2014 World Series thread

Sam Mellinger had a good take on how the Royals, by being so far outside the mainstream for so long, got themselves ahead of the curve as priorities changed from home runs to speed, defense and contact hitting. He says even the Royals' front-office people wondered about Moore's obsession with outfield defense, but that a lot of AL teams are looking to KC for clues now.

http://www.kansascity.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/sam-mellinger/article3113391.html

 

The Cardinals had no reason to lose that game. Orta was down 0-2 before the bad call. Orta was erased at third on Sundberg's gawdawful bunt. The Cardinals lost that series because they shat the bed in that inning and in Game 7, and because they batted .191 or whatever it was for the Series. Cardinals fans are still whining about Denkinger. Cardinals fans who weren't even born in 1985 whine about Denkinger. So many other reasons why they lost that game .

 

The 1988 Dodgers had a pitcher having one of the best seasons in major league history leading them. The Royals have nothing of the sort.
The 1988 Dodgers were old. Or, charitably, 'experienced'. They had two former WS MVPs on the roster. They Royals have nothing like that.

The Royals are young, fast and play super OF defense. The Dodgers did none of that.

They both have good bullpens.

 

The Clark missed pop foul also comes to mind.

KC in 4, though I half-heartedly hope it goes 6 so KC can close it at home.

 

As I've said for 29 years on Denkinger...

St. Louis fans need to also blame Jack Clark for whiffing a pop fly and Darrell Porter (the true irony here given his years in KC) letting a passed ball advance two runners from 1st/2nd to 2nd/3rd.

The Cardinals were up 3-1 in that series.

Bring on the Royals! Bring on Game 2!

 

Jesus, guys. Its a 2014 World Series with the Royals and Giants. Can you give the call a rest?

 

Run prevention didn't just become a thing. I remember it became a big deal with the Mariners when they had that winning season in 2010(?) And of course the Red Sox made a big leap in 2013 largely by improving their defense.

I tend to think the Royals are just a pretty good team on a phenomenal hot streak. If there was more to it than that, they would have won more than 89 games.

 

Why do people think that having a good defense is somehow this big rebuke to sabermetrics?

One of the most provocative, flying-in-the-face-of-conventional-thinking chapters in "Moneyball" was the one about how dependent pitchers are - almost completely dependent - on their defense when the ball is put into play. There is an entire field of sabermetrics devoted to this concept, Defensive Independent Pitching Statistics ("DIPS").

 

Because sabermetrics hit the national consciousness during the PED-influenced high-offense era. 15 years ago, MLB averaged 5.08 runs a game. This year it was 4.07, thanks in part to the PED cleanup and in part to an interesting phenomenon where average velocity is shooting up remarkably rapidly in the last few years.

That completely changes the relative value of various strategies. But people assume that because statheads told you in 1999 that the sac bunt was terrible (when runs are higher, outs become harder to give away), they must think it's terrible for all time.

You know what team defense led MLB in percentage of balls in play converted to outs? Your playoff-choking, SABR-built Oakland A's.

 

Primarily because the A's of that area were a beer league softball team. They had bad defenders at almost every position. A 162-game season smooths out the impact with the number of chances and such, but just about all of their postseason failures can trace to some horrible defense.

It's largely the same now. Moss, Vogt, Lowrie, Gomes and especially Norris -- those guys are bad defensive players. And it cost them dearly in a close wild-card game.

 

I'm very confused.

 

Who cares how many outs the team makes, as long as it *feels* like their defense is bad?