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Baseball Primer Newsblog— The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Mike, figga it out yourself!
The Rangers are the best team since the ’98 Yankees. Do you agree?
Tom Verducci made this statement yesterday to John Feinstein and Bruce Murray during their mid-day show on Mad Dog Radio. I think Nolan Ryan and Jon Daniels have done a fabulous job turning around that ballclub, but they should not be discussed in the same breath as one of the best baseball teams of all-time.
...The biggest difference between this Rangers group and the late nineties Yankees, or early nineties Blue Jays for that matter, is they haven’t sealed the deal. They lost to inferior National League clubs in the World Series. When it counted the Giants’ and Cardinals’ staffs were able to shutdown this powerful offense. Those Yankees teams always found a way to win against an Atlanta team that, arguably, was better on paper. The Rangers are still very much about potential and not results.
There has to be a World Series title for me to even discuss this Texas team with the ’98 Yankees. Even if there is I don’t know if that still would justify putting them in the same category of that dynasty.
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1. Avoid running at all times.-S. Paige Posted: May 31, 2012 at 05:14 PM (#4144578)And too early to say they are better than the Mariners.
Woot! Woot!
Always good to have independent confirmation that that happened. Sometimes I start to think the Jays winning the World Series was a figment of my childhood imagination.
I remember the 98 series against the Braves. It was almost as good as the 2000 series against the Braves.
I mean, for serious ####'s sake. I know pennants are frequently won in April, and that the Rangers already have a hard-to-overcome lead on their division. But they have played .500 baseball in May. The '98 Yankees' worst month was .593 in September.
Wash has been intent, ever since running up the big lead, on resting guys and giving his bench some playing time. This is possibly good playoff strategy, but their bench is OK, not '98 Yankees great. And the starting rotation is always a concern, good as some of the guys have been so far. The thing about the '98 Yankees was that Wells and Cone (and in retrospect, Pettitte) were money in the bank. They were extremely durable, experienced pitchers – not in some gutsy-intangible sense, but in the sense of excelling year after year. I don't know if Matt Harrison and Derek Holland are quite in that category, or will ever be.
Probably the 1999 Yankees, who breezed through the three-tiered playoffs with only 1 loss.
Wake us up after the World Series and we'll see then. And this time you might want to remember to get that last out.
wow--I just looked at the Mariners in 01--THEIR worse month was .667 (which they did in both months that start with J)
It has been a long time since I wished there was a Hell, but I may renew my youthful eschatology just for you, Andy :)
It has been a long time since I wished there was a Hell, but I may renew my youthful eschatology just for you, Andy :)
That's cool, but just remember that people far better and holier than either of us have tried and failed to immanentize the eschaton. Just getting that last out might be a lot easier.
EDIT: Oh, and also the Devil Rays of the last few years. Doing what they've done, in that division, is damned impressive; beating up on the good guys (otherwise known as Reddick and the 7 dwarves), the Angels (so far, they seem to be getting it together), and the Mariners, not so impressive.
SEA 2001 40 12 0.769BOS 2002 36 15 0.706
BOS 2007 36 16 0.692
ATL 2000 35 16 0.686
CLE 1999 33 16 0.673
CHA 2005 35 17 0.673
LAN 2009 35 17 0.673
ATL 2003 37 18 0.673
MIN 2001 34 17 0.667
SEA 2003 36 18 0.667
DET 2006 35 18 0.660
CLE 2001 33 17 0.660
NYA 2002 36 19 0.655
PHI 2001 34 18 0.654
ATL 2007 34 18 0.654
TAM 2010 34 18 0.654
STL 2005 33 18 0.647
SEA 2002 34 19 0.642
STL 2006 34 19 0.642
LAN 2012 32 18 0.640 *pending game tonight
ARI 2000 33 19 0.635
SDN 2005 33 19 0.635
CHA 2006 33 19 0.635
CLE 2007 33 19 0.635
ARI 2002 34 20 0.630
SFN 2003 34 20 0.630
CHN 2008 35 21 0.625
BOS 1999 31 19 0.620
PHI 2011 34 21 0.618
NYN 2006 32 20 0.615
CLE 2011 32 20 0.615
NYA 2004 30 19 0.612
ATL 1999 31 20 0.608
CHN 2001 31 20 0.608
BOS 2004 31 20 0.608
BAL 2005 31 20 0.608
BOS 2006 31 20 0.608
NYA 2006 31 20 0.608
MIN 2010 31 20 0.608
NYA 2010 31 20 0.608
SDN 2010 31 20 0.608
TEX 2012 31 20 0.608
They'll probably only win the division by a pitiful 8 games, rather than the 22 NYC did.
I was thinking the Cardinals should be considered on the short list of best teams since the '98 Yankees. I don't think you judge a team solely on that one season though. I would say that the Yankees and Red Sox both have great arguments as having been the best team since the '98 Yankees, I think that with the previous two years, that the Rangers are also in the discussion. The 2001 Mariners was an aberration, that couldn't be sustained or even within the surrounding years.
On a one year basis, I'm not sure I would put the Rangers ahead of even the Phillies of last year.
This team has batted Dee Gordon and his .269 OBP leadoff 33 times. Mark Ellis bats 2nd. 36-year-old Adam Kennedy has batted 5th six times. I admit I haven't followed them very closely but every time I see one of their lineups I am baffled as to how they are playing so well. And 3rd in league OPS! (6th in scoring). They've got two real hitters. I just can't see them continuing at this pace.
Who the hell is AJ Ellis? Jesus.
Maybe Donnie Baseball is a brilliant manager. I hope so.
I have some very serious repenting to do.
If you do restrict the field to one year teams, though, the 2009 Yankees are definitely in the mix. They didn't have all-time great overall numbers (120 OPS+ and 108 ERA+), but what stood out was their starting lineup and their bullpen.
Of the nine everyday starters, other than Melky's 98 OPS+ and Johnny Damon's 118, every other player was over 120. There simply wasn't anyplace for a pitcher to hide or breathe.
And while the starters weren't anything special for a pennant winner (their postseason rotation was 137 / 114 / 111), their bullpen was almost invincible. When they were tied at the end of the 7th inning, they won every game but one.
Oh, and unlike the Rangers, in the World Series they got that last out.
I realize this is outside the date parameters, but I think a lot of people have forgotten how good the 95 Tribe was--OPS+ of 116 and ERA+ of 123.Just so happened that the Braves were better...
I'm not sure people have forgotten that team. I'll double check in a second, but didn't that team have an Albert Belle, Thome, Manny, Lofton and Vizquel, along with an in peak Nagy, Colon and Finley....(checking.... no Finley, add Dennis Martinez Orel Hershiser, Carlos Baerga and Eddie Murrah) and it's a memorable team. Roster construction it's one of the best teams of all time when you look at the quality of the players and their careers.
Let's not forget their all-killer no-filler pitching staff with such luminaries as Chris Capuano and Aaron Harang putting up great start after great start.
I don't know that the Braves really were better. They had a very good rotation with an astonishing front 3, and the good pitchers in the bullpen were very good. But the offense had some real black holes in it and they finished below the league average in runs scored and OPS+. I mean, maybe that Braves team was actually better than Cleveland, but it's not inarguable.
In a lot of ways those teams are mirrors of each other, the Braves with the most memorable rotation of the last couple of decades and the Indians with maybe the most memorable offense.
My favorite part is that the September callups were two HoVG outfielders (Giles and Burnitz), and they also gave the first two career PAs to another guy (David Bell) who ended up getting over 5000 more before he was done. I know it wasn't really like this, but it feels like they had a whole second team of good players lurking down in AAA and just didn't bother to use them.
It seems like a lot of people just stopped paying attention after the Rangers went 15-4, built up that huge lead over the Angels, and hadn't lost a series yet. From their first series loss onward they've gone 16-16 and have only outscored their opponents 184-160 (though to be fair those numbers would have looked a whole lot better before they got pasted 31-11 in their last two games). It's a very good team and their pythag is still strong (33-18) but they've looked much more ordinary lately. Their lead over the Angels isn't anything special either; 5.5 games is a whole lot better than one game but with four months left including 16 games against the team chasing them that lead isn't hard to lose. Hell, just three days ago the Red Sox went into their game with that same 5.5 game defecit and suddenly they're only 2.5 back.
Right, they lucked into those 116 wins. And the 90+ wins they had the year before and each of the two years after. They won 2/3 of their games IN THEIR WORST MONTH. How many teams in the past 30 years have won 2/3 of their games overall? If the 2001 Mariners had won as often as the Rangers have this year, it would have been over 100 points below their actual season winning percentage.
Just because they didn't win their last game people seem to forget about the other games they played that year. Seattle didn't have any kind of dynasty, but there is just no way to objectively look at that 2001 Mariners team without seeing that they were a historically dominant team.
I remember Costas (or somebody) during the playoffs saying,'"there are no outs in this lineup"
from 1-8 one of the best ever
They won 100 games in only 144 of them, while not being remotely pushed at all after the first week of June (if that). Hell, they had a 20-game lead and then their best hitter went on one of the all-time great two-month tears.
Fantastic team that bizarrely did not have HFA in any of the three rounds of the playoffs.
Right, they lucked into those 116 wins. And the 90+ wins they had the year before and each of the two years after. They won 2/3 of their games IN THEIR WORST MONTH.
That's funny, I thought I remembered that in their worst month they went something like 4 and 6. (smile)
Just because they didn't win their last game people seem to forget about the other games they played that year. Seattle didn't have any kind of dynasty, but there is just no way to objectively look at that 2001 Mariners team without seeing that they were a historically dominant team.
You're absolutely right, but that goes to show that if you don't win it all, among non-sabermetricians you often lose a lot more than just that last game.
Also: tied with a team that went 74-88 (BAL '05).
Seeing the 2009 Dodgers so high on that list is kind of depressing, by the way. I remember that as one of the years that made me ####### hate the Phillies, but in kind of a weak, ineffectual kind of way, because I knew that Phillies fans barely even registered our existence on the way to the Series.
I'm not saying they weren't a great team, but the team's best offensive player, was Brett Boone in a career year that was massively out of line with his norm, career average or even his third best year every. Cameron having a career year. Mark McLemore with a 115 ops+ etc...nothing on that roster screams 'dynasty' capable or even a historic team. They won games, were extremely consistent all year long, and had a great record, but looking at that roster, the point in the career of the players on that roster and it just doesn't scream "greatest".
You seem to be remembering series' that never happened. '96 and '99?
It didn't hurt that Boone went apesh*t, but Martinez-Ichiro-Cameron-Olerud was always going to be an excellent offensive core and Ichiro-Cameron-rotating LF was a pretty terrific defensive outfield.
So that's what he was using.
He was joking. In the blurb the author makes it seem like the Yankees played the Braves in 1998 even though they played the Padres.
Speaking of the 1998 Braves, that was a great regular season team too. Are these Rangers better than them? I don't think so...
edit: I was surprised to see that Indians team didn't win 90 games. Nevertheless, it was 5 straight division titles.
The Indians wasted Andy Pettitte in game 3 after Knoblauch's meltdown in game 2, and with a Yankees' rookie (El Duque) on the mound for the 4th game in Cleveland, all the momentum was with the Indians. That series did not have to go back to Yankee Stadium for game 6.
The Yanks got a run in the top of the 1st on an O'Neill home run, but the Indians got two runners on with two outs in the bottom half, with Jim Thome coming up. The night before, Thome had hit two monster home runs, and you could almost sense that he was about to crush another one.
Instead he got his bat maybe a tenth of an inch too far under the ball, and his fly ball was caught at the wall. El Duque settled down after that and pitched seven brilliant shutout innings, the Yanks won by 4 to 0, and went on to close out the series in 6. But if Thome's ball had gone five feet further, I'm completely convinced that the Indians would've gone on to win it all.
Sure ... which is the core of a good or even very good team, not a great one. And a rotation of Garcia, Sele and Moyer, Abbot and Halama?
Yes, they won 91 in 2000 and 93 in 2002-3 ... that's an argument this wasn't a great team but a good team having an historical fluke season. The 91 wins was good enough for the wild card, the 93 win seasons weren't -- not the sign of a great team.
You can probably make an argument as one of the greatest defensive teams ever. Rfield puts them at 104, so averaging +13 at each position which is ridiculously good. But that too looks extremely flukey as they were only +5 in 2002 and +35 in 2003 with largely the same players.
If you want to say that the 2001 Ms _played_ like one of the greatest teams ever, that's hard to argue with. To say that they were one of the greatest teams ever is a big stretch.
Of course, TFA doesn't get written if the 1998 Yankees hadn't won the WS.
And that's what killed them in the postseason, really. Moyer won all three of his starts, and the rest of them went up against Colon, Sabathia, Pettitte, Clemens, and Mussina, and were just outclassed.
To reflect back on the Rangers, the reason they haven't broken through in the past two Series is also arguably their starting pitching. I mean, they did very, very well, and came within a strike of a six-game win. But in 2011 they didn't even have Cliff Lee, and they really had no overpowering starts in the postseason, with the exception of Derek Holland in WS Game Four. Another really dominant WS start by anybody for Texas, and the Series would have been over in five games. Instead, Chris Carpenter just manhandled them. Great teams tend to have great ace starters.
What Yu talkin' 'bout, BDC?
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