If he wins every game and has an ERA over 5, he will still have the worst ERA for any pitcher in history with that many innings pitched. He will still be one of the worst postseason pitchers ever. He will still be a choker. Will it keep him put of the HOF? No. Will he ever be in the discussion of best pitchers of all time? Absolutely not, no matter how good his regular season stats are.

I don't think anyone needs more time to decide if Kershaw is a good postseason pitcher. He has proven himself not to be. He's even worse in the NLCS than he is in the NLDS. I can't imagine he'd be better in the Series. When you could theoretically have Kershaw throw 3 games in a 7 game series and you've still never managed to win one, that tells you all you need to know.

Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight. Nervous for tonight.

Take 10 sedatives and call me in the morning.

:cool:

I wrote this in the Aaron Judge thread and I am also nervous!

The Yankees scare me. They looked really good/confident last night and that will carry over when they play the Indians.

I also believe it is going to be a battle.

Go Indians!

Losing double EE did not help as that is a huge bat out of the lineup and a guy who scares pitchers.
Surprised to see him jogging yesterday so I am guessing he may see some limited action tonight?

I actually wanted the Yankees. The Yankees haven't so much beaten the Indians as the Indians have beaten themselves. They had 6 unearned runs the other day - 6! They're also being very impatient at the plate and pressing big time. These aren't Tito Francona-managed team characteristics. Tito kept things loose around the clubhouse yesterday, and I think we'll be fine tonight. Keep in mind the Indians got to CC for 3 runs, but the Yankees haven't seen the real Kluber yet. Assuming (praying, too) that the real Kluber shows up, it should be a fun night tonight for all Indians fans and Yankees haters alike.

EE will be in the lineup tonight I think. He was only listed as day-to-day since his injury on Friday, and everything I've heard is he's fine to play. He won't be much on the base paths, but he wasn't much to begin with.

If we can plate a couple runs within the first 3 innings, I like our chances.

Those are very good points!

And yes, we need to get to them first.

Fingers crossed here!

I'd like to see the Yankees win tonight and get some sweet revenge on the Astros for sending them home in 2015.

Didi's on fire! :D

right but if he wins 3 of 7 games you cant deny that he came through and criticism that post season performance, if that happens would be unwarranted even if his era was 4.8 for those starts etc..

anyway we will see....last year he was better at this point of the playoffs but he was involved in 3 games i believe..not just 1 at that stage..

In the games on 10/11/17 only one starter went more than 6.1 innings which is what kershaw did in his one start which people criticize ....


Zero surprise the Yankess are in the ALCS

I can't believe NY pulled that series out. If the Cubs lose tomorrow, then I officially don't care about the rest of the post season.

I went to bed early last night and was hoping for a different outcome when I woke this morning. The indians were making a comeback 3-2 and I was really hoping to read this morning they pulled it off.

Wasn't meant to be I guess, which sucks, as I was really hoping the Indians were going all the way! :(

you should have stayed up...they needed your support!!!

Sickening. I won't be watching another playoff game this year. Can't stomach it.

Start spreadin' the news . . .

I could go without having to hear "Go Cubs Go" again this season.

The Yankees won, the Yankees won, at least now I have a reason to keep watching the playoffs.:)

Now Judge can set the post-season record for strikeouts.:eek:

He had 16 Ks in 20 ABs vs. Indians...

That's only 20% better than I could have done...


and they still won!



.

You forgot the four walks. In 24 atbats he put the ball in play four times.

You can't fault Judge for his performance without giving him due credit too. The double he had was a big hit for the Yankees and he saved a home run that would have sent them home.

By the way, while people have been killing Judge they've been pretty quiet about Kris Bryant, who's struck out 9 times in 16 at bats and has one single RBI.

Judge also saved the season with a great catch. And delivered the key knockout blow to Bauer. Despite an otherwise terribly rough series for him.

Hate all you want; if you know baseball, you know there are ebbs and flows— true fans aren’t fazed, and will keep rooting.

Go Yankees.

Exactly. Judge hits 52 homers as a rookie, and emerges from a slump to be Player Of The Month in September— then has a great WC game, and a season saving catch in the DS... and yet some lie in wait for his next rough patch or bad series, eager to slither out and trash him. Then they will vanish when he gets hot again, slither out again when he has a bad series, rinse, repeat. It’s a puerile cycle. The kid had a historic season and there’s no changing that. And a rebuilding team just dismissed the top seed from two games down, to reach the CS. Judge and the team and the fans are very happy with this.

+10. Dead on.

Sadly, even tragically for our fragile hobby, we have an ample share of individuals on here who must have university B.S. degrees in SCHADENFREUDE, after having tested out of 75% of the classes! They may have an invisible framed diploma, but distilling their lives down to the foundation, they're just a bunch of dips. They slither out of the grass, after having lived on grass.

--- Brian Powell

+10. Dead on.

Sadly, even tragically for our fragile hobby, we have an ample share of individuals on here who must have university B.S. degrees in SCHADENFREUDE, after having tested out of 75% of the classes! They may have an invisible framed diploma, but distilling their lives down to the foundation, they're just a bunch of dips. They slither out of the grass, after having lived on grass.

--- Brian Powell

No. I was correct. 20ABs + 4BBs = 24PAs.


...and I don't mean to 'pile on' Judge, it's just the state of the game...

...and I also realized that Bryant was almost as bad.


Speaking of the state of the game: I wonder how many organizations will have their pitching instructors stressing curveballs this off-season.

Before the slider came into prominence, the curveball was what separated the AAA hitters from those who got to the Majors.

If enough pitchers develop their curveballs, it could be the bane of 'pinball' baseball.

One of the great things about this GAME is that these hitter-v-pitcher adjustments happen again and again over time.

A happy medium is the way I prefer it...an occasional slugfest and an occasional shutout.

I don't want 1968 again, but let's bring back the deuice ,the yakkers, the double-yellow hammers...the Uncle Charlies to even out the board a little.

Bryant is worse and his team faces elimination. If the Cubs lose, no one is going to dump their Bryant rookies, but Judge has a bad series (one in which he was responsible for saving one game and knocking out the starter who dominated the team in game 1) and everyone is sure he's got major problems ahead of him.

Judge has a troubling profile tho. As teams do their offseason scouting reports by looking at tape...etc Judge is going to have make some major adjustments or else he could end up in Rob Deer territory

not saying he can't do that, but his batting profile is generally one of the most volatile and short lived.

How can you compare him to Rob Deer? Rob Deer is a career 220 hitter who couldn't take a walk and didn't score runs. Judge led the league in runs and walks.

I posted Bryant's batting line already. Harper is hitting 133 himself in his series. But there is something wrong with only Judge. I don't buy that.

Not defending Bryant or Harper and certainly a five game series is not a significant sample size from which to predict future performance.

Nevertheless 16 Ks in 5 games (3.2/game) would result in 518.4 Ks in a 162 game season if one played in every game. I recognize the Aaron struck out only (?) 208 times this year, but could this number go higher next season. I wouldn't bet against it, unless of course the "Judge" spent a little more time on the "bench" next year.

Unfortunately with the evolution of the game into a home run derby/strike out game much of the "inside baseball" of the older game seems to be disappearing. Is anyone surprised that a record number of home runs and strikeouts occurred in the same year? Judge is just the most hyped example of this trend, but there are many others.

Not a hater, just the facts.

That ignores Judge's entire season though. He had a historic September where he hit 15 homers in a month, but you're not saying that Judge can be expected to hit 90 home runs next season.

I too am shocked Cleveland lost the series. They finished the season 32-4, probably the best finish ever, and after their amazing comeback to win game two, they played the last three games as the walking dead.

And the Yankees did this with a minimal contribution from Judge. If he gets hot...maybe, just maybe, this will be the Yankees year. It could get interesting.

Tee hee...


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and he was instrumental in winning 2 games of a best of 5 series.

agree.... i keep saying a couple of good games wipe out many bad games...all the Judge haters kept pointing out the Yankees didnt win the division so his hot streak did nothing....yet Indians go bye bye..and Yankees move on.. I guess Kris Bryant is terrible now..

but Judge did win or at least was instrumental in 2 games as a position player. Yes hes not an all time best hitter, but i find it hard to knock the guy this year for anything...

A- using the playoffs as a gauge of a player's ability is silly, it's too small of a sample size and means absolutely nothing

B- Deer posted a career walk rate of 12.7% and a K rate of 31.2% , at present Judge ,after only one and 1/6th of a season, has a BB% of 17.6 and a K% of 32.3% Deer also has his entire career to compare with scouting reports and age decline built in to these numbers.

C- runs are a team stat and not indicative of individual performance (you have no control over how well the people hit behind you)

D- Bryant has a history of being good in MLB and doesn't have the same batted ball profile of Judge, he also plays good defense at a premium position and has averaged 7 fWAR for 3 straight seasons and only strikes out 23.7% of the time using the playoffs to compare them is silly ,once again


E- league avg for the AL was 18.6% soft contact 49.2% med. contact and 32.2% hard contact with a 21.3 K% and a batting avg on balls in play of .300 Judge posted a 11.2 soft contact, 43.5 med contact and 45.3 hard contact but with 30.7 K% and a BABIP of .357 (which is high for him) Using his nearly 800 PA's worth of data , he looks like a guy who swings hard but got lucky on balls in play, if that regresses towards the mean of .300, and hi K% increases or BB% decreases (or all of the above) he could become a guy who struggles to make contact enough to be viable.

F- AL hitters avg swinging at pitches out of the zone (O-Swing%) was 30% and they made contact on those pitches 62.9% of the time, in the zone (Z-swing%) AL avg was 66.8% and they made contact 85.5% of the time. Judge's O-swing% was 27.4$ with 44% contact, and his Z-swing% was 62.4% with 82.2% contact. like I said, contact + K's could be an issue for him if he doesn't make the proper adjustments,

it's almost like the wildcard playoff format dilutes the postseason into a random bunch of nonsense! (which it does)

I was pretty upset this morning. Sure was hoping I'd wake to much better news but learned quick they came up short.:(

Now that EE and the Indians are out, I don't care so much and will likely concentrate on watching hockey from here on out instead.

No favorite team now, but I guess, at this point, I'll root for the Astros.

scherzer getting smoked..game 5 relief

both starting pitchers tonight wont be as good as kershaw

it todays playoffs..if your starter can get 6.1 innings with 4 earned...and bullpen closes the rest of the way you going to win every 5 or 7 game series..

Washington's Madson and Doolittle pitched the last 2.2 innings with zero runs...bet they wish they had a kershaw average start of 6.1 innings and 4 earned...

Also for the Yankees..If Judge contributes to basically win 2 games for the yankees in the next round..they will win the series...he can go 0-40 with 30 ks...it doesnt matter if he basically wins 2 games for them....

Allow me to be the first to say, 'Aaron Judge will NOT hit 90 home runs next season!'
.

Haha I don't think anyone does. My point was only that if you focus on one aspect of his game and extrapolate stats over a season, the same should be done for all stats.

How in the world do you intentionally walk Jason Heyward with two out? Unless the bases are loaded you walk batters to GET TO Jason Heyward with two outs. Dusty Baker deserved to lose just for that.

Glad I was wrong. I had almost written the Yanks off after that devastating Game 2 loss, but Severino and Tanaka really picked them up in the next 2 games, and CC did just enough before Girardi made the decision to take him out at the perfect time.

On the Aaron Judge front, it was really frustrating to watch him at the plate from a Yankees fan standpoint, but it is encouraging to know that he is very capable of taking walks.

Even the Strikeout/Throwout that happened when he was at the plate in Game 5, should have technically been a Walk with men on 1st and 2nd.

He has an excellent eye and a patient approach for the most part. His biggest problem is he is so big and his strike zone tends to be so big that it gets him in trouble, especially with Umps behind the plate who often unintentionally extend his strike zone even bigger then it should be.

I think with his approach, he would be one of the best beneficiaries of a computer calling balls and strikes in the game, instead of an umpire doing it behind the plate. He could have confidence an outside force isn't going to the pushing the boundaries of his already huge strike zone.

Houston is also a great team. In a 7 game series the bullpen is going to have to be even better then they were against the Indians. Betances is going to have to get his sh*t together, because we will need him to be his occasionally dominant self this time around.

I thought the exact same thing.

....and that's why I'm not a betting man :)

Unusual???
 

Don't hold me to it, but as an old fart, I don't recall a postseason game in which both clean-up (that means fourth in the lineup) hitters were shortstops (NY at HOU today). Prove me wrong. Don't be shy. I bet I've forgotten 99 such games.




Wow, no response, and according to last night’s broadcast I am correct. Who knew? Even a blind squirrel can find a nut occasionally.




Still waiting for Joe Buck to thank me.:D

Hey Frank, only twice has the World Series winner used a batting order that featured the shortstop and second baseman batting in the 3 and 4 spots. One was the 1906 White Sox (G. Davis and Isbell). Can you name the other team to bat their SS and 2B third and fourth?

Sean,

Don't bother me. I'm watching the Kate Upton Show too frequently interrupted by the game and those pesky commercials.:D

boy did verlander pitch a gem tonight...very impressive!!!!