Down 3-0, 2004 vs. 2020 comp

terrynever

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I think he was referring to the fact that Gordon likely had some ugly racist remarks thrown his way, and that that's beneath the dignity (or ought to be) of any sports fan or fanbase, and way past the line of "fair heckling".

Anyway, my heart goes out to you VORPster. I'm sure you're lying on the floor in the corner somewhere rocking back and forth in a half-drunken stupor, but, like, we've been there too. Most every one of us here lived through 2003. We had them on the ropes. The vampire was chained to the table, the stake was in our hand, the mallet was raised, and our bumbling moron manager came out and said "ehhh, he's not going anywhere, let's everyone take a coffee break and finish this later", and every horror-movie trope followed from there. So we know how dark it gets. But at least you've still got a chance tonight to see your team make us all laugh this off, and be able to joke about it years from now. We had to wait a year for a chance to go all Braveheart on those jerkfaces. And we never got another shot at the Mets (1986) or Reds (1975). So I hope you and your team can both get up off the mat tonight, muster up some furious anger, and send that sorry excuse for a team back to whatever rock they crawled out from under.
Great post. Never thought of the racist angle. I just find the whole bullpen logistics of Fenway frightening, fans leaning over, shouting, cop standing there, rooting for Sox. Multiply by 100 and you have the 2003 ALCS.

Watching Pedro dissect Dusty’s decision to leave Greinke in, my mind flashed to Posada’s dunk hit off Pedro after Grady left him in. That had to be a good pitch, right? Baseball is so infuriating. And 2003 was just another world in terms of intensity.
 

reggiecleveland

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Gordon definitely was in his head after the Ortiz HR in the 8th. He walks Millar who is then PR for with Roberts. I seem to remember a ton of throw overs to keep Roberts honest. Nixon then singles him to 3rd leading to Tek's sac fly to tie it. The rest is history. What a game that was.
Torre pitched a 36 year old guy 80 times in the regular season and the most innings since he was a starter. That off season they acquired Scott Proctor.

We too often overlook physical explanations. Guy was exhausted.
 
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bob burda

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Torre pitched a 36 year old guy 80 times in the regular season and the most innings since he was a starter. That off season they acquired Scott Proctor.

We too often overlook physical explanations. Guy was exhausted.
I absolutely hate "intangible" explanations too, but Keith Foulke was also exhausted and pitched quite well.

Tom Gordon made 21 relief appearances in his career in post-season, and gave up runs in 12 of them, with a 7.06 ERA, and with WHIP over 1.5. In 21.2 post-season innings he gave up 6 HRs. In and among that record there are a few good appearances - even one earlier in the 2004 ALCS that was fairly high-leverage to keep a 4-2 lead - but on the whole his post-season record is execrable.

Worth noting, he also pitched 80 innings the following year, and had one of his better post-seasons (for him, anyway; one bad appearance sandwiched between two good ones). I did not realize that Torre Proctored Gordon before he got around to Proctoring Proctor.....
 

Leskanic's Thread

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Given the wider context of where we are in the world right now, I'm borderline embarrassed at how relieved I am that "The only team to ever come back from 0-3 town in MLB history" is still a viable sentence going forward.

Gordon succumbed to the pressure while journeymen like Curtis Leskanic came in and got outs for Boston. At some point after Game 3, Boston stopped worrying and the Yanks started stressing. I don’t believe in teams choking but do believe the emotional stakes can be two different things in a series.

As this pertains to Tampa-Houston, we just have to let the players decide. Some of the Rays’ bullpen looks hittable right now after 10 games in 12 days, 10 games where the starters rarely went more than five innings, often less. Is this the chink in Tampa’s armor?
A very important point, you should feel good about saying it, and all of us should consider saying it again in the future.