Mr Acta pinch-hit for Detwiler in the top of the fifth. The Nationals were down, 5-1. To my mind, it was one of those mystifying Manny moves. The bullpen would leak a few more runs, and the Nationals would lose.
Amazing - five relief pitchers went out there, and the Phillies could not add a single more run! This is against the Washington Nationals' bullpen, the worst in the league.
And then the Nationals' bats woke up. They scored three more runs. The last four innings of the game were quite entertaining.
All of which is a long-winded way of saying that, although the Nationals lost, awarding a Goat of the Day seems churlish. Instead, I award a Pat on the Back to the chaps who took the mound last night.
Saturday, 30 May 2009
Friday, 29 May 2009
Whither the Blue Jays?
Somehow, I managed to obliterate the original post for this, packed as it was with all kinds of helpful links. I guess I just don't know all the ins and outs of blogger.com
So, here's the Cliff's Notes version:
20-game chart, blue line = runs scored, orange = runs allowed.
The Blue Jays may have given up lots of runs recently, but look at that downward trend in runs scored. That's the real culprit, the sputtering offense.
So, here's the Cliff's Notes version:
20-game chart, blue line = runs scored, orange = runs allowed.
The Blue Jays may have given up lots of runs recently, but look at that downward trend in runs scored. That's the real culprit, the sputtering offense.
Nationals' Bullpen Goats of the Day #s 7, 8, 9
Several awards to hand out today owing to modem issues.
25 May vs Mets
26 May vs Mets
27 May vs Mets
Much as I don't like to kick a man when he is down, I feel obliged to point out that Colome has been the goat in all but one of his outings. I'd also like to point out that Wells is excellent for one inning - so, Mr Acta, don't get ambitious.
25 May vs Mets
Reliever Effect on
Win Expectancy
Colome -0.079
Cabrera -0.012
Wells 0.004
Bergmann 0.010
26 May vs Mets
Reliever Effect on
Win Expectancy
Bergmann -0.172
Wells 0.005
Tavárez 0.001
27 May vs Mets
Reliever Effect on
Win Expectancy
Colome -0.118
Villone -0.109
Wells -0.055
Hanrahan 0.002
Much as I don't like to kick a man when he is down, I feel obliged to point out that Colome has been the goat in all but one of his outings. I'd also like to point out that Wells is excellent for one inning - so, Mr Acta, don't get ambitious.
Sunday, 24 May 2009
Nationals' Bullpen Goat of the Day #6
Another easy one to identify. Or was it?
Those numbers suggest that it's unfair to blame the bullpen for this one. In this case, the previously vaunted Nationals' lineup just couldn't score the needed runs. Manny Acta certainly made that point about Friday's loss: "We just couldn't get anything going offensively, and it cost us," Acta said.
It might be more applicable to this one.
Reliever Effect on
Win Expectancy
Villone -0.386
Tavárez 0.008
Hanrahan 0.045
Bergmann 0.059
Those numbers suggest that it's unfair to blame the bullpen for this one. In this case, the previously vaunted Nationals' lineup just couldn't score the needed runs. Manny Acta certainly made that point about Friday's loss: "We just couldn't get anything going offensively, and it cost us," Acta said.
It might be more applicable to this one.
Saturday, 23 May 2009
Nationals' Bullpen Goat of the Day #5
This one is obvious.
Reliever Effect on
Win Expectancy
Wells -0.794
Villone 0.114
Bergmann 0.149
Friday, 22 May 2009
Nationals' Bullpen Goat of the Day #4
What with one thing and another, and my eagerness to post the Interleague comments, I didn't get round to doing the latest Goat of the Day this morning. In the spirit of Respice post te! Hominem te memento!, I otherwise mutely post the Goat rankings for Wednesday's game.
Reliever Effect on
Win Expectancy
Hanrahan -0.711
Villone 0.114
Thursday, 21 May 2009
Improving Interleague Play
I'm a baseball traditionalist. Even at age 12, I quit being a fan of the local team, an AL one, and switched to a nearby NL one whose radio station's clear channel signal reached my abode. So, as you can imagine, I'm generally of the view that interleague play is the abomination of desolation, and not worth improving.
However, like the Expos being in DC now, I'm forced to accept that the situation isn't changing for the foreseeable future, so I'm left with thinking how to make the best of it.
To me, the main problem is that while there are natural rivals, like two New York teams, or two Ohio teams, there are also teams that don't have any natural rivals. To make Interleague Play work better, they need to get manufactured rivals. How to do it?
One obvious way is to pick a nearby team that isn't someone else's rival but, because I'm an historian and a traditionalist, I'd prefer to do something more complicated that actually made sense from a temporal perspective. If you are going to invent tradition, do it properly, like the British do.
I sat down and made a list of all the teams by league, and then I paired them off, initially by 'natural rivals'
AL Philadelphia with NL Philadelphia
AL Chicago with NL Chicago
AL New York with NL New York
AL Boston with NL Boston
AL St Louis with NL St Louis
AL Cleveland with NL Cincinnati
That left Washington and Detroit in the AL and Brooklyn and Pittsburgh in the NL. Now I adopted the principle of vicinity, and matched Washington with Brooklyn and Detroit with Pittsburgh.
Keep applying this principle but move pairings around as teams move or expansion occurs. Thus, the Dodgers end up being paired with the Angels, even though they originally were matched with today's Twins. This is what you would end up with, before we try to deal with the significant problem in that the leagues have different numbers of teams:
AL New York with NL New York
AL Boston with NL Atlanta
AL Chicago with NL Chicago
AL Detroit with NL Pittsburgh
AL Cleveland with NL Cincinnati
AL Baltimore with NL Philadelphia
AL Oakland with NL San Francisco
AL Los Angeles with NL Los Angeles
AL Texas with NL Houston
AL Kansas City with NL St Louis
AL Seattle with NL San Diego
AL Tampa Bay with NL Florida
But that gives us some leftover teams. Until there are a couple of contractions or expansions, we really have to create a concept of a 'rivalry pool'. In the AL, there's Toronto and Minnesota. In the NL, there's Milwaukee, Colorado, Arizona and Washington. For each of these teams there's a certain amount of sense in plunging them into this pool. Milwaukee switched leagues, Toronto lost its 'natural rival', Minnesota and Washington moved, Colorado and Arizona would actually make a pretty good 'natural rival' pairing, but they are in the same league. Being among the most recent expansion teams hurts them.
My solution would be to have each of the natural rivals play home-and-home series with one another as the core of the interleague programme. Meanwhile, the AL rivalry pool plays one series against two from the NL pool, alternating home and away each year, and cycling through all four teams through four seasons. E
Like so:
Eventually, one hopes two more teams will be added to the AL, and we can actually have a sensible Interleague Series.
I know this does nothing about balancing the schedule, but that's not really the point of interleague. It also would cut the number of those games down, and hopefully allow the intraleague schedule to balance out better.
However, like the Expos being in DC now, I'm forced to accept that the situation isn't changing for the foreseeable future, so I'm left with thinking how to make the best of it.
To me, the main problem is that while there are natural rivals, like two New York teams, or two Ohio teams, there are also teams that don't have any natural rivals. To make Interleague Play work better, they need to get manufactured rivals. How to do it?
One obvious way is to pick a nearby team that isn't someone else's rival but, because I'm an historian and a traditionalist, I'd prefer to do something more complicated that actually made sense from a temporal perspective. If you are going to invent tradition, do it properly, like the British do.
I sat down and made a list of all the teams by league, and then I paired them off, initially by 'natural rivals'
AL Philadelphia with NL Philadelphia
AL Chicago with NL Chicago
AL New York with NL New York
AL Boston with NL Boston
AL St Louis with NL St Louis
AL Cleveland with NL Cincinnati
That left Washington and Detroit in the AL and Brooklyn and Pittsburgh in the NL. Now I adopted the principle of vicinity, and matched Washington with Brooklyn and Detroit with Pittsburgh.
Keep applying this principle but move pairings around as teams move or expansion occurs. Thus, the Dodgers end up being paired with the Angels, even though they originally were matched with today's Twins. This is what you would end up with, before we try to deal with the significant problem in that the leagues have different numbers of teams:
AL New York with NL New York
AL Boston with NL Atlanta
AL Chicago with NL Chicago
AL Detroit with NL Pittsburgh
AL Cleveland with NL Cincinnati
AL Baltimore with NL Philadelphia
AL Oakland with NL San Francisco
AL Los Angeles with NL Los Angeles
AL Texas with NL Houston
AL Kansas City with NL St Louis
AL Seattle with NL San Diego
AL Tampa Bay with NL Florida
But that gives us some leftover teams. Until there are a couple of contractions or expansions, we really have to create a concept of a 'rivalry pool'. In the AL, there's Toronto and Minnesota. In the NL, there's Milwaukee, Colorado, Arizona and Washington. For each of these teams there's a certain amount of sense in plunging them into this pool. Milwaukee switched leagues, Toronto lost its 'natural rival', Minnesota and Washington moved, Colorado and Arizona would actually make a pretty good 'natural rival' pairing, but they are in the same league. Being among the most recent expansion teams hurts them.
My solution would be to have each of the natural rivals play home-and-home series with one another as the core of the interleague programme. Meanwhile, the AL rivalry pool plays one series against two from the NL pool, alternating home and away each year, and cycling through all four teams through four seasons. E
Like so:
Year One Year Two Year Three Year Four
Tor v Col (h) Tor v Col (a) Tor v Ari (h) Tor v Ari (a)
Was v Tor (a) Was v Tor (h) Was v Min (a) Was v Min (h)
Min v Ari (h) Min v Ari (a) Min v Col (h) Min v Col (a)
Min v Mil (a) Min v Mil (h) Tor v Mil (a) Tor v Mil (h)
Eventually, one hopes two more teams will be added to the AL, and we can actually have a sensible Interleague Series.
I know this does nothing about balancing the schedule, but that's not really the point of interleague. It also would cut the number of those games down, and hopefully allow the intraleague schedule to balance out better.
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