LCS Previews
Should we do a real one of these arbitrary exercises this time? What the hell:
Tigers v. The Fucking Yankees: Oddly, of my 2012 predictions the one that produced the most criticism was not one of the many I got wrong but one I got right: namely, that the Tigers, while the best team of a poor division, were being massively overrated. The good news is that the Detroit’s lack of depth is a little less damaging in a short series, and you can argue that the difference between the teams in this context is a little less than the 70 or so runs that separated them in the regular season. I think in the abstract I’d rather have the Tigers starter in every matchup in the series except Sanchez/Kuroda, although whether I’d prefer the Tiger starter when I also have to take the hideous Tiger defense is a more complicated question. So I’m picking the Yankees for two reasons: there offense is better 1-9, and (especially) their bullpen is much better. YANKEES IN SIX.
Giants v. Cardinals Although it was hidden because Reds ran away with the Central, only the Yankees, Rays, and Nats had a better run differential than the Cardinals this year. Carlos Beltran, already cited yesterday, was a classic smart Cardinals move, and I was happy to the the most underrated player of his generation reward them with an excellent year. The Giants are still a pretty good team, better offensively and with worse pitching than their World Championship team. But although I’m not crazy about the St. Louis rotation, I still like the Cards and their much more powerful offense. CARDINALS IN FIVE.
You had to do it , eh?
May Buster Posey invade your every dream this week.
Buster? I hardly touched her.
I thought Hunter Pence is the one that stalks the sleeping world.
Is Posey the result of a “Boy Named Sue” overcompensation effect? (Gerald Dempsey Posey III?) Or is he just a very talented, even-keeled, hard-working, well-mannered young man? As a Giants fan, I gotta say that this is not my usual kind of sporting hero (I’m more of a Lincecum guy), but Posey really is showing every sign of greatness.
As a Pirates fan who wanted them to pick Posey over Alvarez, I say: screw you.
Also, I laugh at the Expo fan’s prediction of Cardinals in 5. Giants in 5, easy.
Yeah, a Cardinals-Yankees world series. Darth Vader vs. Voldemort. Awesome.
My thoughts exactly. Probably won’t really watch much of that one.
Which normally wouldn’t be a problem because hockey, but this year ….
There’s always the KHL.
Some of the KHL’s top games are available at http://www.laola1.tv
Today they posted Ak Bars Kazan-Lev Praha and Salavat Yulaev-Slovan Bratislava. Yesterday they had Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod-Yugra. The day before that, there were three games: Donbass Donetsk-Dynamo Minsk, Neftekhimik-Slovan Bratislava, and Sibir Novosibirsk-Metallurg Novokuznetsk.
Tomorrow, they have Dynamo Moskva-Amur Khabarovsk. I understand Ovechkin is playing with Dynamo Moskva now. One doesn’t have to watch the matches live; they are available on demand.
How do I know this? Well, http://www.laola1.tv also hosts the European Handball Federation’s Champions League competition for both men and women. (They also have fairly extensive volleyball, curling, and table tennis coverage, too.)
Out of curiosity, how does one motivate players for Sibir Novosibirsk? You can’t threaten to send them to Siberia. They’re already there.
Well, there’s the Alaska Avalanche, based in Wasilla………
The Avalanche moved to Pennsylvania, and are now known as the Johnstown Tomahawks.
What explains all the hate for the Cardinals? Is it just because they’ve beaten a lot of better teams the last couple years in excruciating ways? Is it Tony LaRussa? I mean, St. Louis is a small market and the Cardinals have a midsize payroll – they’re not exactly the Yankees or Red Sox. Their fans aren’t known for being particularly boorish (I’m looking at you, Phillies and Braves). Yet people just seem to despise them. If it’s nothing more than they win a lot I’ll be pretty disappointed.
Mets fans have a reason but overall it doesn’t seem fair that one team keeps on winning like that. Spread around the wealth to other midsize teams etc.
So this is Obama’s America… ;)
there you go making everything political :-P
I don’t despise the Cardinals. I don’t even really dislike them. I just get bored watching the same teams win all the time.
Burning desire for vengence for ’06, and ’34.
I’ve been to St Louis a few time and people there are mostly polite, and actually pretty courteous drivers.
East coast fans, OTOH, are world class shits.
Thus, my hatred for the Cards is totally irrational.
Bullshit. Look at how Cardinals Nation has reacted to the rise of the Reds: “How dare they challenge our historic greatness?!” As an NLC native, Cardinals fans don’t deserve 1/10 the praise they get from out of towners who are evidently impressed that they know to wear red to a baseball game.
I’m kind of surprised I need to point this out on LGM. Where are you, Farley?
If the Tigers beat the Yankees, I promise that I will hate them 10% less than I do now.
Jeeebus, how I hope you’re wrong about at least one of those predictions.
For this Yanks diehard, it looks like Tigers in six, Giants in five. NYY hitting woes continue thus far in Game 1; I don’t see them getting much better, particularly with Verlander coming down the pike for Games 3 and 6 or 7. Giants seem to have that look from two years ago, and came up big time in Games 4 and 5 against Cincinnati. Lincecum in long relief looks like an inspired decision.
I hope you’re right. But the Cardinals have that “hey look we’re the wild card and weren’t that great in the regular season but what do you know we’re going to randomly win everything from here on out now LOL” look from way too many fucking times already.
Unrelated: I suspect Lincecum is going to start Game 4.
Only because the Reds couldn’t get more out of Zito’s Nerf balls. Hard to fault Bochy, though. None of his pitchers are rock-steady right now, which is good news for the Cards.
i think you overrate the yankee hitting in the post-season context.
the quick way to put this (since it’s just a pitching change) is that the yanks had 180 at bats in the baltimore series: by their norms, they would have had 7 strikeouts fewer and 4 homers more, and yet i wasn’t surprised that they didn’t.
in short, i’m dubious that they have enough offense even if their starting pitching stays strong.
Kinda OT, but I will never buy a Samsung product because I am so damn sick of their commercials. I will buy an iPhone out of spite.
I still think they’re funny. But then again, I haven’t been watching a lot of TV lately, so maybe I just haven’t seen them enough.
I do this all the time: I’ll see an ad for the first time, comment that it’s kind of clever, and everyone in the room turns on me. I think there’s a special magic in creating a spot that holds up past the first 5 broadcasts.
I second Howard’s comment and can see the Cards (Jason Vorhees like) finding yet another way not to die, but see them doing it in more than five.
OTOH … ugh. That “save” attempt was as bad as the opening of SNL.
The tired anti-Yankees schtick is the LGM version of a Fox News TelePrompTer joke. Get some new material or go back to Canada. Boring, like watching old people spoon, and gross and tiresome. Yawn, mf’er. Oh wait Tim Raines just stole second base in Olympic Stadium in 1983 and…no one cares. Eat me.
A little testy this evening. I wonder why.
BDF could’ve been sitting in one of the many empty seats in Yankee Stadium if he cared so much.
When you’re tired of hating the Yankees, you’re tired of life.
I’m confused. I don’t see anything in this post about the Littoral Combat Ship.
Can Valverde suck any harder?
And let us not forget Jim Leyland, who picked a bad time for his evening nap.
No contract for next year. I put his chances of returning at about 25%.
Only if he gets another chance to pitch.
I seem to remember that in 2010, you were saying Phillies in five, and then Texas in five. Mays willing, you’ll be just as right about the Giants as you were then.
Do you mean “Willie Mayes,” as the crack TBS/TNT crew identified him tonight?
The Cardinals run differential isn’t nearly as impressive as it seems. They are +109 vs the Cubs, Astros and Brewers this year, +8 vs everybody else.
I was gonna say (although I didn’t know those exact details). But whatever stats you trot out to try and show the Cards have some hidden strength going, bottom line is how come it didn’t translate to a better record, against a worse division? Giants were six games better than the Cards, in a better (if not exactly awesome) division (8 games under .500 vs. 46 under).
There you go. A much more effective way of getting at what I was saying below. It’s the most hollow +117 RD in decades.
No Reds? No Nats? Frack it… or Frell it. Your choice…
Anyone who remembers George Steinbrenner and his thousand*-year clown show still has a gut-level loathing for the Yankees.
*Yes, I know it wasn’t really a thousand years of temper tantrums and stupidity but it sure felt that long.
For the record: People have been raving about the Cardinals’ RD since fucking May, and they’ve been a barely above average team all season long. Every single year, teams both outperform and underperform their RDs by significant margins (Rays, meet Orioles), but apparently seamheads will never accept this basic fact of life. The Cardinals had 162 games to show that they could win like a +117 team, and failed. They may end up winning the next couple short series, but that will prove no more than the 5 previous Wild Card teams to have won the WS.
PS – Fun Fact: the Cardinals’ RD since May 17, when they were 22-16: +52. That would be over 124 games. After ~124 games of the season, 7 other MLB teams were more than 52 runs to the good (many of them far more than +52). IOW, the Cards ran up a huge RD (+65) in the first ~6 weeks of the season, had an unimpressive record to show for it, and then played good-not-great baseball for the last 3/4 of the year. But national writers and lazy analysts can’t be bothered to see how the team actually played, day in and day out, and assume that their +117 must indicate some sort of monster club that was somehow denied a division win.
This has to be the best ad placement on LG&M, ever.