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Season's on! Season's off! Season's on! Season's off!
Ya mooks, youse. :: grrrrr ::
.........
We listened to (some of) the game on radio. The M's got 14 hits and 4 walks, but then again, on Sunday they got 12 hits and walks in a shutout.
Dr. D figured that, on Tuesday, Pascal's triangle had simply worked its BABIP magic -- that all of these randomly-struck balls simply found grass this time. Later that night, he turned on his DVR to watch the bloops fall in.
Not hardly! He was stunned to watch one smoked line shot after another. Here's How. Later we'll riff as to the Why.
After a BB and a HBP to start the 5th, here's what happened. Note particularly Zunino's double, and Ackley's:
| Batter | Pitch | Pitch Quality | Result |
| Zunino, 5th | 0-0 fastball, low away | Good / Very Good | Screaming 2B over Trout's head |
| Taylor | 0-1 hanging curve | Terrible | Line-shot 2B pulled down the line |
| Ackley | 0-1 fastball right at knees | Very Good | Vapor-trail low line double to LEFT center |
| - (6th) | |||
| Morales | 2-2 changeup, high | Bad | Smacked line drive 1B to left-center |
| LoMo | 0-0 changeup @ knees | Excellent | Very sharp groundball 2B down the line (coulda been a GIDP, if 3' to left) |
| Chavez | 0-2 fastball up out of zone | Superb | Got on top of it, swatted a groundball single the other way (coulda been a GIDP, if 6' either way) |
| Zunino | HBP (this is a skill of his) | ||
| A. Jackson | 0-0 change on black | Decent | Frozen rope 1B the other way, to RF |
| Ackley | 1-2 slider away | Very Good | 100 MPH sacrifice fly, pulled to RF |
| (Cano) | (infield single) | ||
| Seager | 3-2 fastball away | Very Good | Beat the shift with a grounder steered through the left side |
| Morales | 1-1 changeup, knee high | Good | Sharp grounder found a hole for a 2B |
Other happiness followed also ... Chris Taylor had ANOTHER clean single, later on, and Zunino had another (LOL) hit by pitch in the 9th inning. etc.
I was particularly taken aback by Dustin Ackley's double. It was a knee-high fastball, perfectly splitting the plate. Why would you Ichiro! this centered pitch over the shortstop? Because you're getting a long look at it, and you're not being greedy. That's why.
Gordon has told us about Ackley in AAA, standing bored at the plate, watching the pitch sizzle in and almost sneeringly whacking the ball into the gap. That was the way with this double. He looked positively contemptuous.
The bone spurs are surely painful, but there are 13 games left. Like when Carroll was asked about Harvin's hip last February. "We're in Super Bowl mode here." For $100M in career earnings, I'll take some painkillers, too.
This guy is going to be a very melancholy watch, the last 10 years of his career. Probably the most melancholy ever. A sports fan's reaction:
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Whyfore, dept.
In the postgame, Blowers was asked ... realistically, now, in a player's mind, how much does a game like this do to restore confidence among the batters. (Pro athletes are not AS up-and-down as you and I are, but that means --- > they have 30% of our emotional response. Not 0%.)
Once again, Blowers had an understated, instructive comment on it. Paraphrasing, "I hadn't thought they were swinging that great. When you're fighting for the playoffs like this, you have the last four or five games in the back of your mind. When Mike's double got past Trout, I think the guys could loosen up some. And this game will take some pressure off."
Just so. We had complained about the M's "stiff and mechanical" swings; exactly at the moment of Zunino's double, the M's shoulders visibly relaxed, and (we presume) they started visualizing the positive. They then (no presumption needed) started accomplishing exactly what they wanted to accomplish.
Dr's prognosis? Follows Mike Blowers'. Very likely, the M's will show a "happier" orientation at the plate going forward. A little success against C.J. Wilson would amplify the little burst of mini-momentum.
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Royals Lose! Royals Lose!
KO'ed some meatball named Chris Bassitt, who has 17 ML innings, a 5.72 ERA, and 11 walks against 13 strikeouts.
Staked to a 3-1 lead against a AAA pitcher, they promply wasted their bounty like Conan the Barbarian squandering a pouchful of rare jewels. The Sox' bullpen, and Adam Eaton, crawled out of the coffin to draw several pints of blood from the Royals' cheery color.
On the bright side, at least the Royals get Chris Sale tonight.
:: cute puppies feeling ::
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A's Lose! A's Lose!
Following the little oasis that the Mariners provided them, the Orcs promptly picked up their tragicomic script. Right. where. they left. off.
The "sloppy" Orcs scrounged a feeble 6 hits against a Tepesch or something, following up their bungling with at least 2 errors in the field. Meanwhile, Scott Kazmir got garroted, skinned, and spit-roasted over the river Styx.
In other words, the Texas Rangers (?) beat them like a AAA team playing a college team. Melvin's comment: "It didn't look like we were ready to play tonight." Well, why would you be? There's a looooonnnnnng way to go to the finish line.
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Dr's R/X
Even supposing the M's do tie Kansas City and have to play a second entry game, you know what? I'll still watch the game. ...
-1.0 to KC, -2.0 to Oakland. Let's see if we can further bloat C.J. Wilson's ERA tonight, shall we?
Enjoy,
Dr D
The good news, if I understand the new rules, is that there is not a tie-break game for the WC teams anymore - isntead there is a tie-break stat to check. The teams' head to head record against. On that score, MARINERS 5 - ROYALS 2. We need to gain 1 game to get to the play-offs.
Under the M's Playoff Odds, Redux article, Dr. D has already corrected himself a time or three.
On this MLB.com page, dated Sept. 2, 2014, the relevant clause seems to be:
Two-Club Tie for One Wild Card Spot:One tiebreak game will be played to determine the Wild Card. Home field advantage will be determined by the rules above for a two-team tiebreaker.
Does anybody know, for sure, what is the deal-io here?
Got a Facebook page up. If the mood strikes you to set me straight (again), I'll be much obliged. :- ) In any case, keep on keepin' on!
I am 99% sure that if we tie, we play KC in a one game playoff. I think Doc pulled out the most salient clause, but if you read through the rules (I linked them before), the tiebreakers only ever apply to home field advantage, NOT playoff births. There is also this, the first sentence of the article:
If one game is needed to break a tie for a playoff berth between two teams, it will be played on the Monday after the scheduled end to the regular season, hosted by the team that won the season series against the other.
Just hate to see the discussion here proceed from a false premise! Go M's
Lloyd had a comment after the first loss to the angels.
Paraphrased, "We're loooking for that big hit to get us going".
Hopefully, that was yesterday.
Meh.