As you are all now no doubt aware, the Kansas City Royals won the World Series on Sunday, finishing off the New York Mets in 5 games. First, some links to some good stories about it, and then some thoughts.
First, probably the craziest number: From the 7th inning on the the playoffs, the Royals outscored their opponents 51-11. The other 9 playoff teams combined to score 55 runs from the 7th inning on. Or another take on it: the Royals scored 40 runs in the 8th inning or later. No other playoff team scored more than 5. That boggles the mind. Seriously. Using Fangraphs win expectancy, the Royals had 8 different games that at some point they had less than a 35% chance of winning, historically, and won all 8 of them. Drilling down further, in 6 of those games they had less than a 20% chance, and in 4 of them they had less than a 10% chance. That just doesn't happen. Specifically, in the World Series, the Royals won 3 games which they trailed in the 8th inning. Which Jayson Stark says has not happened in the previous 110 World Series. I've read a lot about the Royals lately, and listened to some podcasts discussing them (shout out to Jonah Keri and Mike Schur/Ken Tremendous on a sort of "Grantland goodbye"). There's a lot out there about what to take from the Royals. Professional sports are notorious for copycats. Everybody wants to emulate the kings. Sidebar before going too far into that: Moneyball is now pretty well known to people even who aren't necessarily baseball fans thanks to the Brad Pitt movie. A lot of people over the years have taken the lesson that "Moneyball means walks and OBP" and so a team like the Royals would seem to be anti-Moneyball. That's the wrong lesson. Moneyball was (and is) about taking advantage of market inefficiencies. The Oakland A's of the early 2000's (who baseball writers have noted were blessed with having 3 great young pitchers, which had a lot to do with their success but was sort of passed over in Moneyball) were financially unable to compete with teams like New York, Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago, and many others, but still found themselves in or near the playoffs for a good run. The author (Michael Lewis) revealed that they were one of the first teams to really embrace "analytics" and try to find how players could actually contribute to "wins" (basically WAR) and what skills were not valued as highly as they should be. Batting average, RBIs, and home runs were valued. Walks and on base percentage were not as valued at the time, but Oakland realized that they should be, and built a very competent offense on this basis. Walks and on base percentage are very highly valued now. They are no longer an inefficiency. Back to Kansas City. They've done a few things that seemed unorthodox, but maybe now are revealing some truths and some "market inefficiencies" that they had taken advantage of. For one, and you'll find this in many articles, they've really tried to build a culture of good people in the organization and on the team. By all accounts, this is a group of players who like each other, and who love baseball. Alex Anthopoulos of Toronto apparently realized about a year ago that "character" was actually pretty important for the team and the fanbase (and whether that lesson was learned much too late is a discussion for another time. There have been teams in the past that were known for "25 players, 25 cabs", as in, nobody did anything together. If you have enough money to get great players, maybe that works for a bit. But maybe Kansas City's method is a lot more sustainable. The San Francisco Giants are known to be a pretty good clubhouse with a manager that is well loved by the players, and this has been a pretty good decade for them. The 2004 Red Sox famously crowned themselves "the idiots" and seemed to have a lot of fun playing. Fun can't be the only part of playing professional sports, I imagine, but in a long season, it probably helps. And for a team like Kansas City who has now been to the World Series 2 years in a row, that growing success is probably not an accident. To that "culture" as well, take another look at that Eno Sarris piece, or the Joe Posnanski one (or both really). The Royals were mocked over the years for their "5-year plan" which turned into a 6-year, 7-year, 8-year... and eventually, as it turned out, 10-year plan. Dayton Moore, their GM, was mocked many times for his decisions, but as it turns out, his moves over the last 4-5 years have been largely outstanding. And above all, they have been very, very patient. Alex Gordon was a high draft pick who hit poorly and fielded poorly at 3rd base, eventually got sent back down to the minor leagues, learned to play left field, and came back as a strong hitter and a gold glove fielder. Mike Moustakas and Eric Hosmer were supposed to be great in 2012, but both struggled (Moustakas in particular) before seeming to really settle into what they are. Alcides Escobar was one of the worst hitters in the league THIS YEAR, but he plays a very good shortstop, and seemed to really hit well in the playoffs (and that making contact on fastballs thing really made a difference). Lorenzo Cain didn't start playing baseball until late in high school when he was cut from his basketball team. He was a good fielder with some speed who hit for some average last year, then added power and really turned into a star this year. Salvador Perez was signed as a 16 year old and brought up as their starting catcher as a 22-year-old. A lot of bi9 market teams would not have had the patience to let some or all of these players grow and find their level. Maybe this was an advantage of being unnoticed for years. Frankly as a fan, I'd love to see a team build something out of good young players, even if it hurts at first. Houston may be on the fast track to this particular part of the Royals success, and the Giants have been doing it for the last 5 years. Another thing which has been discussed a lot lately is the value of making contact. The Royals lead the league in not striking out. They also didn't walk a lot, leading to kind of an average offense. But it was a very difficult to stop offense. Strikeouts having been going up for years now, and walks are starting to go down. As starting pitchers pitch less and presumably maximize their effectiveness and more and more guys throw hard in the bullpen, the ability to hit the ball and give yourself a chance probably is very valuable now. Home runs and walks are getting harder to come by, so a good single can be a difference maker. They've also built an exceptional defense with some great athletes around the field (at most positions anyway), and take advantage of their large home field by letting some of their pitchers (the starters at least) put the ball in play and trust that their fielders will take care of it. Chris Young is an extreme contact and fly ball pitcher. That would be a terrible strategy in Yankee Stadium or Coors Field, but in Kauffman Stadium, it can really work. And of course, they have that great bullpen. Now, bullpens are traditionally volatile and guys who were great one year can be decidedly average the year after that (or worse). Kansas City experience some regression (and then a season ending injury) from Greg Holland this year, but Wade Davis and Kelvin Herrera were excellent again, and helped shorten every game they were in. Remember, 51-11. It may be instructive (and I think it is), that Wade Davis and Danny Duffy are both former starting pitchers (Danny Duffy may be a starter again) whose stuff played way up in the bullpen. Even the aforementioned Chris Young struck out a lot of guys out of the bullpen for a guy with a high 80's fastball. If you want to make a greater point out of that, probably the best short reliever of all time (Mariano Rivera) came up as a starter before getting converted. This is something for teams to think about rather than maybe overpaying strict relievers. I may have more thoughts on ideal team building in another post at another time. In any case, I liked the Royals and their story last year (though, as a Giants fan, I was more than happy with how it ended - Bumgarner forever), and was impressed with how they built on it this year (almost no "experts" or predictors even had them back in the playoffs this year), though a little less a fan after the Blue Jays series and the way a couple of their players acted (Ventura in particular). But they earned this. And hey, in a league of 30 teams, every team should have a chance at one championship in 30 years. So we'll see the Royals back in 2045.
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The links might become a slightly less frequent feature during the offseason, which will start at the latest 8 days from now. I'm assuming, because many weeks may not have as many things to link to. Awards season, free agency, that sort of thing. But for now, it's World Series time. Game 1 was a good one. Started off with a strange and exciting play, ended with.... a sacrifice fly. But there you go, there were 14 innings of action altogether. And condolences to Royals starter Edinson Volquez. Some things are bigger than baseball.
To the links!
This is not intended to be an in depth analysis. Only to note the following:
My predictions for the Championship Series went 1 for 2, unfortunately. I plan to do a looking back post on the Blue Jays and their season (and perhaps on the "strike zone" in the top of the 9th inning of game 6). But for now, I'm looking forward, and there is a new series to preview. In this case, thanks to the Mets sweep of the Cubs and the Royals victory in 6 games, there will be a couple of days off until the next series starts on Tuesday. The Mets sound like they will line up their starters as follows: deGrom, Syndergaard, Harvey, Matz. For the Royals, Ventura probably won't be available until at least game 2, so it will depend whether they have more trust right now in Edinson Volquez or Johnny Cueto for game 1. The schedule will be as follows (games 5-7 if necessary):
Game 1 - Tuesday, October 27 in Kansas City Game 2 - Wednesday, October 28 in Kansas City Game 3 - Friday, October 30 in New York Game 4 - Saturday, October 31 in New York Game 5 - Sunday, November 1 in New York Game 6 - Tuesday, November 3 in Kansas City Game 7 - Wednesday, November 4 in Kansas City As an aside, many people have written many words about the somewhat ridiculous fact that the World Series now goes into November for a sport that can be very affected by weather. Game 6 of the ALCS this year was on October 23, which was the date of Game 6 of the World Series in 1993 (and Jose Bautista did his best Joe Carter impression, but got no support - again, more on that in another post). It is difficult because the playoffs now go 3 rounds vs the 2 they used to go. The truth is, most years it doesn't go quite this late. Opening day this year was April 5, vs March 30 and March 31 the last 2 years. Last year, the World Series started on October 21, which was game 5 of the ALCS and game 4 of the NLCS this year. So it may be a quirk of the schedule, but it seems like it would be better to start a bit earlier to try to actually finish in October. There have also been people nearly every year who propose slightly shrinking the schedule to 154 games (which was the standard length until 1961), and some think that there is a legitimate chance that it will see heavy discussion before the expiration of the current CBA between the players and owners, though obviously there will be much money discussed. But more on that in another post sometime. Kansas City Royals (95-67) vs New York Mets (90-72) Another aside, the Royals have home field advantage because... the American League won the All Star Game. People write about this every year, but this is really a silly way to decide home field advantage. Some bluster that "well, we need to be able to make travel arrangements, and how would we know where to go in advance" but that argument holds less than no water because the matchup isn't decided until the previous round ends anyway. People have proposed different things (they used to alternate between leagues, another silly way to go, but explains why the Blue Jays opened the 1992 World Series in Atlanta, and the 1993 World Series in Toronto). Let's propose right here that the simplest way would be by record, which would produce the same result this year. And realistically, it might make 3 possibilities for the World Series vs the current two. Use the All Star Game or Interleague records as a tiebreaker if you want. Second aside over. So the Royals and Mets didn't face each other this year, but through a lucky hit by the schedule makers, they actually open the 2016 season against each other, so there will be an immediate rematch. This is actually helpful in analysis, because some people got a little too excited about the Cubs 7-0 record against the Mets in the regular season, and, well, look at how that worked out. I thought the Mets starting pitching would make for a tough matchup against the Cubs, but I honestly didn’t see that dominance coming. Maybe I should have, but they are a legitimately frightening contender this year. In the Royals, though, they will face a team that is almost the Cubs’ polar opposite. The Cubs struck out over 20% more than the league average this season, and almost 10% more than the second place team. The Royals, meanwhile, struck out over 20% less than league average, and more than 10% less than the second lowest team total. Interestingly, this led to a team .321 OBP for the Cubs, and a team .322 OBP for the Royals, so they made outs at almost exactly the same rate (and if you remove pitchers, the Cubs had a team .332 OBP vs a .322 OBP for the Royals). Regular Season Royals .269/.322/.412, 98 OPS+, 139 HR, 104 SB, 4.47 R/G Mets .244/.312/.400, 98 OPS+, 177 HR, 51 SB, 4.22 R/G Royals 3.96 RA/G, 4.04 FIP, 111 ERA+, 7.2 K/9, 3.0 BB/9, 1.0 HR/9 Mets 3.78 RA/G, 3.53 FIP, 107 ERA+, 8.2 K/9, 2.4 BB/9, 0.9 HR/9 Playoffs Royals .271/.328/.449, 11 G, 63 R, 15 HR, 71 K, 27 BB, 7 SB Mets .235/.300/.433, 9 G, 43 R, 14 HR, 94 K, 26 BB, 9 SB Royals 4.41 ERA, 96.0 IP, 114 K, 40 BB, 15 HR, 1.29 WHIP Mets 2.81 ERA, 80.0 IP, 91 K, 22 BB, 6 HR, 1.04 WHIP Taking a quick look at the numbers between the two teams, boy the Mets can pitch. They were a tough team in the regular season, but have kicked it up a notch in the playoffs (though some would argue that the Royals have faced tougher opponents). C – Salvador Perez (KCR) vs Travis d’Arnaud (NYM) Perez has now played 318 games in the last two seasons including playoffs, and he will start every game in this World Series unless he literally breaks. That might put him at 2 full 162 game seasons, which is probably way too much for a catcher. He’s only 25, but you kind of hope he can stick around for a while. Meanwhile, d’Arnaud is actually older than Perez by over a year, but has been brought along a little more slowly and has already struggled a bit in his career with injuries. d'Arnaud is a better pure hitter than Perez (.340 OBP this year for d’Arnaud, .280 OBP for Perez). Both have some power (Perez hit 21 HR in the regular season plus 4 in the playoffs, d’Arnaud hit 12 in less than half as many games in the regular season plus 3 in the playoffs). Perez has a good reputation for working with his staff, though d’Arnaud has much better pitch framing numbers. This is a close matchup, but if d’Arnaud can steal a couple of strikes and make a couple fewer outs, he might take it. Advantage - Mets 1B – Eric Hosmer (KCR) vs Lucas Duda (NYM) Hosmer turns 26 today, and this year seemed to really show the promise that made him a top prospect five years ago. He seems to be the opposite of the San Francisco Giants, putting up good numbers in odd years, and struggling in even years. Duda has been in the major leagues about as long as Hosmer, though he is 3 and a half years older. He seems to be a consistent .350 OBP guy with around 30 HR power, which is valuable in the current offensive environment. In the field, Duda actually rates a little bit better than Hosmer by dWAR, though Hosmer has won the Gold Glove in the AL the last two seasons. Both players have struggled a bit during this year’s playoffs, though Hosmer did have the game- and series-winning RBI yesterday (thanks much more to Lorenzo Cain’s running than anything). Advantage – Tie (too much splitting hairs in too many directions here, maybe they’re just even enough) 2B – Ben Zobrist (KCR) vs Daniel Murphy (NYM) Zobrist has had a pretty good postseason, hitting .326/.375/.558 with 4 doubles and 2 home runs, but Murphy has gone crazy, hitting .421/.436/1.026 with 2 doubles and 7 home runs. Zobrist has been an underrated but excellent player since 2009, though his value tumbled this year mostly thanks to negative defensive numbers at every position he played this year for the first time since then. Murphy was a high contact hitter this year (only 38 strikeouts in 499 at bats), and has been a consistently decent hitter for average the last 5 years, but this power seems to have come from nowhere. It’s hard to imagine Murphy continuing what he did in the first two rounds, but then it was pretty hard to imagine him doing it in the first place. Advantage – Mets (though, baseball being baseball, Murphy could go 0 for the World Series and it wouldn’t be that shocking) 3B – Mike Moustakas (KCR) vs David Wright (NYM) Both men have struggled in the playoffs so far, with identical .167 batting averages, but Wright has drawn 9 walks in 9 games, and Moustakas has drawn 2 walks in 11 games. Moustakas made huge strides this year and is looking a bit like the star that many prospect lists predicted. Wright, meanwhile struggled with injuries this year, but hit well when he was in the lineup, and frankly I like his chances to handle KC’s starting pitching more than Moose’s chances at handling the Mets starters. Advantage - Mets SS – Alcides Escobar (KCR) vs Wilmer Flores (NYM) Hot hitting and ALCS MVP aside, Escobar is not a great hitter (career OBP of .298, which is higher than his full season mark this year of .293), but then, neither is Flores (OBP of .295 in his first full season this year). Flores is just 24, nearly 5 years younger than his counterpart with the Royals. Right now, Escobar is a bit more established and has been an excellent defensive shortstop during his career. And yes, I’m giving Daniel Murphy a bit more credit for his NLCS than Escobar, but his hitting does seem a bit more well-rounded. Advantage - Royals LF – Alex Gordon (KCR) vs Michael Conforto & Juan Lagares* (NYM) The asterisk there is because Lagares will probably play CF when he plays, shifting Cespedes to LF (and I might guess Conforto at DH during games in Kansas City). For the long term, Conforto is a good looking hitting prospect, but he is just 22 and has struggled so far in the playoffs. Gordon has been a very good player the past 5 seasons, and one of the best fielders in LF in the league. I’d probably rather have Conforto for the next 5 years than Gordon, given that Gordon will be 32 next year and struggled with some injuries this year, but for now he is the better player. Advantage - Royals CF – Lorenzo Cain (KCR) vs Yoenis Cespedes (NYM) Cespedes got a little bit overrated thanks to the Mets hot play in the second half that coincided with his arrival, but he actually accumulated 6.3 WAR this year vs 7.2 for Cain, so this is closer than you might think. Cain hits for a slightly higher average, with more speed, less power, and excellent fielding. Cespedes is an above average fielder in LF, though maybe not in CF, but has a great arm, and hits for very good power (83 extra base hits this year). Both have been decent in the playoffs, though neither has had to carry their respective teams. They have fairly different strengths but they balance out pretty well. Advantage – Royals (very slight – this came close to being a second tie) RF – Alex Rios (KCR) vs Curtis Granderson (NYM) Two of the older players in the starting lineups at 34 years old. Rios hit better than expected in the first two rounds of the playoffs, but has really struggled in the last two regular seasons. Granderson, meanwhile, had his best season since 2011 this year, though the slide of the two years before may be more likely to continue than his performance this year. Advantage - Mets DH – Kendrys Morales (KCR) vs Michael Conforto? (NYM) Morales was much better than expected this season for the Royals, and has hit 4 home runs in 11 playoff games so far this year, though he is a definite threat to hit into a double play when there is a runner on first. If the DH here is Conforto, he has every chance to break out or continue to struggle. Hopefully the Mets don’t go the Cuddyer route, but it’s hard to say. Morales will probably be relegated to pinch hit duty when the series shifts to New York, unless they decide they want his bat more than Alex Rios and try putting Hosmer in RF (which would probably be a bad decision). Advantage – Royals (kind of by default) Bench – Drew Butera (C), Paulo Orlando (OF), Jarrod Dyson (OF), Terrance Gore (OF), Christian Colon (IF) (KCR) vs Kevin Plawecki (C), Matt Reynolds (IF), Kelly Johnson (UT), Juan Uribe (IF) or Kirk Neuwenhuis (OF), Michael Cuddyer (OF/1B) The Royals bench is mostly pinch runners. If Juan Uribe is healthy enough to make the roster, he might get some big at bats, maybe even a start at some point, though that’s hard to predict. Advantage – Mets (kind of by default, since Yost isn’t likely to do much with his beyond run) SP – Johnny Cueto (RHP), Yordano Ventura (RHP), Edinson Volquez (RHP), Chris Young (RHP) (KCR) vs Jacob deGrom (RHP), Noah Syndergaard (RHP), Matt Harvey (RHP), Steven Matz (LHP) (NYM) The numbers above tell one side of the story. Here’s another side. Maximum and Average Velocity this season and this playoffs for each pitcher: Mets deGrom 99.03 mph / 95.81 mph Syndergaard 101.33 mph / 97.78 mph Harvey 100.23 mph / 96.54 mph Matz 96.93 mph / 94.57 mph Cueto 97.27 mph / 93.24 mph Ventura 100.54 mph / 96.92 mph Volquez 98.21 mph / 95.04 mph Young 90.16 mph / 87.18 mph There is going to be some heat in game 2 if Ventura matches up with Syndergaard. Or game 3 if he matches up with Harvey. That the Mets slowest fastball averages just under 95 mph with a max of just under 97 mph is kind of terrifying. These are their starting pitchers, not their bullpen. deGrom, the NL Rookie of the Year last year is actually the oldest of the 4 Mets at 27 years old. Harvey is 26, Syndergaard is 23, and Matz 24. All of which is to say, this team may not go away soon. The Royals starters seem almost geriatric at 29, 24, 32 and 36 years old. This may be the difference maker in this series. Advantage - Mets RP – Wade Davis (RHP), Ryan Madson (RHP), Kelvin Herrera (RHP), Luke Hochevar (RHP), Kris Medlen (RHP), Franklin Morales (LHP), Danny Duffy (LHP) (KCR) vs Jeurys Familia (RHP), Tyler Clippard (RHP), Bartolo Colon (RHP), Addison Reed (RHP), Jonathon Niese (LHP), Hansel Robles (RHP), Erik Goeddel (RHP) (NYM) The Royals have the more famous bullpen after their success last year and this year, but the Mets have an effective group, including Jeurys Familia and his nearly 95 mph split-finger fastball (now that just seems unfair). The Royals prefer to shorten the game by going to their bullpen (55 IP in 11 starts), while the Mets are happy to let their starters dominate a little more (54.1 IP in 9 starts – though 44.2 IP in 7 starts by their top 3 guys). The Mets will want to take a lead in the first 5-6 innings, in general, though that’s probably the Royals preferred strategy as well. Advantage – Royals On offense, the Royals might have a slight advantage, though the Mets have been pretty good in the second half of the season, with their regular season numbers dragged down by struggles early on. The playoff numbers are dragged down a bit by having to face Kershaw and Greinke for 4 games in the first round as well. Among the pitchers, the Mets have a great rotation and a decent bullpen, and the Royals have a decent rotation and a great bullpen. As with last round, I like the advantage that this gives the Mets. Prediction – Mets in 6 Imagine on July 28, when the Blue Jays had sunk to 50-51, that somebody had told you that in just under 3 months, the Jays would be starting David Price (!) in Game 6 of the ALCS (!!) with a chance to start Marcus Stroman (!!!) in Game 7 if they won.
It has felt almost disappointing to see the Jays drop 3 of the first 4 games in this series after how well they played in the last third of the season, taking the American League East for the first time in 22 years. But honestly, they've come so far, they've given us two full rounds (so far) of playoff baseball, and energized the whole country. There would be no shame in losing to Kansas City (a sentence that might have sounded strange 18 months ago) in the ALCS. They are the defending American League Champion, they had the best record in the AL this year, and they were one Madison Bumgarner from being defending World Champion. That the Jays still have more than a fighting chance to beat them is pretty awesome. Much has been written about David Price, about his use, about his playoff record. I read today that he feels like his problem in some of his playoff starts has been trying to be a little too perfect, make his pitches be a little bit too fine. He is one of the top pitchers in the league, and if he can just relax and pitch his game tomorrow, the Jays would have every chance to win, and then have a rematch of Game 3 to move on. It's hard to win on the road, and Kansas City has been great at home, but the Jays have shown resilience so far in the playoffs, and are now 4-0 when facing elimination. I hope they can make that 6-0 by the end of Saturday, but either way, Canada will remember this team, and they'll be back next year, to defend whatever they have accomplished. I have to say, I'm pretty happy with how my predictions for the Division Series ended up. I hadn't expected to go 4/4, but with normal luck, I could easily go 0/2 in this round. But given the one pick I have already made, I hope I at least get that one right. Check a couple of posts ago for a preview of the Jays Royals series.
The Jays have announced that their rotation will go as follows: Marco Estrada, David Price, Marcus Stroman, R.A. Dickey, Estrada (if necessary), Price (if necessary), Stroman (if necessary). The Royals are lined up as follows: Edinson Volquez, Yordano Ventura, Johnny Cueto, TBD (Kris Medlen or Chris Young probably), Volquez (if necessary), Ventura (if necessary), Cueto (if necessary). Chicago Cubs (97-65) vs New York Mets (90-72) The Mets have home field advantage because they won their division, while the Cubs actually came in 3rd in the tough NL central even though their raw record was actually 3rd best across Major League Baseball. Before the NLDS round started, I thought that the Cubs best chance to beat the Cardinals would be to steal some runs against a tough pitching staff with their young bats and at least get one great start out of their ace, Jake Arrieta. As it turned out, their offense was the key. And they did win Arrieta's start, but allowed the most runs of any of the 4 games in the series, because of course they did. On the Mets side, I thought they might have a good shot at getting to the Dodgers bullpen and break through against Brett Anderson. The second part was exactly right, as they won game 3 by a 13-7 score, but the bullpen wasn't the Dodgers' main issue, it was the Mets young starters, who matched up with Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke and beat them each once, which was just enough. Now the Mets find themselves in the reasonably familiar version of underdog. Despite being a New York team, they often find themselves in the shadow of the team in the Bronx in headlines, attention, and money spent. And against the Dodgers' $307 million payroll they were definitely facing a perceived Goliath. What might be less familiar to them is the roll of villain, as America is embracing the young Cubs team and hoping for them to end their 107-year title drought and prove Marty McFly right (though they won't be facing a team from Miami in the World Series – but the fact that they made that prediction is impressive in and of itself because at the time, there was no team in Miami). Many have already noted that the Mets went a very unimpressive 0-7 against the Cubs this year. (Aside – the Mets actually went winless against two teams this year (Cubs: 0-7, Pirates 0-6) and undefeated against two other teams (Reds: 7-0, Rockies: 7-0). I'm not sure how often that has happened, but it is at least curious). All 7 of those games, however, came before the All Star Break, before the Mets had made their trade deadline moves. The last loss to the Cubs dropped the Mets to 40-40. They would go 50-32 the rest of the way. The Cubs victory raised their record to 42-35. They would go an even better 55-30 the rest of the way. Which is all to say, probably throw out those results. Both teams are better now, and have some different players. Also, rather than type out all of the stats for each position, I'll mention if anything stands out among any of the players here. For Cubs playoff stats, click here, and for the Mets, click here. I'll also generally put their most likely starters unless it's likely that one position will see some change. Joe Maddon of the Cubs does seem to switch things around depending on matchups and other things, so guys in the Bench section may seem some real time. C – Miguel Montero, David Ross (CHC) vs Travis d'Arnaud (NYM) Neither team received much offense from its catching, though d'Arnaud did hit a home run against the Dodgers. Offensively, d'Arnaud is probably a bit better than Montero at this point, and has a good future if he can stay healthy (which has been an issue for him). The Cubs receivers are among the best in the game at pitch framing, and are working with some veteran pitchers, but d'Arnaud was actually better on a per game basis than Montero this year. Advantage – Mets 1B – Anthony Rizzo (CHC) vs Lucas Duda (NYM) Rizzo hit two big home runs for the Cubs against the Cardinals, but has only had one other hit in the playoffs so far. Duda managed to strike out 11 times in 18 at bats after having to face 3 left-handed starters in the Dodgers series. The Cubs do have one tough lefty in Jon Lester, but he may do a bit better against their third and fourth men. Advantage - Cubs 2B – Javier Baez (probably – Addison Russell will miss NLCS) (CHC) vs Daniel Murphy (NYM) Daniel Murphy, who had very little success against left-handed pitching during the regular season, managed to hit two home runs off of Clayton Kershaw, plus the game winning home run against Zack Greinke. It will be quite a story if he can continue his performance against Lester in game 1. Javier Baez will probably take over for Addison Russell for this series, and has gone 4/5 with a home run so far in the playoffs. He has a bright future, but can be pretty strikeout prone, so he'll have some tough matchups against the Mets. Advantage – Mets (though in the long term, probably the Cubs) 3B – Kris Bryant (CHC) vs David Wright (NYM) David Wright has had a fine career, and is one of the best Mets of all time, but he is 32 now, has struggled with injuries the last couple of years (and this year in particular), and has not looked great so far in the playoffs. Bryant may be one of baseball's new superstars after a great rookie season. He could also see some time at other positions in this series, as Joe Maddon is happy to move people around for matchups. Advantage - Cubs SS – Starlin Castro (see note from 2B) (CHC) vs Wilmer Flores (NYM) It is possible that Baez will actually play SS and keep Castro at 2B, but for now I'll go with these as comparisons. Flores is another injury replacement after Ruben Tejada's leg was broken by Chase Utley early in the Dodgers series, although he did get significant playing time during the season. Castro has had some ups and downs in his career already, though he is only 25 still. Advantage – Cubs (same advantages if Castro and Baez are swapped) LF – Kyle Schwarber (CHC) vs Michael Conforto & Juan Lagares (NYM) Schwarber is quickly turning into a fan favourite with his slightly round physique and a penchant for absolutely destroying baseballs, including one that landed on top of the Cubs huge scoreboard in right field, where it will stay permanently. Conforto was a highly touted prospect for the Mets as well, and had a solid regular season, though he hasn't yet displayed quite the flare for the dramatic of Schwarber. In games that Lagares plays, he is more likely to move to CF and shift Cespedes over to LF probably. Neither Schwarber nor Conforto are exceptional fielders, but both can provide plenty of fireworks at the plate. Advantage - Cubs CF – Dexter Fowler (CHC) vs Yoenis Cespedes (NYM) Fowler has had a good playoffs so far, starting with a strong game in the Wild Card matchup against the Pirates. He helps get the Cubs offense going at the top of the lineup. Cespedes has been a huge part of the Mets second half success this year, and has a flair for the dramatic, including great (thought in my opionion, not quite Bautista-esque) bat flips. Advantage - Mets RF – Jorge Soler (CHC) vs Curtis Granderson (NYM) Soler didn't start the first couple of games for the Cubs, but after reaching base in 9 consecutive plate appearances, his numbers (.571/.769/1.571 over 13 plate appearances) demanded a spot in the lineup. He can be very strikeout prone, though he has 6 walks vs 1 strikeout so far in the playoffs. Granderson had a very good year after 3 years of declining performance, but at age 34 he is likely still on the downslope of a fine career. Advantage - Cubs Bench – Austin Jackson (OF), Chris Coghlan (OF), Chris Denorfia (OF), Tommy La Stella (IF), Ross (C), Jonathan Herrera (IF – possible Russell replacement) (CHC) vs Kelly Johnson (UT), Michael Cuddyer (1B/OF), Kevin Plawecki (C), Matt Reynolds (IF), Kirk Nieuwenhuis (OF) The Cubs players are more likely to see playing time as Joe Maddon mixes his lineups and makes defensive replacements (Schwarber in particular seems to come out late in games), and they have some quality players on their bench. David Ross may get into the starting lineup when Jon Lester pitches as well. Advantage - Cubs SP – Jon Lester (LHP), Jake Arrieta (RHP), Kyle Hendricks (RHP), Jason Hammel (RHP) (CHC) vs Matt Harvey (RHP), Noah Syndergaard (RHP), Jacob deGrom (RHP), Steven Matz (LHP) (NYM) The Cubs have announced already that Jon Lester will pitch game 1, and Jake Arrieta will go in game 2. If the series goes at least 6 games, both starter would pitch twice, and evidently Maddon wants to give Arrieta one extra day off after a long start against Pittsburgh and some struggles against St. Louis. The Mets showed their strength against the Dodgers, and if you thought there were a lot of strikeouts in that series, their could be some serious whiffing in this one as the Cubs led MLB in strikeouts by 126 more than the second place team during the regular season (and 260 more than the Dodgers in particular). The Cubs may have an advantage in 2 of the games this series, but if it were to go 7 games, the Mets might have the better starter in 5 of them, depending on your feelings around Harvey vs Lester. Advantage - Mets RP – Hector Rondon (RHP), Trevor Cahill (RHP), Pedro Strop (RHP), Travis Wood (LHP), Clayton Richard (LHP), Fernando Rodney (RHP), Justin Grimm (RHP) (CHC) vs Jeurys Familia (RHP), Addison Reed (RHP), Tyler Clippard (RHP), Bartolo Colon (RHP), Hansel Robles (RHP), Jonathon Niese (LHP), Erik Goeddel (RHP) (NYM) Neither team has an exceptionally big name in their bullpen, and both have a couple of guys who have usually worked as starters in their careers (Cahill and Wood for Chicago, Colon and Niese for New York). It's hard to pick one group who will have the advantage here, though Joe Maddon's creativity could tilt it slightly in favour of the Cubs. On the other hand, look at “closers”, Familia probably is better than Rondon. Advantage – Cubs (slight, mostly because of manager). I said up at the top that the Mets 0-7 record against the Cubs shouldn't matter for these purposes (not least because that's just not that many games). The Cubs scored just 27 runs in winning those 7 games, but held the Mets to 11. I can see them pitching well particularly in Arrieta's starts (though he did struggle in his last start), but the Mets pitching really looked excellent against the Dodgers. In a matchup of young fireballing pitchers against a young powerful offense, the Cubs' huge propensity for strikeouts (just under 9 per game in the regular season) might turn into an Achilles heel against the Mets' rotation. Prediction – Mets in 7 (sorry America) Wow. Guys (and girls)... wow. Did you see what happened? I guess we might as well go over the craziness, because, some things happened today.
For the first 6 innings of game 5 of the Toronto-Texas series, things were pretty close. Marcus Stroman had been excellent, minus a fat pitch to Shin-Soo Choo in the 3rd inning. Cole Hamels had been excellent until a fat pitch that Edwin Encarnacion destroyed (and boy did he know it) in the 6th inning. Then the 7th inning happened. Go ahead and read Grant Brisbee's description of it, because he does it as much justice as anybody can. Twitter was going berserk. The shortened version of it: Rougned Odor reached to lead off the 7th for the Rangers. He moved to 2nd on a bunt, then to 3rd on a groundout. Then, Russell Martin went to throw the ball back to Aaron Sanchez when... something happened? There was a lot of confusion as the home plate umpire initially ruled the ball dead when it bounced off of Choo's bat on the throw, but then after some questions from the Rangers' manager and a conference of the umpires, they awarded Odor home plate (and the go ahead run), and Toronto fan's lost their minds. It was ugly, and I hope not an indicator of what Canadians are like (although the way Vancouver behaved after losing a Stanley Cup... I don't know). (By the way, that's one of the first times Harold Reynolds was right about something, which Twitter also enjoyed.) So Toronto trailed 3-2 on a very controversial call going into the bottom of the 7th. This is when things went from strange to truly bizarre. First, Russell Martin reached on an error by SS Elvis Andrus. Then, Kevin Pillar grounded to 1B Mitch Moreland, who bounced his throw to Andrus for the attempted force, and both runners were safe on the error. Martin was then replaced with a pinch runner, which came in handy when Dalton Pompey raced to third on a bunt by Ryan Goins, which 3B Adrian Beltre threw to Andrus, who dropped the ball again. After Ben Revere grounded to Moreland for a force at home, Josh Donaldson popped the ball just over Rougned Odor's head for an RBI forceout, when Revere was thrown out at second after retreating before the ball cleared Odor. The game was tied with two outs. And then Jose Bautista stepped up. People, bat flips are awesome. And this made the fans go even more berserk, which led to Encarnacion trying to shush them, which led to Rangers P Sam Dyson getting mad because he thought EE was trying to rile them up (which, really? I mean, really?), which led to a bench-clearing... something (those are much less awesome, and mostly just dumb). Anyway, this led to Mark Buehrle getting ejected, a fan getting thrown out or arrested, and then Sam Dyson slapped Troy Tulowitzki on the behind, as players will do, but usually teammates (but whatever), and this led to another clearing of the benches. To quote Grant Brisbee directly: "The baseball gods are on peyote and throwing flaming furniture off the roof, and there isn't a damned thing we can do about it." The rest of the game was relatively calm, though 20-year-old Roberto Osuna did come in to a 1 out, 2 on situation and shut the door in the 8th, then slammed it in the 9th, and boy that kid looks like he has a future. While it wasn't quite the easy victory in the LDS that I thought it might be, the Jays were able to pull it out, and now they get to go back to the ALCS for the first time in 22 years. And they will meet the same franchise they played the very first time they made the playoffs 30 years ago. While the Royals series overall was pretty dramatic (and their game 4 had a whole bunch of other craziness including that blown 4-run 8th-inning lead by the Astros), in the end they put away game 5 in the 5th inning. Johnny Cueto was everything the Royals hoped for when they traded for him in late July. I mean, he was really really good. Royals superfan Rany Jazayerli tweeted "It's taken Johnny Cueto less than two hours to undo all the damage from his last two months." He made exactly 2 mistakes over 8 innings and 92 pitches, allowing a single and a 2-run home run in the 2nd inning. No other Astro reached base against him, and the Royals got 1 back in the 4th, 3 in the 5th, and 3 more in the 8th. After not reaching the playoffs for 29 years, the Royals have gotten back to at least the ALCS for the second year in a row. And for the second year in a row, I'm hoping that the team I'm rooting for might end their season before its ultimate goal. But first, let's preview! The preview! Toronto Blue Jays (93-69, 3-2 in ALDS) vs Kansas City Royals (95-67, 3-2 in ALDS) I'll forgo giving the full stats again since they're all in the ALDS previews, but I'll at least compare the positions a bit and give some stats from the first round. C - Russell Martin (3/15, 2 2B, 1 BB, 3 K, 2 R, 1 RBI) & Dioner Navarro (1/5, 1 2B, 1 R) (TOR) vs Salvador Perez (KC) (4/14, 2 HR, 2 BB, 3 K, 3 R, 4 RBI) (KCR) Russell Martin had 15-30 minutes of worrying about costing the Blue Jays the series after that play in the top of the 7th inning, but after getting picked up by Joey Bats, all is good in his world. Both catchers are very important to their teams, though Perez has shown a bit of an ability to come up big in the playoffs the last couple of years. Advantage - Blue Jays (believe in defense and eye) 1B - Chris Colabello (6/16, 2 2B, 1 HR, 1 BB, 5 K, 3 R, 2 RBI) & Justin Smoak (0/6, 3 K) (TOR) vs Eric Hosmer (4/21, 1 HR, 4 K, 3 R, 5 RBI) (KCR) The Jays finally decided that Justin Smoak was not going to cut it in a starting lineup against some tough left-handed pitching. Although the Royals are entirely right-handed with their starting staff, I wouldn't be surprised to see Colabello get some more playing time after hitting well in the opening series. Still though, Hosmer is probably the more consistent player here overall, including on the field. Advantage - Royals 2B - Ryan Goins (0/17, 1 BB, 5 K, 1 R) (TOR) vs Ben Zobrist (6/18, 1 2B, 2 BB, 2 K, 2 R, 2 RBI) (KCR) It is a good thing Goins keeps coming up huge on defense, because he was a disaster at the plate in the first round. But his defense is very important to the Blue Jays, and with a high-contact team like Kansas City, that could become even more crucial during this round. Still, Zobrist can really hit, and 0/17 is a bad look. Advantage - Royals 3B - Josh Donaldson (4/18, 1 2B, 2 HR, 3 BB, 4 K, 5 R, 4 RBI) (TOR) vs Mike Moustakas (2/18, 1 2B, 2 BB, 2 K, 1 R) (KCR) The probably AL MVP made his hits count, picking up 11 bases on 4 hits, and tying up game 5 with the bloop fielder's choice in the 7th. He also played well on defense. Moustakas had a bit of a tough round by the numbers, but is still a good part of Kansas City's lineup overall. Advantage - Blue Jays SS - Troy Tulowitzki (2/21, 1 HR, 2 BB, 7 K, 2 R, 4 RBI) (TOR) vs Alcides Escobar (6/21, 1 2B, 1 3B, 4 K, 3 R) (KCR) Tulo seemed to struggle to find his timing for a lot of this series, but during a tight game 3 in Texas, with Toronto hoping to grab a win after dropping the first two at home, he came up big with a long 3-run homer in the 6th to help put the game away. Meanwhile, Escobar hit well atop the Royals lineup despite all previous evidence suggesting he should be much lower in the order. Still, I'm going with overall track record here. Advantage - Blue Jays LF - Ben Revere (7/23, 1 BB, 3 R, 1 RBI) (TOR) vs Alex Gordon (4/17, 1 2B, 1 HR, 2 BB, 5 K, 2 R, 2 RBI) (KCR) Revere was helpful in some key situations late in games when a strikeout would have been crippling, as he managed to avoid going down on strikes throughout the series. His high contact approach would fit in well with the Royals lineup. Alex Gordon has been one of Kansas City's best players for quite a while now, and the Jays should be careful of him when they are on the basepaths. Advantage - Royals CF - Kevin Pillar (7/21, 2 2B, 1 HR, 5 K, 3 R, 4 RBI) (TOR) vs Lorenzo Cain (5/20, 1 2B, 1 HR, 2 BB, 5 K, 5 R, 2 RBI) (KCR) In a year without Josh Donaldson and Mike Trout, Lorenzo Cain might have been a very good MVP candidate. And in a year without Kevin Kiermaier and specific awards for each of the 3 outfield positions, Lorenzo Cain and Kevin Pillar might both have warranted Gold Gloves for their outfield work this year. But life isn't always fair, and it certainly won't seem fair for hitters on both sides trying to find the gaps in the outfield in this series. Advantage - Royals RF - Jose Bautista (6/22, 2 2B, 2 HR, 1 BB, 2 K, 3 R, 5 RBI) (TOR) vs Alex Rios (4/14, 2 2B, 3 BB, 5 K, 3 R, 2 RBI) (KCR) Once a minor star for the Blue Jays, Alex Rios' star has fallen quite a bit over the last few years, and there are many who would rather he not be in the Royals lineup at all. Still, he did drive in the go ahead run in their clinching game 5, and has not been a total zero at the plate in this series. But track record is track record, and this one isn't close. Advantage - Blue Jays DH - Edwin Encarnacion (6/18, 1 2B, 1 HR, 5 BB, 1 K, 3 R, 3 RBI) (TOR) vs Kendrys Morales (5/19, 3 HR, 1 BB, 4 K, 3 R, 6 RBI) (KCR) Morales was a controversial signing in the offseason, but has been big for the Royals all year, and during the first round of the playoffs. He is a dangerous switch hitter who Jays pitchers will have to watch out for, but he can be pitched around. Encarnacion has been one of the top hitters in the American League over the past 3 years, and gives the Royals no breaks through the middle of the Jays lineup. Advantage - Blue Jays Bench - Ezequiel Carrera (0/1), Cliff Pennington (0/1), Dalton Pompey, Navarro, Smoak (TOR) vs Paulo Orlando (0/1), Jarrod Dyson (0/1, 2 SB), Drew Butera, Terrance Gore (1 SB) (KCR) You're more likely to see somebody for the Blue Jays actually get an at bat or two (or a start, in Navarro's case), where the Royals are more likely to provide pinch running with the Dyson-Gore combination. Advantage - Blue Jays SP - David Price (10.0 IP, 11 H, 8 ER, 2 HR, 2 BB, 7 K), Marcus Stroman (13.0 IP, 11 H, 5 ER, 1 HR, 3 BB, 9 K), Marco Estrada (6.1 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 4 K), R.A. Dickey (4.2 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 3 K) (TOR) vs Johnny Cueto (14.0 IP, 9 H, 6 ER, 2 HR, 3 BB, 13 K), Yordano Ventura (7.0 IP, 8 H, 6 ER, 2 HR, 4 BB, 10 K), Edinson Volquez (5.2 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, 4 BB, 8 K), Kris Medlen (DNP) (KCR) The Royals didn't use their 4th starter after a rain delay in game 1 limited Yordano Ventura to 2 innings in the game, letting him come back on "short rest" for game 4. Meanwhile, Jays game 1 starter David Price struggled, and came back in game 4 to pitch 3 innings of relief. It isn't certain who will start game 1 for either team, though Marco Estrada has been rumoured. David Price would be on 3 days rest since his relief outing, which should be more than enough for having thrown 50 pitches. Either way, Marcus Stroman is likely to pitch game 3 at home, with R.A. Dickey going for game 4. As mentioned above, Johnny Cueto finally looked like the ace the Royals were hoping for. Ventura and Volquez were both decent without being dominant, and Kris Medlen did not appear in the first round. Advantage - Blue Jays RP - Roberto Osuna (5.2 IP, 0 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 6 K), Aaron Sanchez (5.1 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 6 K), Mark Lowe (1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 2 K), Aaron Loup (1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 0 K), Liam Hendriks (0.1 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 0 K), Ryan Tepera (DNP) (TOR) vs Wade Davis (4.0 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 5 K), Kelvin Herrera (3.0 IP, 2 H, 1 ER, 2 BB, 6 K), Ryan Madson (3.0 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 3 HR, 0 BB, 7 K), Luke Hochevar (2.2 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K), Chris Young (4.0 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 1 HR, 2 BB, 7 K), Danny Duffy (0.2 IP, 1 H, 1 ER, 1 HR, 0 BB, 0 K), Franklin Morales (DNP) (KCR) This would seem like an advantage for Kansas City coming into the playoffs, but one of their big three (Ryan Madson) struggled a lot against the Royals, while youngsters Roberto Osuna and Aaron Sanchez were brilliant in their playoff introductions (11 IP, 3 H, 1 BB, 12 K), eating up most of the relief innings after Brett Cecil went down with a torn calf muscle. His loss is a blow to the Jays, especially with the tough left-handed bats in the Royals lineup. If the series goes deep, it will be interesting to see how Gibbons manages workloads. Thoughts also are with Aaron Loup as he had to miss games 4 and 5 for a much-more-important-than-baseball family emergency. Advantage - Royals As you might expect with two teams that had such evenly matched records, this one is pretty tough to call. Joe Posnanski made the point during the last week of the season that should these teams meet in the ALCS, home field might play into it a lot, as both teams played much better in their home parks (Toronto 53-28 vs 40-41, Kansas City 51-30 vs 44-37). The season series was pretty close, as Toronto took 4 of 7, going 1-2 in Kansas City in early July, then 3-1 in Toronto July 30-August 2 as they remade their team and started on their journey to the playoffs. I think this will be a well-matched series, but I like that Toronto is tough to strike out (thought not quite as much as Kansas City), but tends to hit for a lot more power, and I like their starting rotation because I don't think David Price's struggles will continue. Prediction - Blue Jays in 7 Playoff baseball is just the best. Even better, when you maximize the amount of it. In the first round, of a possible 20 games, by the end of tomorrow, we will have seen 19 games. Three of the four series are going the full 5 games, and in the other, the only team to win 100 games of course lost in 4 games to a team that hasn't won a World Series in 107 years and had never clinched a playoff series in their 99-year-old stadium.
Jays fans came into the first round pretty confident, given the team's performance, and a lot of prognostications (including this rather inexpert one) that they would win easily in the first round. The team left Toronto down 2-0 and looking anything but alive, but after bludgeoning Texas in back-to-back victories, they get a third game in Toronto to try to pull the series out after all. Toronto vs Texas - Game 5 - Wednesday at 4:00 ET - Cole Hamels vs Marcus Stroman When the Rangers picked up Cole Hamels at the trade deadline, it seemed like the best case would be him helping them in the playoffs next year, but they made a big push to get to the playoffs, and now Hamels is on the mound for an elimination game for them. Meanwhile, after a strong rookie season last year, it looked like Stroman was going to be part of next year for the Jays when he tore his ACL in spring training. But his now famous training story brought him back to the team by September, and he has been a huge part of their end-of-season success. After their imported ace struggled a bit in the first game of the series, and then pitched 3 innings of highly debated relief in game 4, Stroman got the call for game 5. As an aside, much has been made of Gibbons' call to pitch David Price for 3 innings of seemingly low leverage relief in game 4. I didn't think it was an absolutely necessary call, but it was something he believed in, and as Houston fans can tell you, once you're up, don't let the other team back into the game. I might not have made the same call, but it was a must-win game, and Gibbons decided that was how they were going to ensure the win, and they did win, so they have a chance to go to the ALCS now. I think they'll win tonight. I thought they'd win the series before it started, and after a rocky start, I think they've found their footing and should play well at home as they did during most of the regular season. But it is one game, and prediction one game is awfully tough. Houston vs Kansas City - Game 5 - Wednesday at 8:00 ET - Collin McHugh vs Johnny Cueto The Royals were hoping to pick up an ace when they traded for Johnny Cueto, but his performance for them this year has been spotty to say the least. He pitched reasonably well in game 2 at home, in one of the Royals' two wins in this series, and they're hoping for more of the same. Meanwhile, McHugh had a strong start for Houston in game 1 of the series, which they won in Kansas City. This has been a pretty well matched series, with both teams splitting the games in both stadiums so far. My guess is still that the Royals are likely to pull this out with the game at home and a strong bullpen. Either way, I'll try to preview the ALCS at the end of the night or in the morning. For the record: New York vs Los Angeles - Game 5 - Thursday at 8:00 ET - Jacob deGrom vs Zack Greinke This will be an excellent pitching matchup. Or it will be another 13-7 game like game 3? This has been a good back and forth series. Clayton Kershaw has started to shut down the narrative that he can't pitch in the playoffs after yesterday's strong performance against the Mets. But if you watched game 1, you saw Jacob deGrom dominate the Dodgers, striking out 13 in 7 innings while allowing 5 hits and no runs. I'm not going to change my prediction now about the Mets winning, I think deGrom will give them a chance to go through to the next round. Enjoy the games today! And remember, win or lose, it's been a great round of playoff baseball. Assorted thoughts, and musings about the playoffs, about some controversial plays, about the Blue Jays so far...
So I opined in my last entry that there was no need to panic about the Blue Jays losing in game 1. I believed it, and I still think that was true. If you are the type of person who "panics" about the sports team you follow losing or getting eliminated, I guess now it could be reasonable to do so. I'm a little bit disappointed that those fans in Canada and people who are finding or getting back into the sport may not have a chance to see them play further than this round. But that's life sometimes. Every series will have a winner and a loser, and right now the Rangers have capitalized on their opportunities, and the Blue Jays have not. Anyway, I might as well start with the Blue Jays. What has happened, people probably want to know? More in a metaphorical sense. What has literally happened is that they have lost 2 games. Their record during the regular season when scoring either 3 or 4 runs was an almost hard to fathom 12-25, and after two playoff games, it is 0-2. A quick statistical comparison to other playoff teams this year: Astros - 26-21 Rangers - 22-15 Royals - 31-9 Mets - 26-22 Cardinals - 42-21 (That's 63 of 162 games!) Cubs - 23-20 Dodgers - 20-20 So if you're keeping score here, that would be 190-128, or a .597 winning percentage among the other 7 playoff teams. The Jays somehow managed a .324 winning percentage. The Missouri teams combined to go 73-30 somehow in games while scoring only 3 or 4 runs. The Jays tacked onto that by going 4-31 when scoring 2 runs or less. So to combine statistics, Toronto went 16-57 if they scored 4 runs or fewer. They went 77-12 if they scored 5 runs or more. This is all a bit of a diversion from the fact that the Jays just had trouble either putting guys on base, or advancing those same guys. In game 1, the Jays reached base 7 times and scored 3 times, the Rangers reached base 9 times and scored 5 times. They managed 2 doubles and 1 home run to 1 double and 2 home runs for the Rangers. It's easy to say 1 extra home run might have made the difference for the Jays, but it might have. They just had trouble, whether it was pressing too hard, squeezing the bat a little too tight, or something else. Game 2 was more of the same, missing opportunities, and providing a couple too many to Texas, including with poor glovework, which again may have been a bit of pressure and nerves. I'm not a psychologist, and I'm not in the clubhouse. There's a possibility that while the big crowds of September provided a boost to the home 9, that they are feeling pressure in being the first Jays team in the playoffs in 22 years and trying to do a little bit too much. But they have veterans who have experience at this kind of thing. The truth is, losing two games in a row is not too hard to do, it just happens to have come at an inopportune time. If you just want to consider the Jays over their last 62 games, once they added Tulowitzki, Revere, Price, Hawkins and Lowe and really became the juggernaut that they seemed to be, they lost 2 games in a row 5 different times, but they never lost 3 in a row. If there's something positive to be taken from this, it's that they're unlikely to lose a third in a row. Could it happen? Definitely, they lost two games already that people expected them to win. But they're now facing the Rangers 3rd and 4th best pitchers, two left-handers in an extreme hitters park. Could the road and some fallen expectations loosen them up and lead to some good things? Absolutely. One of my favourite teams in the last decade has been the San Francisco Giants for various reasons. I'll get into some of the teams I've liked and why in a future post, but I'm not a strict Blue Jays fan. I am strictly anti-Yankees though, that's an easy call. In 2012, the Giants lost the first two games at home to the Cincinnati Reds before going to Cincinnati for the last 3 games (this was when the scheduled the first two games at the home park of the lower-seeded team, an interesting approach). They won games 3 and 4 in Cincinnati, and then trailed 2-0 in game 5 until the 5th inning when Buster Posey created one of the best all-time catcher reactions with this play. So it isn't over. But today's game is literally must-win. I do sometimes laugh when people call games must-win, but literally if the Jays do not win today, their season is over. And if they do win today, tomorrow's game will also be literally must-win. And if they win both games, then game 5 in Toronto would be a must-win for both sides. All of that has avoided some of the "controversy" that came up in game 2 of the series. Rougned Odor, who has been a huge thorn in the side of the Blue Jays in the first two games, ran aggressively past second base on a single to right field in the top of the 14th inning. When Jose Bautista threw hard into second base he jumped back into the base while Troy Tulowitzki held the tag on him. It was a seemingly innocent play, but then slow-motion, hi-definition replay seemed to show that his foot might have come off the base for a split-second while the tag was still on him. There were two outs at the time, but the Rangers would drive in Odor and an insurance run, neither of which the Jays were able to match. Naturally, people on both sides of the argument jumped to some fun overreactions (America is conspiring against the Blue Jays because they hate Canada was a fun way to go, for example), but I would challenge an observer to find an angle that shows that he lost contact with the base. I wish he clearly had, but I watched every replay they showed, and I couldn't have sworn to it either way. With the policy of needing "clear evidence to overturn", the downside was that he was called safe originally. Had he been called out and the Rangers appealed, there may not have been sufficient evidence to then call him safe. Is this a problem with the replay policy? Maybe it is, but if all you can see is all you can see, then without building some kind of electronic sensors into things, a lot of that is going to have some interpretation in it. Another source of controversy was the strike zone called by home plate umpire Vic Carapazza. Somebody on Twitter had a statistic that Carapazza had the highest number of called strikeouts in the MLB this year. A look at that link from Brooks Baseball is interesting, because while there are a few calls that aren't very good, what was a bit frustrating for people watching was that he didn't seem to have a lot of consistency. In the vs LHH zone, there are a couple of pitches off the left edge that are called strike, and then several at about the same distance off the edge that aren't. So it was hard to know really what was going to happen from one pitch to -the next. In fairness to Carapazza, if we can be fair, he seemed to be inconsistent for both teams. He called several pitches strikes that should have been balls, and several pitches balls that should have been strikes. It is yet another argument for robot umpires, or an automated strikezone. Baseball Savant tracks umpires by percentage of balls in the strike zone not called strikes, and percentage of balls out of the strike zone called strikes. Out of 93 umpires (if I didn't miss any) Carapazza had the 18th highest percentage of pitches outside the zone called strikes, but the 18th lowest percentage of pitches in the zone called balls. Maybe he just calls too many strikes, period. The Jays have not had the only controversial plays in the playoffs so far though. Last night saw another instance of football being brought into baseball as Chase Utley tried to break up a double play by sliding/jumping/tackling Mets' shortstop Ruben Tejada without really going anywhere near second base. This happens a little too often, and although it is technically against the rules, it is rarely enforced. Last night though, it had more consequences than usual, as Tejada broke his leg on the play, similar to what happened to Pirates' shortstop Jung Ho Kang late in the season. While some players and former players jumped on Twitter to defend Utley's "hard nosed style of play", others took a more measured approach, noting that it was not really a baseball play, and I have to agree. While you are trying to to make good plays for your team and reach base, doing it at the expense of injuring another player is not a good play, period. After Buster Posey had his leg broken on a tackle at home plate in 2011, the play at the plate was changed to ban catchers from fully blocking the plate, but mostly to prevent having the baserunner dive at them. There are some people in baseball who suspect that this incident may finally be the straw that breaks this plays back, and puts in some harder rules on not sliding way past the base or way out of the baseline. Frankly I hope it is. The sport should be played hard, at full effort, but without one player ever injuring another player. And I absolutely include throwing at opposing players on this. I don't believe in "retribution" in any sport, be it baseball, hockey, or anything else. Some people get frustrated at hitters for "showing up" a pitcher. There's an easy answer. Strike them out the next time. Throwing a projectile at 90-100 mph at them is more assault than "playing the game the right way". With all that said, where are we now? Blue Jays vs Rangers Unfortunately most of you reading this are probably most familiar with this series. The one series that was predicted by every ESPN expert to have the same outcome is now the only series at 2-0 after 2 games, naturally the opposite of the predictions. The Jays have a chance to keep the series going tonight in Texas, with right-hander Marco Estrada facing Rangers' left-hander Martin Perez. Only a couple of Jays have faced Perez, but those who have have hit him pretty well, and Perez allowed all right-handed batters to hit .305/.342/.425 against him this year, which bodes well for the right-handed heavy Jays lineup. If they are able to win this game (no guarantee, especially after what happened on Thursday-Friday), they would face left-hander Derek Holland, who gave up 10 home runs in 178 at bats by right-handed hitters this year. If they are able to win that game as well, they would have to find a way to beat Yovani Gallardo for the first time in 4 tries this year. In any case, I imagine we're all hoping for a win today. Tonight - 8:00 - Marco Estrada (TOR) vs Martin Perez (TEX) Royals vs Astros After game 1, this looked like it might be another upset as the Astros pulled out a 5-2 victory, particularly with Royals fans worried about Johny Cueto's recent struggles. But the Royals were able to pull out a 5-4 victory in the second game. Their reward for that, unfortunately, is to face Dallas Keuchel and his 15-0 record at home in game 3. Fortunately for them, it should be the only time they would face him in this series, and as the Mets showed against Clayton Kershaw, any pitcher can lose a game, even if they play pretty well. Today - 4:00 - Edinson Volquez (KCR) vs Dallas Keuchel (HOU) Dodgers vs Mets Another series tied at 1 after two games that featured a combined total of 50 strikeouts by the two pitching staffs. The Mets now get to go home with a probably advantage in the game 3 pitching matchup of Brett Anderson vs Matt Harvey (and probably another good pile of whiffs for both teams). The pitching choices for games 4 and 5 have not been finalized yet, and it will be interesting to see whether there is desperation on one side or another. Tomorrow - Brett Anderson (LAD) vs Matt Harvey (NYM) Cardinals vs Cubs A third series tied at 1 after two games. John Lackey shut down the Cubs in game 1, but their bats came alive in game 2 to send the series back to Wrigley Field for games 3-4. Unfortunately for the Cardinals, they will have to face off against the absurd Jake Arrieta, who hasn't lost a game since July 25, when the opposing pitcher (Cole Hamels - then of Philadelphia, now with Texas) threw a no-hitter. Think about that. The current working formula for beating Jake Arrieta over the last 10 weeks or so is to not allow a single hit. If you allow any hits, turns out you lose. But, like with Houston, Arrieta will only be starting this one game in this series. The Cardinals will hope that they can scrape out a close win behind their tough pitching staff and then finish the Cubs off after that. Most of North America will hope that they do no such thing. Tomorrow - Michael Wacha (STL) vs Jake Arrieta (CHC) Enjoy, everybody! This title may be slightly misleading, but my question is this: is there a pitcher in the postseason this year who can carry a team on his back the way Madison Bumgarner did last year. Maybe you saw it, maybe you didn't. But last year Bumgarner pitched 52 2/3 innings over 4 series including 5 innings on 2 days rest in game 7 of the World Series while allowing all of 6 earned runs for an ERA just a hair north of 1. It was one of the most impressive postseason performances in a long time, if not ever, reminding viewers of Curt Schilling and Randy Johnson in 2002, Josh Beckett in 2003, everybody for the White Sox in 2005 (aside - that was an underrated performance I think. That was a team that didn't have one superstar pitcher, but hardly needed one, going 11-1 in the playoffs, and in the ALCS in particular, they used 1 relief pitcher to get a total of 2 outs over 5 games. Really think about that. And then maybe wonder if I underrated the Cardinals chances...
Toronto Blue Jays The best bet here is David Price, who has postseason experience, and has pitched exceptionally well in big games down the stretch for the Jays. Marcus Stroman could really show the world what he's got, but he probably won't be allowed to throw the kind of innings that Bumgarner did last year. Given their second half performance, this is a pitching staff that also has a chance to be something like those 2005 White Sox, just going game after game of dominance. Texas Rangers This may be why I have trouble seeing the Rangers even getting past the Blue Jays. Their innings and wins leader from this year also had a 4.66 ERA (Colby Lewis). Yovani Gallardo is a good pitcher, but hasn't shown that kind of dominance before. Cole Hamels put his team on his back potentially, but he has been a bit erratic this year and really struggled against the Blue Jays in the past. He would be their best bet I think. Houston Astros Anybody who watched Dallas Keuchel dominate the Yankees and looked at his numbers for this season can see an easy pick here. He's 27, so his arm shouldn't be too much of a worry. He averaged 7 innings per start all year. He's already got a playoff beard in full swing. Kansas City Royals This is a weapon missing from their arsenal. They were hoping Johnny Cueto might be that guy, but he really struggled for most of his time in Kansas City. If he finds what he had early in the year in Cincinnati, he could be big trouble for other teams. But don't forget, they didn't really have an ace last year, and they went to game 7 of the World Series behind that terrifying bullpen. They'll be looking to use the same blueprint this time. New York Mets People will probably say that their star pitchers are too young to put up the kind of workload Bumgarner did a year ago, perhaps forgetting that Bumgarner turned 25 two months before the playoffs and is still younger than Matt Harvey and Jacob deGrom. But the Mets do have at least 3 guys who could put in some dominant performances, and could again be a qualifier for the 2005 White Sox style of play. Los Angeles Dodgers Here's a team that is hoping that they have the Curt Schilling - Randy Johnson type of duo from 2001 in Kershaw and Greinke. They certainly looked the part during the regular season, combining to go 35-10 over 65 starts, 455 1/3 IP, 501 K's, combined ERA of 1.90 (vs a league average of 3.90). That's slightly better than the Diamondbacks duo ERA-wise, but look at the rest of their numbers. 43-12, 69 starts, 506 1/3 IP, 665 Ks, combined ERA of 2.74 (vs a league average of 4.36). If they can do what those two did in the playoffs (11 GS plus 1 relief appearance, 9-1, 89 2/3 IP, 103 Ks, 13 runs, 14 BB, 50 H for an ERA of 1.30 and WHIP of 0.714), the Dodgers will be insanely tough to beat. And like those Diamondbacks, they would probably need to, because the rest of the staff is a little shaky. St Louis Cardinals Very much in the 2005 White Sox vein, as mentioned before. With Adam Wainwright in the bullpen, I'm not sure who would take on that kind of workload, unless it's Michael Wacha's year (and it could be - Bumgarner didn't come from nowhere, but he wasn't totally expected to do what he did last year). I'm not sure I see it for one of the other guys though. Chicago Cubs Ask the Pirates who they think could be this year's Bumgarner, after they got shut out by last year's Bumgarner in last year's NL Wild Card game, and shut out again by Jake Arrieta in this year's Wild Card Game. By the way, from ESPN Stats and Info: "Jake Arrieta's last 10 starts (regular season/postseason) 76 innings pitched 2 earned runs". He is probably the easiest pick on the board. Possible Bumgarners - David Price (Toronto), Dallas Keuchel (Houston), Clayton Kershaw and/or Zack Greinke (Los Angeles), Jake Arrieta (Chicago) Possible 2005 White Sox style teams - Toronto, New York, St. Louis. |
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Greg JacksonA baseball fan in general. Interested in statistics and analytics. Usually follow the Giants and Blue Jays, fan of all MLB in general. |