Congratulations to Yourrrrrr World Series Champion Los Angeles Dodgers!
Let’s take a moment to just watch…
Nope, we’ll have Joe Buck and John Smoltz yack through it all, noting all the records set, and complain about the “Cybermetrics” (wait, that was the former players in the studio, all of whom have great SABRmetric stats, a tribute to Joe Morgan, maybe) of pulling a pitcher, and how the front office is “ruining the game of baseball” (A-Rod). They claim that the Front Office, not Kevin Cash, made the call to pull Snell (never once noting that Cash did the same thing in Game 2, 'cause they won that game) while he was leading and doing well.
So, in three of the past four WS, the Dodgers are 1-1-*.
Anywho, on to 2021. The too-early prediction and sporting odds have Dodgers repeating.
Let’s check out that Hot Stove, perhaps let me just touch it…
A well-deserved victory for them. The Dodgers just seem like such a complete team. They’ll be hard to beat in 2021.
Great fight by the overachieving Rays. I never thought they would make it that far. Definitely a thorn in the side for AL teams. Not sure I would have taken Blake Snell out. I mean, did they actually intend to save him in case it went to Game 7? Nick Anderson had a very shaky postseason up to that point. In all fairness, it had been a successful strategy for them, and Fairbanks had been great. But still, Blake was light’s out. Their bats went quiet, and the better team won out.
They were just saving him from the eventual Murderers’ Row coming up. Then it could have been, “Third time through! You should have pulled him!” Lose-Lose (Lose) choice.
Pull/Not-Pull seems to be largely a 50/50 choice, and the managers don’t really know what the right decision is.
Here is a guy going off on “waah, I want starting pitchers!!” rant:
(To say nothing of the still-existing “closer role” that needs to be killed.)
(I also saw the other day that revenue-focused Zach Greinke complaining about fewer starts means less money for starting pitchers. Well, maybe you’re overpaid. Ever think of that?)
It’s a basic Gladiator question: “Are you not entertained??” Teams want to win, but fans want to be entertained, and team owners want fans to spend money to make owners rich. Oh, the dilemma.
Yup, tough to say what would’ve happened in the 3rd time through the lineup. I’m not really second-guessing taking Snell out that much as I am giving the Dodgers credit. The Rays played their game, and they had been winning with it.
Great sports fodder from those armchair QBs. Everybody needs to stay relevant somehow. \red\ I know all these guys can manage a team better than Kevin Cash lol.
I normally don’t watch post-game shows, but it was the Dodgers, so I blew off my personal boycott. Nice interviews with happy Dodgers and all that.
Then they started ranting on “cybermetrics” and blaming the Front Office and the Ivy League geniuses (didn’t lower themselves to “never played the game” level, though) for pulling Snell (or at least for providing Cash with the knowledge to make the decision).
Big Papi was fun to watch and listen to, although my stupid brain could not remember his actual name for several minutes. After finally remembering his last name, I broke down and looked up his first name.
I had friends (Dodger fans) who drove in from Houston to watch 5 and 6. Lucky bastards (check: can we write “bastard” here?).
Unhappy with Justin Turner’s actions post-game.
I fully expect there to be several COVID cases involving Dodgers and family members that were on the field.
Assuming the positive test results were true positives.
And I was thinking at the time Corey Seager was awarded the WS MVP that he might want to skip the celebrations, drive that brand new Chevy out of the freakin’ bubble and just get the heck home! (It might have been too late by that time. Hope not!)
Man, they spent way too much time wondering who the “Chevrolet World Series Most Valuable Player sponsored by Chevrolet, makers of the Chevy Tahoe” was.
For the life of me, I can’t figure out why.
In the olden days (heck last year!), they gave a Corvette.
White Sox fans were starting to get really excited after all the good things that happened this year. But Reinsdorf put an end to that today by picking Tony La Russa as the new manager. The press conference was like a funeral and then got worse and went down the “I don’t have a racist bone in my body” path. Yikes. Local reaction is strongly that this is a horrible choice. And since he’s being hired to make up for Reinsdorf having fired him once before, he’s probably immune from ever being fired again. I wonder if La Russa had any idea that his hiring was going to alienate most of the fan base.
And also the first Asian GM. These things are important to some people.
Anywho, she’s been top-notch for decades. Sure, not the best GM job in the MLB, a barely 0.500 team with a -41 run differential into an expanded playoff (another 100 games would more likely have either corrected their record than corrected their run differential, but who knows), and a very low payroll mandate. And, of course, never played the game, 'cause that is important to people.
Not for Total-count stats, since they won’t include non-league games (barnstorming tours and such), and the seasons were not as long as the NL and AL.
But, ratio stats might take a hit. (HAH! PUNNY!)
I think Aaron and Mays will have more HRs counted.