World Series: Game 7

The Cardinals were, not once but twice, one out from elimination on Thursday night, but both times they rallied for one of the most dramatic endings to a game in World Series history. As a result of their 10-9 victory in the 11th inning over the Rangers, the scene is set for Game 7 tonight at 8:05 PM EDT. Here are some random thoughts about everything playoffs.

This was just the third time in the history of the World Series that a team came back from being one out from elimination. The 1986 Mets accomplished the feat. Some of you will remember that contest. I will venture to guess though that not a single person reading this piece will remember the other time it occurred. It was before the Vietnam War. It predated World War II. My goodness, it was even before World War I. The other time it happened was when the 1911 Giants pulled off the trick.

The Cardinals have won more Game 7′s in the World Series than any other team. They have gone 7-3 in their 10 chances.

Speaking of World Series titles, most know the Yankees lead the way with 27 championships since 1903. How many of you realized that the Cardinals are second on that list with 10? Speaking of championships, the Rangers are one of eight teams that have yet to taste World Series triumph (Rockies, Astros, Brewers, Padres, Mariners, Ray and Nationals). Amongst those clubs, none has been a team longer than the Rangers who are one year older than the Astros.

There were 393 pitches thrown in Game 7.

Neftali Feliz had not blown a save chance in 17 postseason appearances heading into Game 6.

David Freese is just killing it this postseason. Besides hitting .393 with a .448 OBP, he’s also sporting a Bondsian 1.235 OPS. Freese has gone deep five times and hit seven triples in just 17 games as he has plated 19 runners. Oh, and that walk-off homer from last night was just the fifth in a Game 6 or Game 7 in the history of the World Series (the last to pull off the trick was Joe Carter in 1993 for the Blue Jays). You would be hard pressed to find a more productive postseason in the history of the game.

Nelson Cruz has an injured groin, but he’s expected to play in Game 7. He’s tied Barry Bonds (2002) and Carlos Beltran (2004) for most homers in a single postseason with eight. Speaking of a wonderful run in the playoffs, Cruz has those eight homers and 16 RBI in 16 postseason games. He’s only batting .241, but he does have a 1.023 OPS for the Rangers.

Josh Hamilton is all beat up. A 30 homer threat every year, it took him 61 at-bats to hit his first postseason home run in Game 6. Hamilton has been a shell of his powerful self this postseason (.273/.292/.409).

To close… did you actually count out the Cardinals last night? You do remember that they came back from a 10.5 game deficit to overtake the Braves for the NL Wild Card, right?

By Ray Flowers

2011 Positional Review – Outfield

You remember back to March when I gave away all my position player rankings for free, right? For those of you who want to revisit my greatest hits, here’s where you would go to get all my rankings for hitters – 2011: BBGuys Hitter Capsules.

I’ll review my top-10 predictions at each position as well as point out my biggest “hit” outside of the top-10 and my biggest “bust.”

CATCHERS

FIRST BASE

SECOND BASE

THIRD BASE

SHORTSTOP

2011 OUTFIELD Top-20
1 Ryan Braun
2 Carl Crawford
3 Matt Holliday
4 Carlos Gonzalez
5 Nelson Cruz
6 Josh Hamilton
7 Matt Kemp
8 Andrew McCutchen
9 Shin-Soo Choo
10 Jason Heyward
11 Alex Rios
12 Justin Upton
13 Andre Ethier
14 Hunter Pence
15 B.J. Upton
16 Ichiro Suzuki
17 Jayson Werth
18 Jay Bruce
19 Shane Victorino
20 Chris Young

Braun was amazing in 2011. You can read all about that in Braun: Best of the Bunch.

Crawford was a disaster in 2011. You can read all about that in Carl Crawford: Total Failure.

Holliday had all kinds of issue this year (appendicitis, a quad, a finger, a bug in his ear), and in the end it hindered his performance. Holliday still was productive hitting .296 with a .912 OPS, and his pace over 550 at-bats would have equated to 27 homers, 92 RBI and 102 runs scored. Too bad he appeared in just 124 games.

Gonzalez was injured multiple times, but don’t let that fool you, he still had a fine fantasy season (.295-26-92-92-20 in 481 ABs) even if it failed to live up to his unrepeatable 2010 effort (.336-34-117-11-26 in 587 ABs). There are few better five category options in the game.

Cruz has been killing it in the playoffs, a sure sign that if he could ever stay healthy he’d produce a truly special season. Cruz had 29 homers and 87 RBI during the year, but with 475 at-bats he failed yet again to stay healthy long enough to post his first 500 at-bat season.

Hamilton was injured, again (what a shock), as he appeared in just 121 games. However, whenever he was on the field he was darn productive as he hit .298 with 25 homers, 94 RBI, 80 runs scored and eight steals.

Kemp was the best player in fantasy baseball in 2011. Kemp finished one homer short of going 40/40 as he hit .324 with 126 RBI and 115 runs scored. Kemp led the NL in homers and RBI, and finished just .013 points behind Jose Reyes to fall just short of the Triple Crown.

McCutchen was everything that was advertised for the Pirates going 20/20 (23 homers, 23 steals), scoring 87 runs and knocking in a career best 89. His average dipped from the .280s to just .259, but that number figures to rise in 2012.

Choo was injured multiple times resulting in a season of just 85 games. After hitting .300 the last two years, his .259 average was a major disappointment, and his .344 OBP was a career worst as well. He’s still got the skills to be a top-20 outfielder, but he’ll need health to prove it.

Heyward fell so far this season (.227-14-42-50-9), that even people in keeper leagues are worried about his long term value. Immensely talented, no so quiet whispers pen him as “soft.” After an impressive rookie season and a second year flop, there may be no one in the game with more to prove.

Rios was an abject failure hitting .227 with 13 homers, 44 RBI, 64 runs scored and 11 steals. How bad were things? His .265 OBP was .010 points below his career batting average. Too talented to do this again, his BABIP (.237 versus a career .306 mark) should rebound next season, so don’t overlook him on draft day 2012.

Upton had another outstanding season for the D’backs. He posted his second 20/20 season with a career best 31 homers and 21 steals, and he also scored a career-high 105 runs. Throw in that .289 average and .898 OPS and we have an excellent all-around performer who just might be able to take his game up another notch.

Ethier hit .292 with a .368 OBP, right on his career averages (.291 and .364). Unfortunately, he hit a meager 11 homers, knocked in only 62 runs and scored just 67 times. There’s no way of sugarcoating what was a poor season made even worse by how well it started out (he hit .380 over his first 28 games).

Pence ended the year with the Phillies after getting out of the exile that was playing for the Astros. All told he had yet another, well, Pence like season resulting in 22 homers, 97 RBI, 84 runs, eight steals an a .314 average. The average an RBI marks were career bests for the ultra consistent performer.

Upton had another up and down effort for the Rays as he hit a mere .243 with a third straight season of 150+ Ks. However, he also was one homer and one RBI off his career bests (he hit 23 bombs with 81 RBIs), scored 82 runs and swiped 36 bases. He was one of the more productive outfielders in baseball if you could look past the batting average.

Suzuki finally lost it, and by “it” I don’t mean his virginity, I mean his streak of hitting .300 with 200 hits as he batted .272 with 184 hits to end his 10-year run. He still offered production with 80 runs and 40 steals, but given the cost it took to acquire him on draft day he was a substantial disappointment.

Werth was always going to lose some of his production moving from a great park with a great lineup in Philly, but he really stunk it up in certain respects in 2011. It’s fair to say he had some value, he was only one steal short of a 20/20 effort, but he hit .232, posted a 7-year low in OBP (.330) and only drove in 58 runs after averaging 92 the previous two seasons.

Bruce hit an impressive 32 homers, fell just three RBI short of his first 100 RBI campaign, and scored a career best 84 runs. Still, he was wildly inconsistent driving his owners mad (.342-12-33 in May, .241-11-40 over his last 69 games).

Victorino just goes out and gets it done year after year. He hit .279, spot on his career mark, and for the fourth straight year scored at least 84 runs (he had 95) while he hit 17 homers (one off his career best), and stole 19 bags (though that was a 5-year low).

Young hit an awful .236 including a stupefyingly low .193 in the second half, but the guy still did his best Mike Cameron impersonation with 20 homers, 71 RBI, 89 runs scored and 22 steals.

Busts: Carl Crawford #2, Shin-Soo Choo #9, Jason Heyward #10, Alex Rios #11, Andre Ethier #13, Ichiro Suzuki #16, Jayson Werth #17

There were so many busts in the outfield, I’m not even gonna list any “hits.”

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: August30, 2011

(1) Andrew McCutchen one steal from joining the 20/20 club.

(2) Miguel Cabrera is simply phenomenal yet again.

(3) Carlos Lee on fire of late, RBI streak continues.

(4) Mark Buehrle is boring, but the guy is really good.

(5) Luke Hochevar pitching very well in the second half.

(6) Nick Swisher on fire, six homers in seven games. Has he lived up to my expectations? See 2011 Player Profile: Nick Swisher.

(7) Jose Reyes back from injury while Nelson Cruz is out yet again.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Diamond

photo © 2009 Keith Allison | more info (via: Wylio)

One guy is trying to make history while a former all-star is just trying to stay in the lineup. Another all-star could be headed to the DL, someone can’t figure out how to manage his weight properly and there are some white hot players the last two weeks that deserve a mention.

Asdrubal Cabrera has been the second most valuable shortstop in the game behind only Jose Reyes. Cabrera is on pace to hit .302 with 32 homers, 113 RBI, 108 runs and 18 steals. There is only one shortstop in the history of the game to produce a season as good as that in all five categories, and that is Alex Rodriguez who did it twice. Obviously history doesn’t bode well for Cabrera being able to keep up this pace, nor does a review of his previous levels of production. Consider his homer and RBI totals each year of his career (all levels for each season).

2006: 4 homers, 36 RBI
2007: 11-79
2008: 10-60
2009: 6-68
2010: 4-32

I don’t have any idea how you go from that to 30-100, do you?

I saw X-Men First Class last night. A really good flick, even for those of you who don’t have an affinity for superhero movies. I also learned that January Jones ain’t a bad looking lady at all. Where have I been on that one?

In one of the more vexing cases this season, Jason Bay is hitting .207 with two homers over 164 plate appearances thanks to a recent run of 23 hitless at-bats. Bay has hit at least 21 homers with 84 RBI and 78 runs scored in each of his five big league seasons of at least 145 games played. Moreover, in four of those seasons he hit at least 30 homers with 100 RBI and 100 runs scored. At just 32 years old his struggles this year are befuddling to say the least. The guy has been flat out awful since joining the Mets hitting .244 with eight homers, 57 RBI and 68 runs scored in 134 games with the club.

Dustin Pedroia might need surgery on his right knee that could reportedly keep him out for four or more weeks. A career .299 hitter, Pedroia is struggling along at .247 and has looked little like the player we expect at the dish. Oddly though, he’s on pace for a career best steal total, he already has 13 (career best 20), despite the knee issue and the surgery he had on his foot last year.

Did you see the ridiculous story that Francisco Rodriguez lost 15 lbs over the last week after having two teeth removed? Even crazier than that is the ludicrous notion espoused by K-Rod that he was unaware that he lost the weight. Those two points lead me to two points. (1) Don’t they have milkshakes in New York? It’s completely asinine to suggest that K-Rod couldn’t keep his weight on cause he had teeth removed. You don’t have to eat steak to keep your weight up, especially when you have access to the elite in the medical profession to help to guide you in how  to keep the weight on. (2) How fat is K-Rod if he didn’t notice that he lost 15 lbs? If I gain or lose five pounds my clothes don’t fit.

Only two lefties are in the top-25 in terms of batting average against versus right-handed batters since the start of 2009. They both pitch in the NL. They both are in the NL West. They are Clayton Kershaw and Jonathan Sanchez. For those of you with a curious bent, Kershaw is 9th on the list while the Giants lefty is one spot ahead of him in 8th.

The last two weeks…

Michael Bourn has eight steals.

Nelson Cruz has blasted six dingers leading to 13 RBI and 11 runs.

Kelly Johnson has six homers, 11 RBI and 13 runs scored.

Andrew McCutchen is hitting .417 with 10 RBI, 12 runs and four steals.

Mitch Moreland is hitting .405 with three homers.

Daniel Murphy is hitting .467.

Miguel Olivo has 15 RBI, one more than the 14 of Carl Crawford.

David Ortiz is hitting .405 with five homers, 11 RBI and 12 runs.

Corey Patterson is hitting .356 with three homers/steals and 13 runs scored.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: May 19, 2011

(1) Jake Peavy twirls masterpiece. Should you be buying?

(2) Colby Rasmus, Matt Holiday and Lance Berkman hurt.

(3) Fernando Salas the Cards’ closer? Not so fast.

(4) Adam LaRoche = abysmal. Is a turn around coming?

(5) Injured players update – Joe Mauer, Nelson Cruz and Josh Hamilton.

By Ray Flowers

Did You Know…

I throw up one of these pieces every once in a while, an as we all head off to our 2010 Turkey Day celebrations I thought it apropos to look back and give thanks for some rather interesting production from the men on the diamond

Did You Know… Jose Bautista scored 49.5 percent of his runs by knocking himself in as he went deep 54 times while scoring 109 runs (the homers led baseball, the runs were 6th)? Albert Pujols, who led baseball with 115 runs, only knocked himself in 36.5 percent of the time. The only player who scored 100 runs this season while hitting less than 10 homers was the Tigers’ Austin Jackson who scored 103 times while hitting just four long balls.

Did You Know… Ian Desmond led baseball with 34 errors, seven more than any other player (Starlin Castro, 27 errors)? Castro may have caught him if he had played a full compliment of games as the Cubs’ shortstop suited up for only 123 games, 27 less than Desmond. These young shortstops both have bright futures, but both could stand to tidy things up on defense.

Did You Know… Prince Fielder was the only player in baseball to hit under .265 while posting an OBP of at least .380? Fielder hit just .261 though his 114 walks – the most in baseball – helped him to a .401 OBP. Moreover, he was the only player in baseball to post an OBP of at least .395 who didn’t hit at least .300. Yeah he had a “down” year, but Fielder was pretty darn productive despite the prevailing wisdom that he was awful because he had only 83 RBI.

Did You Know… Jeff Keppinger had the best BB/K mark in baseball amongst qualifiers (502 plate appearances) with a 1.42 mark? He was followed by arguably the two best hitters in baseball in Albert Pujols (1.36) and Joe Mauer (1.23), who in turn were followed by the only two other men in baseball who posted a mark of at least 1:1 (Daric Barton – 1.23, Chase Utley – 1.00). At the other end of the spectrum we have Andruw Jones at 0.19. If we had seven Andruw Jones and we added them together that we would still come up short of the mark of Keppinger (1.33 to 1.42).

Did You Know… Juan Pierre led baseball with 18 caught stealing attempts? Of course, he also led baseball with 68 steals so we can overlook the CS run. Still, 18 is a pretty big number when you consider that he was caught stealing more times than Nelson Cruz or Jimmy Rollins were successful (they each had 17 steals).

Did You Know… Albert Pujols is more than just a hitter as he actually led baseball in putouts (1,458), total chances (1,619) and double plays (146) in the field? He also made only four errors on the year leading to a .998 fielding percentage once again showing that he might be the most complete player in baseball – even if the talk of his greatness is usually limited to his work at the dish.

Did You Know… Mark Reynolds is the only player in baseball who hit at least 30 homers in 2010 yet failed to rap out at least 23 doubles? Reynolds had only 17. Given that he hit 28 and 30 the previous two years, his ’10 effort has to be seen as a downer. Of course, he also fell from 24 steals to just seven, while his average fell .044 points below his career rate of .242, so it wasn’t just the loss of doubles that led many a Reynolds owner to consider hitting the bottle at 11 AM in the morning through most of the 2010 season.

By Ray Flowers

World Series Numbers

The only numbers that really matters are 2 and 0, as in the Giants 2-0 lead over the Rangers, but that isn’t going to stop me from relaying a whole host of numbers that have come to light in the 2010 World Series.

* There have been 106 World Series match-ups, and this is the 52nd time that a team has taken a 2-0 Series lead. Of the 51 previous times it occurred, the team with the 2-0 lead has won 40 times – a winning percentage of 78.4 percent. The last seven teams to go ahead 2-0 have won the Series, and 13 of the last 14 (Atlanta came back in 1996). This is the fourth time that the Giants have led a Series 2-0, and they won each of the previous three times (1922, 1933 and 1954).

* Matt Cain is a star (note to East Coasters, he has been for a while now, he didn’t just all of a sudden get good). Cain is one of only four pitchers in history to post 20 or more scoreless innings in a single postseason. Here are the others: Christy Mathewson (27 IP), Waite Hoyt (27 IP), Kenny Rogers (23 IP) and Carl Hubbell (20.0). Some more Cain knowledge. Cain is the 8th starting pitcher in postseason history who has not allowed an earned run in 3-straight starts. Cain is the fourth pitcher out of that group to do so in his first three postseason starts. Only one pitcher has ever gone 4-straight – Whitey Ford in 1960-61.

* Elvis Andrus and Nelson Cruz both lost their playoff hitting streaks in Game 2 at 12 games. They had become the 4th and 5th players to compile a 12-game hitting streak to open up their playoff careers. The record is 15-straight by Marquis Grissom in 1995-96.

* The Giants, going all the way back to the New York vintage, have won 47 World Series games. The only two teams with more victories are the Yankees (134) and the Cardinals (52).

* FOUR: The number of starters the Giants have used through the playoffs, and each one of them is homegrown – Tim Lincecum, Matt Cain, Jonathan Sanchez and Madison Bumgarner, That makes the Giants the first team since the 1986 Red Sox to have a 4-man World Series rotation of entirely homegrown hurlers (Roger Clemens, Bruce Hurst, Oil Can Boyd and Al Nipper).

* The Giants don’t score seven runs very often, they were held to six or fewer runs in 141 of their previous 172 games before Game 2, but when they do score seven runs they hardly ever lose (they are 29-4). Speaking of scoring runs, here are some other amazingly relevant facts.

The Giants went 4-for-9 with runners in scoring position in Game 2 and are now 13-for-26 in the Series.

Each of the Giants runs, all 20 of them, have come with two outs.

The Giants have scored more runs in their last 12 innings (19) than they did in winning the NLCS (17).

The Giants have scored nine runs in back-to-back World Series games, only the ninth time a team has done that in Series history.

* The heart of the Rangers lineup has been held in check. Michael Young (1-for-8), Josh Hamilton (1-for-8) and Nelson Cruz (1-for-9) are hitting a combined .120 through two games.

* Edgar Renteria, who is playing with a torn left biceps, has played 63 games at shortstop in the playoffs, second in baseball history to the 147 games of Derek Jeter. Oh, and after producing three RBI in Game 2 Renteria now has one 3-RBI game this season.

* Cliff Lee had never allowed more than three extra base hits in any playoff game. In Game 1 he allowed three doubles to Freddy Sanchez.

* TWO: The number of catchers in World Series history who have hit third in the lineup. Yogi Berra did it for the Yankees in 1947, and Buster Posey is currently doing it for the Giants.

By Ray Flowers

World Series: Giants vs. Rangers

With the 2010 World Series set to start today I will go through the lineups of the San Francisco Giants and the Texas Rangers to see which club has the advantage.

Oh, and if you are in search of that link for the NL Rookie of the Year, well, there you go.

By Ray Flowers

World Series: Giants vs. Rangers

No one could have predicted this back in April. The San Francisco Giants and the Texas Rangers will face one another in the World Series for the first time. Not only that, this will mark the first time that two teams with World Series droughts of at least 49 years since their last championship will square off (in the case of the Rangers, they have never won a title). Here are some other interesting facts as we get ready for the final battle of the 2010 season.

* Two Rangers have hitting streaks of 11 games (every game the team has played this postseason). Nelson Cruz is batting .375 with five homers, eight RBI an a 1.294 OPS while Elvis Andrus is hitting .333 with six runs scored and seven steals for the team from the Lone Star State.

* Eleven is the number of consecutive games in this postseason that the Rangers have homered in, one short of the record of 12 set by the 2004 Astros.

* The Giants have tied the playoff record with six victories in one postseason by a single run (the 1972 Athletics pulled off the same trick). The Giants won 28 of the 52 one-run games they had during the regular season.

* Vladimir Guerrero had 115 RBI during the regular season while batting .300, but his body is no longer capable of playing everyday, especially if he is taxed by playing in the field (he played 18 games in the field this season). Therefore, the Rangers are planning on using Vlad in only one game in San Francisco in Games 1 and 2 since the DH will not be in effect.

* Josh Hamilton was the ALCS MVP after hitting .350 with four homers, but more impressive was the fact that he reached base in 15 of his 28 plate appearances (.536 OBP).

* The Rangers have never reached the World Series before while the Giants are 5-12 over the history of the franchise. However, the Giants have never won the Series while playing on the left coast as they lost in 1962 in seven games to the Yankees, in 2002 they fell in seven games to the Angels, and in 1989 they lost to the Athletics in the Series that was delayed because of the Loma Prieta earthquake.

* Cliff Lee will start Game 1 for the Rangers. He is 7-0 with a 1.26 ERA in eight postseason starts earning himself the moniker of “the” big game pitcher going (with all due respect to guys like Roy Halladay, Tim Lincecum and Andy Pettitte to name just a few).

* Bengie Molina will get a World Series ring no matter who wins. He played 61 games with the Giants before he was traded to the Rangers where he suited up for 57 games.

* Cody Ross was the NLCS MVP for the Giants after hitting three homers with five RBI an a .350 batting average in the six game victory over the Phillies. He is also working on a 7-game postseason hitting streak, the second longest in franchise history in the playoffs.

* Only two teams have won a best of seven series with each of their four victories coming by at least four runs – the 2007 Red Sox and the 2010 Rangers.

* Brian Wilson became the fourth pitcher in history to pick up a win or save in each of his teams four victories in one playoff round (he had one win and three saves). The others are Dennis Eckersley (1988 ALCS), Mitch Williams (1993 NLCS) and John Wetteland (1996 World Series).

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: ALCS Preview

Ray Flowers breaks down the American League Championship Series with a position by position breakdown of the Yankees and the Rangers.

By Ray Flowers