Hello Ball Fans,
The post-season is settling in on its midpoint as both Game Fours of the League Championship Series are being played tonight thanks to heavy rain in Detroit. The Yankees will try to stay alive in the best of seven match up against a Tigers team on top of its game while the Giants will try to square up at two and two versus the cool and collected Cardinals. In general, the playoffs have been well played and low scoring games as the pitching has dominated thus far. Here’s some examples: The Yanks have hit .200 so far and are only 8th out of 10 teams in overall team playoff batting average. Hello Robinson Cano, Nick Swisher, and Curtis Granderson, are you there? Then, we have the Giants, O’s, and A’s coming in at a stunning .195 and .194. They already went golfing. All-stars Adam Jones and Matt Wieters struggled. Ironcially, Atlanta, Texas, and Cincy are the top three in post-season average with nice .308, .265, and .261 averages, respectively. They, too, are golfing though. The overall futility reminds me of Bobby Bonilla and Co. in their early 90s Pittsburgh playoff days.
The games are tight and intense. I’m lovin’ the action. Pitching wins. Interestingly, and I have to chuckle to myself, Washington has the worst post-season ERA at an astounding 6.14. That’s unreal for a team that was number two in MLB with a 3.33 staff ERA and 1.22 WHIP during the regular season. I’m thinking Stephen Strasburg could have helped lower that ERA and grab that coveted third ‘W’ to get out of the first round. Odds are the defending champion Cards would now be teeing off instead of taking BP.
Just for the record, Robinson Cano’s awkward, but indeed in-time, tag of Omar Infante at second base on a nice chuck from Nick Swisher in right field proves only one thing. And that is that the media needs to immediately recognize and emphasize that a replay on that type of play is deceiving. No ump is ever going to have that angle for a viewpoint. Nor should he. The tag was under Infante’s chest and toward the left-center side, away from the ump, who was in perfect position technically speaking. To that, this was not a bad call, just an incorrect call. To me, that makes a huge difference. And I’m ok with it. Sometimes, all teams are on the wrong end of a call, but it’s a small, small percentage. And the proverbial make up call exists in baseball too, and when was the last time a team got stuck with a net of two bad calls in one game?
This play is no reason to encourage more replay, post-season or not. The Yanks were down 1-0 in the 8th. This ruling combined with the ensuing poor pitch execution, led to a 3-0 hole. I get the argument that it’s tough to protect a one run versus a three run lead, but if you never score a run, that’s a bad argument. Besides, there’s less pressure to hit when you’re down by three with two innings to bat, right? No one expects a comeback then. Unfortunately, that’s how it works. And another thing I didn’t catch in any of the over done analyzing was that Cano could have gotten a better tag by correctly waiting for Infante to come to him to slide into the glove at the bag rather than going out to get him like he did. That’s not a great tag. A textbook error by the fielder somehow goes unnoticed while we sit on the couch pointing out ‘that’s so obvious’ about the umpiring on a difficult play. What about the players?
Later Fans.