You have to check to make sure Kaleb Ort is still securely shackled in the basement before wishing for stuff like that.
2023 WC Round Game/Discussion Thread
- Thread starter DeadlySplitter
- Start date
One network owns all the rights, they show all the games but they overlap them (understandable) and they keep the score of the other one on the screen the whole time (infuriating). I get this in the regular season but it drives me nuts in the postseason, let us watch all of both games if we want. THEN WE WOULD BE WATCHING YOUR TELECASTS TWICE AS LONG. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.
Yeah, I'm generally in favor of expanding the playoffs, but I'm really not sure that MLB is accomplishing anything with these new WC rounds.
Sure they are. This year just happened to be a very rare worst case scenario. 4 Game 3's would be a blast.
Anything is better than the coin flip single game wild card games were IMO, one dominant pitcher and your season is over, leaving everyone unsure if they even made the postseason or not as it ended so quickly. 2 of 3 can also end really quickly as we just saw 4 times also, but at least one notch more meaningful.
You can find him after the games in the doorway of the local Dunks asking for change.
Interesting — I have really enjoyed the last two days. I think the playoffs is most fun when you have a mix of the teams that have been playing the best all year and a couple of hot at the end of the year teams.
I think this new format is entertaining and fair, and I am excited about the 8 teams that have made the real tournament, which starts now.
8 games is a small sample — give it a couple of years. We did not get a winner take all game 3 this year, but that was just weird luck. I think over a few years we will get some big moments.
One other thing I would add is that the new pitch clock — as great as it is in the regular year — may be a negative in the playoffs. I noticed that today. The high drama moments happen fast and there isn’t as much time for tension to build. It will be interesting to see how that plays out.
For better or worse, we will never have moments like we are used to — with the pitcher kicking around the rosin bag between pitches, the crowd building, then receding, then building again like ocean waves. I don’t know if this is better or worse, but it feels much different, and I think will be more noticeable as the stakes get higher.
For better or worse, we will never have moments like we are used to — with the pitcher kicking around the rosin bag between pitches, the crowd building, then receding, then building again like ocean waves. I don’t know if this is better or worse, but it feels much different, and I think will be more noticeable as the stakes get higher.
Youtube TV has had the option this year to put both up on a split screen and be able to toggle which gets audio. Can't pause/rewind and it's not a native solution, but it's certainly a perk.
This week we had no meaningful games Sunday, and no games at all Monday, Thursday, and Friday. The earliest the World Series can end is Halloween. You're stretching out the playoffs to let in the 6th best team in each league and play a marginally more "fair" 3 game set versus one. Yes, it's the worst case scenario this year, but even in the best case, you're making people wait a week to watch the best teams in baseball in the playoffs.
On YouTubeTV you can bring both games up at the same time in separate browsers.
Reseed after the Wild Card round, add 5-10 seconds to pitch clock or give hitters an additional timeout.
I guess if seeing the Dodgers and Orioles play is your top priority, waiting stinks. But in the old 8 teams make it days, didn’t the playoffs always start on Wednesday and Thursday? So now it’s Saturday. Maybe I am off by a day, but this isn’t a big deal to me, when I get 8-12 additional games, with plenty of stars and action.
Imagine if this year were 8 teams. The Rays would have limped in as a 99 win team and gotten throttled in a shitty ALDS walk through. This round flushed them out, and I am much more interested in seeing the Rangers now.
To each his own, obviously. Maybe it will grow on you.
You guys are grumps. The expanded playoffs really helped a lot of races down the stretch, and I think the three game series over the one-game playoff. We saw some good baseball over the last two days, even if all the series were sweeps.
Not surprising, but the wild card series were all basically won by teams that had touted, defined starting pitchers who threw a lot of solid innings. Jordan Montgomery, Nate Eovaldi, Sonny Gray, Pablo Lopez, Zac Gallen, Aaron Nola, Zach Wheeler--not everyone was a superstar or paid a brinks truck of money, but clear and obvious high quality starters.
Not surprising, but the wild card series were all basically won by teams that had touted, defined starting pitchers who threw a lot of solid innings. Jordan Montgomery, Nate Eovaldi, Sonny Gray, Pablo Lopez, Zac Gallen, Aaron Nola, Zach Wheeler--not everyone was a superstar or paid a brinks truck of money, but clear and obvious high quality starters.
Blue Jays players confused by the pitching change
After the game, some Toronto players let their opinions on Berríos’s benching known. Blue Jays utility player Whit Merrifield did not hold back on his thoughts.
“I hated it, frankly,” Merrifield said, via FanNation’s Inside the Blue Jays. “It’s not what cost us the game, but it’s the kind of baseball decisions that are taking away from managers and baseball, at this stage of the game.”
https://www.si.com/mlb/2023/10/05/blue-jays-players-jose-berrios-managers-decision-remove-early
After the game, some Toronto players let their opinions on Berríos’s benching known. Blue Jays utility player Whit Merrifield did not hold back on his thoughts.
“I hated it, frankly,” Merrifield said, via FanNation’s Inside the Blue Jays. “It’s not what cost us the game, but it’s the kind of baseball decisions that are taking away from managers and baseball, at this stage of the game.”
https://www.si.com/mlb/2023/10/05/blue-jays-players-jose-berrios-managers-decision-remove-early
It reminded me of when NY tried to use Deivi Garcia as an opener for JA Happ against TB in 2020, overthinking the platoon edge and losing a crucial game.
https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/30057724/new-york-yankees-switch-deivi-garcia-ja-happ-1-inning
https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/30057724/new-york-yankees-switch-deivi-garcia-ja-happ-1-inning
What's most painful is upper management making Schneider take the hit without being able to say that the call came from up above.
Verducci
https://www.si.com/mlb/2023/10/05/toronto-blue-jays-blow-playoff-series-flawed-analytics-script
Verducci
https://www.si.com/mlb/2023/10/05/toronto-blue-jays-blow-playoff-series-flawed-analytics-script
Along these lines, can someone sell me on the D-Backs? I know basically no one on that team except Longoria and Ketel Marte I guess. And of course the Lovullo/Hazen connection. Why is everyone so excited about them?
Corbin Carroll is one of the very few true 5 tool players in the league and will won RotY and probably an MVP someday. Seriously, get to know his name.
Alek Thomas is a ton of fun to watch in center field. They are maybe the most aggressive team in the league on the basepaths, and are probably the best baserunning team, and are one of the more fun teams to watch play defense.
Their pitching is just okay, but Zac Gallen and Merrill Kelly are a pretty good 1-2 punch. The bullpen can make games interesting, though.
They are also decidedly NOT the Dodgers, Braves or Phillies, which is probably why a lot of people are pulling for them in the NL.
They were my sleeper pick at the beginning of the year, and I wish I had put money on them back then.
I am a bit salty because the Sox finished so lamely, I am glad to see TB and Toronto bounced so early. TB acts like they reinvented baseball and Toronto is really wasting a good young core.
Yeah I see that they were 24th in bullpen fWAR this year. But then they totally shut down Milwaukee in the two games. Batted ball luck or have they turned a corner?
Last night the Brewers loaded the bases with one out in the 8th and got nothing out of it, the got 2nd and 3rd in the 9th and got nothing. Night before they had bases loaded one out and Longoria made a leaping catch on a rocket and threw to second for the double play. Even in a small sample size of two games, they for sure got lucky at times
Fans have always loved a team that's had its struggles but is coming of age with a wave of young talent... for a year or two. After that they usually decide they're too cocky and unlikeable and root for their comeuppance.
One of my best friends served in the marines with Kerkerings dad. I've been hearing stories about him since high school, when he was barely a JV player. My buddy, who lives here in town in MA has seen him pitch like 5 times in person out of his like 7 major league appearances. Him abd a group of marines got tox and drove to Philly hoping he'd pitch one of the first two games. He got in last night, struck out the side. From what I've been told, he is am all world kid. Google "Orion Kerkering dad cries at Sons MLB debut" if you want it to get dusty.