2015 World Series -- Kansas City Royals vs New York Mets

The most unbelievable thing about this series for me (and this has been mentioned a few times on TV, but I still have trouble processing it) is that it's the first ever between two expansion teams.

Amazins in 6

lgm

rooting Royales wit cheese

but not vehemently or anything, just want some good games

so what do we do until this starts?!

Who is the Howard Johnson of the '15 Mets?

tt: watch the Seventh Inning repeatedly?

voting mets bcz cespedes + residual royals antipathy from last year's wild card game

mets in 7

Neil Best ‏@sportswatch 1m1 minute ago View translation
Mets' rotation: Harvey, deGrom, Syndergaard, Matz.

royals sweep

Royals in 7, without much enthusiasm. They lost a tough one last year, and I try to root for such teams if they're back within a year or two. I hope Cueto gets thoroughly trounced twice, and I'd like to see Ventura trounced once. The rest of the team I like, Cain and Perez especially.

What happened w cueto why is he hated now?

This isn't the best clip to see it, but in game 3, Cueto kneed Pillar in the face just after he scored. "I'll throw a knee into this young player's face because I'm not pitching well."

http://www.sportsnet.ca/baseball/mlb/gotta-see-it-did-cueto-take-a-cheap-shot-at-pillar/

I saw another clip (that I can't find) where it's plain as day.

Cueto also ended Jason Larue's career

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

@McCulloughStar 5 hours ago
Ned Yost won't announce his rotation until tomorrow. Asked why, he said, "Because I'm being a little bit of a punk."

hmm not buying the knee to the head there from Cueto. the Larue thing is unfortunate after reading about that.

Nitkowski questions Mets' plan

http://www.foxsports.com/mlb/just-a-bit-outside/baseball-joe/blog/questioning-the-mets-world-series-rotation-102415

‏@AdamRubinESPN 9h
Tell me how Mets fans are long-sufffering again?

Most WS appearances by expansion teams (>1960):
Mets 5
KC 4
Texas 2
Miami 2
SD 2
Toronto 2

Major League Baseball announced its World Series umpiring crew Monday, led by crew chief Jeff Kellogg, who boasts more than 22 years of experience and will be umpiring his fifth Fall Classic.

Ted Barrett and Jeff Nelson, also regular season crew chiefs, were named as part of Kellogg's team, as were Eric Cooper, Jerry Meals, Jim Reynolds and Hunter Wendelstedt.

Meals will be behind the plate for Game 1 on Tuesday (7:30 p.m. ET airtime/8:07 ET first pitch, FOX). He'll then head to New York for Game 3 to serve as the replay official for the remainder of the series. Nelson, the replay official for Games 1 and 2, will join the rest of the crew in San Francisco for Game 3.

Brian O'Nora will serve as replay assistant to Meals and Nelson during the series.

http://m.mlb.com/news/article/99080514/mlb-announces-world-series-umpiring-crew

Jerry Meals behind the plate in Game 1 of the WS sounds like must see TV.

I've always rooted for KC so I'm pulling for them, I think this matchup favors them too because they've been so great vs. those huge fastballs

the Mets do throw other types of pitches.

Yost STILL sitting on rotation plan afaik

volquez, cueto, ventura, young

oh, the Citi crowd will love Yordano.

Lindbergh-Keri preview

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/2015-mlb-playoffs-royals-mets-world-series-preview-predictions/

‏@Ken_Rosenthal 14m
#Royals IF prospects Raul Mondesi and Cheslor Cuthbert are in KC and working out with team. Possible one could be added to WS roster.

Cheslor Cuthbert is a real name?

http://www.minorleagueball.com/2015/7/11/8922473/the-enigma-of-royals-prospect-cheslor-cuthbert

potential T Gore replacement

this series is kinda like a childhood time machine for me. I was a Kansas City Royals fan in the late 80s/early 90s because my Babe Ruth League team was the Royals (we were all fighting over the right to have George Brett's number).

and of course the Mets being my grandpa's team.

almost sad one of them has to lose. sentimentality for my grandpa has me pulling Mets, plus they're the hottest team right now.

As a Milwaukee fan I always root for teams like the Royals because hey, if KC can do it, why not Milwaukee? Even though Yost frustrated me to no end when he was here, you have to admit there was...something there

Though, if the series went 7, then Bartolo has got to pitch some significant innings right? That alone makes me pull for the Mets.

I have a close friend that's a Brewers fan, from Manitowoc.

That fandom typically lasts until about May 30th each year

Uribe roster status not yet clear

Kelly Johnson will DH in Game 1

I'm from Manitowoc. Who's your friend??

pretty wet KC weather forecast from 8am til early evening tomorrow.

xpost his last name is D3ck3r.

hmm not buying the knee to the head there from Cueto.

There's nothing to buy--he did it. I'll try to find a better clip.

I mean I guess I'm not buying that the intent was malicious. But maybe another view will tell the real story.

You're right, I'm wrong. When you look at it here, it doesn't look like much of anything.

http://thebiglead.com/2015/10/20/johnny-cueto-kind-of-kneed-kevin-pillar-at-home-during-game-3-of-the-alcs/

Swear that I looked at another clip the day after where it looked really bad. I guess the fact that the outcry was so short-lived speaks for itself.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

!!!

18-11 is not that lopsided. Aside from there being more Mets(ish) fans on the board than Royals, more of us are probably sick of the lionization of Yostball than we are are of ALCS postmortems in the WS thread three fucking days after it ended.

hey guys

Go Royals, boo Mets

feel like the mets should break out the black jerseys for game 3

go to hell w/ yr smallball, Royals

hey maura

the other potential Gore replacement

http://www.foxsports.com/mlb/story/kansas-city-royals-raul-mondesi-jr-could-be-first-major-leaguer-to-debut-in-world-series-102615

d'Arnaud d'pitch framer

http://espn.go.com/blog/newyork/mets/post/_/id/112598/twice-traded-travis-darnaud-now-amazin-backstop-for-met

@mellinger
Kansas City is playing New York in the World Series, and Kansas City has the higher payroll.

uribe activated

juaaaaaaan yoo-REE-bee

hi maura!

envy royals lineup. pulling for the pond scum.

this was a thing in st louis in the 80's for some reason ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
http://i.imgur.com/lDrushr.jpg

mondesi in! will be the first player ever to make his MLB debut in the world series

to add mondesi to the 40-man, the royals have dfa'd joba chamberlain ;_;

Uribe for Reynolds; no backup SS now, really

@Ken_Rosenthal
Eiland, the #Royals’ pitching coach, said of Murphy yesterday, “He’s very comfortable right now, I’ll leave it at that.” Expect KC to go in.

Remember your world series prediction in the winter? I had the Indians in there!

brisbee on postseason commercials, shit has me dying http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2015/10/26/9616834/viagra-ads-mlb-postseason

degrom to cut hair after world series

xp - about time someone called out those dumb Chevy ads, I hate ads where they come up with the concept first and then find a twisted way to relate it to the product at hand (Geico is the worst at this but their concepts are sometimes funny)

@AdamRubinESPN
Terry Collins doesn't mind game starting in drizzle, he told MLB officials. Doesn't want to play on scheduled off-day and need 5 starters.

loving how those four Run KC standing fans iced out Marlins douche for camera time.

Great start.

"Think I'll stretch now."

@barrysvrluga
The Royals are saying that Edinson Volquez does not know about his father's reported death.

damn wtf

jesus.

what the hell, I just turned the tv on and the Mets scored

That is really, really sad. I understand why they're not telling him. I'm sure his father woul prefer that he didn't know until later, if he had a say. It's just so tragic.

Good job, Fox.

lol@fox

oh now this is some bullshit. They paused the game until the broadcaster could get back up and running?

Haaaaa

grandish

Matt Vasdeferensvirginsurgeon so mad he had to give up his working booth mic and seat to Buck.

bitch u want my pencil

@JeffPassan
Edinson Volquez has generated just two swings and misses from the Mets in his 69 pitches.

Did Verducci get lost on the booth transfer?

Ah, there he is.

Hoo boy, here come the Royals!

Bartolo Colon's the only guy left from the '86 Mets, right?

Swear the Royals murder most pitches that immediately follow taken balls that could've/should've been called strikes.

didn't even know cuddyer was alive

Came back from 3-0 on Granderson.

"Colin Cowherd and his smart sports talk"

HOMSER

u gotta get in front of that son

WOW boneheaded play by hosmer, at the very least you have to make sure you knock that down

Just came back to the game - how is it that the inside-the-park HR wasn't scored as an error??

that was probably the most relaxed tag in the history of 9th innings of world series

Perez's 0-1 swing there might have been worse than either one of Cain's bunt attempts.

"You wanna bunt this toward the line, or possibly foul." -- Harold Reynolds

didn't even know cuddyer was alive

still don't

And here comes DH Jarrod Dyson.

Is this the longest ever WS game 1?

Jonathon Niese should be a diplomat in a Merchant-Ivory film.

"cmon guys, did you hear me? steven king thinks this is crazy!"

And DH Jarrod Dyson bats in another crucial spot!

One of the rare cases where IBBs are the best strategy.

I had ascribed all sorts of magical run-manufacturing qualities to the Royals that they apparently don't really have.

young has hung about 5 breaking pitches this inning, someone's about to hit something hard

disappointed that cuddyer won't get a shot at the sombrero

Come on, I want to go to sleep.

HI DERE EAST COASTERS

It's 5 in the morning here. I have to get up soon...

at least joe buck is suffering with us

@ least young cant start gm 4 now prob cuz the metz cant fuckin touch him

I'm watching on MLBtv (xpost)

damn

Very pedestrian bat-flip by Hosmer.

A few feet to the side and Grandy's throw might have gotten him.

He made the play at the plate waaay closer than I thought it would be.

rough game to watch in a bar

and drink for 5 hours

on a work night

RELEASE CUDDYER THIS WINTER

at least Mets get to start actual ace in Game 2

@BenLindbergh 6h
Wonder how many more networks would have to go down for the Bob Uecker broadcast to be next in the line of succession

In tears.

https://twitter.com/david_j_roth/status/659242846088728576

despite his 2 hits, might need to drop wright in the lineup imo

lagares has to play

Bartolo Colon's the only guy left from the '86 Mets, right?

― clemenza, Tuesday, October 27, 2015 10:05 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

underrated post

also i gave up on this game when they tied it in the 9th because i was so tired. now that i see f/14 i am glad i did.

blowing Fox's fuse = OccupyJoeBuck

@sportswatch
NY averaged 26.2% of homes for Game 1. That's a lot! KC averaged insane 57.3, highest for any market for Game 1 since since at least 1996.

@sportswatch
Game 1 averaged 10.5% of homes in major markets on @MLBONFOX, best overnight rating for a Game 1 since Yankees and Phils did a 13.9 in 2009.

Mets have never won the first game of a World Series.

http://www.faithandfearinflushing.com/2015/10/28/the-tradition-continues/

i mean what else were you gonna do in kansas city tho

well i ran into a mighty amusing drag queen in a bar there

Daren Willman
‏@darenw

Pitches Chris Young has thrown 90 MPH+ by year since 2008:
2015- 8 (last night)
2014- 0
2013- 0
2012- 0
2011- 0
2010- 0
2009- 2
2008- 36

@AdamRubinESPN 17m
Juan Lagares in center field, as expected. Michael Conforto is the DH over Yoenis Cespedes. Conforto 0-for-16 since HR vs. Greinke.

to be clear, YC is in LF

really was a great throw by granderson. love that dude

@AdamKilgoreWP
Observed from time there during the ALCS and watching last night: Kansas City is the baseball town St. Louis thinks it is.

zing!

you go to hail adam kilgore

Every WS should start like this, with a marathon game where the pitching game plan goes out the window and everyone is probably exhausted already. Now we can really find out which team is better -- survival of the fittest!

Morbs and other NY'ers -- do asshole Yankees fans morph into Mets fans when they're in the Series and the Yanks aren't? What happened in 1986?

deGrom and Cueto probly aren't exhausted tho. i am.

when the Mets got good in '84 after about 8 years in the wasteland, all these ppl showed up at Shea, i'm not sure who they were. We called them "yuppies." i think mostly wishywashy types jump on the bandwagon. this was a little news thing last week:

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/10/family-feud-heats-up-after-times-mets-coverage.html

lol i definitely hopped on the mets bandwagon when the yanks lost

i am not really a typical team-centered sports fan tho

apparently NOT!

Collins thinks this is mostly to do with Harvey's innings total:

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/matt-harveys-career-worst-stuff/

kinda wasting a roster spot

http://espn.go.com/blog/newyork/mets/post/_/id/112780/despite-inclusion-on-roster-mets-hesitant-to-use-juan-uribe

both twirlers appear to be on

big missed DP; bad Yostball

Do not want A-Rod commentary, ick

Mets survive some shoddy D

4-1/2 innings in 80 minutes

one swinging strike by KC in 68 pitches

well this feels over

y'all can stick with your Republican freak show

the fawning over the Royals, holy crap.

They're very good but I think deGrom was getting the ball up too.

Zobrist, perfectly positioned on the shoulders of the right-field foul-line umpire, times his dismount just so, gloves a magical hop foretold by a 97-year-old advance scout, fires to first for the 4-3.

Got to admit as a Reds fan seeing Volquez and Cueto winning back to back World Series games for the Royals is a bit bittersweet.

royals were celebrating on the field like the series was legit over

i hate them so fucking much

aw, give 'em a break. I think it's awesome that they're getting another shot at a WS. but yeah, series far from over.

I had absolutely no problem with the Royals until about mid-way through this season. For whatever reason, they seem far more obnoxious to me than the Cardinals and Giants teams that beat the Tigers in '06 and '12.

the giants were obnoxious in 12?

i like when teams have fun.

the giants were obnoxious in 12?

― Spottie, Thursday, October 29, 2015 12:50 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Apart from eliminating my hometown team, not at all.

Apart from Bumgarner, obv.

aw

I find most of the Royals very engaging, Perez and Cain and the guy the crowd moos for the most. I made my peace with Cueto when I re-looked at that Pillar clip, and I feel bad for Volquez. (And when I saw him interviewed after his ALCS start, he seemed like a funny guy.)

@BenLindbergh
Yost is the managerial equivalent of the beloved substitute teacher who just puts a video on and walks out of the room

'i've only called for like four bunts this whole season, but what can you do?'

"freedom to bunt"

Angell on Game 1

http://www.newyorker.com/news/sporting-scene/post-patsy

fwiw, the guys at my local deli haven't given up

Are they the dj from the opening of Bad Lieutenant

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6ZsftVtLjo

PECOTA puts the Mets at 69% tonight! Not sure I've ever seen game odds that high from it.

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=27791

I'm feeling good about my Royals in 5 vote.

that's nice.

on contact-hitting teams

http://www.foxsports.com/mlb/just-a-bit-outside/story/2015-kansas-city-royals-similar-to-2002-world-series-champ-anaheim-angels-103015

conforto back in

yep. i don't really have a problem w/ the lineup unless Cespedes is hurt worse than they're claiming.

Lindbergh while ya can

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/2015-mlb-playoffs-world-series-weekend-mets-royals-five-questions/

^had no idea Royals hitters chased that much

Blake Guyer: What’s your take on the Royals adding Raul Mondesi Jr. to their World Series roster?

Klaw: Joe Sheehan’s newsletter piece on it was great: if this is indeed a way to cover for Ben Zobrist possibly leaving if his wife goes into labor early, then Yost and company deserve a ton of credit for doing so and for handling it as they did. Because Mondesi has basically no way to help this team right now.

the peepul of Citi Field

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=27787

there's hope http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/mets/strat-o-matic-predicts-mets-win-4-games-world-series-article-1.2415801

thor gives sportswriter little starbursts: https://sports.vice.com/en_us/article/the-man-beneath-the-golden-hair-how-noah-syndergaard-is-winning-the-mental-game

Royals, solved

OH CAPTAIN MY CAPTAIN

being slow as shit + making the dumb slide into first = Duda

ike would never have done that

jesus

that's a lot of hits in two innings

what is this singles shit from the 1910s

<3 crutis

crutis best

NATIONAL LEAGUE BASEBALL

also: eat a a moussaka, third baseman

this has been an awesome game so far

Hamlet Hosmer!

https://twitter.com/CespedesBBQ/status/660263214005915649/photo/1

Wilmer hits a Rey Ordonez Special

Daren Willman ‏@darenw 9m
Ventura and Syndergaard have already combined to throw as many pitches 96 MPH+ than the #Athletics threw all year, 37.

"beyonce just called shes jealous of that flow"

GRANDYMAN channeling Agee

(Tommie, not James)

10 straight for Thorrrrrrrrrrr

i'd have lifted him here

they're gonna kiiiiiilll me

That was intense

https://twitter.com/CespedesBBQ/status/660272304220446721

UUUUUUUUUUUURIBE

lol morales

Howie Rose on Mets radio just compared Morales on that play to Scooby-Doo

Trading him off my RBI Baseball team when I get home

how are Foxgoons coping with KC mortality?

@AdamRubinESPN
David Wright's four RBIs are one shy of the franchise record in a World Series. Rusty Staub had 5 in Game 4 of the 1973 World Series.

@dschoenfield
Mets went 5-for-8 against Ventura's fastball with 2 HR, 2B. In the postseason, opponents are hitting .360 w/ 4 HR in 50 ABs against it.

"Oh gosh!" -- Kris Medlen

Medlen "getting work" at THIS point, huh

Ned Yost, folks

https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3550/3854769395_f9bbf80cbc_z.jpg?zz=1

and then Familia, cripes

@DCameronFG
No, you do not use your closer tonight with a six run lead when you could play four more games in the next five days.

gray pitches from Thor

https://twitter.com/JeffPassan/status/660324891502239745

Cool pitching match-up.

"We give them the freedom to interfere with the catcher."

"...and they can lose track of the outs if they wish to do so."

There's the Rios the blue jays gave away for free!

@based_ball

Chris Young's last 17 pitches that inning (post-bunt):

2 fastballs
13 sliders
2 changeups

Jayson Stark
Senior Writer, ESPN.com

That Michael Conforto HR vs Danny Duffy gets more amazing when you remember Duffy hadn't allowed a HR to a LH hitter since 2011 - to Jim Thome. Who has been retired for 3 years.

Clippard walked Cain after getting ahead 0-2. Getting two strikes on a Royals hitter hasn't meant a thing all series.

Familia vs Hosmer and Moustakas ... the series is on the line right here.

Bill Buckner may get a mention or two in the papers tomorrow.

Well that was quick.

Neither ball was hit hard.

many lols

Two walks, two infield dribblers = two runs. You could call it luck but the Royals do this all the time. Good things happen when you put the ball in play etc.

with davis (presumably) coming in, that'll do it

Royals have scored 22 runs in the 8th inning this postseason... Second place? Cubs and Jays with 4 each

And more runs scored in innings 7-9 than in innings 1-6. They scored nine runs were in garbage time vs the Jays in game 4 of the ALCS, but still. I count six comebacks to tie or take the lead in the seventh inning or later this season. That's six late inning comebacks in 15 total games.

That must be the most unhittable pitch in baseball when Davis throws it right.

Wouldn't be surprised if Davis uncorks a wild pitch.

mets swinging at anything out there

yikes

Baseball's a tough game, but geez, that was the kind of baserunning mistake our school team makes (routinely). That wasn't sharp or anything, and he's got a baserunner in front of him.

wow cespedes is a fuckin idiot

What a dumb baserunning mistake. Even dumber than this one:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQnHJwIabBU

i've seen Murphy play that kinda "defense" his whole career

"Murphy’s error, in terms of single-game win expectancy, was the most costly fielding mistake by any player in World Series history, save for Boston’s Bill Buckner."

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/daniel-murphy-and-the-costliest-errors-in-world-series-history/

yikes

on the bright side, it cushions unthinking people's potential upset at his exit

I need to read that more carefully to understand why Murphy's error was more damaging than Rivera or Fernandez's errors. It wasn't even in the ninth inning!

Jeurys Familia threw the pitches that lost New York the lead. They weren’t bad pitches – he induced soft contact – but the results were abysmal. Again, Royals Magic.

Two of the three. Moustakas found a hole and Perez hit the ball hard.

I am headscratching at Cespedes's explanation as to why he took off. it doesn't address why he'd run with a stopped runner in front of him on second, but he really thought it'd go over the infielder's head? I remember playing baseball that sometimes seeing things from the first base angle could be misleading, but I still can't fathom what angle he would have seen that ball chop and assume "oh yeah that's a surefire hit".

the ball was in front of him, there is absolutely no excuse

Had to read up on what "Merkle's Boner" was all about (I had it in my mind that it had to do with him missing a base):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merkle%27s_Boner

I think Merkle might have had a better excuse for confusion. If the Mets were to come back and win, Cespedes's play will be forgotten. If not, it will need a nickname.

Aw, did the US put it's clocks back?

nope they're still at large

It was just nice having a week (or two?) of 8pm EST being midnight, and now it's back to 1am.

there's your run, Batman

keep the grounders away from Durph

starting now

Ten swing-and-misses by KC thus far? practically unheard of.

Harvey strikes out the side in the fourth!

8 k in 5 ip

wow duda swinging 3-0 there?

again: where was this edinson in last year's wild card game

There's nothing quite like having the pitcher bat in a one run game with two out and two on and the world championship on the line.

Still only one hit for the Mets.

volquez hasn't liked the strike zone the last couple innings

great AB from grandy

Those inside pitches haven't been called for strikes all night though (for both teams).

Every pitcher has a little Lackey in him.

I'm surprised that nobody was warming up for KC at the start of the inning. Volquez's pitch count was low and he'd given up just the one hit, but the four walks allowed suggested that he was living on borrowed time.

yoenis doesn't swing at that and he probably wears it anyway

Mets PUTTING THE BALL IN PLAY this inning

xp well thatdof been much preferrable

wow he's staying in? ball on the ground is 2 outs

yo is fuckin hurting

signs with yankees in a month, knee finally falls off

oy can't move hardly

Unless the trainer's diagnosis was acute possession of the spirit of Kirk Gibson, I have no idea why they let Cespedes stay in the game.

gonna b tough flexing that front leg to play golf tomorrow

at least Cain in CF knew what out it was

The Mets aren't going to have another inning giftwrapped for them like that, so they'd better hope that Harvey keeps dealing at least into the eighth.

Brian Holmsten @bcholm
@joe_sheehan If Royals win WS, do we need to re-evaluate importance of managerial acumen? Or is it "Good teams can win despite mgr?"

Joe Sheehan ‏@joe_sheehan
We've known this for a long time. Go watch the 2001 World Series.

man, that was a horrendously managed WS

harvey gettin amped

2001 will always be the gold standard of bad managing, what a horror show that was.

does Harvey start the 9th?

No matter who wins this series, that was a career making performance for Harvey. Unless of course he comes out for the ninth and blows the lead.

why are they chanting Ed Hardy?

you vanish for weeks to work on material and this is it?

Through the 8th, Harvey is up to 216 IP this season -- the most ever for a pitcher coming off TJ surgery.

preparing google image search for icarus.jpg

Take him out.

Unless of course he comes out for the ninth and blows the lead.

Close enough, goddammit

I can defend the decision to let him start the ninth but when a guy with impeccable command all night suddenly walks the leadoff batter you've got to take him out.

And does d'Arnaud need a cutoff man, or

jeurys pleaase

I can defend the decision to let him start the ninth but when a guy with impeccable command all night suddenly walks the leadoff batter you've got to take him out.

― NoTimeBeforeTime, Sunday, November 1, 2015 11:01 PM (40 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah seriously.

need a fuckin K

Omg

fuck u duda

https://i.imgur.com/eNtlu1r.jpg

No step to the plate... very 06 Tigers

this is tangential but i don't think i could ever root for a team that has eric hosmer on it

What we couldn't do, NoTime: advance him to third, get the run in. (Albeit some gutsy baserunning).

'OUTSTANDING BASERUNNING BY ERIC HOSMER'

verducci was the first one to mention, like ten minutes later, a good throw gets him

Guess he stepped (in it)

Two innings of Wade Davis coming right up.

Yeah, looking at the replay it wasn't even close--good throw had him. But up 3-1 heading home, worth the risk. Especially when you left the tying run on third last year.

really thought Hos was a dead duck there

lures Duda into a bad throw.. oh come on backpedaling Verducci

he looks a bit sling blade

17th inning Dyson bunt, 2 SBs, and a wild pitch win it.

Cespedes is the only Met w/ a HR off Herrera

industrious royals fans shd be making some good animated gifs mocking all that harvey 'no way' protesting

Good throw might have required him to set his feet in which case Hosmer has another step or something.

i will be as shocked as i have ever been if the Mets win this game.

that's it i'm buying shares of louisville slugger

morbs, very good chance of the Mets coming back from the brink tonight. next game(s) in KC might be another story.

‏@jonahkeri
"They keep finding ways!!!" = They spiked Duda's Gatorade with Ketamine!!!!!!

‏@tangotiger
Hosmer added 0.35 wins with that run. Had he been thrown out, would have cost 0.17 W. Basically, needed to be safe 33% of time to justify.

contusion to YC's knee, no break

is it me or the every met is just trying to homer it home?

Surprised at that no-rookie-WS-walkoff factoid, but if you added up all the opportunities, maybe it wouldn't be that surprising.

v ironic that flores is the only infielder not to make a crucial error (duda wasnt charged w one but idc)

how the HELL was he not charged with one

slowly losing hope for the mets, that hitting is reminding me of may-june

Yost is pretty determined to bring Davis in with a lead. Considering the Mets only have three hits in the game and have been useless against everyone in his bullpen, you can't really fault that strategy.

if only Harper had shown up the other night, Buck could have done a Gotham: Rise of the Villains tie-in

pleeease put me out of my misery

It would somehow be fitting if Reed throws the ball into center field on a pickoff attempt and Dyson comes around to score the series winning run.

Woot woot

First post-season AB--incredible. If the Royals hold on, I wonder if that's a first.

oh yes, that's the Murphy I knew

so neither Cespedes nor Murphy get resigned now? so much for those either/or thoughtpieces.

Murphy finds a way

Once-ler, whoever YOU are, get the fuck off this board

good night

http://i.imgur.com/YnKrakZ.jpg

My money is on Volquez for WS MVP.

oh man bed time

I win. Royals in 5. In your face morbs

nagl dude

He was asking for it

yall arent cool like that, not kosher

sry for your loss, morbs MD

btw im new but how in the FUCK is there a man named rusty kuntz (kc 1st base coach) on this earth

his name is russell so at least half of it was a choice

yes, let me offer the crotchety stranger a hankerchief and offer my condolensces

that rotation will be back, mets fan.

congrats to the royals.

this has been a tremendous season overall.

Final late inning tally -- if I heard it right, the Royals outscored their opponents 51-11 from the seventh inning on. Ridiculous.

I don't know how big a role it played overall--probably not very--but I've never seen a team so helpless at cutting down the running game. Anyway, having also lost a crushing series to the Royals, they really are an amazing team. I hope they now go into next season without karma on their side.

Yes congrats to my team!

Can't say they didn't earn it.

No matter who wins this series, that was a career making performance for Harvey. Unless of course he comes out for the ninth and blows the lead.

Yep

you from kc once-ler?

First catcher MVP since...Pat Borders! I somehow think Sal will have the better career.

"The next good baseball question Erin Andrews comes up with will be the first"
twitter lolz

Good for KC.

Keep Cespedes if possible, but trade the Jesus Freak.

the jesus freak is a free agent, clown

http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--ga1f5mRn--/1500767722866214215.jpg

Now what?

Hard to have a great Series that doesn't go six or seven, but for a five-gamer, this was pretty memorable: two long extra-inning games, three late-inning comebacks, a few controversial plays. Even games 2 and 3 were close till the middle innings.

plz have another 30-year drought, KC

Sunday, December 9, 2012
Complete Analysis of the Myers-Shields Trade.
This sucks.

http://www.ranyontheroyals.com/2012/12/complete-analysis-of-myers-shields-trade.html

just because things "work out" doesn't mean they're right

Like playing Russian roulette...

It worked out in the sense that Shields and Davis were as good or better than advertised and Myers never became a star (at least not yet).

You could argue that the trade was unnecessary because it's not that hard to put together a bullpen and the Royals just won a WS even with a shaky starting rotation.

https://vine.co/v/e3j2eOOT5Xx

the big hurt says look on the bright side

There's no possibility that the Royals' front office saw something in that move that gave them a legitimate reason to make it?

Fans, particularly of the Royals, took to their phones and keyboards to register their displeasure, and many baseball analysts rushed to outdo each other in piling on to general manager Dayton Moore and to praise his Rays counterpart, Andrew Friedman.

Inside the game, the response is much more measured. In checking with six pro scouts, none saw the trade as one-sided, and all were convinced that the chorus of criticism of the Royals for making the deal is misplaced.

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/majors/trade-central/2012/2614446.html

When Shields signed with San Diego as a free agent, did they get a draft pick for that (and who was it)?

They got a compensatory pick, 33rd overall, and drafted Nolan Watson.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.cgi?id=watson000nol

xxxp Myers strikes out a lot more than the type of players Moore seems to like; could also be an excellent example of selling high on a guy their internal analysis didn't value as much as the market. trading him as such may have been very savvy, and if community liked Moore he may be receiving more benefit of the doubt as selling high rather than wasting resources on veterans.

got what they could have expected out of Shields and Davis -- solid inning eating performance from the former and high upside out of the latter. question becomes if ex ante that was a good return for a sold-high top 10 prospect, a good-not-great SP prospect, and change. at the time people said no, though trade market is pretty opaque. another recent trade of a very good prospect didn't net the return statheads expected either, and even though beane tends to get the benefit of the doubt that one appears to be working out ex post pretty much as well as folks suggested. (maybe even worse, Shark had a brutal year for the Sox and Russell was a contributor quick.)

interested in seeing if KC can keep this up next year. i'm inclined to think they're doing something that outwits the current sabr orthodoxy -- 324 regular season games + playoffs is a huge sample; also makes 4 of the last 6 WS winners teams using a model advanced stat folks are somewhat skeptical of. sometimes feels at places like fangraphs that winning WS isn't goal, but instead being supposed to win WS based on various assumptions that have a not-particularly-awe-inspiring r-squared. and when this happens (i.e. KC/SF wins) i don't see curiosity but instead a chorus of BABIP, clutch, etc. as folks scramble to fit results into their preconceived notions rather than attempt to come up with smarter ways to look at things. i say that as though it's easy, which of course it isn't, but it's funny (and maybe a little disappointing) to watch a movement that was once about challenging orthodoxy doubling down on all its assumptions every November.

^^Fantastic post. Could not agree more.

it's funny (and maybe a little disappointing) to watch a movement that was once about challenging orthodoxy doubling down on all its assumptions every November

Maybe KC and San Francisco were lucky--you don't want to start drawing broad conclusions based on the postseason. But you need to be curious enough to at least investigate. And I think the best writers--James, Posnanski, etc.--do stop and question their assumptions. But I think some people are content to put it down to random luck and leave it at that.

324 regular season games + playoffs is a huge sample

Most of the regular season they were a middle-of-the-pack offense. So, nope.

Why didn't the Royals try hard in the first 6 innings?

Cameron:

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-lessons-the-royals-should-and-shouldnt-teach-us/

After every WS, there's a rush to declare that the winning team's strategy is the new orthodoxy but really the winning teams have very little in common with each other from year to year. People feel the need to make sense of it all and justify everything after the fact but there are countless ways to build a winning team and no method is intrinsically the best method. We know that the Royals won because of baserunning and contact hitting and a great bullpen, but that doesn't mean that they'd win the WS more often than not if this year's playoffs were played 100 times.

Its amazing to me how BADLY pecota whiffed on the Royals two years in a row. They were projected to have like 75 wins this year.

^^ was gonna mention the same thing. My guess is A) it undervalues the effect of a great bullpen, B) it doesn't account for a team building for their home park (51-30 at home), and/or C) it assumes BABIP is more random than it actually is. From what I gather the Royals' scouting department may be really advanced and directly influenced several of their playoff wins, I'm guessing that projections can't figure that in. also D) Yost

After every WS, there's a rush to declare that the winning team's strategy is the new orthodoxy but really the winning teams have very little in common with each other from year to year. People feel the need to make sense of it all and justify everything after the fact but there are countless ways to build a winning team and no method is intrinsically the best method. We know that the Royals won because of baserunning and contact hitting and a great bullpen, but that doesn't mean that they'd win the WS more often than not if this year's playoffs were played 100 times.

― NoTimeBeforeTime, Monday, November 2, 2015 12:48 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm -- Theo Epstein w/ some similar thoughts a few weeks back. big gap, imo, between "this is the best/only way to win given state of baseball rn" (sounds like a Harold Reynolds quote) and two seasons of sub-.500 projections against very good observable results. 2015 ofc helped by trades, which are difficult to acct for in advance, but it's not like they were performing terribly and got season-altering performances.

Sam Miller (editor of BP) wrote in mid-September about PECOTA and the Royals:

We didn'€™t think Ben Zobrist would play for the Royals at all. Imagine that. But this is one area where projection systems have an impossible task: Teams change the strength of their roster as the year goes on based on how close to a playoff spot they are. You could make a case, if you're developing your own projection system, that winning teams'€™ projected wins totals should be bumped up a notch or two based on the expectation that competitive teams load up at the trade deadline, and the reverse for losing teams. But, as the Royals show, it'€™s also not easy to pick in March which teams are going to be those reloaders in July; if we'€™d tried that based on our projections, we would have had the Royals probably unloading pieces in July, and perhaps dropping down to 70 wins, or 69....

http://www.foxsports.com/mlb/just-a-bit-outside/story/kansas-city-royals-projections-pecota-lorenzo-cain-wade-davis-volquez-zobrist-morales-091515

Zobrist worth 1.2 bWAR with KC on the year. Cueto worth .2 bWAR over 81 IP w KC (oof). impact of midseason trades prob overblown; even Cespedes' awesome NYM performance only netted 2.3 bWAR. no one's challenging projections for being off even 4-5 wins.

I didn't mean to suggest that the Zobrist quote was the central point... No analytics person worth listening to claims projections work all the time.

2.3 bWAR looks pretty damn good to me!

From the Cameron piece:

I wouldn’t be surprised if other teams started to see their success as a reason to push more towards a higher quantity of good players rather than attempting to ride on the backs of a few great ones.

Same point made by Posnanski in a piece I linked to the other day:

So how have those teams done it? Well, as stupid simple as it sounds, they’ve done it with lots and lots of good baseball players. That’s baseball...When you have enough good players, you are spreading your bets, you are not counting on great players always being great but setting up the possibility that one of your many good players — Daniel Murphy or Alcides Escobar — will emerge to become the hero.

This is hardly a new or radical idea--you can find teams from both the recent and distant past that were built this way--but some franchises seem to forget it and rely overmuch on a few key players.

yup, the 2013 Red Sox were another example of a team without any major flaws, just a collection of players playing very good during the course of both the season and the post-season.

There was a midsummer story which claimed that the Mets' front office expected to push for the postseason in 2016, not this year. Given their lack of infield defense or a deep bullpen, this is retrospectively convincing.

I wouldn’t be surprised if other teams started to see their success as a reason to push more towards a higher quantity of good players rather than attempting to ride on the backs of a few great ones.

Cistulli and Sullivan with two articles on a similar idea, one re Dan Duquette after 2014 Orioles success, one re: Friedman after a few moves with Dodgers.

2.3 bWAR looks pretty damn good to me!

it's great! which was my point: even barnburning post-deadline performances are moving the needle 2-3 WAR at most, and teams aren't getting more than 1-2 of those per year. to back up "it's not like they were performing terribly and got season-altering performances" from my post, and to push back against implied idea that PECOTA being off by 23 games had something to do with Zobrist/Cueto pickups. (which I now appreciate Dr Morbius was not saying.)

It didn't occur to me until the BP podcast yesterday that if the games were 8 innings, the Mets would've won the Series in 5.