Brian Sabean... oops.

Sport psychologists Shields and Bredemeier (1995) defined good sporting behavior as "a drive to succeed, tempered by a commitment to the spirit of play such that ethical standards take precedence over strategic gain when the two conflict."

On this note, Scott Cousins' home-plate hit on Buster Posey last week, ultimately resulting in both a Marlins' victory and a broken leg for Posey, has sparked considerable debate in the days since.  Immediately afterward, Posey's agent Jeff Berry called for baseball rule changes to protect catchers in these situations; before commenting further, Giants general manager Brian Sabean said, "We’re going to wait a couple days, so we can take the emotion out of it."

Okay, good.

Cousins felt bad, especially since he ironically grew up in San Francisco as a Giants fan, so he called Posey a couple times to apologize.  Posey didn't return the calls, but publicly stated that he didn't want to "vilify" Cousins.

Was Cousins' hit thoroughly unsportsmanlike?  No.  Slightly?  Yes.  Was Posey's decision to not return Cousins' phone call thoroughly unsportsmanlike?  No.  Slightly?  Perhaps.  So we're about even, and it probably should have ended there.

But in baseball, there is a certain code that calls for slightly unsportsmanlike things to be acknowledged, and returned with slightly unsportsmanlike acts of your own.  For example, in September of 2009, Milwaukee's Prince Fielder hit a game-winning home run against the Giants, and celebrated wildly with his teammates afterward.  The Giants took exception, and in March of the following year Barry Zito plunked Fielder with a pitch in spring training.  No harm done in the end.  Baseball etiquette, if you will.

Applied to the current situation, the Giants might plunk one of the Marlins (e.g., Cousins) with a pitch the next time they meet, which will likely be a highly publicized event in August.  No harm done, baseball etiquette.

This is what Sabean was referring to when he said yesterday in a now-infamous interview on KNBR radio, “we'll have a long memory. We've talked to [former catcher Mike] Matheny and how this game works. You can't be that out-and-out overly aggressive; let's put it that way. I'll put it as politically as I can state it. There is no love lost, and there shouldn't be."

A little harsh, yes, but we’ll call it baseball etiquette.  It probably shouldn’t have been brought to the media in this way, but we’ll temporarily cut Sabean some slack.  But if we scroll back to earlier in the interview, that’s when things got weird.

“I don’t blame (Cousins).  Why not be hard-nosed?”

Okay, good.

"If I never hear from Cousins again or he never plays another game in the big leagues, I think we'll all be happy."

Oops.

Now he’s crossed the line, and I can't find anyone to disagree with this.  Especially troubling is Sabean’s statement that “we’ll” all be happy, implying that his comments represent the greater Giants organization and/or its fans.

Meanwhile, it’s been reported that Cousins has received death threats since the incident occurred last week.  That means that any statement of ill will at this point that might be interpreted as going beyond baseball, or a simple baseball-related retaliation as I mentioned above, is clearly short-sighted and just looks really, really bad.

Oops.

So now I have to agree with Marlins outfielder Logan Morrison, who made this statement earlier this afternoon:

"(Cousins is) taking this very hard without the comments that (Sabean has) made. He's getting death threats from people. This is his hometown, San Francisco. He's worried about his family and his friends that are there. And now he's going to make comments like that? It's ignorant, it's inappropriate and he has no idea what the hell he's talking about."

Personally, Sabean is largely responsible for my favorite moment as a sports fan, when the Giants won last year’s World Series.  I’d like him to keep his job, so let’s hope he cleans up his act, or else he might not deserve it much longer.

Giants manager Bruce Bochy just spoke on this, so I'll let him have the last word for now.

"There's nobody more supportive and protective of his players than Brian. I'd compare (it) like a papa bear; when something happens to your kids, your fangs come out."

"It's a very emotional time. As we all know, Brian's very emotional. ... Sometimes he needs time to let his emotions settle down. He's not out to demonize any player. He's hurt for Buster and what's happened here. (I) certainly don't want the media or the fans to demonize Brian, either."

"I just think, let's put this behind us and let's try to use this incident to maybe help baseball."

Re: The truth about Kobe Bryant in crunch time

Ahhh ... Kobe Bryant.  The most popular athlete in Southern California, the athlete who has tormented the Sacramento Kings, in particular, for more than 10 years now.  The athlete who is so good in the clutch that, even though it may hurt deep inside, you have to respect for his guts and corresponding success.  Or so it seems.

Henry Abbott's ESPN blog this week calls into question Kobe's apparent status as the king of clutch for this generation.  The stats are quite interesting.  When trailing by one or two points in all games since 1996-97, Kobe has attempted 115 shots, more than anybody else; he has made more than anyone else in the process (36), but also missed more than anyone else (79).  (Kings fans, note that Mike Bibby and Chris Webber both shoot a higher percentage in these situations than Kobe.)

Abbott extends these findings to argue that Kobe's domination of the ball in the clutch hurts his team, since he takes (and misses) so many shots, even suggesting that in doing so he goes against the wishes of his coach, Phil Jackson.  I, however (for fear of making a Kobe-sympathetic argument) highly doubt this is the case.  I do seem to remember Jackson commenting publicly earlier this year that he asks the Lakers to run the offense more consistently through Kobe during parts the second half, and/or when the team is behind (if anyone remembers/can unearth his comments on this, let me know).

The Lakers have won several championships, after all, with Kobe as their crunch time leader.  It's hard to argue with that.  Stats are great (nobody knows this more than I do!) but wins and championships are always the ultimate measure of success.

More than this, doesn't it seem like all NBA teams pass the ball around less in clutch situations?  I'd love to see some stats on assist-to-turnover ratios at crunch time, or simply the number of assists per possession at the end of close games compared to possessions earlier in the game.  Having watched enough basketball over the years, I get the feeling that league coaches must meet during the off-season and agree to stop passing the ball during these crucial possessions.  In other words, it's not just Kobe; I'm betting that down by one with 20 seconds left, the Cavaliers are just as likely to have Mo Williams dribble around for 18 seconds and then launch a shot of his choice.

Is this a bad game plan?  (Well, if you're the Cavaliers, probably.)  But maybe Kobe is on to something: indeed, do turnovers per possession go up at the end of the game as well?  A possession that involves five passes is inherently more risky; everyone that touches the ball has to be mentally prepared for success in the clutch, whereas the Kobe game plan relies only on Kobe, and therefore may be safer.  Abbott's stats reveal that field goal percentages are certainly lower in the clutch (29.7% across the league, yikes!) than earlier in the game, so maybe turnovers are up as well.  Or, maybe excessive use of the Kobe game plan is at fault for such terrible shooting numbers around the league.  Further investigation is needed, for sure.

For now, I'm just happy Kobe and the Lakers let the Kings steal one for a change last night...