Dr. Doom here (via Doug) with an awards-voting post. That’s what I’ve typically done around here. Your friend and mine nsb mentioned to me that he tried to get a discussion going on the NL MVP on another thread, but it’s a little buried and hard to find. I thought maybe we could bring that idea over to its own post. I’ll do the tabulatin’, but I thought we might have fun doing awards voting.
More after the jump! Continue reading
Baseball fans everywhere were stunned and saddened by the tragic passing of Roy Halladay, unquestionably one the greatest pitchers of the recent past. Author of a perfect game and post-season no-hitter, Halladay logged over 2500 IP in a sixteen year career with the Blue Jays and Phillies. Eight times an All-Star and twice a Cy Young Award winner, Halladay recorded a 203-105 career record with a 3.38 ERA, striking out more than 2000 while walking less than two batters per 9 innings.
More after the jump on the career of Roy Halladay.
The Fall Classic starts Tuesday matching two up-and-coming young clubs with just enough veteran presence. The Astros make their second World Series appearance, but first as the AL champion while the Dodgers carry the NL honors for the 19th time in the modern era and 22nd overall. Both teams reached the century mark in wins, the Dodgers on the strength of league leading pitching results, and the Astros with firsts in nearly every offensive category. More after the jump.
The post-season is here, beginning with the wildcard round and its one game winner-take-all contests.
Yesterday, I looked at the AL match-up. Tonight is the NL’s turn. More after the jump.
These two NL West teams seem destined to face each other in the one-game crapshoot known as the wildcard game. The Rockies were division leaders as recently as Jun 20, then lost eight straight to drop down to third where they’ve remained since (aside from a few brief forays into second place, the last on Aug 20). The D-Backs haven’t led since Jun 1 and have mostly held down second place since then. This three game set is the final series between these two, with Arizona holding a 9-6 season edge going in. More after the jump.
A companion to my earlier piece on AL teams, here is a rundown of unusual team accomplishments in the senior circuit. More after the jump.
As the 2017 season heads into the home stretch, here’s a look at some of the junior circuit’s more unusual team accomplishments, both good and bad. More after the jump.
As football season gets underway, here’s a look at baseball’s version of the takeaway/giveaway margin. On the gridiron, the unit of measurement is turnovers and winning teams usually need to show a positive margin between turnovers forced (takeaways) and turnovers surrendered (giveaways). In baseball, the metric is more like points off of turnovers, as this post will consider unearned runs scored vs. unearned runs allowed, those runs being the “points” arising from errors forced and errors committed, More after the jump.
Don Baylor, longtime AL player and later an NL manager, has passed away at the age of 68. Baylor played over 2000 games, all in the AL, in a career spanning 19 years that included an MVP selection in 1979 and appearances in 7 post-seasons and 3 World Series. After his playing days, Baylor was the first manager of the expansion Colorado Rockies, guiding them to a post-season appearance in only their third season. More on Baylor after the jump.
The front runners in the NL Central squared off last weekend in Milwaukee. The Brewers had held down top spot for 60 straight days until the Cubs caught them last week, with the Baby Bears holding a 1½ game lead entering this series. The Northsiders were riding high with an 11-2 run since the All-Star break while Milwaukee had hit the skids with a 2-9 swoon.