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!
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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. |