2012 MLB Season Discussion: Off-Season

MLB Playoffs: St. Louis Cardinals Are Driving Baseball Fans Crazy Again

The MLB Playoffs haven’t even been a week old and I am already annoyed by th St. Louis Cardinals. I am an American League fan, so the Cardinals don’t neccessarily bother me as much as other teams should, but I absolutely cannot stand when a team - from any sport - constantly gets lucky over and over again. I’m not trying to discredit the Cardinals by any means; however, just look at all the breaks St. Louis has benefitted from in the last week alone. This breakdown is from one of my friends, Andy Roberts, who basically summed it up to a tee on Facebook:

- Reached the playoffs via a playoff spot that didn’t exist before this season – Won wild-card game with help from one of the worst (or at the least, most controversial) umpiring calls in baseball history, not to mention inexplicably terrible defense from one of the best-fielding teams in the game this year – Advanced to play the only team in the playoffs who is without one of their best players (and just to rub it in, said player is not even injured) – About to take 2 games to 1 lead in best of 5 series on the back of a player who is so bad at hitting that as recently as last year was putting up an OPS AT TRIPLE-A that was worse than Joe Mather’s major-league OPS this season – Starting pitcher who is pulling off something medically unprecedented just by playing right now has 4 shutout innings and collected 2 hits at the plate.

Seriously, this stuff is beyond ridiculous. I honestly can’t pick one of those bullet points as the most egregious. It’s one thing if the Cardinals were close to the Atlanta Braves, but they were six games behind Atlanta in the wild card hunt. That alone made the one-game playoff all the more annoying, because it probably shouldn’t have happened to begin with. Bud Selig and company threw this year’s playoff structure together without much preparation, which is one of the main reasons these playoffs feel a little tainted.

In addition, Stephen Strasburg is just witnessing his team lose in the playoffs while he is perfectly healthy, yet Chris Carpenter is doing just fine on the mound, even though he was supposed to miss the entire 2012 season. Lastly, Pete Kozma – who has a career .652 MiLB OPS – has turned into Cal Ripken Jr. over night.

After all this nonsense I just mentioned above, we have to remember this team is the defending World Series champion after doing the same stuff last season!

Death, taxes, the St. Louis Cardinals pulling something out of their behind.

The three automatics in life.

Wow. Congrats guys.

That was fun to watch.

Stele wrote:

Wow. Congrats guys.

That was fun to watch.

+1 Game 5 baby!!

LOL... watching that quad cam was amazing.

Every time in the build up to the play 1 camera close up on the crowd 1 on the dugout.

Postgame 4 cams close up on the fans going nuts.

Holy damn, I went to bed in the eight absolutely sure that the Tigers would win.

Go A's!

Jayhawker wrote:

MLB Playoffs: St. Louis Cardinals Are Driving Baseball Fans Crazy Again

The MLB Playoffs haven’t even been a week old and I am already annoyed by th St. Louis Cardinals. .

Amen.

Stele wrote:

Wow. Congrats guys.

That was fun to watch.

Come to the Athletics. We'll embrace you warmly. The A's are like the Goonies, we never say die.

I sure wouldn't mind the Cardinals annoying A's fans in the World Series. It would have been more fun if La Russa was still running the show.

Looking forward to today's game. Both pitchers have had really subpar outings against the other team this season. It could be a high scoring affair.

Detwiler is going for the Nats, and he is a St. Louis native. This has to be a pretty awesome day for him.

Blind_Evil wrote:

Just wanted to get on record saying that I'm specifically pulling for the Reds and Nationals, specifically against the Tigers, Yankees, and Cardinals, in those orders. I don't feel anything in particular about the A's, Giants, or Orioles.

Poor Reds.

They were the closest geographic team to me for most of my life so I casually supported them. And the old Riverfront was my first MLB game when I was a kid.

Darn.

Its hard not to get romantic about baseball. ;P

The Cards/Nats game has turned into exactly the kind of game St. Louis has lost more often than not this season. A 1-1 tie in the 8th is not a good sign.

And the ump is giving the Nats pitchers way too many outside strikes. The Cards have struck out five straight times now, and I think they through 4 strikes in all.

Jayhawker wrote:

The Cards/Nats game has turned into exactly the kind of game St. Louis has lost more often than not this season. A 1-1 tie in the 8th is not a good sign.

And the ump is giving the Nats pitchers way too many outside strikes. The Cards have struck out five straight times now, and I think they through 4 strikes in all.

Well, Oakland will be experiencing that tonight when Verlander gets his 60ft strike zone.

And Molina strikes out because he is forced to swing at balls well off the plate.

Yeah, this strike zone is all over the shop.

Thirteen pitches in that game winning at-bat. Damned impressive, Werth.

Thanks for making me not hate baseball today.

Playoffs have been nuts so far... so many close games and guys either withering under the pressure or rising.

sh*tf*ck!

Gonna be a hell of a game tomorrow.

Blind_Evil wrote:

Thanks for making me not hate baseball today.

I'm at least comforted that apparently everyone else hates the Nats.

I don't think the O's want to win. I really don't.

Edit: Well, apparently McClouth is trying to be a one man team.

Great American Ballpark was named as a tribute to Buster Posey.

IMAGE(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/1003/norecords/Giants/posey-1.jpg)

Yes! Orioles win!

Uh... Detroit is kicking ass though.

Stele wrote:

Yes! Orioles win!

Uh... Detroit is kicking ass though. :?

BLargh.

All day I've been thinking as long as they can get Verlander out of the game sometime in the 6th they got a good chance. :/

jowner wrote:
Stele wrote:

Yes! Orioles win!

Uh... Detroit is kicking ass though. :?

BLargh.

All day I've been thinking as long as they can get Verlander out of the game sometime in the 6th they got a good chance. :/

Well, Verlander went for the whole game and we took the division series, but honestly I don't see us making it much past that. When we have to rely on our ace to go the full game in order to clinch a series (and avoid using our set-up / closer), it doesn't bode well.

I'll be looking forward to watching the Orioles/Yankees game 5, though. Naturally rooting for the Orioles in that matchup I'll be honest and say that I haven't paid too much attention to them during the season, so it's been interesting watching that series. Aside from the first game, that series has been damn close.

Jayhawker wrote:

TBS is by far my favorite broadcast of games. Mainly, I like having the strike zone graphic up all the time, with pitch counts.

You know, I actually don't like having that strike zone graphic up. Most of the time because I have no idea where they think the strike zone is. There are sometimes borderline pitches that (according to the graphic) will be WAY out of their strike zone, and some pitches that are high/inside that apparently are over the middle. I dunno, it might have something to do with the camera angle, but having that graphic up is more of a distraction for me than anything.

Also, before anyone brings it up, I completely agree that the strike zone for the umps was completely wonky for the Oakland v Detroit series. For both sides, really.

I am hoping for an eventual Orioles/Nats matchup.

CptDomano wrote:
Jayhawker wrote:

TBS is by far my favorite broadcast of games. Mainly, I like having the strike zone graphic up all the time, with pitch counts.

You know, I actually don't like having that strike zone graphic up. Most of the time because I have no idea where they think the strike zone is. There are sometimes borderline pitches that (according to the graphic) will be WAY out of their strike zone, and some pitches that are high/inside that apparently are over the middle. I dunno, it might have something to do with the camera angle, but having that graphic up is more of a distraction for me than anything.

Also, before anyone brings it up, I completely agree that the strike zone for the umps was completely wonky for the Oakland v Detroit series. For both sides, really.

The problem is that the angle and distance of the camera shot makes it impossible to actually read balls and strikes. But the tech they are using is incredibly accurate, as in less than an inch. It really isn't ever wrong.

What I like about TBS is that they keep the previous pitches up, and it helps tell the story of how a pitcher is working a hitter, or a whole team. It explains why Molina struck out swinging at outside pitches yesterday.

But really, I like having an accurate view of what the hitters and pitchers are seeing. I find that it my perception is corrected far more often than umps are wrong.

Of course, I'd let the computer call balls and strikes. It may be fun to see how some pitchers and batters work the umps and get calls, but I'd like to see that human element taken out of the game.

Jayhawker wrote:

Of course, I'd let the computer call balls and strikes. It may be fun to see how some pitchers and batters work the umps and get calls, but I'd like to see that human element taken out of the game.

Oh man, that's the part that I like the best, though! I mean, it can be annoying when you get an ump that is screwing your team, but I feel like that's the best part of baseball. If they just used a computer for the balls/strikes, they might take a bit of the personality out of the game. I know it would cut out discussion/arguments amongst friends regarding calls for sure

I find "the human element" compelling when programmed into a baseball video game, but next to useless in real life, strangely. I guess there's an interesting psychological component to a pitcher getting in synch with and taking advantage of what an umpire's doing on a given day, but achievements of ball placement in objective reality please me far more.

Slumberland wrote:

I find "the human element" compelling when programmed into a baseball video game, but next to useless in real life, strangely. I guess there's an interesting psychological component to a pitcher getting in synch with and taking advantage of what an umpire's doing on a given day, but achievements of ball placement in objective reality please me far more.

Yeah, I wasn't feeling the love when Werth was kept alive by the same pitch that resulted in the Cardinals striking out 8 times in their last 9 outs.

But mostly, I like data that tells me what is going on in the game. The strike zone TBS uses, and the way they use it provides that. You see zones pitchers are targeting, curent pitch counts, and just how well a pitcher is or isn't painting the black.

I will say that overall, the strike zone does show that umpires are far better than they are given credit for.

Hm. Rain in NYC. Might be delayed.

All this talk of how TBS handles things, well I've been annoyed with how many times they'll replay something. Small irritation, really, but it is wearying.