Ozzie Guillen is a baseball genius

In September of 2008 I took a vacation to Manhattan. I mostly went because my beloved White Sox were in town, and this would be my last opportunity to visit Yankee Stadium (version 1.2). The thing I most remember from my Yankee Stadium visit was the drunk dude sitting behind me. I was wearing my Ozzie Guillen Jersey (With the '05 world series patch - Best Gift Ever!), and, as drunken hecklers are wont to do, this drunken idiot had decided to use what was directly in front of him to heckle. The only thing is, he had no idea who my jersey was referencing.

Throughout the game all I heard was "Jose Guillen sucks! Who gets a Jose Guillen Jersey?! I didn't even know he played for the White Sox! Jose Guillen, Jose Guillen!" and so forth. Now, Jose Guillen, despite being payed quite a lot of money by various baseball teams over the past decade, does indeed suck. Ozzie Guillen, on the other hand, is a extremely good baseball manager with a championship on his resume.


(This is Jose Guillen presumably flying out softly to shallow left field)

(This is Ozzie Guillen, even he thinks Jose sucks)

Obviously I shouldn't take drunken ranting to heart, but it does bring to mind an interesting point: Ozzie Guillen, beyond being underrated, is simply forgotten in the conversation of the game's best managers. While I'm certainly biased, allow me a moment to delve into this.

Ozzie is constantly derided by the upper-echelons of baseball writing society. I imagine this is mostly due to his lack of native command of the English language. Also, he loves to swear, in both English, Spanish and his own Ozzie language (Seriously, he talks so fast it becomes its own language). I think its easy for baseball writers (many of them elitist and self-righteous) to sub-consciously discriminate against Ozzie because of this. It certainly doesn't help matters that Ozzie has had some public media battles, and is quick to use hyperbole and expletives to ad-hominously slur his detractors. (I find this hilarious)

The fact of the matter is that he guides his teams to success time and time again, and I'm not just talking about the '05 World Series or the '08 Central Division title. The Sox under Ozzie have routinely beaten expectations. PECOTA (a statistics based baseball prediction system devised by stat genius Nate Silver) is the modern statistical equivalent of the crystal ball. The system predicts the performance of every player and team for the upcoming season. Every year baseball fans wait breathlessly to see the PECOTA break-down of the upcoming season. It is often scarily accurate... except when it comes to the White Sox under Ozzie Guillen. Since the arrival of Ozzie in '04, The White Sox have beaten PECOTA in 5 out of 6 years. Check this out:

• '04 - Beat PECOTA by 4 games
• '05 - Beat PECOTA by 19 games (World Series Win)
• '06 - Beat PECOTA by 8 games
• '07 - Equaled PECOTA (Man did that team suck, I blame Jay Mariotti)
• '08 - Beat PECOTA by 12 games (Division Title)
• '09 - Beat PECOTA by 8 games

(67WMAQ at southsidesox provided the info and inspiration. Check it out.)

That's 51 games better than predicted over his tenure with the Sox. While I don't have a PECOTA subscription, and therefore can't delve into the numbers in greater detail, one would have to assume that this compares favorably to the rest of baseball.

Basically, Ozzie makes his teams better than expected. Success like this over one or two years could be considered an anomaly, but the better part of a decade? That's statistical relevance, my friends.


(Laughing Ozzie appears courtesy of ESPN)

I will always stick up for Ozzie. Not only did he finally bring a title to the South Side, but he was one of my favorite players growing up, so feel free to take my opinion with a grain of salt. If you look past all the bullshit, he is one of the best managers in baseball, and should be recognized as such.