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  1. #41
    Quote Originally Posted by Olympic Fan View Post
    I'm a Braves fan and I'm sorry they lost, but I'm still not knocking the one-game playoff.

    It worked out the way it should -- the wild card teams SHOULD have to face a major hurdle. The regular season does mean something -- the 162-game schedule determines the division champions and they in turn deserve an edge over the second-place teams that are graciously allowed into the playoffs. Yeah, over the last 15 or so years, the Braves would have had a best of 5 playoff before they were eliminated ... but for most of baseball history they would have been done at the end of the regular season.

    I do wish they would return to a balanced regular season schedule ... but I also wish the NL would adopt the designated hitter, they would ban interleague play and get rid of the salary cap. I'm not likely to see any of those things happen.

    As for the infield fly rule in today's game -- I think it was called incorrectly (the rule says that it's called when the infieler can "easily" catch the fly and this one was opbviously not easy ... he just deaked the ump into thinkiong so), but it WAS called and that's a judgment call that can't be overturned. The Braves made three errors and couldn't get any key hits with runners on base ... that's why you hate to be in a one-game playoff. So next year, they can win the division and not have to deal with that.
    But it is a paradox, you make the regular season mean more but at the same time mean less. Braves were 6 games better than the Cards in a much tougher division. ESPN says the Braves had 11th hardest SOS in baseball, Cards were at 28. So as you bring up, a more balanced schedule would be the only fair way but you'll never see that b/c MLB needs the East rivalries and rivalries in general.

    I agreed that the importance of winning the division was minimized but there should be an alternative. I'm sure wildcard teams would much rather face a 3 game series, that way they are at a bigger disadvantage but don't have to worry about one call or one uncharacteristically bad performance to knock them out. Perhaps just go to 4 divisions or maybe just scrap divisions and have a completely balanced schedule with top 4 teams in each league advancing, etc. but I just don't see how this works other than making excitement/money until your 90+ win team loses when it was one of the best teams in the league.

    As an aside, I have no problem with any of your recommendations save for the salary cap. It isn't a real salary cap and if anything I'd say baseball needs a hard cap or at least something like the NBA. Sure, you have what seems to be a competitive balance and MLB loves to use the different teams winning/making the playoffs but it seems only a matter of time until this trend seems bucked. Grantland ran an article saying the Dodgers might change the landscape showing no care for the bottom line something the Yankees have shown since Steinbrenner passed away. As many successful MLB teams get new TV deals, money will be less of an issue as shown by the Dodgers, Angels, Rangers, etc. One team in the bottom 10 of the league salaries made the playoffs and building a team like the Rays/Nats takes lots of losing (being the worst team in baseball actually) to get that talent and it remains to be seen how fans will react to losing top talent or if they can keep it.

    And I'll clarify I'm a Phillies fan who just thinks Chipper deserved better and a fan of a team looking at perhaps the biggest new TV deal.

    http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/...dodgers-regime
    Last edited by sporthenry; 10-06-2012 at 03:04 AM.

  2. #42
    Quote Originally Posted by Jim3k View Post
    A's Reliever Pat Neshek's newborn son died less than one day after being born on October 2.
    Oh Jim, that is heartbreaking. I am so sorry for them.

  3. #43

    salary cap

    Quote Originally Posted by sporthenry View Post
    As an aside, I have no problem with any of your recommendations save for the salary cap. It isn't a real salary cap and if anything I'd say baseball needs a hard cap or at least something like the NBA. Sure, you have what seems to be a competitive balance and MLB loves to use the different teams winning/making the playoffs but it seems only a matter of time until this trend seems bucked. Grantland ran an article saying the Dodgers might change the landscape showing no care for the bottom line something the Yankees have shown since Steinbrenner passed away. As many successful MLB teams get new TV deals, money will be less of an issue as shown by the Dodgers, Angels, Rangers, etc. One team in the bottom 10 of the league salaries made the playoffs and building a team like the Rays/Nats takes lots of losing (being the worst team in baseball actually) to get that talent and it remains to be seen how fans will react to losing top talent or if they can keep it.

    http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/...dodgers-regime
    I keep hearing -- 'Well, baseball has competitive balance, but it's only a matter of time until this trend is bucked" -- I heard it 20 years ago when the Twins were winning titles with relatively low-payroll teams. Now we have low payroll teams such as the Orioles, A's, Rays succeeding while the Phillies, Dodgers and Red Sox -- three of the top five payrolls in baseball missed the playoffs and the Rangers, another top 5 payroll, make a meek exit.

    Baseball has a soft cap with a payroll tax for the big spenders -- the crime was that the money redistributed to the poorer teams was rarely used to improve their teams. McLatchy in Pittsburgh was famous to sticking his money from payroll tax in his pocket. Thank goodness he's gone.

    I know I won't convince anybody, but I continue to insist that baseball has and would continue to do just fine without a salary cap (hard or soft). The continuing debate about high payroll teams is merely a cover for incompetent management to cover up their incompetence -- Oh, boo hoo, we can't match the Yankee payroll ... no, don't look at the Rays or the A's who spend less than us ... look at those mean, big spending Yankees."

    As for your other comment ... I actually wouldn't object to a three-game wild card playoff -- as long as the wild card teams have a major disadvantage compared to the division winners. Balance the schedules, balance the divisions (why can't baseball redrawn the divisions every five years or so to make them fairer?) ... fine. But to me, the 162 game schedule should be honored and that means protect the division winners.

  4. #44
    I miss Chipper...

  5. #45
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    Quote Originally Posted by Olympic Fan View Post
    I do wish they would return to a balanced regular season schedule ... but I also wish the NL would adopt the designated hitter, they would ban interleague play and get rid of the salary cap. I'm not likely to see any of those things happen.
    If the National League ever adopts that garbage designated hitter rule, I'll quit watching the sport. I'm proud to say I've never lived in an American League market. The American League making a horrible, indefensible, game-distorting decision four decades ago is no reason to trash up the remaining league that actually plays baseball.

    A sewage pipe exploded under my kitchen! What should I do? I know! Smear the sewage all over the rest of the house! That will fix things!

    Not.

    I only saw the first six innings of the game, so I'm just now seeing the entirety of the infield fly debacle on the DVR. (I had decided I would root for the Braves, for Chipper's sake). I became aware of the controversy after I emerged from Mahler 3 and Twitter and Facebook were in full conflagrations. Two things strike me the most.

    1) While the call could not have been more wrong, people were acting like this was a situation like Green Bay-Seattle where the officials literally awarded the game to one team at the expense of the other. It wasn't. If you give the Braves the pre-call, pre-riot status, Motte's walk of McCann pushes a run across to make it 6-4. Motte strikes out Bourn, so that would be bases loaded, two outs. The Braves still have to get two (or three, to win) more runs, there's a force at every base and they've been stranding runners left and right all day. It's still a tough spot for the Braves even if the umpires don't blow the call.

    2) I'm terribly disappointed in the Braves fans at Turner. It's bad enough to throw all that stuff on the field, causing an 18-minute delay, but these things happen from time to time. What's truly unconscionable is initiating two more rounds of trash-throwing after these poor people have had to come out and clean it all up. A liquor bottle hit one of the umps. What is this, the University of Maryland? I feel sorry for Chipper, and the Braves players, but the people throwing things in that stadium could not have more richly deserved the loss. You go to the game know it could be Chipper's last game, you're in the eighth inning and that possibility is looking a lot closer, and a call is blown--so you decide to honor Chipper's last game by throwing garbage all over the field. Hell, If I were Chipper Jones, I'd be finding myself wishing I had retired a year earlier.

    I've been deprived of seeing the Braves regularly since they left TBS, so when I do see a game, things strike me anew. Y'all know what? That ridiculous "Seminole" chant has got to go. Two decades ago would have been nice, but I'd settle for anytime soon. Ignoring the fact that it's at least mildly offensive, it's incredibly played. Leave it to Florida State.

    A movie is not about what it's about; it's about how it's about it.
    ---Roger Ebert


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  6. #46
    Quote Originally Posted by sporthenry View Post
    As far as the rule, it was not the correct call at all. There is no way you can call a 200 feet fly ball an ordinary effort by an infielder.
    What was extraordinary about the infielder's play there? Before giving way to the outfielder, which is irrelevant under the rule, he was getting in position to make the play, and there was nothing special about his effort to have gotten in position. Had the infielder stayed with the play, it would have been a fairly routine play on his part. I don't know why the rule should include a play like that where the defense can't benefit by intentionally dropping it, but the language seems to pretty clearly include it.
    Demented and sad, but social, right?

  7. #47
    Quote Originally Posted by Blue in the Face View Post
    What was extraordinary about the infielder's play there? Before giving way to the outfielder, which is irrelevant under the rule, he was getting in position to make the play, and there was nothing special about his effort to have gotten in position. Had the infielder stayed with the play, it would have been a fairly routine play on his part. I don't know why the rule should include a play like that where the defense can't benefit by intentionally dropping it, but the language seems to pretty clearly include it.
    Baseball is all about the spirit of the game and rule. You can argue this call like any judgment call as being right under a very ambiguous rule but many baseball minds will tell you it just wasn't applied correctly in this situation. It is like the balk in baseball, if an ump calls a balk on just about any lefty, you can go to the rule book and defend it as either breaking the 45 degree rule or just flat out trying to deceive the runner but you just never see it applied that way. And what defines normal effort? Is it different for each player? I'm not sure how running 100 feet back pedaling on a major league pop up is ordinary effort. I've always interpreted it as if you put out a replacement player (i.e. a minor leaguer or Desi Relaford), would they make the play with ordinary effort? Do we start to take into account the SS involved? Then all pop ups near Ozzie Smith would be an infield fly rule. If the SS points to the sky like they do on most pop ups, do you still call it? I suspect some major league SS would go this route and not go after the ball as much as Kozma did. So I guess credit him for deceiving the ump and making it look easy but I can tell you from experience that backpedaling 30 feet let alone 100 feet all the while on a pop up that high is not normal effort and I don't think it is coincidental that no infield umpire called it. With just 4 umpires, that is not called b/c they realize how far the ball went, but to an ump used to the 3rd base line, he probably lost his depth and didn't realize it lands right at Holliday if he isn't in no doubles defense.

  8. #48
    Dev11's Avatar
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    Under totally predictable stories, Verlander threw 7 innings and gave up 1 run tonight, which was a homerun to Crisp on the first at-bat of the game. Valverde in now to close it for Detroit

  9. #49
    Quote Originally Posted by Dev11 View Post
    Under totally predictable stories, Verlander threw 7 innings and gave up 1 run tonight, which was a homerun to Crisp on the first at-bat of the game. Valverde in now to close it for Detroit
    Justin Verlander's not bad at throwing a baseball.
    Demented and sad, but social, right?

  10. #50
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    Quote Originally Posted by Blue in the Face View Post
    Justin Verlander's not bad at throwing a baseball.
    Yeah, it's cute for us to discuss other guys like Felix and Dickey and Gio and all the rest, but honestly, Verlander is just on another level. Dude gasses 98 in the 8th inning pretty much effortlessly.

  11. #51
    Quote Originally Posted by Dev11 View Post
    Yeah, it's cute for us to discuss other guys like Felix and Dickey and Gio and all the rest, but honestly, Verlander is just on another level. Dude gasses 98 in the 8th inning pretty much effortlessly.
    And he doesn't start pitching in the 8th inning like Chapman, Jason Motte, etc ;P

    Looking to today's Nats-Cards game...Wainwright pitching in St Louis -- you would think that the Cards have the advantage. Not the case. Wainwright has been just mediocre this year coming off of elbow surgery, his September ERA is 4.20. Nats P Gio is a legit Cy Young contender...and his last game against St Louis he pitched a CG SO.

    The Cards do have a decent shot at the series -- Garcia is a good home field pitcher, and then we can throw Carpenter (returning from injury) and Lohse in Washington...my guess is this series goes the full 5 games, but the Cards really need a strong showing by Wainwright...

  12. #52
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    Quote Originally Posted by theAlaskanBear View Post
    And he doesn't start pitching in the 8th inning like Chapman, Jason Motte, etc ;P

    Looking to today's Nats-Cards game...Wainwright pitching in St Louis -- you would think that the Cards have the advantage. Not the case. Wainwright has been just mediocre this year coming off of elbow surgery, his September ERA is 4.20. Nats P Gio is a legit Cy Young contender...and his last game against St Louis he pitched a CG SO.

    The Cards do have a decent shot at the series -- Garcia is a good home field pitcher, and then we can throw Carpenter (returning from injury) and Lohse in Washington...my guess is this series goes the full 5 games, but the Cards really need a strong showing by Wainwright...
    Nats fans are worried because the Cardinals just trounced us a couple weeks ago in a 3 game set, and we're starting lefties in 3 of 5 potential games, although Gio accounts for two of those. The Cardinals mash lefties, so it should be an interesting series.

    Also, BOOOOO the powers that be for overlapping the Nats game and the Skins game. This a problem for any other baseball/football fans?

  13. #53
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    Quote Originally Posted by Dev11 View Post
    Nats fans are worried because the Cardinals just trounced us a couple weeks ago in a 3 game set, and we're starting lefties in 3 of 5 potential games, although Gio accounts for two of those. The Cardinals mash lefties, so it should be an interesting series.

    Also, BOOOOO the powers that be for overlapping the Nats game and the Skins game. This a problem for any other baseball/football fans?
    Not with DVR =)

    Although missing the last quarter of the Redskins game wouldn't have been the worst thing in the world. Oh well, at least the Nats had a nice 8th inning comeback!


    Baseball on DVR is great... with the 30-sec forward button there's no downtime between pitches! (or combo of 30-sec forward, 10-sec back in case the pitcher's going a little faster)

  14. #54
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    Quote Originally Posted by snowdenscold View Post
    Not with DVR =)

    Although missing the last quarter of the Redskins game wouldn't have been the worst thing in the world. Oh well, at least the Nats had a nice 8th inning comeback!


    Baseball on DVR is great... with the 30-sec forward button there's no downtime between pitches! (or combo of 30-sec forward, 10-sec back in case the pitcher's going a little faster)
    The idea of sports on DVR is great, but I really enjoy the live emotion. I hate sitting there constantly hitting buttons, even if it does save me time.

    That said, way to go Nats! A clutch performance from an unheralded rookie, Tyler Moore, made up for some sloppy but still unhittable pitching from Gio (probably the most likely pitcher in MLB to throw 6 innings with 7 walks and just 1 hit).

  15. #55

    Yankees win

    Well, it took until midnight, but the Yankees finally scored 5 in the top of the 9th to top the Orioles.

    Smart of them not to let it become a one-run or an extra-inning game!

    BTW Did anybody else hear Joe Torre before the game, talking about the Baltimore "Oreos"?

  16. #56
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    Quote Originally Posted by Olympic Fan View Post
    Well, it took until midnight, but the Yankees finally scored 5 in the top of the 9th to top the Orioles.

    Smart of them not to let it become a one-run or an extra-inning game!

    BTW Did anybody else hear Joe Torre before the game, talking about the Baltimore "Oreos"?
    If the "Oreos" were playing this game then I guess it doesn't count and we gotta start that one over...

    Tough game. Y'all deserved that one. Yanks have been big in the late innings recently. CC was outstanding. Could my sentences be any more choppy?!?!

    Obviously, that's a tough one to swallow, but I'm still confident the O's can win this series. O's have played their best baseball when their backs have been against the wall and when nobody thought they were supposed to win. So, Yanks, we've got you right where we want you. See you tomorrow night.

  17. #57
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    Was travelling so missed the last three innings of the Nats-Cards game, including the bottom-of-the-7th escape and Moore's pinch-hit single. Only got the results as soon as I landed. My Cards-lovin-cousins are not happy! Was home in time to watch the Yankees win (although I fell asleep on the couch before they really broke it open). Plus, the Redskins and Eagles lost, and the Giants won. Good day for me!

  18. #58
    Somewhat tentative past today, since series will start ending and things will be shuffled, but here's the schedule for the rest of the divisional series.

    Tuesday October 9, 2012
    All times Eastern. Subject to change.
    Giants Reds 5:30pm
    Tigers Athletics 9:00pm

    Wednesday October 10, 2012
    Cardinals Nationals 1:00pm
    Giants Reds 4:00pm
    Orioles Yankees 7:30PM
    Tigers Athletics 9:30pm

    Thursday October 11, 2012
    Giants Reds 1:00pm
    Cardinals Nationals 4:00pm
    Orioles Yankees 7:30pm
    Tigers Athletics 9:30pm

    Friday October 12, 2012
    Orioles Yankees 5:00pm
    Cardinals Nationals 8:30pm
    Demented and sad, but social, right?

  19. #59
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    Quote Originally Posted by Blue in the Face View Post

    Friday October 12, 2012
    Orioles Yankees 5:00pm
    I really hope the O's win it in 4. If the series goes 5 games, I guess I'll be skipping class so I can get home for fall break before the game starts...
    Last edited by dukebsbll14; 10-09-2012 at 10:52 PM.

  20. #60
    Quote Originally Posted by dukebsbll14 View Post
    I really hope the O's win it in 4. If the series goes 5 games, I guess I'll be skipping class so I can get home for fall break before the game starts...
    And the ALCS starts saturday, so if the series goes 5, someone will have some hasty travel plans. If Detroit holds on, it wouldn't be such a big deal, but if Oakland wins, either the A's or the O's would have long night of travel friday night.
    Demented and sad, but social, right?

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