Plano, Texas — Brad Pitt delivered a memorable line from the movie 'Moneyball' that has stuck with me from the time I saw the advanced screening last week in Kansas City, Mo.
Playing the role of general manager Billy Beane, Pitt said, "It's easy to be romantic about baseball."
After a script of sorts that played out Wednesday night in the final MLB games of the regular season, that line held even more significance when I sat back and thought about what had just happened around the league. ESPN baseball analyst/historian Tim Kurkjian called it the craziest day of regular-season baseball in the sport's lengthy history.
Tough to argue with that statement, as bold as it is. Wednesday night, wild card matchups had yet to be decided in the American and National leagues, home field advantage was still up for grabs and playoff hopes and dreams were either going to be clinched with feelings of euphoria, or crushed with feelings of hopelessness.
I was home in Plano Wednesday night and had the opportunity to watch a slew of games with my mom.
Texas began the night one game ahead of Detroit for the second-best record in the American League. To secure home-field advantage in the first round of the playoffs, the Rangers had to beat the Angels in Anaheim, or, in the event of a loss, hope for a Detroit loss against Cleveland.
Mom and I ate dinner (one of the most delicious meals I've had recently: grilled salmon from Sea Breeze in Plano, with broccoli, cauliflower, sweet potatoes/pumpkin spice topping and frozen yogurt; basically, a victory meal) before the Rangers game at 7 p.m. Meanwhile, Detroit and Cleveland had their first pitch at 6 p.m. The solution: We watched the Rangers game in HD on TV, while I brought my computer downstairs to pull up Tigers-Indians on mlb.tv.
So many games were going on at once with serious postseason implications. This is one of the many reasons baseball is my favorite sport. It's such a precise game that stresses numerous elements of statistics, geometry, psychology, superstition, tradition, history, fans, timing, teamwork and, sometimes, a gut feeling. Despite a 162-game regular season, some teams were forced to play their final game before they knew whether they were heading to the postseason, or heading home. Now that's exciting.
The breakdown:
• Boston and Tampa Bay entered Wednesday night tied for the AL wild-card lead at 90-71.
• St. Louis and Atlanta entered play tied for the NL wild-card lead at 89-72.
• Texas (95-66) and Detroit (94-67) were still battling for the second seed in the AL and home-field advantage in the ALDS.
None of these teams played each other on Wednesday night, making the landscape of baseball feel like March Madness in September. I was combining our television watching with mlb.tv and online box scores. It was sheer craziness in the best way.
Detroit beat Cleveland, 5-4, putting pressure on the Rangers to win in Anaheim to secure home field in the ALDS. At the time Detroit won, Texas and Anaheim were tied at 1-1 in the seventh inning.
In a development that was too Disney-like to realistically fathom, Rangers catcher Mike Napoli blasted a two-run moonshot of a home run in the ninth inning to put Texas ahead, 3-1. Mom and I were jumping around and screaming like 14-year-old girls at a Justin Beiber concert, a vivid and fuzzy 15-second moment in time that I won't be forgetting any time soon.
How fitting was it that Napoli belted the game-winning blast? Before the season, Anaheim traded the catcher to Toronto as part of the Vernon Wells deal. The Rangers, shortly after Napoli arrived in Toronto, dealt Frank Francisco to the Blue Jays for Napoli. Another brilliant move by Texas general manager Jon Daniels. Napoli finished the season hitting .320 with 30 home runs, 75 RBIs and a .414 on-base percentage. All that in only 369 at-bats.
The victory clinched home field in the first round for the Rangers and represented the best single-season mark in team history at 96-66.
Next was finding out who the Rangers would face at 4 p.m. on Friday in Arlington. By this point, we knew Detroit would travel to New York. The Rangers' opponent came down to either Boston or Tampa Bay, the two wild-card contenders.
This is when stuff really got whacky. Boston led Baltimore, 3-2, in the seventh inning when a rain delay pushed the game back an hour or so.
Meanwhile, Tampa Bay was in the midst of producing one of the greatest comebacks in baseball history. Trailing by seven runs in the eighth inning, the Rays rallied for six runs (highlighted by a three-run homer by Evan Longoria) in the eighth and one in the ninth — a solo home run by Dan Johnson to tie the game at 7.
Since the Rangers game was over by this point, I was flipping back and forth between Boston-Baltimore and New York-Tampa Bay.
In the bottom of the 12th inning, around 11:05 p.m. central time, Longoria ripped a liner of a home run over the left-field wall to complete the miracle comeback and send the Rays to an 8-7 victory.
At the same time, Boston was in the bottom of the ninth at Baltimore, protecting a 3-2 lead. Had the Red Sox won, they would have faced the Rays the next day in an extra game to decide who faced the Rangers in the ALDS. And it appeared it would end up that way when Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon had no problem securing two quick outs in the ninth inning. Boston was one strike away from a victory when Papelbon faced former Rangers/current Orioles first baseman Chris Davis. But Boston, which went 7-19 in September and couldn't hold onto a nine-game wild-card lead on Sept. 3, couldn't protect the lead. Papelbon gave up two doubles and a single, and the Orioles shocked the Red Sox in most improbable fashion, 4-3.
Suddenly, the Rays were in the postseason and coming to Arlington for the ALDS, while the Red Sox, who made mammoth offseason moves in acquiring Carl Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez, were going home. It was completely surreal, and I just sat upstairs, shaking my head in disbelief as the drama unfolded.
Longoria's home run came about three minutes after the Orioles' game-winning hit.
I didn't even mention the National League side of things, which saw St. Louis clinch the wild card with a victory and an Atlanta loss.
So now, you have postseason participants in St. Louis (10.5 games behind Atlanta in the wild-card race on Aug. 26) and Tampa Bay (nine games behind Boston on Sept. 3).
Yes, it was quite possibly the most fascinating night of regular-season baseball in the sport's history. I'm just glad I could watch it.
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Sunday, September 18, 2011
Late-night contemplation: Rangers in playoffs, and football past 3 a.m.
It's 3:18 a.m. and I'm currently witnessing a ridiculous event on TV. Oklahoma State is facing Tulsa with 6:53 left in the fourth quarter. And this thing is live. At 3:18 a.m.
After a three-hour lightning delay, game officials apparently are going to try to finish this thing. I've been watching football a long time, but I've never seen a game in the central time zone push 3:30 a.m. Oklahoma State is not helping the telecast either, because it's leading, 59-26. Long game with a lot of scoring.
At any rate, the Rangers made significant progress tonight with a 7-6 victory at Seattle. The significant progress came in large part because the Angels lost at Baltimore on the same night, 6-2.
With the Rangers winning and the Angels losing, Texas currently holds a 4.5-game lead in the American League West with 10 games remaining. Combine that with the rest of the Texas schedule (series left at Oakland, vs. Seattle, at Anaheim), and it really started to hit me tonight that the Rangers are well on their way to becoming back-to-back AL West champs.
It's a great time to be a Rangers fan. The team has a talented nucleus of players in the prime of their careers, and, for the most part, general manager Jon Daniels has attempted to keep the core together.
I'm aware not everyone will stay. C.J. Wilson, Josh Hamilton and Nelson Cruz will require new contracts soon. But hopefully, we can keep the majority of the nucleus in Arlington. If that happens, this can be a playoff contender for the next three to four years.
It's about 3:30 now and this OSU-Tulsa game still has 1:42 remaining. Insane. I'm barely keeping my eyes open, so I'm going to end this post now and rest easy, knowing the Rangers are on the brink of capturing another AL West crown.
After a three-hour lightning delay, game officials apparently are going to try to finish this thing. I've been watching football a long time, but I've never seen a game in the central time zone push 3:30 a.m. Oklahoma State is not helping the telecast either, because it's leading, 59-26. Long game with a lot of scoring.
At any rate, the Rangers made significant progress tonight with a 7-6 victory at Seattle. The significant progress came in large part because the Angels lost at Baltimore on the same night, 6-2.
With the Rangers winning and the Angels losing, Texas currently holds a 4.5-game lead in the American League West with 10 games remaining. Combine that with the rest of the Texas schedule (series left at Oakland, vs. Seattle, at Anaheim), and it really started to hit me tonight that the Rangers are well on their way to becoming back-to-back AL West champs.
It's a great time to be a Rangers fan. The team has a talented nucleus of players in the prime of their careers, and, for the most part, general manager Jon Daniels has attempted to keep the core together.
I'm aware not everyone will stay. C.J. Wilson, Josh Hamilton and Nelson Cruz will require new contracts soon. But hopefully, we can keep the majority of the nucleus in Arlington. If that happens, this can be a playoff contender for the next three to four years.
It's about 3:30 now and this OSU-Tulsa game still has 1:42 remaining. Insane. I'm barely keeping my eyes open, so I'm going to end this post now and rest easy, knowing the Rangers are on the brink of capturing another AL West crown.
Saturday, September 17, 2011
2011 Rangers ... better than 2010 edition?
With only a little more than a week left of regular-season baseball, the Texas Rangers sit at 86-65, 3.5 games ahead of Anaheim in the American League West.
In the 2010 regular season, the defending AL champions compiled a 90-72 record and won the West by nine games over second-place Oakland.
There's a good chance, with 11 games remaining this season, the Rangers will finish with a better regular-season record in 2011 than in 2010.
To me, that says a ton about fifth-year manager Ron Washington. I like to say I'm proud to be a Rangers fan because of the team's sense of direction these past few years. The Rangers have improved their regular-season record each year Washington's been at the helm in Arlington. How's this for direction:
2007: 75-87
2008: 79-83
2009: 87-75
2010: 90-72 (AL West champions, AL champions, lost in World Series)
2011: ?
With these numbers in mind, is this year's Texas team better than the 2010 edition?
I'm not sure I'm ready to go that far yet. Last season, there was a sense of confidence and borderline cockiness in games that Cliff Lee took the mound, especially in the postseason. This year, Lee is pitching on a dominant Phillies team that owns the best record in baseball (97-65) and will enter the postseason as the clear World Series favorite.
Really, the 2011 vs. 2010 debate boils down to one question: Can C.J. Wilson be 'that guy?'
You know, the guy the Rangers can turn to when they desperately need a victory to stay alive in a postseason series. The guy who mows down American League lineups with the pressure mounting. The guy who makes you feel more at ease about a playoff series because the opposing team has to beat him twice in order to eliminate the Rangers. Asked quite simply, can C.J. Wilson even come close to resembling Cliff Lee from 2010?
Lee was, by all accounts, absurd last postseason, to the point where I'd go to bed seriously contemplating if the guy was human. Lee went 3-2 with a 47/2 K/BB ratio and an ERA near 3.00. He was hit around a bit in the World Series, but was unstoppable in the ALDS and ALCS, more so than any pitcher I've ever watched on TV.
Lee proved that a legitimate, shutdown ace at the top of the Rangers' rotation could send them all the way to the World Series. Wilson doesn't carry the same intimidation factor as Lee, but he's pitched like an ace in 2011, the final year of his contract.
Wilson enjoyed a breakout season in 2010, going 15-8 with a 3.35 ERA and a 170/93 K/BB ratio. I've said many times before on this blog that if Wilson cut down his walk totals, he could be a front-line ace. This year, he's approached that status.
In 2011, Wilson is currently 16-7 with a 2.97 ERA and a 198/69 K/BB ratio. The walk totals are still a bit high, but at least it's progress from last year. He's giving up more hits (184 in 2011, 164 in 2010) and home runs (16 in 2011, 10 in 2010), but he's issuing considerably fewer free passes and striking out more hitters as well.
Wilson, by all accounts, has been an ace in 2011. For the Rangers to be a better team than last season, though, Wilson will have to elevate his game even more in two weeks.
Offensively, the teams are very comparable. A closer look:
2011 likely postseason batting order:
1. Ian Kinsler, 2B
2. Elvis Andrus, SS
3. Josh Hamilton, OF
4. Michael Young, DH
5. Adrian Beltre, 3B
6. Nelson Cruz, OF
7. Mike Napoli, C
8. David Murphy, OF
9. Mitch Moreland, 1B
2010 World Series batting order:
1. Elvis Andrus, SS
2. Michael Young, 3B
3. Josh Hamilton, OF
4. Vladimir Guerrero, DH
5. Nelson Cruz, OF
6. Ian Kinsler, 2B
7. Jeff Francoeur, OF
8. Bengie Molina, C
9. Mitch Moreland, 1B
Pretty close. Beltre (.288, 25 HR, 91 RBI) and Napoli (.312, 26 HR, 67 RBI, .411 OBP) have been huge additions to the offense.
Defensively, you'd have to say the 2011 team is superior, with Beltre holding down the hot corner.
The pitching depth, one through five, seems to be better this season with Wilson, Colby Lewis (12-10, 4.29 ERA, 150/52 K/BB), Alexi Ogando (13-8, 3.58 ERA, 123/43 K/BB), Matt Harrison (12-9, 3.56 ERA, 112/52 K/BB) and Derek Holland (14-5, 4.02 ERA, 148/63 K/BB). The top of last year's rotation, though, with Lee, Wilson and Lewis was tough to beat.
This year's bullpen is certainly stronger with the addition of Mike Adams and Koji Uehara. Closer Neftali Feliz was much better in 2010 (2.73 ERA, 71/18 K/BB) than he's been in 2011 (3.04 ERA, 45/28 K/BB).
But to me, it all comes back to Wilson, whom the Rangers will have to make a decision on in the offseason. Should the Rangers make the postseason, you're looking at shelling out $90-$100 million to keep the 30-year-old Wilson. Yes, he's 30, but since he's primarily pitched out of the bullpen, his arm shouldn't have as much wear and tear as other starting pitchers who are that age. I'm very tempted to spend the money, especially considering the best free agent pitcher this offseason figures to be Chicago's Mark Buehrle (32 years old).
I hope C.J. makes it a tough decision for Texas general manager Jon Daniels and company. A deep playoff run would certainly do the trick.
In the 2010 regular season, the defending AL champions compiled a 90-72 record and won the West by nine games over second-place Oakland.
There's a good chance, with 11 games remaining this season, the Rangers will finish with a better regular-season record in 2011 than in 2010.
To me, that says a ton about fifth-year manager Ron Washington. I like to say I'm proud to be a Rangers fan because of the team's sense of direction these past few years. The Rangers have improved their regular-season record each year Washington's been at the helm in Arlington. How's this for direction:
2007: 75-87
2008: 79-83
2009: 87-75
2010: 90-72 (AL West champions, AL champions, lost in World Series)
2011: ?
With these numbers in mind, is this year's Texas team better than the 2010 edition?
I'm not sure I'm ready to go that far yet. Last season, there was a sense of confidence and borderline cockiness in games that Cliff Lee took the mound, especially in the postseason. This year, Lee is pitching on a dominant Phillies team that owns the best record in baseball (97-65) and will enter the postseason as the clear World Series favorite.
Really, the 2011 vs. 2010 debate boils down to one question: Can C.J. Wilson be 'that guy?'
You know, the guy the Rangers can turn to when they desperately need a victory to stay alive in a postseason series. The guy who mows down American League lineups with the pressure mounting. The guy who makes you feel more at ease about a playoff series because the opposing team has to beat him twice in order to eliminate the Rangers. Asked quite simply, can C.J. Wilson even come close to resembling Cliff Lee from 2010?
Lee was, by all accounts, absurd last postseason, to the point where I'd go to bed seriously contemplating if the guy was human. Lee went 3-2 with a 47/2 K/BB ratio and an ERA near 3.00. He was hit around a bit in the World Series, but was unstoppable in the ALDS and ALCS, more so than any pitcher I've ever watched on TV.
Lee proved that a legitimate, shutdown ace at the top of the Rangers' rotation could send them all the way to the World Series. Wilson doesn't carry the same intimidation factor as Lee, but he's pitched like an ace in 2011, the final year of his contract.
Wilson enjoyed a breakout season in 2010, going 15-8 with a 3.35 ERA and a 170/93 K/BB ratio. I've said many times before on this blog that if Wilson cut down his walk totals, he could be a front-line ace. This year, he's approached that status.
In 2011, Wilson is currently 16-7 with a 2.97 ERA and a 198/69 K/BB ratio. The walk totals are still a bit high, but at least it's progress from last year. He's giving up more hits (184 in 2011, 164 in 2010) and home runs (16 in 2011, 10 in 2010), but he's issuing considerably fewer free passes and striking out more hitters as well.
Wilson, by all accounts, has been an ace in 2011. For the Rangers to be a better team than last season, though, Wilson will have to elevate his game even more in two weeks.
Offensively, the teams are very comparable. A closer look:
2011 likely postseason batting order:
1. Ian Kinsler, 2B
2. Elvis Andrus, SS
3. Josh Hamilton, OF
4. Michael Young, DH
5. Adrian Beltre, 3B
6. Nelson Cruz, OF
7. Mike Napoli, C
8. David Murphy, OF
9. Mitch Moreland, 1B
2010 World Series batting order:
1. Elvis Andrus, SS
2. Michael Young, 3B
3. Josh Hamilton, OF
4. Vladimir Guerrero, DH
5. Nelson Cruz, OF
6. Ian Kinsler, 2B
7. Jeff Francoeur, OF
8. Bengie Molina, C
9. Mitch Moreland, 1B
Pretty close. Beltre (.288, 25 HR, 91 RBI) and Napoli (.312, 26 HR, 67 RBI, .411 OBP) have been huge additions to the offense.
Defensively, you'd have to say the 2011 team is superior, with Beltre holding down the hot corner.
The pitching depth, one through five, seems to be better this season with Wilson, Colby Lewis (12-10, 4.29 ERA, 150/52 K/BB), Alexi Ogando (13-8, 3.58 ERA, 123/43 K/BB), Matt Harrison (12-9, 3.56 ERA, 112/52 K/BB) and Derek Holland (14-5, 4.02 ERA, 148/63 K/BB). The top of last year's rotation, though, with Lee, Wilson and Lewis was tough to beat.
This year's bullpen is certainly stronger with the addition of Mike Adams and Koji Uehara. Closer Neftali Feliz was much better in 2010 (2.73 ERA, 71/18 K/BB) than he's been in 2011 (3.04 ERA, 45/28 K/BB).
But to me, it all comes back to Wilson, whom the Rangers will have to make a decision on in the offseason. Should the Rangers make the postseason, you're looking at shelling out $90-$100 million to keep the 30-year-old Wilson. Yes, he's 30, but since he's primarily pitched out of the bullpen, his arm shouldn't have as much wear and tear as other starting pitchers who are that age. I'm very tempted to spend the money, especially considering the best free agent pitcher this offseason figures to be Chicago's Mark Buehrle (32 years old).
I hope C.J. makes it a tough decision for Texas general manager Jon Daniels and company. A deep playoff run would certainly do the trick.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)