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| Monday, June 23 Updated: June 30, 11:06 AM ET Baker's Dozen: The week in preview By Jim Baker ESPN Insider |
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1. The Best Matchup of the Week A Giants-Dodgers pennant race would be wonderful for baseball and here's hoping that both teams hang in it until the final weekend when the Dodgers are back in San Francisco for four games. Since moving to the coast, the Dodgers and Giants have finished one-two or two-one six times:
2000: Giants by 11 games Of course, the loser in such a race would probably still be the Wild-card team (I capitalize it to illustrate the awe in which I behold the institution), so the drama of the 1962 or 1971 situations in which the also-ran is fighting for its existence at the end of the year is done for. This brings us to another discussion: what has been the impact of three-division baseball on the number of close races. By increasing the number of divisions by 50 percent, it would stand to reason that there would be 50 percent more pennant races? Actually, there have been. If we define "pennant race" as any finish of 2½ games or under, the number of those as a percentage of all division races is about the same since 1995 as it was from 1969 to 1993 (1981 and 1994 not counted). Understanding that finishing 2½ games out is not a guarantee that an actual dogfight took place, it will have to do for the purposes of this study. Number of games separating first and second place teams:
There has been a fairly noticeable increase in the number of runaways. Fully a third of the 48 three-division races have ended with the second-place team 10 or more games back while it was just under a quarter in the 96 two-division races. What is more, the average distance between a first- and second-place team has risen from 6.4 games to 8.3.
2. The Worst Matchup of the Week Ohioans, are you going to take this from me; casting aspersions on your native teams in such a manner? Before you sharpen the pitchforks, heat up the tar and pluck the feathers for my comeuppance, consider this: as of press time (Monday, a.m.), this was the only one of two matchups of the 30 this week that featured two teams with sub-.500 records. The other, the Mets-Marlins, features teams with a better combined record than the Reds-Indians, so, always the stickler for rules, they are designated as the worst. What's the closest these two clubs have ever come to making the World Series an intra-Ohio affair? Well, after many years, they were getting closer but both have fallen back. The close calls: 1919: The Red showed up, but the Indians finished in second by 3½ games behind Chicago. Perhaps had they not traded Joe Jackson to the White Sox that 3½-difference might have been covered. No, that's a silly thing to say, because the Indians won the next year. Too bad the Reds faded to third. 1940: This is the closest they have ever come. The Reds held up their end, but the Indians were eliminated by the Tigers with just two games to go in Bob Feller's famous loss to the obscure Floyd Giebell. In June, Gordon Cobbledick (they don't name 'em like that anymore) broke a story about an Indians players' petition to remove irascible manager Ossie Vitt. This move -- deflected by the owner -- got them forever dubbed the "Crybaby Indians." A lot is made of the incident, but the truth is, they played about as well after news of the incident broke (59-44) as they did afterward (30-21). 1995: The Indians got there, but the Reds were denied by eventual world champion Atlanta, four games to none. 1999: The Indians won their division, but were ousted by Boston in the first round. Cincinnati almost got that far, losing a one-game wild-card playoff to the Mets, 5-0.
3. The Slugging For Glory Matchup of the Week No team has ever slugged over .500 in a season. Neither the murderous Yankee lineups of yore nor the high altitude-bound Rockies of our day have ever gotten to that exalted plateau. Have circumstances arisen that could change that in 2003? The Toronto Blue Jays are currently slugging at a .489 clip, a number that puts them right there with the best team ever in this category: the 1927 Yankees. Some other great teams in this regard have included the 1930 Yanks, who had a .488 showing and the 1930 squad that belted out a .483 song. More recently, the 1996-97 Mariners slugged .484 and .485 respectively. The National League record is held by the 2001 Rockies at .483. What would it take for the Jays to improve to over .500? Bearing in mind that extreme numbers tend to move back toward the norm as the season progresses, rather than getting even more extreme, they would have to slug about .509 the rest of the way, getting something like 1,550 to 1,600 total bases in their remaining 87 games. It helps to be playing in a slugging-friendly league environment, which they are. The current league slugging average is about .428. Most of the top slugging teams of all time were in leagues where the average was over .400 (an exception would be the '27 Yanks who did their damage in a .399 league.) Even if they don't crack .500, the record is clearly within their sights.
4. The Old School Matchup of the Week Then there are the Tigers, a team that could set a record heading in the opposite direction from the Blue Jays. While Detroit is in no danger of posting the lowest slugging average ever, they very well could post the lowest in relation to the league average. Currently at .343 in a .428 league, they are about 20 percent below the league norm. A team like the 1908 White Sox only slugged .271, but they did it in a league with a .304 average, so they were only off by about 10 percent -- half of what the Tigers are doing. Of course, the higher the league average, the more margin there is for differential. This means a fairly substantial difference like this has to be the residue of circumstances: an especially anemic team playing in a pitchers' park in a season favorable to sluggers. The Tigers have that going for them as an advantage over their non-slugging counterparts from the ancient past. Speaking of the ancient past, these two teams were playing a series exactly 100 years ago this week, albeit in Detroit. They split two games, eventual world champion Boston won the first game 1-0 and dropped the second 2-1. These sound like plausible 2003 Tigers scores as well.
5. The Attendance Spike Portion of Your Schedule Matchup
of the Week These two teams met at Yankee Stadium last week and a friend of mine named Jack Moulds was on hand for one of the contests. I only mention this because it represented the 600th professional ballgame he has seen in person. Jack sees around 50 games a year at as many different ballparks as he possibly can get to. This past weekend, he went to his 116th different professional facility when he saw a game at Fox Cities Stadium in Appleton, Wis. Obviously, he keeps a very detailed log of all the games he's been to. Some of the milestones: 1. 8/7/79: Chicago White Sox vs. New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium. 50. 9/28/87: New York Mets vs. Philadelphia Phillies at Veterans Stadium. 100. 8/20/91: Detroit Tigers vs. Chicago White Sox at New Comiskey Park. 300. 9/27/97: Florida Marlins vs. Philadelphia Phillies at Veterans Stadium. 500. 7/21/01: Batavia Muckdogs vs. Staten Island Yankees at Richmond County Bank Ballpark at St. George. I used to work with Jack and he was always plotting a post-workday mad dash for a night game in Reading, Pa. or Wilmington, Del., which I thought was pretty cool. I'm kind of hoping that when it comes time for his 1,000th in-person game in seven or eight years, the host team will have some sort of ceremony for him. Jack does not pretend to be the most prolific fan in terms of number of games seen or stadiums visited. He and I both wonder who that person might be and are somewhat determined to find out. Could it be you? Now, we're not talking about someone who gets paid to be at the ballpark. No players, scouts, staff, coaches or reporters need apply. This can only be limited to those who pay their way in to see the games. We are looking to crown three champions, one in each of the following categories:
This last category would be to give a fairly young person like Jack (who sports about a 5.19 GPV figure) a fighting chance against someone who has racked up scores of games by holding a season ticket for the same team for a number of years or against some of those people who do those tours where they try to see as many games in as many places as they can in one summer. (And what's up with these roadtrippers getting sponsors? Where's the sport in that? Deprivation and sacrifice are the only things that make those kinds of trips even worth discussing.) So, do you or someone you know qualify? Let me know at the e-mail address given below.
6. The Biggest Mismatchup of the Week You've heard this before, but it bears repeating: the Angels and A's get to play six games against the teams battling for supremacy in the National League West (the Dodgers and Giants) while the Mariners pull six contests with the team battling for supremacy over a .300 winning percentage. (Who should we feel sorry for here? The teams agreed to this arrangement, right?) So what if San Diego took Seattle two of three in their first meeting? That is pretty much beside the point. This is the ugly side of the interleague equation, the imbalance of scheduling and the questions it raises in regard to competitive fairness. When will the good burghers at MLB realize they have sold one of the cornerstones of the game for some window dressing? Leave questions about ease of scheduling for NCAA Division I football.
7. The Perfect Product Series of the Week Is there such a thing as the perfect product, one that people will buy no matter what the circumstances? While I'm not an economist, I did meet one at a party once and I think that qualifies me to make the judgment that the Tribune folks have the closest thing to the perfect product that there can be: Cubs baseball at Wrigley Field. Consider this: the Cubs have been acting as their own ticket brokers and nobody really seems all that upset about it very much. It is really quite scandalous for a company to fix a price for something and then charge up to 30 times the face value for it, isn't it? Where is the outrage? Where is the well-orchestrated boycott? I put it to you that it cannot be done in this case. One glimpse of that ballpark this Tuesday and Wednesday afternoon and all resolve for action will melt away. The first thing you'll notice is that you'll begin thinking it's worth whatever they're charging to get in there regardless of what happens on the field, the second is that you'll get caught up in the timelessness of the event and forget the very meaning of money. That sounds like the perfect product to me.
8. The Battle for the Right to be Called The Best Last-Place Team in Baseball Matchup of the Week It's a good bet that baseball's best last-place team will come from this division and that it will be one of these two teams. That stands to reason as a significant amount of money was tossed around in the off season by four of the five teams that do their playing here. Even the Marlins ponied up eight figures for Ivan Rodriguez. Last year's Mets were one of the better last-place teams of the three-division era. If it turns out they do finish in last, will they be able to work their way onto the following list of best last-place teams?
Three-Division Era -- National League
Three-Division Era -- American League We should naturally assume that the smaller the divisions get and the larger the percentage of scheduling that takes place outside of each team's own division gets, the better the last-place teams will be. Except that hasn't quite happened as this list of the best two-division last-place teams shows:
Two-Division Era -- National League
Two-Division Era -- American League The best last-place team of the pre-division era was the 1915 New York Giants who finished just 21 games out of first place. Their .459 finish was just the third time in National League history to that point that a last-place team had finished over .400. They themselves had done it 15 years earlier and Pittsburgh also did so in 1891. The best American League pre-division, last-place team was the first Yankee team to finish at the bottom in over 50 years, the 1966 club. Two of the four best last-place teams of the pre-division era come from the 10-team period of 1961-1968.
Pre-division Era -- National League
Pre-division Era -- American League I've been writing that before baseball realigns again, the American League West will produce another all plus-.500 roster, breaking the Angels' 1991 last-place team winning percentage record in the process. The Rangers just don't seem to be cooperating with this prediction, however, which leads us to this:
9. The Great Player Few Get to See Matchup of the Week Was baseball hurt when Alex Rodriguez signed with the Rangers? Has that signing placed a man who should be one of the game's most bankable stars into a last-place Gulag where he only gets seen by a national audience for the five innings he's in the lineup at the All-Star Game? Looking at the big picture, would it have been better for the overall well-being of the product to have had Rodriguez go to a team with a pitching staff? Well, ponder that while you watch A-Rod on ESPN Monday night, making a rare appearance on the national stage.
10. The Day the Earth Stood Still Matchup of the Week OK, this is a stretch, but bear with me. I just watched the above-titled movie in which a flying saucer lands in Washington, D.C. and it got me to thinking: were the Senators home that day in 1951? If so, could they have been playing the White Sox just as their descendants, the Twins are this week? The answer is, alas, no -- they could not have. It is stated that the little boy in the movie -- Bobby -- is still in school and the saucer lands on a weekend. The White Sox did not visit Griffith Stadium during any school months in 1951, the year the movie came out. If you think this is an indication I need to get out more, consider this: perhaps if I went out less I wouldn't have to resort to this sort of thing to use up one of the numbers. In any case, the Twins, rather than putting the pedal to the metal and leaving the rest of the division in a cloud of blue smoke, have allowed the field to stay right there. They remain the only team in the division to score more than it has been scored upon which means that if this race stays a race, it will not be an especially inspired one -- but it will be a race nonetheless and that would be more entertaining than last year's stroll to the finish. Back to "The Day the Earth Stood Still." While no characters were overheard to say, "I was heading to the Senators game but I think I'll go see the saucer instead," here are the baseball references I could find:
11. The We're Still Here Matchup of the Week Is the 2003 season already a guaranteed success for the Royals? Yes, it is -- regardless of whether they stay in the race or not. Why? Because they have already guaranteed they won't repeat as 100-game losers, something the Tigers and Devil Rays will be doing (the fourth 100-game loser from last year, Milwaukee, has a good shot at avoiding the century mark again as well). In spite of the Royals' improvement, center fielder Carlos Beltran appears to have one foot out the door. The Kansas City Star ran a quote from a fan named Anthony McLean that said, "I'm very frustrated that there is no loyalty in the game at all. The era of George Brett and Don Mattingly and Kirby Puckett all playing for the same team is over. I'd like baseball more if it wasn't that way ..." One hears this a lot and it brings up a number of points: 1. Back when those three players were still active, people were saying the exact same thing! 2. There are any number of players active nowadays who may well do exactly what those three did. Among the elder statesmen there are Craig Biggio, Jeff Bagwell, Frank Thomas and Edgar Martinez. In the next age bracket you'll find Chipper Jones, Derek Jeter, Nomar Garciaparra and Garret Anderson. 3. "Loyalty" rarely enters into the equation. The chances that a player will be asked to leave by his team either through trade or release are much greater than the player taking the step himself. 4. It has been demonstrated that transience is the same now as it has ever been. The only thing that is different are the reasons for it.
12. The Mystery Matchup of the Week You would think these two cities would be sporting rivals, but history has conspired to make them not so. In fact, their NFL counterparts once went 15 years without meeting -- even though they were in the same league! Last week's clue and answer: Two players in particular who were once on this week's opponents both appeared in movies in the 1990s. One is known -- if he is known at all -- only for the first at-bat of his big-league career which marked a milestone for the first team. The player for the second team was out of position in his movie appearance, although he did play one game there the year the movie came out. Scott Pose was the first man ever to bat for the Florida Marlins. He appeared in the movie For the Love of the Game. Bernard Gilkey appeared in the 1997 movie Men In Black in which he played a Mets center fielder startled to see a flying saucer zoom over Shea Stadium. He made one appearance at that position that year. So, it was Marlins vs. Mets. Jim Baker writes Monday through Friday for ESPN Insider. He can be reached at jimbakerespn@yahoo.com. |
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