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PANTS PISSERS!!!
*punches timecard* Mornin', Ralph.
How are you? Is it still whining to point out that the Red Sox don't seem to be focusing on winning games?
I said two months ago that this team would need another bat, and seeing situation after situation where easy out after easy out comes up to bat with no relief in sight... it's maddening to watch.
How about not pitching him for 13 days, then pitching him? Okay, it still beats Lawrence, but not by as much.
Nonetheless, I still think they'll win it.
I can't see it. The Orioles are playing so badly right that they could lose to the '62 Mets, even though most of those players are probably dead. And that's who the Yankees have 4 more freakin' games with. You can pretty much give the MFYs 4 wins right there. And another game with KC to boot.
About the only hope we have is Texas and Toronto.
I hate this Sox team, no killer instinct at all. And I notice that B-Pro has failed to update their vaunted ELO Playoff odds.
This is my solemn promise: if the Yankees win the AL East, I will not taunt you. I will gloat outside of ST and the Sox Chatter, but I will not taunt. I will be a better man (well, in that ONE way) than those who saw fit to taunt Yankees fans in May.
Can't say the same for some of my friends, though.
???
How is letting Gagne lose the game tonight getting anyone healthy? How is letting Ellsbury face the lefty getting anyone healthy?
I got on their cases about 2004 a bunch of times, but c'mon, we're talking a lifetime over here.
This is my solemn promise: if the Yankees win the AL East, I will not taunt you, I will not gloat.
However, if the Yankees advance to the World Series, I will taunt loudly and mercilessly.
Boston has the D-Rays, A's (no Haren) and Twins (no Santana).
Well we see where management falls on that question. To me and a bunch of us here who have seen the Sox finish second to the MFYs too frequently in the last 10 years, even in a World Series victory season, I think a division title is coveted more.
The Yanks still put Farnsworth in play. I think that is less defensible.
And almost all of the losses for 6 weeks now have been painful rib kick types. Is that a good sign?
Also, I don't see a really good reason why I should give a #### about the rest of the games this year if the management doesn't. Why should I watch NESN or go to Fenway? To see the new and interesting ways the team can find to lose?
I agree with Darren. One can stretch to think of reasons why the Sox don't care about the outcome of these games. But the way they make their money (well, one of the ways) is by NESN knowing that the Red Sox games guarantee a certain number of eyeballs, which they sell to advertisers. If the everygame product they put on the field is not everything it could be, Sox management is screwing their broadcast partners and thumbing their noses at the people who paid to attend the games.
And can someone explain what's wrong with Okajima?
He pulled the same #### last year, but I didn't care because the season was a lost cause by then anyway.
I'm suddenly glad that contract runs out next year.
Don't look now, Scori, but the Professor has been generally very good recently.
if you mean "make the Yankees use Mo when they start the 9th with a 5-run lead" good, than you're dead on
I dunno. The Red Sox are quite obviously a very good team. I don't think anyone is particularly skeptical of that. What we hate is what's actually happened, which has been painful to watch. It's mainly been poor play and bad timing, combined with a decision from upper management to stop caring particularly much about the regular season. It really, really sucks.
Of course, all the Red Sox and Yankees have to do is play reasonable baseball down the stretch, and Boston finally wins a division and we're all happy again. As we've seen, though, the fact that this is relatively likely in no way means it's certain.
In all seriousness, I can't defend the particulars but the Sox are a lock and very formidable. Keep the faith, and I hope my team sees you in the ALCS.
So has every ####### Yankee. Mussina was dropped from the rotation and got his spot back because of injury--he hasn't given up a run since. (This is class Torre.) Clemens was pronounced dead and still threw 94.
Molina's hitting .304 .327 .457 with the Yanks. Chamberlain and Kennedy start the year in A ball and are handed key jobs down the stretch. They of course dominate without so much as a stumble.
The Yanks played like crap for the first 1/3 of the year. They don't deserve to even be in the playoffs but the Tigers and Red Sox have handed it to them.
Their bullpen suddenly isn't one of the best in the majors. They've given away more games in the last two months than I can count, to go with some bad breaks.
And every day they look more and more like a medicore team that had a great April/May.
Edit: I mean, of course, ever since Vincennes coined the name; I wasn't claiming to have thought of it myself!
If this is their theory, well then I suppose you could say the goal is to win the WS. The division is nice and all, but getting into the playoffs is all that matters, and they've basically done that, so now they need to go about figuring out who's on the roster, who will get used and how, etc. (This is the only defense for leaving Gagne in, BTW--this was a test, and thankfully he failed, lest we be lulled into a false sense that "Gagne's fine!")
Yes, but for the balance of the year--the one in which they've put up the 22-25 in one run games and -5 in the pythag--it's still one of the best, if not the best. It's not like they just came back to earth from their 6-1 one-run record early on. It's that they totally went in the tank in 1-run games while their pen mostly pitched great.
Textbook slips with the same thought.
Well, Bud Selig proposed it, and the owners approved it for the 1995 season. I'll say it again - a zero-sum race between these two teams at this time of year would be stupendously better.
Molina's hitting .304 .327 .457 with the Yanks. Chamberlain and Kennedy start the year in A ball and are handed key jobs down the stretch. They of course dominate without so much as a stumble.
You're cherry-picking. Hughes came with more fanfare than either of the other pitchers, and while he may turn out to be a stud, his final season line this year will likely be south of replacement-level. Same with Edwar Ramirez, though I have a suspicion that he'll be pretty useful in the postseason. Betemit has hit poorly enough that he lost his spot to Dougie.
yeah, they just have the best record in the majors in the 2nd half. How dare they.
PANTS PISSERS!!!
I apologize for playing an intramural soccer game. I'll never do it again.
If I may crosspost from the game thread since this is where everyone relocated too...
I just really don't understand how you all can be so certain that we're going to lose when we're still up by 2.5 ####### games with only 10 games left in the season for us (11 for the Yankees). I thought all this whiny ######## went away after we won the ####### World Series, but apparently not.
I guess the silver lining - the only one I could think of - would be that Francona would have been canned after last season if this system were in place.
Who has proceeded to hit way, way over his head since being handed the starts.
I cannot see how such a study would control for all the various factors that go into postseason success. For example, this team could have kept trying to win after the All-Star break and still been able set up their pitching in the last week of the season, which most teams who are fighting for their lives cannot do.
In other words, it sounds like just the kind of conclusion that the creator win shares would come to.
Would the records be the same? Would desperation have made the Yankees play better, or maybe worse recently? Did the spectre of the Card give them subconscious "breathing room" to lose games at the beginning of the year?
Would the Red Sox have put the pedal to the metal in August/September if there was a realistic chance that they would be going home if they didn't hold off the Bombers?
Perhaps because we've been watching this team lately. They are flatlining at the moment.
Moving the goalposts a bit from 'we're winning the division, guaranteed.' All of a sudden is 'You shouldn't be SURE we're going to lose.' And I can't think of anyone except Wok who was in anyway sure we were going to lose. Most of the doubters have been saying that the division was still in play, something you steadfastly denied.
Under the old system, the 2004 Sox are playing golf in October, the Comeback never happens, there's still a Curse, and the third place 2006 finish gets Francona sacked.
Also, why give the horse water that he doesn't know how to drink, and why eat Darren's cake when you already have it?
And who's only starting because of panic over a bad fielding game by Giambi. But all panic moves work for the Yanks.
*thinks about it*
I can live with all of these things.
He's a solid manager with a good relationship with his bosses. I wouldn't mess with that.
Even if it likely means one fewer ring* for your Yankees?
* Assuming Cleveland stays in the Yankees' division after 1995.
Which Biff--the one who's certain we're going to win or the one who thinks we might not lose?
Oh, the latter then.
How so? Replacing some of their $20 mil. starters with $20 mil bench players?
MCOA,
Francona's not a good manager.Let me add: if he has a good relationship with his bosses after the way he's handled this season, then it reflects badly on his bosses.
In seriousness, yes. That extra playoff series can be great, but the crucible of two good teams matching up 1-25 (and more), with fifth starter games counting in the standings the same as #1 starter games, with teams dramatically remaking themselves, with your team losing to bad teams and beating good teams has largely vanished from MLB.
It's mostly about Eric Gagne, and the total of 4 runs in two games. I mean, if I'm an opposing pitcher/manager David Ortiz doesn't see a hittable pitch the whole game.
The Yankees, meanwhile, don't seem to have much trouble with the Jays.
The one who is certain! Its not like we are getting blown out. We are losing 1 run games. Games we will win easily once Manny and Youk come back.
Either the Yankees or BoSox could with the AL East. Any of the four teams could win HFA.
Nobody has any idea who they'll be playing in October right now.
Biff, you were being chided because you had been deriding people for doubting the division was in the bank. You responded by saying that those people shouldn't be so sure that we were going to lose the division. Do you see how that could be read as backing off your original viewpoint?
Actually, it starts with two fewer rings: 1996 and 2000. But then, it might get bumped back up if you replay the postseasons where the Yankees lost to wild card teams (2003, 04, 06).
Probably close to a push.
But this frigging race truly exposes how crappy the WC is. The Red Sox are clearly not as interested in winning the division title as a team should be come September.
Actually he only started tonight because Giambi had a sore foot.
And Francona definitely is a good manager. You're wrong.
Who said MFY is a good? It's right up there with the SOSH practice of referring to Yankee Stadium as "The Toilet." Get it--because toilets are yucky and so are the Yankees! Har har har, genius!
The 2005 race, with what should have been an apocalyptic final week, really showed that to me. Instead of two very good teams doing everything they can to win the regular season, we saw two teams trying to out-rest each other.
I don't know how you'd control for all the variables, Darren, but my hunch is that what they may have looked at most is the "teams who were able to set up their pitching" vs. "teams who were NOT able to set up their pitching" because that sort of study would be easy enough to check out, even if it means a little less now that there's a DS and a CS before the WS... going to a Game 5 in a DS almost assures you having a less-than-optimal CS rotation set-up.
I do suspect that teams who were able to set up their pitching--as the Red Sox are clearly now trying to do--may have a better winning % than teams that were not able to, but really unless you sweep the ALDS, you can't set up the staff for the ALCS so the "edge" (if there was one) is kind of lost.
Like I said, I dunno if any of the above happened, I'm just hoping that it did because otherwise the team from the GM on down has no philosophy and thus just look like idiots.
I beg to differ. Francona is not good. Times infinity.
I don't think all of those things are obvious. But I do think that the rest of the management is complicit in this. For example, they either decided that having a decent OF vs. the Yankees in August was not worth losing Lopez for a couple days or they let Francona decide it. Either way, it's on them to some degree.
No argument, though at least that year the teams had to play through until the last week of the season, or until Cleveland imploded. The Sox have been in some form of cruise control for quite some time.
And in my (piss-poor) defense, I only employ MFY on occasion since its simpler than typing out the Yankees, not because I think it's remotely clever.
He's so good with the players that in 2005 we had to DFA an OF that we'd desperately need later.
You're both wrong. He's a good drummer.
Did you watch the ballgames? Dustin McGowan had the second-best stuff of any pitcher the Red Sox have faced all year. He was painting the corners at 95, and he had way more movement on that fastball than should be legal in a nice country like Canada. His slider was devastating, and he threw a bunch of good curves, too. Burnett tonight had a nuclear curveball, and sat 96.
What sucks about tonight's game is they got lucky, but blew it at the end.
It's still unclear, though, whether this team learns from its mistakes. Gagne had pitched pretty well recently, so I can kind of understand bringing and leaving him in. But it now *shouldn't* happen in the playoffs, no matter what.
FWIW, I think the Sox are a stronger team with Francona in the dugout than with anyone else I can imagine.
I hope that they are basing nothing on any goofy study by Bill James, and that they are doing everything they can to get Voros back in their employ.
And even if they have decided that it's the best thing to do, baseball-wise, they have to know what a PR disaster it would be to blow this lead to the Yanks. Going out in the first round, always a possibility, sits a lot better with the fans if you won the division than if you squandered a 14.5 game lead.
To me what sucks is that they blew it while making it clear that they didn't care that much if they won. Like not at all.
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