I wonder, when the forensic baseballogists do a full playoff post-mortem on Kimbrel, if we'll find out that his fingers were betraying him.
(Did we ever hear what Gagne said Kimbrel was doing?)
Watch Kimbrel when he's hunched over with arm held up. Sometimes the fingers on his right hand are dead still... and other times they're moving.
Wonder if that's the tell.
(EDIT: It would also help if they stopped squeezing him... was pretty egregious. And I agree with those posters who wonder if the umps aren't giving Kimbrel the benefit of the doubt -- not just because of a long-term "effectively wild" label, but also the recency bias of "he hasn't had his best stuff during the playoffs," making them more inclined to call a borderline pitch a ball. Yes, umps are supposed to be objective. But they never have been, never will be.)
(Did we ever hear what Gagne said Kimbrel was doing?)
Watch Kimbrel when he's hunched over with arm held up. Sometimes the fingers on his right hand are dead still... and other times they're moving.
Wonder if that's the tell.
(EDIT: It would also help if they stopped squeezing him... was pretty egregious. And I agree with those posters who wonder if the umps aren't giving Kimbrel the benefit of the doubt -- not just because of a long-term "effectively wild" label, but also the recency bias of "he hasn't had his best stuff during the playoffs," making them more inclined to call a borderline pitch a ball. Yes, umps are supposed to be objective. But they never have been, never will be.)