for at least another few days. Ultimately, these bruised and aching Mets may go nowhere. But for now, the race isn’t going anywhere, either.

And Noble’s baseball background- he’s been covering baseball since 1968- is evident in so much of what he writes. To put that in perspective: his first season, covering the Yankees, coincided with the great Mickey Mantle’s final season. Here’s Noble on the history of the Mets at Wrigley Field, opening with an anecdote:

The story, as Leo Durocher told it in the early ’70s, was that Billy Williams pulled a pitch well over the right-field stands of Wrigley Field and through a second-story window across Sheffield Avenue. Durocher claimed the home run not only broke the window, but it also damaged a lamp inside the apartment, and that the occupant complained enough to the Cubs that they covered the costs of the repair and a new lamp.

To miss out on Marty Noble’s intelligence, limitless number of baseball stories, and ability to capture the zeitgeist of a given moment, game or point in the season is to miss out on much of the joy baseball provides. But it would also be a mistake to assume that, because he doesn’t use the same statistical measurements, that his ability to judge players is somehow to be utterly dismissed.

What Noble does is best summarized by the man himself, in this September 10 entry to his blog:

Understand that when I’m covering a game or anything else, I root for just a few things –
good information, a good angle, good quotes and readership that understands that I have no allegiance in the game.

And he certainly does that. I’ll never forget, following a game in 2007, when I watched him continue back and forth between Aaron Heilman and David Wright, intent on getting just one more anecdote straight for one more feature story. The other writers, disappeared, one by one, but Noble, then in his 40th season, stayed long after, getting that extra story.

Noble was named, and justifiably, to the committee to determine annual entrants to the Mets Hall of Fame. I happen to believe Noble himself belongs. And while I enjoy the work of Sam Page, I think it is worth pointing out that it makes no more sense to dismiss Noble’s perspective, erudite and well-earned, for a lack of certain statistical preference than it would be to dismiss Sam’s, as many of the stat-bashing community do, because he hasn’t covered the games live or for an “over-reliance” on math.

My understanding of the Mets would be more limited without either of them.

Tags: Amazin Avenue, Marty Noble, New York Mets, Sam Page