meaningless stats

from salon:

[a source wrote] "Pretend you are a graphics producer for a baseball broadcast. The network's lead announcer mentions on the air that the Angels are particularly proficient at scoring two-out runs. Your job is to make this announcer look as good as possible. You immediately look up how many runs the Angels have scored in that situation and get it on the air, not to get in the announcer's ear and patiently explain that this stat has no context.

"If you're a rookie producer, say, working a baseball game, and the network's lead announcer -- the top on-air guy -- says something on the air that you don't agree with, is it likely that you'd present your theory to the audience at the risk of offending him? Or would you put up the statistic that appears to mean something and be satisfied that at least 80 percent of your viewing public will be satisfied with it?"

Here was my epiphany."Your job is to make this announcer look as good as possible." There's the problem. And here's a bigger one: "You put up the statistic that appears to mean something and be satisfied that at least 80 percent of your viewing public will be satisfied with it." Holy cow.

... I guess I already knew that it's a major priority in television to make the talent look good. What I hadn't realized was that the truth is not too big a thing to sacrifice in that pursuit. So I've had to amend my list of who is being served by the networks that broadcast sports in what order. It now goes like this:

1. The on-air talent
2. Non-sports fans
3. Sports fans



well, duh.

i pity the fool whose job it is to make tim mccarver look good. insert joke about whoever gets paid to spray his hair orange here.