Good Riddance Joe Morgan

So many people that are fans of baseball are jumping for joy at the moment. Sunday Night Baseball on ESPN potentially will no longer be unwatchable, rather, unlistenable. Joe Morgan and Jon Miller will no longer be doing the broadcasts. This is sad in one respect because Miller is truly a fantastic announcer. I love listening to his radio broadcasts. However, if you combine all the Hall of Fame goodness of all the Hall of Fame announcers you still couldn't counteract Joe Morgan. Honestly, I have never understood why he had a job in the first place. I have never known an announcer that was so universally hated by his viewing audience. In fact, I don't know of a single knowledgeable baseball fan that could tolerate 5 minutes of listening to that man. Why is Morgan so frustrating? Well, for a variety of reasons, but mostly because he is a pompous prig. Joe Morgan is giving a lot of credit nowadays as possibly being the greatest second basemen of all time. He is at least in most people top 5 easily. Why is this? Because he is one of the better percentage players of all time. He was always considered a good player, and a Hall of Famer, but nobody was ever saying he belonged anywhere in the same conversation with Lajoie, Hornsby, Gehringer, Collins, or heck, even maybe guys like Joe Gordon. But thanks, largely impart to Bill James and his sabermetrics, ok almost SOLELY because of Bill James and his sabermetrics, Joe Morgan is recognized as one of the greatest of all time. What makes this frustrating is Morgan is so disdainful of stats PERIOD, that it makes me want to slap him upside the head. He hates sabermetrics, becoming antagonistic anytime anybody tries to use them to determine the quality of a player. This was a conversation that happened once while I was watching. A guest was in the booth with them (I forget whom) and he used a state to show that a player was lacking some particular ability. And Morgan responded, “I don't need the stats, I don't need the stats to show me that he is a good player. I played the game and I can tell from watching that he is a good player, because I played the game. Did you play the game?” This is a typical response from Morgan, when anybody implies that he might now something about the game he just tells them over and over that “I played the game.” He basically acts like that because he played that means whatever he says is ALWAYS right over someone who didn't play the game. Even though he benefited greatly from Bill James he adamantly spoke out against the book in a very derogatory manner. “Why would I wanna read the book? All I'm saying is, I see a game every day. I watch baseball every day. I have a better understanding about why things happen than the computer.” A very typical Joe Morgan quote. Bill James perhaps knew how big a jerk Morgan would be about the book, which is why he included that rather hilarious letter to him in it. All I can say Joe, is that Bill James pegged you right on, and frankly the baseball world is much happier that your ego will no longer be stroked as a broadcaster, giving you the facade that people actually want to hear what you have to say. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out.