I interrupt your regularly scheduled blog for a special announcement: The Kansas City Royals and the San Francisco Giants are going to World Series!
Given that these are both Wildcard teams that fought their way through a do-or-die Wildcard game, a League Division Series and a League Championship series, it’s kind of double-plus cool!
[Those looking for more of the previous two posts, can read this older post about the Mike Judge movie, Idiocracy. Be assured I will resume the topic anon.]
Wow! Kansas City Royals — the wildcard team — take the Los Angeles Angels (the best team in baseball this year) three-zip in the ALDS. And that after an amazing wildcard game against the Oakland Athletics. The game last night — their fourth post-season game — was the first to go only nine innings and featured their biggest win so far: 8-3!
It’s hard to separate my rooting for them to win from how objectively great all four games have been, but I think anyone would agree these were great games. The Royals have been so much fun to watch. Their running game alone is a joy to behold.
Blue beat green in one and red in three; now they go after orange best of seven!
World Series bound?
Yesterday featured, not one, not two, not three, but four MLB baseball games to watch. Normally there is nothing unusual about four baseball games in a day. During the regular season, when all 30 MLB teams play (which happens most days), there are 15 games on the day. The big difference yesterday was that these were post-season playoff games, and all four were televised in national markets at times that almost didn’t overlap.
And how about them Royals?! First they give the Tigers fits during the season after fighting their way above the pack — even taking first place in the Division for 30 days late in the season. Then they make it to the playoffs as a wildcard and have played amazing baseball in the three games so far. Quite a story; I hope they go all the way!
Plus, I’ve realized what really annoys me about NCIS: Los Angeles.
Congrats to the Kansas City Royals for winning the MLB American League Wildcard game!!
And what an awesome game it was — an amazing kickoff to the 2014 post-season. Oakland off to a quick start with two runs at the top of the first and Kansas City answering immediately with one in the bottom. Royals take the lead in the third only to lose it in what seemed a game-losing pitching change in the sixth. By the time the dust settles Oakland drives in five runs. Royals get three back in the eighth, tie it up in the ninth, and we’re off to extra innings.
The A’s finally get a run in the twelfth, the Royals tie it up again and then a walk-off hit by catcher Salvador Perez (who has a .167 batting average) wins the game for Kansas City!
Good going guys!! Party like it’s 1985! Go Royals! Go all the way!!
Addendum (later that day): With the Royals win, I’m 1-for-1 on hopes. If the Pirates win tonight, I’ll be 2-for-2!
I’ve decided I want to see a “Central Hoedown Showdown!” Pirates take the Giants tonight (and another Bay Area team goes home); Royals somehow beat the Angels; Pirates somehow beat the Nationals; Tigers take the Orioles; Cardinals take the Dodgers (I’m iffy on that; not a Cards fan). Ultimately it comes down to Royals and Pirates with the Royals taking home the bacon.
Yeah, I know. It’s more likely to end up Nats and Tigers (or maybe Nats and O’s), but I can dream!
∇
Gardy ejected – permanently!
The big surprise news for Minnesota Twins fans was the firing of manager Ron “Gardy” Gardenhire on Monday. In some ways the move was not surprising — the Twins have endured some of their worst seasons in the last four years, starting in 2011 when they came only one game short of losing 100 games. Even Gardy himself seems to agree the move is a good one, telling reporters, “I think this is the right thing.”
Gardenhire coached the Twins under former manager, Tom Kelly, from 1991 to 2001 and became their manager in 2002. That year the Twins made it all the way to the ALCS by beating the Oakland A’s, only to lose to the Anaheim Angels in five games. Since that time, Gardy brought the Twins to the post-season five times, but lost each time in the ALDS.
The surprise is more that Terry Ryan, the Twins GM, actually made such a bold move.
The regular season of MLB baseball ended yesterday. As it turns out, no one has to play a game 163. As recently as Saturday it looked like there could be up to three game 163s, but the final games played Sunday settled matters. On the personal plus side, the Pittsburgh Pirates and — perhaps more significantly — the Kansas City Royals are going to the playoffs. On the flip side, both teams are getting in as wildcard teams, so the journey may be short (but it would be pretty cool if the Royals went all the way).
And your Minnesota Twins, once again, aren’t going. It was another losing year for the Twins — fourth in a row — but they did manage to do a little bit better than they have in the last three. As I wrote earlier in the season, this year’s team showed some potential not seen those last three years. Unfortunately, in the end (as usual) our pitching brought us down. But at least we ended the season on a fairly nice note.
Post-season baseball begins this week and ends with the “Fall Classic” — the World Series.
Last night the Minnesota Twins played their 81st game of the 2014 season. That means they’ve now played exactly half of the 162 games that comprise a Major League season.
They lost, which — unfortunately, lately — isn’t surprising. They’re back in last place in the AL-Central, nine games behind the first place Detroit Tigers and seven games below the break-even .500 mark. Most of the stats show a downward trend that doesn’t bode well for the second half of the season.
It appears that earlier optimism about a decent Twins year was unfounded.
I’ve written several times about the many places we see the idea of a Yin and Yang duality played out in the real world. Even the application of the Yin and Yang concept has a Yin (of true opposites) and a Yang (of thing and not-thing). For example, the opposite of light is not-light, but the opposite of positive is negative.
One of the true opposites is the idea of analog versus digital or, more generally, of continuous versus uneven. Recently I was thinking about the differences between various sports, and I realized there’s a connection to the “smooth or bumpy” distinction I wrote about a while back. Looked at in terms of play, some sports are essentially continuous while others are not.
It turns out that some sports are “analog” while others are “digital.”
Happy Twins; Happy Fans!
The Minnesota Twins have had three of the worst years (2011-2013) in franchise history, but this year there have been hints that this year might be different. In April they had a win-loss record of 12-11 (.522) and averaged 5.57 runs per game. The downside was that starting pitchers had a 6.02 ERA.
In May, the pitching got better; starters threw a very good 4.03 ERA. Unfortunately, the bats went ice-cold. Runs per game were down to 3.17, and Twins lagged behind their opponents by 27 runs. The month ended with a 13-16 (.448) record.
June is off to a bang with one of the most exciting wins the Twins have seen in years!
The baseball season takes place from April to September. In those 180 days, each of the 30 MLB teams plays 162 games. That number doesn’t divide by four neatly but having played 43 games (as of last night), my Minnesota Twins are definitely past the quarter mark of this season.
Back in 2010, when the Twins finished 94-68 (.580) and won the American Central Division, after 43 games they had a 26-17 (.605) win-loss record. In the awful three years that followed, they had (respectively) records of 15-28 (.349), 15-28 (.349 again) and 18-25 (.419) — all three years falling below the important .500 mark.
What’s astonishing is that this year the Twins… aren’t sucking!
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