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Of all the wonderful things that Lloyd has done this year, maybe my favorite was his admonition some time ago that the team just play hard and 'enjoy the journey'. To a young player, the primary response has to be, "Really? OK, cool!" It's liberating, because it removes the end focus on wins and losses and just lets them be them. (Did Miller look like he was feeling a lot of pressure in that AB against Sipp?)
But of course, a veteran will realize this for what it is: a psychological ploy that works for the young. But for the vet? It's different. He understands that at this point in the season...and this point in his career...every game is life and death. You do...or you don't. And thus, my concerns.
I don't think Felix was mysteriously 'out of sync' last night. It looked (to me) like he put himself out of sync. By overthrowing. By trying to will results. It's understandable (and preferable) that his changeup and his breaking stuff sometimes wind up in the dirt. But not the fastball. Not that often. He was trying too hard to hit the bottom edge of the strike zone with maximum gas, and the results were not good. If there were ever a guy who could trust his stuff, it's Felix. But is he trusting it now?
At the same time, we saw Cano react after striking out for what was (not) the last out of the inning. This season, we've seen him blithely shake his head for chasing a bad pitch, maybe flip the bat with a little disgust. But this was different. This was him boiling over, just for a minute. He knew the team needed him. And he knew he failed at that moment. He took a beat to beat himself up. Gone was that megawatt smile that he seems to wear like a logo.
Our greatest advantage this whole pennant race has been attitude. We aren't KC and the Tigers, battling each other to avoid the one game playoff. We aren't the A's, trying to swat away demons. We're not the Indians or the Yankees, sitting and just hoping a couple teams above us totally flop. We know we're better than people give us credit for, and we use that to our advantage. We are loose.
But the actions of Felix and Robbie last night threaten to take that away. They start to imply to the young guys that it's time to 'win or else'. And if that's what the young guys infer, we lose our advantage.
Which is why, were I in a position to talk to both those guys, my message would be simple: "Relax. Don't worry. You got this."