Wednesday, October 10, 2007

ALCS Preview

The Indians just knocked off the hottest team in baseball in 4 games and are still getting no respect. Almost nobody thinks that this team can beat the Red Rox. The argument that I hear most often is the Red Sox have deeper starting pitching. Do they?

Let's look at the numbers.

Game 1: CC sabathia vs. Josh Beckett (Advantage Indians)
  • CC was 19-7 with a 3.21 ERA
  • Beckett 20-7 with a 3.27 ERA
  • Sabathia also had a 2 month span in which he allowed 2 or fewer runs in every start. He went 4-3 in those games. If he had any run support at all he would be something like 22-5 right now and be a hands down Cy Young winner.

Game 2: Fausto Carmona vs. Curt Schilling (Advantage Indians)

  • Sorry Curt, this is a no brainer. I said it before the playoffs...Fausto Carmona is the best pitcher in baseball and he showed it in game 2 of the ALDS.
  • Fausto was 19-8 with a 3.06 ERA.
  • Schilling was 9-8 with a 3.87 ERA.
  • You can throw the post season experience out the window in this matchup as well. Carmona already beat Pettitte.

Game 3: Jake Westbrook vs. Dice K (Advantage Indians)

  • You may think I am crazy but Dice K just does not impress me. This game is also at the Jake.
  • Westbrook was 6-9 with a 4.32 ERA.
  • Dice K was 15-12 with a 4.40 ERA. Again the Indians starter has the better ERA.
  • Futher, since the all star break, Westbrook has a 3.44 ERA while Dice K has a 5.19 ERA. Dice K has just been bad since the break.

Game 4: Paul Byrd vs. Tim Wakefield (Advantage Indians)

  • I am not a huge fan of knuckle ballers in the playoffs.
  • Wakefield had a 17-12 record and an ERA of 4.76.
  • The Byrd man had a 15-8 record and a 4.59 ERA, AGAIN better than his pitching counterpart.
  • Paul Byrd is also coming up an improbable win against the Yankees in game 4.

As for starting pitching, the Indians one through four, based on the numbers are just better than the Red Sox one through four this season in every single matchup. Who would have thought?

What about the bullpen since pitching wins championships?

  • Perez and Betancourt are studs with ERAs of 1.78 and 1.47 respectively. Perez looked dominant at times in the ALDS as did Betancourt in game 4.
  • Okajima and DelCarmen, the two best guys in the Red Sox pen, had ERAs of 2.22 and 2.05 respectively. Again, ADVANTAGE INDIANS.
  • Throw Jensen Lewis in the mix and his ERA of 2.15 is miniscule compared to the 3.42 of Timlin.
  • As for the closer....I'll give the Red Sox the advantage here. Borowski is frightening every time he steps on the mound, while Paplebon and his 1.85 ERA can be dominant. The Red Sox have to be better at one aspect I guess.

How the two teams played down the stretch?

  • The Indians played the final month of the season at 18-9 whereas Boston was 15-11. The Indians swept their AL Central counterparts in Detroit when they were threatening while the Red Sox lost 5 of 6 to the Yankees.
  • Since August 13th, the Red Sox are 26-19 while Cleveland is 31-13.
  • The Indians knocked off an opponenet in the Yankees who were red hot while the Red Sox beat a team in Anaheim that was only 14-13 in September including losses in 6 of their last 9.

My Point: Yeah the Red Sox are a great team and can win this series. But, how are they so superior to the Indians, a team that tied them for the best record in baseball? Ask a Yankee fan who the better team is.

13 comments:

  1. carmona didn't beat pettitte... pettitte didn't give up any runs

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  2. Carmona did beat Pettitte...Carmona was the better pitcher that night...Carmona did not get in any trouble the whole night except one mistake to Cabrera. Pettite only went 6+ innings, Carmona went 9 and allowed 3 hits and the Indians won the game. I'm not saying Pettite didn't pitch a great game, he definitely did, but Carmona was the better pitcher that night. If the Yankees win that game 1-0, I still say Carmona was the better pitcher that night. Pettite allowed 7 hits in 6+ innings, Carmona 3 in 9 innings and if Pettite didn't leave the game in the 6th for Joba whose to say that those two runs would not have scored.

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  3. ok... i can't take anything you say seriously until you spell pettitte's fucking name right. i cut you some slack with guys who you have never heard of... but we are talking about andy pettitte, can you please spell his name right? and i never said carmona wasn't better... i said he didn't beat pettitte. Pettitte did what he had to do. it wasn't andy's fault that canadian soldiers took over the field.


    Who had a better ERA in the game?
    Did Andy Pettitte get a loss?
    Why does allowing baserunners matter when you can completely shut down hitters when there are men on base?

    Bottom line is that despite the fact that it was a great game... it was a fluke of a loss for the yankees. everyone knows under semi-normal circumstances sizemore doesn't score>yankees win game 2>yankees win series. and there is nothing that anyone can say that would convince me otherwise

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  4. Wow ok...it would have been a fluke of a win for the Yankees if they won with all the guys the Indians left on base. Yeah Pettitte allowed less runs in the game through 6.1 innings but he ran out of gas. He couldn't go deeper into the game like Carmona was able to. If he goes deeper, Mariano still may have been in there in the 11th.
    Secondly, blaming the loss on the bugs is crazy. Yeah it may have effected Chamberlain but it shouldn't have. He should have been able to handle the adversity. Carmona didn't seem to be bothered when he blew a 96 mile per hour sinker past Arod when he was covered with bugs. And to say they would have won the series if they won that game is speculation also because there would have been a game 5 in Cleveland with CC Sabathia on the mound. The only hard fact is that the Indians won the game and the series in 5. Also, Chamberlain can be wild in normal circumstances...Throwing 2 balls at Youkilis' head is pretty wild.

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  5. Also, allowing 3 hits and 1 run in 11 innings by Carmona and Perez is anything but a fluke win.

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  6. 338 outs he had 7 wild pitches... he had two in a one out span... if you do the math it makes sense that something Affected his pitching. had they won that game and the next game they wouldn't have started wang and PROBABLY would have won the series. also, different players are affected by things in different ways... i didn't see nearly as many bugs on the back of carmona's neck when he was on the mound... and it wasn't because they blended in... joba was legitimately bothered by the bugs and had to have the trainer spray him down thoroughly twice. so to say they didn't bother him as much when he was "blowing a sinker past arod" makes sense... because they weren't swarming all over his head. some players were noticeably more affected by them.

    but either way, the indians deserved to make the alcs... i'm not taking anything away from them, i just think that things would have been different had the bugs not been involved.

    go yankees.

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  7. i think that if the wild card could play the best team overall including their own division it would be yankees v indians in a 7 game set... and things would be more interesting

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  8. i really hope you're not comparing outs against the devil rays and baltimore to the playoffs .. all those outs might even count single A.. joba is a gas can.. i saw him getting wild from the get go.. youkilis?
    yankees suck.. i'd rather not make the playoffs then get embarrassed and waste 25 mil per season on a sub 280 playoff hitter
    -steve

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  9. aka outs against teams in normal circumstances vs. outs vs. a team with bugs all over your face and neck. you can pretend you would rather not see your team play in the postseason all you want but the truth is that you are only saying that to avoid the embarrassing fact that your team suffered one of the largest collapses in the history of sports.

    remember when glavine pitched in the last game of the season? that was about as pathetic of a moment you can have in sports... that was worse than the bills finish on mnf.
    so that means the team with the highest payroll in the NL didn't even make the playoffs?... rough

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  10. $100 million for 4 more games in which they went 1-3 sound investment

    plus at least i'm not in denial about my team choking you're just an apologist and a blind sheep like fan that is embarrassing
    -steve

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  11. blind sheep? i grew up in new york rooting for the yankees long before they won a world series... how that makes me a blind sheep, i dont know. if your definition of a blind sheep is someone who loves the team of the state that they are from (or city in your case) then i guess that is what you are too. that fact that you like teams that never succeed doesn't make you a better fan than anyone else... but for some reason you think that being miserable all the time and writing shitty blog entries in which you spell 27% of the words wrong a good fan. so why don't you go fuck yourself.

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  12. this is the last time i will ever address you as a human being.. this is western new york blog .. people do care about the sabres as they have sold out 60+ straight games.. keep trying ..
    clickity clank in my piggy bank
    steve

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  13. haha, This is great

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