Monthly Archives: October 2012

One from the Past: Classic pre-WWII finals in British Baseball

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On 28 March 2009 I published an article describing the six classic national finals of British baseball’s post-war era, where a classic is simplistically defined (for reasons justified in the original piece) as one where the deciding game [a] went to extra innings or [b] had a winning margin of a single run. That article noted that there were also six finals in the pre-World War II period that would be defined in this way as having classic status.

I’ve been scrambling round for several years now, trying to piece together details of those earlier six finals, and below I present the still-incomplete findings.

For available details on all pre-World War II national finals, click here.

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Giants take 3-0 World Series lead

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There is surely no stopping them now.

The San Francisco Giants are on the brink of another World Series title after winning Game Three 2-0 and opening up a 3-0 series lead over the Detroit Tigers.

We all know the facts: the only team to ever recover from such a deficit was the 2004 Boston Red Sox in their incredible ALCS victory over the New York Yankees.

It could happen again, but few would be prepared to put much money on it.

So while the Tigers lick their wounds and aim to salvage some pride by avoiding a sweep, the Giants can start thinking about another World Series win to go alongside their 2010 triumph.

The two Giants rosters are not exactly the same, but there are plenty of similarities between the two seasons.  Both times San Francisco entered the Fall Classic as underdogs. Even after they defeated the Texas Rangers 4-1 in 2010 they were still seen as the second-best team in the series by some, with the congratulations being accompanied by questions over whether their batting lineup was the worst ever to win the title.

The phrase ‘damning with faint praise’ comes to my mind.

After the Giants took a messy 2010 Game One 11-7 (the two teams combining for 6 errors), Matt Cain dominated the potent Rangers’ lineup in Game Two, twirling 7.2 brilliant scoreless innings. Texas made the series interesting with a 4-2 victory in Game Three but then Madison Bumgarner (8IP, 0R, 3H) and Tim Lincecum (8IP, 1ER, 3H, 10K) gave them no chance in the next two games and that was that.

The Giants’ exceptional pitching took them to the World Series title in 2010 and, after shutting out the Tigers in Games Two and Three, it’s looking like the story will repeat itself in 2012.

Baseball fans have debated for years, and likely always will, about the relative merits of a strong pitching staff against a strong batting lineup.

The old line of pitching being key in the postseason is a bit simplistic as good pitching is an important element in any situation and one thing is absolute: it doesn’t matter how brilliant your pitching is, if you don’t score you can’t win a game of baseball. What is true is that the better your pitching, the less times you are likely to have to score to beat your opponent.

Good pitching will not always win you a game, but more often than not it will keep you in it. Perhaps that is where playoff pitching gains more prominence, that it’s more important to stay within striking distance in the short-series postseason format where you are liable to come up against another very good team.

Or maybe it’s just the nature of this time of year and the different sense of perspective it lends. Lose three games consecutively in the regular season and the whys and wherefores aren’t analysed so deeply because you can make those games back up in your next series.

Lose the first three games in a World Series and it’s desperation time. All you can do is hope to win one game to stay alive for another day.

The Tigers have to believe that they can stage the ultimate comeback to give themselves any chance. Their Game Four starter Max Scherzer has pitched outstandingly well in recent weeks and you just know that Justin Verlander is desperate to atone for his Game One outing with a typically dominating display in Game Five. Avoid the sweep with Game Four, take the series back to San Francisco with Game Five and suddenly that one win the Giants need to secure the World Series title doesn’t seem quite the foregone conclusion that it does today.

The Giants’ answer to all of that is Matt Cain. We know he can be perfect on the mound and whilst he hasn’t been at his very best so far this postseason, there isn’t anyone they would rather have taking the ball in this situation.

Their pitching did the job in 2010 and it may well do it again two years on.

San Fran take Giant leap towards World Series glory

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Just a few days ago I was predicting that the Detroit Tigers would win the 2012 World Series in six games over the San Francisco Giants.

I was far from the only person tipping the Tigers either. The Old English D dominated the prediction table on ESPN.com, for example.

Detroit earned the tag of being favourites by sweeping the New York Yankees in the ALCS and they’ve got the talent to get back into the series despite trailing 0-2 thanks to the Giants’ 2-0 Game Two victory in the early hours of Friday morning.

However if they are going to live up to my ‘win in six’ prediction they’ll have to take the next four games and that’s going to be a big ask against a surging Giants team.

The lively home crowd at AT&T Park filed away from the stadium knowing that while there’s still plenty of work to do, their team has put themselves in a great position to capture a second World Series in three years.

They have benefitted from some good breaks in winning the first two games of the series – the fortunate bounce off the third-base bag in Game One and Gregor Blanco’s bunt that stayed fair in Game Two, in particular – but the old saying that you make your own luck comes to mind.

Pablo Sandoval wasted little time banishing his personal disappointments of the 2010 World Series with his three homer onslaught in Game One. It didn’t matter where the pitch was, the Kung Fu Panda was more than happy to stick the ball over the fence.

Then in Game Two Madison Bumgarner rebounded from his disappointing recent form by making some adjustments to his pitching mechanics with pitching coach Dave Righetti. The hard work paid off in spectacular style as the Giants’ starter reeled off seven scoreless innings, limiting the Tigers to just two hits and two walks whilst striking out eight.

Bumgarner’s sole mistake came at the start of the second inning when a pitch got away from him and hit Prince Fielder.  It looked like it would prove costly when the next batter Delmon Young stroked a double down the left-field line; however the Tigers’ third-base coach Gene Lamont decided to be aggressive and waved Fielder around third, only for the hefty slugger to be thrown out at home plate.

In fairness to Lamont, Fielder was only just out thanks to some excellent defensive work by Marco Scutaro – acting as the emergency cut-off man when the ball sailed over shortstop Brandon Crawford – and catcher Buster Posey. The gamble nearly paid off, but there’s no doubt that it was a major gamble considering Fielder’s lack of speed and the fact that the Tigers would have still been set for a good inning with runners on second and third and no outs recorded.

Baseball Prospectus’ Run Expectancy matrix shows that in 2012 teams scored 1.9 runs (let’s call it 2 for the sake of practicality) from that position compared to 0.65 with one out and a runner on second.  Jhonny Peralta and Avisail Garcia were retired in order by Bumgarner to end the inning with no damage done and he may have escaped even if Fielder hadn’t been waved around third, but the Tigers definitely made things harder for themselves in that spot.

It could be, and indeed has been, argued that Jim Leyland also made things harder in the seventh inning when he decided not to bring the infield in and effectively conceded a run on a groundball to turn a double play.

Josh Chetwynd on BBC 5 Live Sports Extra’s commentary expressed his reservations about the strategic move and – rightfully, as it turned out – the dangers of conceding a run late on in a tight game. In the context of the game, on balance I would have to agree with Josh rather than Jim because the potential impact of allowing that run was very significant.

However, it could have gone wrong either way Leyland had played it, as bringing the infield in increases the odds of a groundball getting through to the outfield and potentially leading to a big inning. It was a ‘Second Guess City’ situation; whichever way you play it as the manager you’ll be second guessed if the result doesn’t go your way.

My thought at the time was that Leyland was concerned with the way his offence was misfiring on the night and that giving up more than one run would be fatal.  That was confirmed by the Tigers’ manager after the game when he stated, “we felt like we played double-play depth because we felt like we couldn’t give them two runs … to be honest with you, we were absolutely thrilled to come out of that inning with one run”.

The logic behind the call is easily understandable. Perhaps the question then is whether that logic showed Leyland being pragmatic (we’re not swinging the bats well and this will at least give us another chance) or negative (if I bring the infield in we might not get the out and then we’ll be in real trouble etc).

However you want to view it, the moment is gone now and the Tigers head back to Detroit hoping that the Comerica Field crowd can inspire a comeback from their 0-2 series hole.

As a neutral I’m hoping that the Tigers can make a series of it. Meanwhile, Giants fans will be more than happy if the season only has two more games to run.

World Series 2012 preview

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The Detroit Tigers and San Francisco Giants will play Game One of the 108th MLB World Series in the early hours of Thursday morning, U.K. time.

The two teams have made the World Series 30 times combined, emerging victorious on 10 occasions (6 times for the Giants – 5 of which from their period as the New York Giants – and 4 for the Tigers).

However, this will be the first time they have faced each other in the Fall Classic.

The schedule

All of the games in the best-of-seven series are scheduled to begin at just gone eight in the evening Eastern Time. While we in Britain move out of British Summer Time this coming Sunday, Daylight Time in the States continues for one extra week. That means the first three games of the series will begin at just gone 1 a.m. U.K. time, with the remaining games starting one hour earlier.

Game One – 24th Oct. (1 a.m. on Thursday 25th U.K. time)
Game Two – 25th Oct. (1 a.m. on Friday 26th)

Game Three – 27th Oct. (1 a.m. on Sunday 28th)
Game Four – 28th Oct. (00.05 on Monday 29th)
Game Five – 29th Oct. (00.05. on Tuesday 30th)*

Game Six – 31st Oct. (00.05 on Thursday 1st)*
Game Seven – 1st Oct. (00.05 on Friday 2nd)*

* if necessary.

The coverage

BBC Radio will once again be providing their own dedicated commentary for the World Series on BBC 5 Live Sports Extra, available on DAB Radio, Digital TV and online (for U.K. residents). Simon Brotherton and Josh Chetwynd will be in the booth at AT&T Park and Comerica Field.

TV coverage is provided by ESPN America, most likely showing the MLB International feed with Gary Thorne and Rick Sutcliffe on commentary duties. MLB.TV subscribers will be able to watch or listen to the games live and on-demand online, with the TV feed being FOX’s U.S. National TV coverage presented by Joe Buck and Tim McCarver.

The series match-up

The San Francisco Giants are returning to the World Series two years after winning the championship for the first time since crossing coasts and moving to the Bay Area in 1958.

They have been the comeback kings of the 2012 playoffs, recovering from an 0-2 deficit against the Cincinnati Reds to win the best-of-five series 3-2 and then fighting back from a 1-3 deficit in the Championship Series to win their best-of-seven match-up with the St. Louis Cardinals 4-3.

In fact, the Giants’ resiliency has been a feature of their season. They lost star closer Brian Wilson to season-ending elbow surgery early on and then suffered the indignity of seeing their run-scoring catalyst Melky Cabrera’s season – and reputation – go up in smoke following a failed drugs test in mid-August.

However, Cabrera did provide his teammates with a parting gift. His MVP-winning performance in the All-Star Game helped the National League to an 8-0 victory and home-field advantage in the World Series. Games One and Two, as well as Six and Seven if required, will take place in San Francisco as a result.

The Giants’ opponents have also had to battle against some bad luck on their way to the Fall Classic. Detroit’s World Series hopes appeared to have taken a significant blow during the offseason when Victor Martinez suffered a season-ending knee injury and created a sizeable hole in their batting lineup.

The Tigers’ 83 year old owner, Mike Illitch, responded by getting his cheque book out and spending $214m on a nine-year contract for free agent first baseman Prince Fielder. The signing of Fielder alongside the presence of established stars Miguel Cabrera and Justin Verlander made the Tigers overwhelming favourites to win the AL Central division and whilst the Chicago White Sox nearly scuppered their plan, Detroit proved too strong in the end and made their way into the postseason. A hard-fought 3-2 series win over a spirited Oakland A’s team was followed by a 4-0 thumping of the New York Yankees to book a place in the World Series early, leaving the team kicking their heels while the National League series continued.

The layoff has raised some concerns that the Tigers might come into the World Series slightly off the boil. Such fears are understandable considering what happened in 2006, the last time Detroit made it to the Fall Classic. As has occurred in 2012, the Tigers quickly swept their way through the Championship Series (against the A’s) that year whilst the National League Championship Series went the full seven games. The Cardinals ultimately got the better of the New York Mets 4-3 in that series and went on to beat the Tigers in five games.

Could history repeat itself with the battle-hardened Giants jumping on the too-well-rested Tigers this time around?

It could – there’s no doubt about that – but putting too much store in the Tigers being undercooked would be a mistake. Detroit are a well-run club and have played several practice games to keep their players ticking over. More importantly, they earned the ability due to the rest period to align their starting rotation exactly as they wanted and that should more than counter any possible rustiness.

Justin Verlander, the ace of aces, will be Detroit’s starting pitcher in Game One, with Barry Zito likely to take the ball for the Giants. That’s a notable pitching match-up advantage for the Tigers and, upon consideration of the two rosters, on paper it seems fair to peg them as favourites to win an entertaining series in six games.

But if there’s one thing we’ve learned from the 2012 postseason so far it’s that trying to predict how things will turn out is liable to leave you looking foolish.

It’s best instead simply to sit back and enjoy watching or listening to the drama unfold.

Zito’s sophisticated slop

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The Yankees couldn’t escape from their Championship Series predicament, but the San Francisco Giants might after their surprising Game Five victory.

The St. Louis Cardinals were ready to party when heading to Busch Stadium on Friday evening. They were one win away from clinching a return to the World Series and the Giants had Barry Zito on the mound.

What could go wrong?

What went wrong for the Red Birds was Barry Zito finally getting it right. He kept the Cardinals hitters off balance and got the job done by pitching 7.2 scoreless innings, helping his team to a 5-0 win to keep the Giants’ hopes alive.

This was not a case of Zito rolling back the years to his 2002 Cy Young-winning days. Never a hard thrower, Zito’s stuff wouldn’t frighten anyone any more. The big knee-buckling curve isn’t quite so fearsome and he has been far too hittable for the Giants’ liking in recent seasons.

But just as a 99 MPH heater doesn’t guarantee success against the best hitters in the world, a more modest arsenal doesn’t have to condemn a pitcher to an early retirement. With good command of the fastball and a good mix of secondary pitches – plus the odd bit of good luck in batted balls finding fielders rather than grass or the outfield seats – a pitcher can succeed.

MLB.com’s Anthony Castrovince summed up Zito’s performance by stating “you could call his stuff slop if not for the sophistication with which he delivered it”. No pitcher would like to be known for their ‘sophisticated slop’, but I’m sure they would take it if it got Major League hitters out.

Zito more than most would be glad for any compliments he can get, however back-handed they may seem.

He has become a poster boy for ‘free agent flops’ since signing a seven-year/$126m contract with the Giants over the 2006/07 offseason. It was the worst type of free agent contract, one that looked bad from the very moment the player put pen to paper.

Zito had been effective for the Oakland A’s in the couple of seasons leading up to his free agency, yet he wasn’t bowling anyone over with greatness. Even though teams often accept they may have to slightly overpay to acquire a free agent, it’s difficult to understand how the Giants thought his future performances would ever be worth $126m.

Putting the contract into context makes it seem all the more baffling. It was the largest ever contract (in terms of total dollars) given to a pitcher at the time of signing and only four larger contracts have been handed out since. Two came during the current season when the Giants and Phillies locked up Matt Cain and Cole Hamels respectively before they hit free agency, with Johan Santana (6 years/$137.5m signed in the 07/08 offseason) and CC Sabathia (7 years/$161m signed in the 08/09 offseason – since amended by a 5 year/$122m deal this past offseason) being the top two contracts.

Zito had a good run between 2002 and 2005 and even though his performances were trending downwards he deserved a decent-sized free agent deal. However, it clearly stands out as a bad contract when looking at it alongside the others.

Overpays can be brushed to one side if they lead to a World Series victory or two, following the adage that flags fly forever. In Zito’s case, the Giants’ 2010 triumph actually makes his contract look worse as he had pitched so poorly that season that he wasn’t included on the postseason roster.

2012 could be his one remaining shot at redemption. Thanks to Zito’s Game Five performance, the Giants have a chance to win the two remaining games of the series at AT&T Park to make it to the World Series.

If the Giants can do it, and if Zito puts in a decent showing in a World Series start on the way to another victory parade in San Francisco, then history will view the contract in a more favourable light. It will come with an asterisk pointing to a comment saying ‘yes it was an overpay, but …’.

There are some big ‘ifs’ in the equation, but it’s better to have the possibility of ifs than no chance at all.

Rain again

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Games being postponed by rain has been a feature of the week so far.

After the farce witnessed in Poland on Tuesday night, the decision by officials to postpone Game Four of the ALCS in Detroit – even though no rain was falling at the time the decision was made – proved to be a rare instance of common sense winning out.

Whereas FIFA and the Polish Football Federation looked at a forecast for heavy rain throughout Tuesday and left it too late to close the roof for Poland’s World Cup qualifier against England, MLB trusted the weather forecasts and decided to postpone the Yankees-Tigers game before a pitch was thrown.

Sure enough, the heavens soon opened in Detroit and all were spared the disruption of a game being abandoned in mid-course. Sensible decision-making by sports authorities: who would have thought it was possible?

The Yankees and Tigers will play Game Four on Thursday instead and it’s an early start, so we can watch the game from 21.00 BST.  It should be a good pitching match-up between Max Scherzer and CC Sabathia, with the latter now almost certainly ruled out of making a potential second start in the series.

There was hope that if the Yankees could somehow take the series to a Game Seven, Sabathia would be able to pitch in the decider on short rest.  However now he will only have two rest days due to the scheduled off-day between games five and six being scrapped and that’s just not going to be enough time.  If the Yankees’ plight wasn’t difficult enough, it’s just got that little bit harder still.

In the NLCS, great credit should go to anyone that managed to stay the course throughout the six and a half hours that Game Three took to be completed.  I headed to bed before the 3.5 hour rain delay interrupted the seventh inning, but those who stuck with it certainly deserve a ‘hardcore’ salute, in true ‘Baseball on 5’ style.

Game Four tonight also should provide a fascinating match-up between Adam Wainwright and Tim Lincecum.

When Lincecum was helping the Giants to the World Series title two years ago, few would have predicted he would be relegated to the bullpen in the postseason just two years later.

He has endured a tough season (5.18 ERA over 33 regular season starts with a 1.47 WHIP and 17 wild pitches thrown in for good measure), but some recent good showings have led manager Bruce Bochy to entrust him with the start in Game Four and this is his chance to put a difficult season behind him. Still just 28 years old, there’s no reason to believe Timmy is over the hill just yet.

The Giants will need a strong start from Lincecum if they want to level up the series 2-2 and ensure that the teams will head back to AT&T Park for at least one further game.

A 3-0 hole

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For once this season, expecting the unexpected didn’t quite work out.

On paper, the New York Yankees’ struggling offence didn’t stand a chance against Justin Verlander in Game Three of the ALCS. The Tigers were a certainty to win, you could bet your house on it.

This, of course, meant that the Tigers winning was exactly what was not going to happen. Logic flew out of the window a long time ago this MLB season and that should have given the Yankees hope that the odds would be made a mockery of once more.

It would have also made Tigers fans nervous when Phil Coke relieved Verlander during the bottom of the ninth inning and subsequently allowed two baserunners with Detroit holding a slender 2-1 lead. The next chapter in this crazy season was about to be written: the Yankees were going to get back into the series by winning a game that Justin Verlander had started.

But then, all of a sudden, logic returned with a vengeance.

New York had their chance in Game One when they rallied for four runs off Jose Valverde in the bottom of the ninth to take that game into extra innings. They had dealt their opponent a devastating blow but were not able to land the knockout shot and the Tigers recovered to win the game 6-4. Joe Girardi’s team deserve credit for the fight back; however they let a great chance slip by once they had done all the hard work and they may not get another.

Girardi tried to kickstart his offence in Game Three by drafting in Brett Gardener, who has been out injured for the vast majority of the season, and leaving both Alex Rodriguez and Nick Swisher on the bench. It didn’t work and now they find themselves in a deep hole.

CC Sabathia will take the mound for the Yankees in Game Four (a 2 a.m. start on Thursday morning U.K. time) and a combination of their ace lefty and personal pride gives them a good chance of avoiding the 4-0 series sweep. Recovering all the way from an 0-3 deficit, with an offence in turmoil, seems beyond them.

Could the Yankees suddenly find some form out of nowhere and reel off four straight wins, the final one coming against Verlander in a Game Seven? Probably not, although maybe the rule of expecting the unexpected might come back into play at least one more time this season.

Continuing the delay for replay

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Not even the most myopic New York Yankees fan could lay the blame for their ALCS Game Two loss at the hands of umpire Jeff Nelson.

Even if Nelson had correctly ended the eighth inning when Robinson Cano tagged out Omar Infante at second base, the Yankees still would have needed to score at least once before nine innings were complete to take the game into extras.

The way some of the Yankees were swinging the bat – and sometimes the way they were not swinging the bat – it looked unlikely they would have scored one run over ninety innings.

It’s also difficult as a neutral to get too upset at a bad call going against the $200m Yankee team. ESPN.com’s Jim Caple makes the point, in an amusing Yankee tail-tweaking article, that the Bronx Bombers have benefited from incorrect calls at important moments in playoff games plenty of times in the past. ‘Oh dear, what a shame’ would be the polite version of the standard response, accompanied by plenty of laughter.

However, even though Nelson’s blown call might not elicit much in the way of sympathy, it should add to the concerns that grow louder every year regarding MLB’s reluctance to introduce instant replay more widely than present.

Next time it could be your team that’s on the wrong end of it.

All sports have to contend with the fact that TV broadcasters now have so many cameras that they can replay most incidents in detail within seconds of it happening. Officials have always made wrong calls and always will, in exactly the same way players make mistakes and bad decisions, but now there is no hiding place and the line the governing bodies trot out about officiating errors being the ‘human side of the game’ don’t wash if your team has just been undone by a clearly incorrect decision on an important incident.

Judging which are the important events to review is extremely difficult (a close play at second base in the third inning might turn out to have been the decisive run if the next batter hit a one-run homer instead of a two-run homer etc) and surely no fan wants to see every decision reviewed, so finding the right balance is an inexact science.

However the fact that there’s no perfect solution, and arriving at a solution that pleases all will be difficult, is no reason for governing bodies to bury their heads in the sand.  The oft-repeated argument about not wanting to slow the pace of the game is a red herring. Checking the replay footage takes a lot less time than is currently taken up by managerial rants.

The credibility of the game is at stake. You can’t tell millions of TV viewers that although they can see within seconds that it should have been an out on the bases, we’re all going to pretend that it didn’t happen and the referee/umpire’s decision was correct.

A Thursday feast of playoff baseball

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There are four MLB games this evening. When you compare that to the 14 or 15 that we get most days during the regular season, it shouldn’t be too hard to keep up with them all.

All times are in BST

18.07. San Francisco at Cincinnati (Cain – Latos) *BBC 5 Live Sports Extra, ESPN America
21.07. St. Louis at Washington (Lohse – Detwiler) *BBC 5 Live Sports Extra, ESPN America

00.37. Baltimore at NY Yankees (Saunders – Hughes) *ESPN America
02.37. Detroit at Oakland (Verlander – Parker)

However, this is the postseason and every inning counts for so much more than your bog-standard frame in a mid-June game. As the drama, tension and excitement increases, so does the emotional investment you have in the contests, especially when your chosen team is one of those in the mix.

It’s been six years since I followed a postseason that includes the Oakland A’s and when we lost Game Two of our series against the Detroit Tigers on Sunday – with Coco Crisp’s fielding error costing us dear – I was left wondering for a few demoralised moments whether it’s actually more fun when your team isn’t part of it.

You can enjoy the thrills and spills without going through the nerves, the anxiety and the heartbreak.

I quickly put such thoughts to one side. Playing for high stakes in the playoffs is what we all dream of and we cannot hope to embrace the feeling of joy in potential triumph without accepting that for every winner there has to be a loser.

And that the loser may be your team.

There is every chance that Justin Verlander will weave his magic from the mound to knock the A’s out in the early hours of Friday morning. If so it will take a few days of dejection before I come around to focusing on what an incredible season it has been for my team to even make it to Game 5 of the ALDS.

However, it’s just as possible that the A’s may complete their recovery from an 0-2 deficit, beating last year’s MVP and Cy Young award winner in the decisive game, and add yet another chapter to their ‘team of destiny’ tale.

The possibility of the latter scenario coming true makes all of the nerves worthwhile, even if it won’t feel that way immediately after the final out if the game – and the series – hasn’t gone the A’s way.