sycasey said:

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GMP said:

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Dave Roberts on the wind: "Any other night, the CT ball, the Gavin Lux ball would have been home runs."

"Those two balls right there, it would have been a different outcome."

— Kerry Crowley (@KO_Crowley) October 12, 2021

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Crawford and I think maybe Yaz also hit balls that might have gone out on a normal night. The wind was not only blowing when the Dodgers were at bat.

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Exactly. Yaz smoked one 387 ft that goes out most nights. But really you can't assume that one thing changes and that nobody adjusts. Who knows what else the butterfly effect would have changed. It was the kind of baseball game that the postseason magnifies.

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/gamefeed?date=10/11/2021&gamePk=660919&chartType=pitch&legendType=pitchName&playerType=pitcher&inning=&count=&pitchHand=&batSide=&descFilter=&ptFilter=&resultFilter=&hf=exitVelocity#660919

sycasey said:

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GMP said:

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Dave Roberts on the wind: "Any other night, the CT ball, the Gavin Lux ball would have been home runs."

"Those two balls right there, it would have been a different outcome."

— Kerry Crowley (@KO_Crowley) October 12, 2021

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Crawford and I think maybe Yaz also hit balls that might have gone out on a normal night. The wind was not only blowing when the Dodgers were at bat.

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Yup, and as Unit2 says it's all a butterfly effect. Maybe Yaz's ball starts a 5 run rally. No one knows. Which is why Roberts' comment is loser talk. Any other night, maybe that Lux ball goes out. But any other night, everything is different. And it's not any other night. It's tonight. And tonight the Giants won 1-0. I can tell you if the roles were reversed and Kapler said something like that I would be mad. I'm fairly confident he wouldn't do that, though.

GMP said:

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sycasey said:

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GMP said:

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Dave Roberts on the wind: "Any other night, the CT ball, the Gavin Lux ball would have been home runs."

"Those two balls right there, it would have been a different outcome."

— Kerry Crowley (@KO_Crowley) October 12, 2021

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Crawford and I think maybe Yaz also hit balls that might have gone out on a normal night. The wind was not only blowing when the Dodgers were at bat.

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Yup, and as Unit2 says it's all a butterfly effect. Maybe Yaz's ball starts a 5 run rally. No one knows. Which is why Roberts' comment is loser talk. Any other night, maybe that Lux ball goes out. But any other night, everything is different. And it's not any other night. It's tonight. And tonight the Giants won 1-0. I can tell you if the roles were reversed and Kapler said something like that I would be mad. I'm fairly confident he wouldn't do that, though.

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ESPN wrote a whole article about the wind and managed to ignore any negative impact it had on the Giants. Much journalism. I hope the Dodgers bring that fixed mindset into tonight's game and that things snowball but I think we all know that this series is going 5 games. Anything else wouldn't do justice to this season and this rivalry.

okaydo said:

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Heather Graham still looks great after all these years. Amazing.

okaydo said:

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SF people hanging out at Pier 39? Fake.

Dodgers blown out, 1-0: https://t.co/tYpw9J47YJ

— Defector (@DefectorMedia) October 12, 2021

GMP said:

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sycasey said:

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GMP said:

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Dave Roberts on the wind: "Any other night, the CT ball, the Gavin Lux ball would have been home runs."

"Those two balls right there, it would have been a different outcome."

— Kerry Crowley (@KO_Crowley) October 12, 2021

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Crawford and I think maybe Yaz also hit balls that might have gone out on a normal night. The wind was not only blowing when the Dodgers were at bat.

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Yup, and as Unit2 says it's all a butterfly effect. Maybe Yaz's ball starts a 5 run rally. No one knows. Which is why Roberts' comment is loser talk. Any other night, maybe that Lux ball goes out. But any other night, everything is different. And it's not any other night. It's tonight. And tonight the Giants won 1-0. I can tell you if the roles were reversed and Kapler said something like that I would be mad. I'm fairly confident he wouldn't do that, though.

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Roberts' comments not only ignore the Yaz and Crawford balls, they also ignore the extent to which the pitch calls take into account the wind factor.

Coming in to the 9th inning, I wasn't worried about the first two righty hitters against Doval so much as Lux, but not that he might hit an outside fastball out of the park. The odds were pretty strongly against that. Because of the wind. Crawford had already shown how difficult it was for a lefty to hit a ball out to the left of center, and Yaz showed how difficult it was for anybody to hit one out dead center.

For me, the big concern was Lux pulling the ball, a ball hit well to dead right was likely going to get help going out. The closer a ball was hit to the RF line, the more help it would get so long as it didn't get pushed foul. If Doval hangs a slider, Lux might bang it out to right, plus it is easier for a lefty to hit the Doval slider if it is in the strike zone than a righty. Throw fastballs on the outside part of the plate, even it Lux squares one up, it probably won't go out, unless we get a moment of calm from the winds. But Posey can see where the flags are at the moment, if there is a moment of calm, he can see it right in front of him.

So Buster calls for an outside fastball. Doval misses way outside, ball one. Buster calls for another outside fastball. Doval misses up, but not in. Lux squares it up about as well as he can. I'm thinking, "I sure hope that ball dies in the wind," and it did.

For the first 20 years at the China Basin ballpark, it was REALLY hard for righties to hit HR's to right field (a little easier since the plexiglass coverings keep wind from going through the archways. The combination of the deep right center, the high wall, and the wind has made it tough on righties (not easy on lefties, but harder on righties).

So pitchers have always pitched to the ballpark. Buehler may not have gotten the memo that it is now easier to hit it out to right at China Basin, so his game 1 first inning 3-0 fastball away ends up going out (although Posey got that enough so that it may have been out even pre-archway coverings).

You pitch to the ballpark, but you also pitch to the conditions. When the wind is blowing in at Wrigley? You can pitch for fly balls, which you don't want to do if the wind is blowing out. Square one up that dies when the wind is blowing in at Wrigley, well, maybe you would never have gotten that pitch if the wind was blowing out, because the catcher will call a different game. Wrigley plays like a different ballpark depending on how the wind is. China Basin can play like a different ballpark depending on weather conditions. Well, Dodgers Stadium played like a different ballpark last night. Park of baseball is recognizing that not every park is the same, and even the same park plays differently at different times.

In the Lux at bat, give Posey some credit for calling pitches that were appropriate to the conditions. You sure don't want Lux to square one up, but if he does square up a fastball on the very outside part of the plate, at least it probably isn't going out.

When Gavin Lux looked incredulous that the ball didn't go out after his premature jocularity, I could only think, "Did you not watch the game while you were on the bench? That ball did exactly what it was supposed to do on this night at this park, it died in the wind." Yep, that is out on a normal night, but maybe Posey is calling for inside fastballs in on a normal night, or mixing in sliders and fastballs in and out, but it wasn't a normal night. We'll never know how things would have played out on a normal night, but you have to play the ballpark you are dealt.

Buehler on short rest tonight.

sycasey said:

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Buehler on short rest tonight.

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Desperation has sunk in.

sycasey said:

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Buehler on short rest tonight.

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Not sure I'd make that call if I was Roberts, but it's Roberts and he is all about making bad calls.

Buehler, Gonsolin, or bullpen game? Kershaw is hurt and the other guy punches vaginas.

oski003 said:

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Buehler, Gonsolin, or bullpen game? Kershaw is hurt and the other guy punches vaginas.

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Buehler is the best choice given his overall record. Why can't he pitch on three days rest? Heck, Bumgarner won a World Series for SF by pitching five innings on two days rest.

And, of course, who can forget Koufax winning on the last day of the 1965 season on two days rest to give LA the pennant over SF.

sycasey said:

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Buehler on short rest tonight.

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To quote Han Solo: "I've got a bad feeling about this." I think Buehler on short rest is still better than Desclafani. What also concerns me as a natural pessimist in my fandom, is if the Dodgers win tonight, they'll pitch Urias on almost full-rest for game 5. Webb looks great, but Urias has the proven track record and was pretty lights out in SF for game 2.

Youngbearcub89 said:

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sycasey said:

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Buehler on short rest tonight.

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To quote Han Solo: "I've got a bad feeling about this." I think Buehler on short rest is still better than Desclafani. What also concerns me as a natural pessimist in my fandom, is if the Dodgers win tonight, they'll pitch Urias on almost full-rest for game 5. Webb looks great, but Urias has the proven track record and was pretty lights out in SF for game 2.

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I agree. Also, Urias will be on full rest since Game 5 is not scheduled until Thursday.

Agreed. Looks like Thursday decides it. Maybe that is fitting. Go Giants!

dimitrig said:

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71Bear said:

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Youngbearcub89 said:

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sycasey said:

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Buehler on short rest tonight.

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To quote Han Solo: "I've got a bad feeling about this." I think Buehler on short rest is still better than Desclafani. What also concerns me as a natural pessimist in my fandom, is if the Dodgers win tonight, they'll pitch Urias on almost full-rest for game 5. Webb looks great, but Urias has the proven track record and was pretty lights out in SF for game 2.

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I agree. Also, Urias will be on full rest since Game 5 is not scheduled until Thursday.

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Too bad these two teams couldn't play a proper 7 game series.

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Yup - it's fitting that the series is going 5 though. I think we all knew it would have to be this way. They couldn't settle the regular season until game 162 and this will probably go until the 9th inning in game 5, if not extras. That's just the way it's been.

Two excellent teams. Really impressive.

It should be a 7 game series. This needs to be fixed.

bonsallbear said:

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It should be a 7 game series. This needs to be fixed.

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Actually, it should have been a 3 game series .

Seriously, it doesn't matter whether it is a 5,7, 9, or 11. The difference will always be one game. The teams are that closely matched. Let's finish it and move on….

Heck, the LA and SF played a 19 game series during the regular season and the difference was one game.

bonsallbear said:

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It should be a 7 game series. This needs to be fixed.

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MLB's postseason format may be completely different next year anyway, but if they were to keep the current field (three division winners and two wild cards in each league), here's how I'd fix it:

1. Wild card round is best of three games, not one. A single game to decide things between teams without equal records is dumb. At least make them use all their top rotation pitchers. No off days. They can fly overnight to the next location, like they do in the regular season.

2. Re-seed by record after the wild card is decided, but keep the rule that the wild card team never gets home field advantage in a series from the DS onward. So the Dodgers would be re-seeded to be #2 in the NL, but would have to go on the road to face #3 Milwaukee.

That way you can keep the incentives for winning your division (which did make the NL West much more interesting this year) but don't have dumb things like a 106-win team potentially getting eliminated by a 90-win team in one game, or the two best teams in baseball only getting a five-game series against each other.

sycasey said:

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bonsallbear said:

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It should be a 7 game series. This needs to be fixed.

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MLB's postseason format may be completely different next year anyway, but if they were to keep the current field (three division winners and two wild cards in each league), here's how I'd fix it:

1. Wild card round is best of three games, not one. A single game to decide things between teams without equal records is dumb. At least make them use all their top rotation pitchers. No off days. They can fly overnight to the next location, like they do in the regular season.

2. Re-seed by record after the wild card is decided, but keep the rule that the wild card team never gets home field advantage in a series from the DS onward. So the Dodgers would be re-seeded to be #2 in the NL, but would have to go on the road to face #3 Milwaukee.

That way you can keep the incentives for winning your division (which did make the NL West much more interesting this year) but don't have dumb things like a 106-win team potentially getting eliminated by a 90-win team in one game, or the two best teams in baseball only getting a five-game series against each other.

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I don't like the rule that the WC card never gets home field advantage.

It should be like the NBA and decided based on record.

There is already an incentive for winning the division, which is you get to avoid the wildcard.

The 88 win Braves having home field against the Dodgers (if they should advance) is ridiculous.

dimitrig said:

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sycasey said:

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bonsallbear said:

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It should be a 7 game series. This needs to be fixed.

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MLB's postseason format may be completely different next year anyway, but if they were to keep the current field (three division winners and two wild cards in each league), here's how I'd fix it:

1. Wild card round is best of three games, not one. A single game to decide things between teams without equal records is dumb. At least make them use all their top rotation pitchers. No off days. They can fly overnight to the next location, like they do in the regular season.

2. Re-seed by record after the wild card is decided, but keep the rule that the wild card team never gets home field advantage in a series from the DS onward. So the Dodgers would be re-seeded to be #2 in the NL, but would have to go on the road to face #3 Milwaukee.

That way you can keep the incentives for winning your division (which did make the NL West much more interesting this year) but don't have dumb things like a 106-win team potentially getting eliminated by a 90-win team in one game, or the two best teams in baseball only getting a five-game series against each other.

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I don't like the rule that the WC card never gets home field advantage.

It should be like the NBA and decided based on record.

There is already an incentive for winning the division, which is you get to avoid the wildcard.

The 88 win Braves having home field against the Dodgers (if they should advance) is ridiculous.

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I'm not hard-line against the wild card team having home field, but it's pretty clear that MLB generally wants advantages for division winners. We can do that and still preserve the potential best matchups for the LCS.

Item #1 is key. They play 162 games and then it becomes entirely different strategy in the playoffs. No off days would reduce the overmanaging and starters getting taken out of the game because they gave up a run or because the offense has a chance for a big inning in the 3rd or 4th.

Maybe keep an off day before game 5 of the short series or games 6 and 7 of the longer series.

I am 99% sure they will expand the playoffs next year when they negotiate their new CBA. Last year was a preview of how it'll be: 8 teams in each league qualify with the 1st round being a 3 game series with the higher seed hosting all 3 games. LA would've been seeded 4th if they had that format this year.

philbert said:

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I am 99% sure they will expand the playoffs next year when they negotiate their new CBA. Last year was a preview of how it'll be: 8 teams in each league qualify with the 1st round being a 3 game series with the higher seed hosting all 3 games. LA would've been seeded 4th if they had that format this year.

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The MLB playoff setup is a joke. It is designed to maximize income to the owners and the players, rather than reward the best teams by placing them in the World Series. The original setup that was placed by the playoff scenario was the best. Teams play 162 games during the regular season. That is more than enough to definitely determine which team is the best in the National League and in the American League. This year, the best team in the National League is the Giants, and the best team in the American League is the Rays. The Giants should be meeting the Rays in the World Series.

In the regular season, the Giants won 19 games more than the Braves and 12 games more than the Brewers. Neither one of those teams deserved to be in contention for the World Series. Regarding the Dodgers, granted they won only 1 game less than the Giants, but they ended up in second place. Second place teams don't deserve to be in the world Series.

Golden One said:

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philbert said:

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I am 99% sure they will expand the playoffs next year when they negotiate their new CBA. Last year was a preview of how it'll be: 8 teams in each league qualify with the 1st round being a 3 game series with the higher seed hosting all 3 games. LA would've been seeded 4th if they had that format this year.

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The MLB playoff setup is a joke. It is designed to maximize income to the owners and the players, rather than reward the best teams by placing them in the World Series. The original setup that was placed by the playoff scenario was the best. Teams play 162 games during the regular season. That is more than enough to definitely determine which team is the best in the National League and in the American League. This year, the best team in the National League is the Giants, and the best team in the American League is the Rays. The Giants should be meeting the Rays in the World Series.

In the regular season, the Giants won 19 games more than the Braves and 12 games more than the Brewers. Neither one of those teams deserved to be in contention for the World Series. Regarding the Dodgers, granted they won only 1 game less than the Giants, but they ended up in second place. Second place teams don't deserve to be in the world Series.

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Sounds good. Let's implement this next year. The Giants traditionally do better in the playoffs than the regular season. This season is an anomaly.

oski003 said:

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Golden One said:

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philbert said:

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I am 99% sure they will expand the playoffs next year when they negotiate their new CBA. Last year was a preview of how it'll be: 8 teams in each league qualify with the 1st round being a 3 game series with the higher seed hosting all 3 games. LA would've been seeded 4th if they had that format this year.

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The MLB playoff setup is a joke. It is designed to maximize income to the owners and the players, rather than reward the best teams by placing them in the World Series. The original setup that was placed by the playoff scenario was the best. Teams play 162 games during the regular season. That is more than enough to definitely determine which team is the best in the National League and in the American League. This year, the best team in the National League is the Giants, and the best team in the American League is the Rays. The Giants should be meeting the Rays in the World Series.

In the regular season, the Giants won 19 games more than the Braves and 12 games more than the Brewers. Neither one of those teams deserved to be in contention for the World Series. Regarding the Dodgers, granted they won only 1 game less than the Giants, but they ended up in second place. Second place teams don't deserve to be in the world Series.

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Sounds good. Let's implement this next year. The Giants traditionally do better in the playoffs than the regular season. This season is an anomaly.

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Ridiculous. I like the current set up with one exception - I would increase the divisional series to seven games.

Heck, the Giants won the WS as a WC team in 2014 and the Dodgers could equal that feat this year. If you are good, you win. Otherwise, play better…..

I happen to think G1 is directionally right. There is no reason to have the teams play 162 games and then have this many rounds of playoffs. I can live with something in between the original standard (from when there were fewer teams) and a more NBA like version where half the teams make the playoffs. The thing about MLB is that the season is a grind. Building for championships is a lot different if you don't have an incentive to be the best team in the regular season.

I think expanding the playoffs would incentivize people to rest their best players far more during the regular season because they would be rendered far less important. Basically you would be turning regular season baseball into the NBA except the sport is less engaging and with 2x as many games.

It's not clear to me that there is a facile answer here. I would understand someone taking the position that the Giants shouldn't have been in a position to win the WS as a wild card in 2014. It wasn't just them though. The Marlins won twice as wild cards (beating the division winning giants twice in NLDS') and were built for postseason success rather than to dominate the regular season. Since 1997, roughly 1/3 of WS champs were wild card teams. What does that say about having a 162 game regular season?

Unit2Sucks said:

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I happen to think G1 is directionally right. There is no reason to have the teams play 162 games and then have this many rounds of playoffs. I can live with something in between the original standard (from when there were fewer teams) and a more NBA like version where half the teams make the playoffs. The thing about MLB is that the season is a grind. Building for championships is a lot different if you don't have an incentive to be the best team in the regular season.

I think expanding the playoffs would incentivize people to rest their best players far more during the regular season because they would be rendered far less important. Basically you would be turning regular season baseball into the NBA except the sport is less engaging and with 2x as many games.

It's not clear to me that there is a facile answer here. I would understand someone taking the position that the Giants shouldn't have been in a position to win the WS as a wild card in 2014. It wasn't just them though. The Marlins won twice as wild cards (beating the division winning giants twice in NLDS') and were built for postseason success rather than to dominate the regular season. Since 1997, roughly 1/3 of WS champs were wild card teams. What does that say about having a 162 game regular season?

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I am a proponent of the current WC system, principally because of what happened in 1993 (and this year). Eliminating a team that won 103 games (in '93) or 106 games (in '21) is crazy.

As for resting players, it happens now. Buster Posey is rested every third day and it has revitalized his career. Quite frankly, regardless of whether the playoffs are expanded, I think other teams will look at SF and begin focusing on developing depth to allow their guys to rest more. It certainly worked for the Giants this year.

The old school comment of two teams is ridiculous. This is like the straw man argument that all past records are precious and we can't ever change the rules. Based on this, I'm assuming y'all would be ok with the Giants giving up those World Series titles in 2010, 2012 and 2014? They wouldn't have even been one of the two teams in the World Series.

The big issue is that each team in a particular division plays a different schedule than teams in the other divisions. If it was one big league where all teams played equally, then yes, 162 games might be enough. But the very nature of divisions makes that impossible as some teams play the best teams much more than others. And interleague play would have go away as well, something this fan would not like.

No, the system is evolving. I'm in favor a slightly shorter season but a greatly expanded playoffs. As it stands, MLB has the lowest percentage of playoff teams, 10 of 30, of any of the major sports. While I'm not a fan of 3 divisions, it is what it is. So I'd like to add one more wildcard team and have the 3 wildcards plus the worst leader of a division play a 3 game series to eliminate 2 teams. Then those 2 winners play the other 2 division winners in a 5-game series, and the winners then play a 5-game series before moving to the World Series. The most amount of games a team could play is 20 extra, and though unlikely, we could cut the regular season by about 10 games and no one would notice. This would require a change to media rights and CBA, but it will all even out at the end. The argument that Orioles fans won't watch playoffs is also silly, they gave up in May anyway! Ha. But seriously, just re-work the money and it will all work out, I believe fewer games would also result in more fans at games as there more pressure on teams to perform in a shorter season and thus even more interest. The way it's always worked here (mostly crap teams) is that as the season goes on, less and less fans show up at each game, but the costs of running the stadium etc are still high. Less would become more.

2 cents...out.

sandiegobears said:

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The old school comment of two teams is ridiculous. This is like the straw man argument that all past records are precious and we can't ever change the rules. Based on this, I'm assuming y'all would be ok with the Giants giving up those World Series titles in 2010, 2012 and 2014? They wouldn't have even been one of the two teams in the World Series.

The big issue is that each team in a particular division plays a different schedule than teams in the other divisions. If it was one big league where all teams played equally, then yes, 162 games might be enough. But the very nature of divisions makes that impossible as some teams play the best teams much more than others. And interleague play would have go away as well, something this fan would not like.

No, the system is evolving. I'm in favor a slightly shorter season but a greatly expanded playoffs. As it stands, MLB has the lowest percentage of playoff teams, 8 of 32, of any of the major sports. While I'm not a fan of 3 divisions, it is what it is. So I'd like to add two more wildcard teams and have the 3 wildcards plus the worst leader of a division play a 3 game series to eliminate 2 teams. Then those 2 winners play the other 2 division winners in a 5-game series, and the winners then play a 5-game series before moving to the World Series. The most amount of games a team could play is 20 extra, and though unlikely, we could cut the regular season by about 10 games and no one would notice. This would require a change to media rights and CBA, but it will all even out at the end. The argument that Orioles fans won't watch playoffs is also silly, they gave up in May anyway! Ha. But seriously, just re-work the money and it will all work out, I believe fewer games would also result in more fans at games as there more pressure on teams to perform in a shorter season and thus even more interest. The way it's always worked here (mostly crap teams) is that as the season goes on, less and less fans show up at each game, but the costs of running the stadium etc are still high. Less would become more.

2 cents...out.

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MLB has 10/30 teams in the playoffs, not 8/32.