MLB 2023

[unclevlad]

If it's the D'backs, one good point:  no chance of weather delays/issues.

[slikmar]

Again, have to wonder after the Houston/Texas series. Has there ever been another 7 game series where the visiting team won every game. I know there has been at least one with the home team winning every game.

[Pariah]

1 hour ago, unclevlad said:

If it's the D'backs, one good point:  no chance of weather delays/issues.

 

Counterpoint: Baseball is meant to be played outdoors, dangnabit.

 

(Ideally on real grass with wood bats and no designated hitter, but those halcyon days are long passed.) 

[unclevlad]

All things being equal...I'd agree.  They're not, particularly this time of year.  Baseball isn't a late-fall sport, it's a summer sport.  I don't want to see 3 hour rain delays, with first pitch at 10 pm local time.  Or get through 6 innings, then the rain comes in.  Or games played in 30 degree weather.  

 

Plus, in Phoenix and Arlington this time of year, it's likely the roofs will be open, so it's mostly outdoor baseball.  Admittedly, not on grass, but they're trying to make it as close to grass as possible.  If there is a surprise, tho?  The option's still there.

 

And I'll take playing in playable conditions...well...almost any day.  There's exceptions...Tampa.  But that's a terrible field in soooo many ways.  I think most of the bad surfaces...Cincy, Toronto from the 70s and 80s...are gone.  Could be wrong there.  Kansas City...?  Might still be up there, I don't remember.  (When's the last time you saw a Royals game on TV?)

[unclevlad]

Wow.

 

WOOWWWWWWw.www.....

 

I saw quite a bit of the D'backs this year.  They're the primary local team...the 2 Texas teams?  Their network isn't even available.  So I saw a lot of em, especially once MLB took over production from Bally.  

 

They're the little girls with the curls.  When they were good, they could be very good.  When they were bad...mostly, they couldn't hit the pinata even with the blindfold OFF.  And the pitching...the root problem with deep bullpen commitment is, you can't afford one of em to go bad.

 

They hit...enough.

 

The relievers were BRILLIANT.  Pfaadt went 4, giving up 2...hey, for a kid who was in the minors earlier?  That's FINE.  From there, the bullpen...5 pitchers in total...only gave up *1* hit, and 2 walks...both by Saalfrank, who faced the minimum 3.  But Ginkel stranded them both, then threw another shutdown inning, and Sewald finished it in the same manner.

 

NEVER saw this.  Nor did anyone else.  This WS matchup?  You could make MONEY betting this matchup.  For grins...around the 8th, or so...I checked.  WS winning odds at the start of the season?  Texas, 50-1.  Arizona, 66-1.  Figure that makes the WS matchup around 25-1 and 33-1.......so, maybe 600-1?  Pretty sure you don't get full value on a parlay.  

 

Road teams both down 3-2...win both.  First time ever.

2nd year in a row that the NL 6 seed advances to the Series.  And 5 seed in the AL.  THIS is just going to petrify the notion that "hey...all ya gotta do is make the playoffs, then anything can happen."  And its impact on the trade deadline will only grow.

 

There might be comparisons with the '07 Rockies, in terms of the implausibility of it...but it was nothing like it overall.  They scrapped against the Brewers.  They blew the doors off the Dodgers...THAT was more like an exorcism than anything else.  Then this series was a back alley knife fight.  

 

And there's no long layoff...I still feel this might've killed those Rockies.  Series starts Friday.

 

NLCS MVP was Marte...that was foregone.  He *raked*.  19 hits in the post season...franchise record.  16 game hit streak...Jeter has the record at 17.  KEY hits.  Mind, if there was a group MVP, I'd vote for the bullpen.  But Marte was the obvious individual.

[Pariah]

Obvious choice for the Hall of Fame, one would think.

 

Dusty Baker announces retirement after 26 years as manager: 'Baseball has been my life'

[unclevlad]

Kelly goes 7 very strong...3 hits, no walks, 1 run.  D'backs rake with 2 outs, driving home 7.  Montgomery throws 6 strong, but fades in the 7th, and the D'backs blow it open late.  9-1.  Series tied, heading to Phoenix.

[Cancer]

Rest in peace to four-time All-Star and World Series champion Frank Howard, who passed away yesterday (Oct 30) at the age of 87.

[Cancer]

And the Rangers now lead Arizona in the World Series, 3 games to 1.

[unclevlad]

Yeah, it was hammer time.  5 runs in the 2nd, 5 more in the 3rd.  Called it a night at that point.

[Pariah]

Not MLB, strictly speaking. But look at that setting. What a beautiful place to play baseball. 

 

Brand new Roberto Clemente stadium in Masaya, Nicaragua, to be inaugurated for U-23 Baseball World Cup Americas Qualifier in November

 

[unclevlad]

<sigh>

 

Gallen throws 6 innings of no-hit shutout ball.

Problem is...D'backs go 0 for 9 (!!!) with RISP...yeah, each inning, 1-5, they've got 1 or more.  They don't score either.

 

We know this pattern, right?  

 

Yep.  7th inning, 3 hits in a row to start...1-0 Texas.

 

That's all they need.  They get 4 more in the 9th to largely end the drama.  5-0 final.

 

Texas wins the series.

 

This was a problem with the D'backs several times during the season...stretches where they just could not get the key hit.  The games they won...pretty much, in those early situations, they got the hits, they grabbed the momentum, usually they stayed loose and hit.  They don't?  They got tight, collectively.  Still went MUCH further than anyone could ever expect. so congratulations to them.

 

And to the Rangers.  UNDEFEATED on the road for the *entire* post season.  AMAZING.

[death tribble]

As this is a maiden win, the first in their club's history the Texas Ranger are to be congratulated.

[Pariah]

With the Rangers' win, there remain only five teams that have never won a World Series: the Seattle Mariners, the San Diego Padres, the Milwaukee Brewers, the Tampa Bay Rays, and of course my Colorado Rockies.

 

Of these five, the only one never to win a pennant is the Mariners. Sorry, Dr. C.

 

 

Edited November 2, 2023 by Pariah

[unclevlad]

Speaking of the Padres...another story in the Athletic today.  Padres took out a $50M loan to cover expenses.  Reaction is apparently mixed, but a Padre insider speaking anonymously was wondering why.  The Padres sold 3.3 million tickets last year...but they still had to do this?  Their payroll is likely not sustainable, is one concern.

 

OTOH, some of this may be a one-year issue, related to the media rights concerns.  The Padres were the first team where MLB took over production after Diamond Sports Group missed its payment.  Curiously...the second such team?  The D'backs.

[Cancer]

11 minutes ago, Pariah said:

With the Rangers' win, there remain only five teams that have never won a World Series: ....

 

Of these five, the only one never to win a pennant is the Mariners. Sorry, Dr. C.

 

As John Fogerty once said, "But you knew that."

[slikmar]

13 hours ago, unclevlad said:

Problem is...D'backs go 0 for 9 (!!!) with RISP...yeah, each inning, 1-5, they've got 1 or more.  They don't score either.

This is one of those things. Do you give credit to Eovaldi, who has a rep for pitching better with men on, or do you blame the D'Backs hitters for not getting guys home from third with less then 2 outs? Maybe a combination of both.

[unclevlad]

Probably both, but as I've said, the D'backs are the only baseball team I get locally.  This was a consistent pattern during their bad streaks...and they had several during the season, especially during their terrible streak in July-August...7-25.  But it was a problem at the end...losing 3 games to the Mets, scoring all of 4 runs.  Losing all 4 to the Astros at the end of the season, same thing.

 

Got to love baseball-reference.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/ARI/2023-schedule-scores.shtml

 

 

[Cancer]

5 hours ago, Pariah said:

Of these five, the only one never to win a pennant is the Mariners. Sorry, Dr. C.

 

5 hours ago, Cancer said:

As John Fogerty once said, "But you knew that."

 

I realized after that post that I was, in fact, in attendance in the Kingdome the first time the Mariners got as close as they have ever come, game 6 of the 1995 ALCS against the Indians.  Sigh.

[unclevlad]

My, my.  The surprises start early.

 

Cubs fire David Ross...that wasn't a big shock...and tempt Craig Counsell, Brewers manager for the last several years, and with multiple playoff appearances in that period, into a signing.  Counsell's Brewers contract expired at the end of October.  

[Pariah]

One silver lining to the dark cloud that was the 2023 Colorado Rockies season: rookie CF Brenton Doyle took home the Gold Glove. 

[unclevlad]

D'backs run was powered by defense.  Moreno won at catcher;  Walker repeated at 1st.  Alek Thomas came in 3rd...despite playing only 125 games, and many of those were as a late inning defensive replacement.  He only had 402 plate appearances, and only started 104 games.

[unclevlad]

Padres owner Peter Seidler has died, age 63.  NYT reports he'd had 2 battles with non-Hodgkins lymphoma, and had another procedure over the summer...no details.  

 

Condolences to the family.  Questions about how this will affect the Padres moving forward.

[unclevlad]

Shohei Ohtani rejects the qualifying-offer contract, and will stay a free agent.  

 

Sounded bad, but...from ESPN:

 

Quote

By making a qualifying offer -- calculated as the average of the top 125 contracts by average annual value -- a team would receive an additional selection in next July's amateur draft if a player signs elsewhere before then. A team signing the player could lose one or two draft picks.

 

It's a bit over $20M.  Which...good golly, that's crazy money, but come on.  It's probably less than half what he'll get.  THAT much difference, come on, it's a no-brainer to decline.

[unclevlad]

And the moves start.

 

Padres may be starting a retool/rebuild on the offensive side, trading Juan Soto to ...  the Evil Empire.  Who'd already gotten another corner outfielder in Alex Verdugo.  The scuttlebutt is, Judge will play center, flanked by Verdugo and Soto.

 

Who's missing from that?  Stanton......  He'll probably be trade bait, MAYBE with the option of making him a DH, but 

a)  I'm not sure how much Stanton likes that role,

b)  There may be too much swing and miss there, given Soto and Judge.  IF they've got hard-contact hitters at first and 3rd, maybe they can get away with another slugger, but too much slugging makes for offensive inconsistency.