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

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.