You just can't figure Zambrano out. You never know what you're going to get from the guy from start to start. Cheers to the big guy, and sadly, yet another piece of Milt Pappas lore passes from history.

any word on the attendance?

23,000ish

any word on the attendance?

23,441.

It was nice that he did it without 1) any help from the home plate ump or 2) going 140 pitches.

I'm guessing this is the first no-hitter thrown on a "neutral field" (heh), at least since the 19th century.

not a bad turn out for that game, zambrano looked just nasty all night

Remember when Bill James wrote that piece about what kind of team is most likely to get no-hit? That term he used was a team that was "draggin' ass."

After all the Astros have been through the past few days, I think they count.

I guess my concern in the other thread about who the Brewer fans would root for today was unfounded: turns out they're rooting for Aaron Rodgers.

That means the last 2 no-hitters the Astros have been involved in have been kind of bizarre. The last one was their 6 pitcher no-hitter against the Yankees, right?

"Surreal" is the best way to describe seeing Zambrano drop to his knee after striking out Erstad. Despite accounts on how great his stuff was tonight, I was convinced the Astros were going to find another way to make me hate them in the ninth. When Erstad swung and missed, I had to let it register that I'd just witnessed the first Cubs no-hitter in almost 40 years.

All of us were down on this team over the last two weeks and they could easily go back to that starting tomorrow afternoon. But if nothing else, tonight's game was just another one of those footnotes in the Cubs' long season that separates this team from previous playoff-bound Cub teams.

That means the last 2 no-hitters the Astros have been involved in have been kind of bizarre. The last one was their 6 pitcher no-hitter against the Yankees, right?

They were also the victims of the Kerry Wood 20 K game, the most dominant 9 inning pitching performance ever.

They were also the victims of the Kerry Wood 20 K game, the most dominant 9 inning pitching performance ever.

Yeah, but that wasn't an "Exceptional for reasons other than dominance" no-hitter, like the 6 pitcher interleague play no hitter and the neutral field hurricane no hitter were.

My son summoned me after the sixth inning, to do bedtime with him. This is normal. I fell asleep myself. Fortunately, my wife woke me up as the bottom of the eighth started.

96 game score, which is the highest this year and the highest in the NL since 2004 (and Randy Johnson's 100-pt perfect game).

Happy birthday to me.

Wish I could have seen more than just the 9th. Stupid espn blackout. Thatll teach me to come to nyc again.

I guess my concern in the other thread about who the Brewer fans would root for today was unfounded: turns out they're rooting for Aaron Rodgers.

As the gap between the Cubs and Brewers increases in the standings, it's the Cub/Brewer/Bear/Packer symbiosis kicking in further - Rodgers exceeds initial expectations, and the Bears start their losing.

Very cool.

Aside from the Wood game, the closest I remember seeing a Cub pitcher get to a no-hitter was this game, where Chuck Rainey's got broken up with 2 outs in the 9th.

Yeah, but that wasn't an "Exceptional for reasons other than dominance" no-hitter, like the 6 pitcher interleague play no hitter and the neutral field hurricane no hitter were.

Well, it was Wood's 5th ML start.

16:

I'll gladly see the Bears go 0-16 for the rest of my life to see the Cubs win the World Series.

The No-Hitter and The Save are meaningless statistics. There did I joykill everyone? Now go to bed, it is a school night.

Congrats, Cubs fans - he pitched a hell of a game.

Zambrano's Game Score was 96, his career best. This disaster was his previous career best.

Since 1956, there have only been two Cubs starts with higher game scores than this one, Wood's famous 20 K start, with a record nine inning game score of 105, and this 2001 start by Wood.

There have been two other starts since 1956 with a 96 game score. One was Ken Holtzman's 12-inning 1971 no-hitter against the Pirates. The other was this late-1995 season one-hit gem by Frank Castillo, against the Cardinals.

Holtzman's was a 9 hitter, right?

Congrats! Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy.

Holtzman's was a 9 hitter, right?

Of course...no hitters on the brain.

Zambrano's Game Score was 96, his career best. This disaster was his previous career best.

It's impossible to forget how horrible those Cub teams of 2005 and 2006 were, but it still blows the mind to see the likes of Burnitz, Hairston, Neifi, and Hollandsworth in that lineup and know that, with exception to Hairston, those weren't back-up guys. Not in Dusty's mind, anyway. Looking back at lineups like that make you confident in knowing that even with a healthy Wood and Prior, the Cubs would've probably still struggled.

The papers will have a field day with this one.

ZambraNo-No, anyone?

That 2001 start by Wood AR referenced above was the day after Jon Lieber threw a one-hitter at the brewers. Those two wins rank up there on my list of greatest Cubs memories with Zambrano's no-hitter.

Anyone who throws a 12-inning no-hitter and ends up with a game score of 96 has some control problems.

Really sorry I missed this. I watched Holzman's 2nd no-hitter (vs. the Reds) live on TV, saw Burt Hooton's live at Wrigley and listened to Pappas' on the radio -- would have watched the last few innings on TV but I didn't want to jinx him! Maybe if I'd watched on TV, he'd have gotten the perfect game.

I also recall watching the Frank Castillo one -- would have been way up there on the list of least likely no-hitters ever. I recall the ump having a strike zone about 4 feet wide and Castillo not throwing a single pitch within a foot of the plate all day but my memory may be off (could have been Chuck Rainey's effort! :-)

And the Cubs are still working on the record for longest string of not being no-hit aren't they?

Richard Justice rips Drayton McLane and (to a lesser degree) Beelzebud for allowing this game to be played in front of a pro-Cub crowd:

Link

Now back to Wood's 20-k game (which I did not see live! err....) ... one thing that's overlooked ... not only was it the most dominant start (by game score) ever but the Astros were the highest-scoring team in the NL that year (and sported the highest non-Coors BA and the 2nd highest OBP). They didn't even strike out all that much (4th in the league).

The "drag ass" effect wouldn't seem to hold either. Wood pitched on Wed, one day after the Astros beat up on the Cubs 10-5 and they had the day off on Monday. Except for Jack Howell (batting cleanup) and Dave Clark, both lefties, that was their regular lineup.

As to Wood, he threw just 122 pitches that day despite all the Ks. Alas, between that start on May 6 and his injury on Aug 31, he threw 8 games of 120+ pitches. All told he averaged 108.5 pitches.

Not that you should draw any conculsions from that.

---The No-Hitter and The Save are meaningless statistics. There did I joykill everyone? Now go to bed, it is a school night---

Why watch the games? More fun to simulate anyway. This #### happens all thje time in my dmb league. Nothing worth watching happened, all a fluke. Baseball isn't fun, its allabout the projections.

Anyone who throws a 12-inning no-hitter and ends up with a game score of 96 has some control problems.

it was actually just a shutout, but your point is still valid.

Drove up for this. Amazing. It was mentioned upthread about not needing help from home plate ump or throwing a ton of pitches. The thing that did it for me was that he didn't need a lot of help from his fielders. You had DeRosa making a non-spectacular running catch in RF, and Lee jumping about 3 inches off the ground for a line drive. Everything else was the definition of routine.

Except of course the little nubber that Z ran in grabbed and got the hitter by a couple steps. Pretty much a carbon copy of the play Sabathia couldn't make in his no-hit bid.

Just an incredible performance.

The upper sections were closed down due to lack of stadium personnel being available. Bruce Levine of ESPN Radio suggested that there would have been more like 35,000 fans there without this restriction.

The upper sections were not closed down. I was sitting in 424, Terrace Box behind home plate. Ate and drank from vendors that were up there.

Back in 2003 when the Cubs had Clement, Wood, Prior, and Zambrano a bunch of us came to a decision that out of the 4 the most likely pitcher to get a no hitter was Zambrano.

: ( I really wanted to go tonight, but family got in the way. It would have been the cleanest scorecard ever kept.

SouthSide,

Did you buy your tix online?

Yeah bought them ~330 this afternoon.

I'm trying to find somebody I can roll with tomorrow. ####!

Because of the short notice, they had to bus vendors in from other cities due to a shortage of available workers.

Only field and loge seats are open for the series.

What an incredible and crazy season. I'm going to be sad when it ends, no matter the outcome.

Which other cities?

I can just imagine the Appletonians who thought their summer employment with the Timber Rattlers was at an end getting an emergency call and offered triple-time pay to come down to Milwaukee and work two Cubs-Astros games.

Which other cities?

Not sure. It was the vendor (SportService) that did that - they called in some of their employees from other cities.

As I said NTN, that's not true about the available tickets. I was there. Sitting in the upper deck. With other fans.

One of the vendors in my area lives about 3 miles away from me on the southside. So at least one vendor came in from Chicago.

EDIT: Maybe it was online only where you could buy upper deck seats, but they had all vending areas fully staffed at least from 424-430.

That's weird - because of staffing issues, they've said the whole time they weren't going to sell anything other than loge and field. Perhaps they got enough vendors at the last minute.

You can't buy terrace for Monday online - it says they're not being sold (I just checked).

Yeah, I can't imagine them getting much more than 6 or 7 thousand for tomorrow. No reason to have the upper deck open.

Went and checked, I can't believe they're charging full price for tomorrow too. It made sense for tonight, but who's gonna be at this game besides Marquette and UWM students?

This is all well and good but the question remains, "Who won the sausage race?"

Happy birthday to me.

Wish I could have seen more than just the 9th. Stupid espn blackout.

I'd bet dollars to doughnuts that you will be able to get the entire game through iTunes. MLBAM has a "TV Show" there called "Instant Classics" (or something like that) where you get the broadcast of notable games for ~$3. I picked up Lester's (and Buchholz's) no-no just a day or two latter.

This is all well and good but the question remains, "Who won the sausage race?"

Thought I read someplace that the sausages didn't show (unlike in last year's Angels/Indians game at Miller), but they did sing "Roll out the Barrel."

Don't get me wrong, the no-hitter is cool and all, but the important thing is that Z is looking great in the middle of September.

That means the last 2 no-hitters the Astros have been involved in have been kind of bizarre. The last one was their 6 pitcher no-hitter against the Yankees, right?

Fox Sports notes that most Astros-involved no-hitters have had something unusual associated with them.

Of course, with yesterday being football day and the mixed-up schedule and all, yesterday's game didn't even register on my personal sports radar. Figures Z would pitch a no-hitter. I'll have to see if I can catch this at some point. Go Cubs!

They must super impose Minute Maid ticket categories over Miller Park seating. I paid $50 for a seat that I know is $28 for a Brewer game. $18 for parking instead of $12. Best $68 I've spemt all year, granted. It was kind of weird when Houston police dragged out this drunk in front of me.

It made sense for tonight, but who's gonna be at this game besides Marquette and UWM students?

The motherf*ckers don't even work. That's why they're out at the f*ckin' game. They oughta go out and get a f*ckin' job and find
out what it's like to go out and earn a f*ckin' living. Eighty-five percent of the f*ckin' world is working. The other fifteen percent come out here. A f*ckin' playground for the cocks*ckers.

Cheers to the big guy, and sadly, yet another piece of Milt Pappas lore passes from history.

After hearing him in a radio interview last year, that's the best part of Z's no-hitter. I don't think I've ever before found an athlete so obnoxious in so many ways in just 8 minutes.

I think the Astros were screwed. I mean, who knows? Maybe Zambrano would've have no-hit them if they had played in Houston, Seattle, St. Louis, San Juan, Topeka or Olympus Mons. But I doubt it. Great performance, but the Astros still got screwed. If they absolutely, positively HAD to play in Milwaukee, the least they could have done was find some Astros fans somewhere and given them seats behind the plate.

I know Carlos no hit them and everything but the Astros are not a bunch of little leaguers who need their mommies to cheer them on in the stands.

the least they could have done was find some Astros fans somewhere and given them seats behind the plate.

I'm sure baseball chick and her kids would have made a difference.

I think the Astros were screwed.

If they were, it was by their own owner.

-- MWE

If I were an Astro fan, I would be thoroughly pissed at the owner. Once they decide to play the game at Miller Park, you've got to support that decision and tell your players that this is a home game. Instead he whined about the decision, whined about the fans, and basically gave his team permission to lose. I doubt they could have hit Z last night, anyway, but it's awfully hard to get up for 162 straight games. The last thing a team needs when faced with adversity is a built-in excuse to lose.

People are acting like it is easy to throw a no-hitter in Milwaukee, it is not.

-signed CC

I seriously doubt the Houston Astros couldn't handle it. This is a red hot team that is used to having strong come from behind finishes at the end of the season. This is a team that has done all that while playing on the road or at home. This isn't some .400 team that can't get it up. The Astros wanted this win, hell, they needed this win. If they psyched themselves out because of 20,000 blue jersies then it pretty much goes against everything they have done the last 5 years.

I know Carlos no hit them and everything but the Astros are not a bunch of little leaguers who need their mommies to cheer them on in the stands.


You're right. They ought to play all 162 games on the road.

You can talk about whether the Astros ownership put the team into this predicament -- that's what we were talking about over the weekend. But it's sheer nonsense to deny that the Astros were disadvantaged playing at Miller Park with 20,000 vocal Cubs fans and relatively few (if any) Astros fans.

By how much? 1%? 2%?

Did the faux-home field atmosphere give Zambrano an advantage? Perhaps. Would he have likely thrown a no-hitter in Enron? Absolutely not. Were the Astros dazed and confused by the disaster in Houston and dealing with personal issues in the previous 48 hours? Perhaps. But come on, Zambrano was on last night. I was a bit worried that he had too much on his fastball in the first and it was too flat, but when he came out for the second that didn't appear to be a problem. He was lights out.

The important thing for that Astros isn't that they were no-hit, it was that they lost, and I think they would have lost in any venue with Zambrano dealing what he was dealing.

You can talk about whether the Astros ownership put the team into this predicament -- that's what we were talking about over the weekend. But it's sheer nonsense to deny that the Astros were disadvantaged playing at Miller Park with 20,000 vocal Cubs fans and relatively few (if any) Astros fans.

Did the Astros have a lot of false-start penalties because the crowd noise was too much? Were the easily swayed umps calling more blocking fouls on the Astros than they would have if the game were at Minute Maid?

Like McCoy, I'd seriously like to know how fans themselves impact a baseball game.

So, I only saw the last inning, as per ESPN, but what about all the turmoil and travesty could possibly have made the guy swing at that last pitch? Geez, louise.

Like McCoy, I'd seriously like to know how fans themselves impact a baseball game.

The mechanism is probably psychological.

Do you believe that home/road records are due to purely physical characteristics of the ballpark?

Like McCoy, I'd seriously like to know how fans themselves impact a baseball game.

You've never heard of a home-field advantage? Seriously?

I'm not saying the Astros would've won last night if the game were played elsewhere. Having said that, if you'd like, I could probably drag out hundreds of quotes from baseball players saying that the crowd gave them a boost, but I really don't think it's necessary. Is it?

Don't get me wrong, the no-hitter is cool and all, but the important thing is that Z is looking great in the middle of September.

Agreed. Last time he had an extended rest (his 2-start DL stint in June), he was absolutely lights out for six weeks when he returned, so perhaps we'll see a redux.

Do you believe that home/road records are due to purely physical characteristics of the ballpark?

Of course -- that's because the teams have extreme short-term memory. They don't ever remember playing in Miller Park before. Heck, they couldn't even find the right dugouts!

You're right. They ought to play all 162 games on the road.

Will you stop tossing this strawman out there? Jesus, it's getting annoying.

Do you believe that home/road records are due to purely physical characteristics of the ballpark?

Only due to those characteristics, no? I believe the biggest advantage is psychological, with the rest attributable to some combination of ballpark characteristics (players knowledge of the setting and limited ability to tailor a roster that takes advantage of those characteristics), comfort in playing near your actual physical home (without travel) and possibly, last licks.

But in this case, the only way this was a Cubs home game was a very modest travel advantage and whatever impact having more fans can have. And I'm seriously stumped what kind of advantage home fans play in baseball.

Do you believe that home/road records are due to purely physical characteristics of the ballpark?

Of course -- that's because the teams have extreme short-term memory. They don't ever remember playing in Miller Park before. Heck, they couldn't even find the right dugouts!

So Florida's 600 fans give them that boost they need to have the same home field advantage?


What is home field advantage? The crowd is probably one small part of it. Outside of the crowd the Cubs were in the same boat as the Astros. The Cubs were in the Brewers clubhouse, the Brewers dugout, playing on a field that was not their own, and doing so on short notice. So again what is home field advantage? Why do home teams win more games at home then lose? You honestly believe it is because of the crowd? Do you honestly believe the crowd is a big chunk of the reason?

If so can you imagine what home records would have looked like 100 years ago if they could have gotten 40,000 to 50,000 fans cheering for the home team every game?

Do you believe that home/road records are due to purely physical characteristics of the ballpark?

Surely a substantial part of the advantage is the ability to play for however many runs you need in the bottom of the 9th or later innings, right? For instance, if the visitor gets three in the top of the ninth, the home team will not be foolish enough to bunt the leadoff man over. The visitor, now knowing the home team will score three in their half, has no such luxury.

Just because it's not capable of being measured (because it's psychological) doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Surely a substantial part of the advantage is the ability to play for however many runs you need in the bottom of the 9th or later innings, right? For instance, if the visitor gets three in the top of the ninth, the home team will not be foolish enough to bunt the leadoff man over. The visitor, now knowing the home team will score three in their half, has no such luxury.

True, but what about games decided before the 9th inning?

Has Zambrano even come close to no-hitting a team at Wrigley? Seems like the games where he's limited the other team to two or three hits have been on the road (Arizona in 2003, St. Louis in 2005). I don't doubt he didn't get a rush from the fans last night, but by all accounts, his stuff was just nasty. When he's on, he's on and it doesn't matter where they're playing.

Cyril Morong tells me that modern day home winning percentage is about .535. So give the Cubs a theoretical .535 to start with. Take a little bit off that due to the Cubs not truly being the home team, AND the Astros being the home team and batting last. The stress the Astros have been under would be present home or road, so that is a wash. So lets say .525 for the Cubs. Compared to .535 the Astros would have had, or the .475 they now have. Or .060 total. For two games. So the Astros lost 0.12 expected wins by forcing them to play on the road.

They may have lost an extra 0.05 expected wins by playing in Milwaukee rather than Tampa. But gained a lot of money in that trade off.

Boo friggin hoo.

Just because it's not capable of being measured (because it's psychological) doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

I don't think anyone is saying it doesn't exist, I think most people (or at least I am) are saying that whatever the impact was it was miniscule last night.

Again the Astros are a team that could have rolled over and played dead earlier in the season. They did not, and not dying is a pretty clear and known event in recent Astros history. So I don't think we are dealing with a bunch of fragiles psyches here who are going to be heavily swayed by the laundry in the stands.

By the way the Astros are 37-38 on the road, in a year when only 6 teams are above .500 and only one of them significantly. Besides the Angels all 5 other teams are within 4 games of .500. So apparently the Astros are up to the challenge of crowds cheering against them.

Cyril Morong tells me that modern day home winning percentage is about .535. So give the Cubs a theoretical .535 to start with. Take a little bit off that due to the Cubs not truly being the home team, AND the Astros being the home team and batting last.

A little bit? I would think, though I can't prove, that the bulk of the .035 over .500 advantage comes from batting last.

A little bit? I would think, though I can't prove, that the bulk of the .035 over .500 advantage comes from batting last.
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What would be the parameters for that research? Would it be batting last in terms of just the 9th, batting last and always reacting to what the away team did on offense every inning?

Or is it just the 9th inning all by itself? Meaning if the home team is leading they can then put in their best reliever and best defensive players if they want to hold the opposing team. While the away team has to be careful with their sub usage since they have to play the 9th. Plus if the away team isn't leading then they might never use their "best" reliever in the game and allowing the home team to score the necessary final runs. And if the home team isn't leading they know exactly how many runs they need to win and for the most part they can pull out all the stops to try and get those runs (though they do have to consider a tie)

A little bit? I would think, though I can't prove, that the bulk of the .035 over .500 advantage comes from batting last.

Someone must have figured this out. What's the percentage of games in which the home team is leading after 7 or 8 innings? That should distill out the advantage in the ninth or later.

Random thoughts:

1. I was just quoting what ESPN radio reported on the upper deck seating. Thanks for clearing it up, SouthsideRyan. I'm jealous... I was about to road trip up there, but wimped out - from NW 'burbs, it's about as convenient as Wrigley.

2. They also said on the ESPN radio report that the gun was fast, showing Z at 99 MPH. In his post-game interview, he said that he saw the 99, and was inspired... that may have had something to do with him being psyched up.

3. Too bad about the prices today, I could break free, but at the prices they want for a Monday afternoon game, no thanks.

I don't think anyone is saying it doesn't exist, I think most people (or at least I am) are saying that whatever the impact was it was miniscule last night.

You have no way of knowing that.

So I don't think we are dealing with a bunch of fragiles psyches here who are going to be heavily swayed by the laundry in the stands.

When have I ever said this? Jeez, if retro is going to get on my case claiming my "why don't they play all 162 games on the road" is a straw-man, then surely the "fragile psyches" line is as well.

The Astros would've lit Zambrano up if the crowd noise hadn't kept them from hearing the snap count.

Jeez, if retro is going to get on my case claiming my "why don't they play all 162 games on the road" is a straw-man, then surely the "fragile psyches" line is as well.

Your "why don't they play all 162 games on a road" is a strawman because:

(1) nobody's arguing that'd be fair under any circumstances, and

(2)more specifically, it's completely fatuous to suggest that it follows, from saying it's reasonable to ask a team to play two games in a not-particularly-favorable alternate site when

(a)that team's home city has been hit by a catastrophic storm that renders the city inaccessible,
(b) the team knew (or should have anticipated) days in advance that such inaccessibility was likely,
(c) the team insisted, despite that high risk, on rejecting alternate arrangements (some of which would have been less unfavorable than what they ended up getting stuck with) anyway until the number of feasible options was severely limited, and
(d) the team was well aware, when rejecting alternate sites, that the opportunities for in-season makeup games were virtually nil given the two involved teams' remaining schedules,

that one should be equally comfortable with saying "hell with it--they should be content with 162 road games."

I would think, though I can't prove, that the bulk of the .035 over .500 advantage comes from batting last.

Tom Meagher wrote an article about three years ago in THT in which he pointed out that much of HFA can be explained by home-team batters walking more and striking out less than do visiting team batters.

-- MWE

....and sadly, yet another piece of Milt Pappas lore passes from history.

Did they ever find out what happened to his wife? That was always a weird story...

(1) nobody's arguing that'd be fair under any circumstances,

Except McCoy, who believes there is no unfairness in playing on the road because of air travel and because players don't have "fragile psyches" and can deal with laundry.

I wasn't basing my statement on McCoy's claim wrt these two games in particular; he was making claims that apply to road games in general. In any event, I wasn't denying that I was exaggerating McCoy's argument a bit; I was simply pointing out that the "fragile psyches" line is at least as exaggerated as my line.

Furthermore, your points (a)-(d) are all variations of the "McLane screwed the team over" argument that we went through over the weekend. It has nothing to do with the issue at hand, namely whether Houston was disadvantaged having to play in Milwaukee versus, say, Tampa.

Just look at how extreme homefield advantage is in basketball. No last licks there - and yet this year in the playoffs there were about a million series that ended in 7 games, each win going to the home team. The advantage is purely pyschological.

But, in that sport the announcer/music guy has a stronger impact, the give-and-take with fans is more immediate. A baseball player could close his eyes and not know which stadium he was in - fans get equally loud when they want a hit or a strikeout, and there isn't even an equivalent of "D-fence! D-fence!"

Did they ever find out what happened to his wife? That was always a weird story...

She drove her car into a pond not far from their house. Police theorized she was drinking at the time and may have mistaken a driveway into the pond for one leading to their subdivision.

Just look at how extreme homefield advantage is in basketball. No last licks there - and yet this year in the playoffs there were about a million series that ended in 7 games, each win going to the home team. The advantage is purely pyschological.

I don't know. Though I'm not an NBA fan, I think the officiating in NBA games plays a big part in this advantage. Teams just seem to get more calls at home.

It has nothing to do with the issue at hand, namely whether Houston was disadvantaged having to play in Milwaukee versus, say, Tampa.

But wouldn't Cubs fans vastly outnumber Astros fans in Tampa as well? Or just about anywhere outside the Houston metropolitan area?

I do think the Astros are at a psychological disadvantage in these games. I also believe that it's largely self-inflicted. If they'd just said "Hey, we're still the home team, we're the hottest team in baseball and we just kicked their ass at their actual home field, so bring 'em on," instead of choosing to whine about the unfairness of it all, then the psychological edge would have been nil.*

* But, in all likelihood, it still wouldn't have helped them much against Zambrano.

It would be interesting to take a look at how players who switch teams fare at their old team's stadium. If you limited the study to hitting and used some sort of Marcel age adjustment on the population, you could compare those numbers to the player's performance in the same stadium the year before.

I wish I was better at harvesting data.

But wouldn't Cubs fans vastly outnumber Astros fans in Tampa as well? Or just about anywhere outside the Houston metropolitan area?

Oh, I agree with this; I just believe it wouldn't have been 20,000:none.

In any event, we're running up against my 100 post limit, at which point I stop following threads (including this one) because, IMO, any discussions that go beyond that point have long exhausted their usefulness.

But wouldn't Cubs fans vastly outnumber Astros fans in Tampa as well? Or just about anywhere outside the Houston metropolitan area?

That's probably true but, to be fair, is there any ball park outside of Chicago where this would have been more pronounced than Milwaukee?

Except McCoy, who believes there is no unfairness in playing on the road because of air travel and because players don't have "fragile psyches" and can deal with laundry.

I do not believe this. What I said was in this instance the "unfairness" of playing in Milwaukee was miniscule. Houston got two days off, takes a three hour flight to Milwaukee. Chicago got two days off, took a two hour bus ride or train ride to Miwlaukee. Both teams are experiencing travel. Hell, a home team flying back from the west coast to play a series at home experiences the same thing as Houston just did and for whatever reason the home team wins more games then they lose. So how huge of an impact is air travel on this series? Especially after two days off.

My fragile psyche piece was a bit of a hyperbole for sure, but what the hell is it you guys are arguing about when you talk about 20,000 cubs fans in attendance? You act like these guys are a bunch of little leaguers were are going to hang their heads because their mommy isn't out there cheering for them.

The Astros suffered the disadvantage of not playing in Houston. They would experience that regardless of where they chose to play these games. The fact that it was in Milwaukee it seems has caused some to people that it created this extreme shift outside of simply playing outside of Houston. I don't believe playing in Milwaukee has caused a huge shift. I don't believe that the Houston Astros who have a history of not calling it quits is suddenly going to get all psyched out simply because of the color of the stadiums laundry.

That's probably true but, to be fair, is there any ball park outside of Chicago where this would have been more pronounced than Milwaukee?

Probably not. But I'm not sure what that means. At what point does the advantage of the home crowd start to take place? Is it at plus-10,000 fans? Plus 20,000? And whatever number it is, the Rays home record this year would seem to be serve as a counterargument.