There were swings, but no swings/misses.
That’s an indication of sub-optimal stuff.
An effort to rehabilitate the post-season reputation of Kershaw, which is well-earned and detracts from his regular season record. He was and remains a post-season bust
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Well, that’s simply incorrect. In fact, Kershaw struck out George Springer, the very first batter he faced in Game 1 on a swing and miss breaking pitch. He then struck Springer out again, getting two swings and misses on breaking balls. That “report” can suck it.
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Here’s the report, from something called “brobible”
Article’s only about Game 5. It did not say how many were swung at and fouled off or put in play, only that none of the 51 were swings and misses.
Here’s the 2 paragraphs…see if you can spot the difference:
Baseball writer Tom Verducci appeared on the MLB Network this week and presented a crazy statistic from the 2017 World Series between the Houston Astros and Los Angeles Dodgers. In Game 5 of the 2017 World Series at Minute Maid Park, Kershaw threw 51 breaking pitches to Astros batters and miraculously didn’t swing at any of them.
Verducci quote: “Kershaw threw 51 sliders and curveballs that day, and got zero swings and misses on them…
That’s bullshit too. He struck out Altuve in the first inning on a swing and miss slider. Not that facts ever enter the mob losing their collective fucking mind…
And what’s the point? That they’ve somehow caught the Astros stealing signs in 2017…you when they flat admitted they did. Fuck the idiots at brobible and Verducci too. Not only are they just shit stirrers, apparently neither of them know what a breaking pitch is nor can they recognize one when they see it.
Exactly. Also Kershaw wasn’t using his leadership skills that day or he would have done better.
Apparently Kershaw is incredibly easy to steal signs off, but only in the postseason?
I don’t recall the particulars yet, probably should watch the whole game again tonight just to see LA lose again, was just b.s.ing about the b.s. article.
So how do these folks explain why both pitchers had games scores under 40. Keuchel lasted only 3 2/3 while Kershaw made it into the 5th.
Maybe they both just sucked.
Kershaw had one other bad start in the post season in 2017. He won the game against the D-backs but gave up 5 hits (4 home runs), 3 walks and struck out 7. The D-backs only swung and missed at 7% of his off speed pitches that day. Way below average swing & miss. Guessing at this chart. The D-Backs only swung and missed at 4 out of 58 or so pitches.. Maybe when he sucks, people see it coming and don’t swing. He doesn’t suck much so there wouldn’t be a large sample size of it.
Sometimes teams say “lay off of his breaking stuff. Sit fastball until you have two strikes”
Zero sign stealing required.
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Also, how many of those pitches that were not swung and missed were called strikes. If you look back at that game, the ump had a very generous strike zone and the Dodgers got caught looking a bunch. If he wasn’t close, they ain’t gonna swing.
I wonder what was their swing & miss rate in the other home post season games?
Rational baseball thought disappeared long ago. This is pile on, give credence to ridiculous claims, stir the pot every day, get other players to attack, repeat every debunked allegation as though it were fact, and report every boo. Beltran needs to come clean and to tell his entire story, but he won’t.
So I wasted some time today. Here is the break down of Kershaw’s Sliders/Curves and the Astros’ batters actions:
Ball - 24 (46%)
Looking Strike - 8 (15%)
Foul ball - 9 (17%)
Contact/out - 7 (13%)
Contact/Hit - 3 (6%)
Swing & Miss - 1 (2%)
So the Astros swung at 20 of the 52 pitches (38%).
It looks like the biggest issue was Kershaws location, especially starting in the 4th.
This was the breakdown in 1st three innings:
Ball - 10
Called Strike - 4
Foul - 4
Out - 5
Hit - 1
Swing & Miss 1
Swinging at 11 out of 25 (44%)
Starting in the 4th:
Ball -14
Called Strike - 4
Foul - 5
Out - 2
Hits -2
Miss -0
Swinging at 9 out of 27 (33%)
Also - Kershaw threw 42 fastballs - Only 29 were for strikes and only 3 swing and misses.
Anyone have any conclusions to draw from this? Do you foul more balls off when you know what’s coming? I don’t know.
It seems like, judging from watching some of the trash can games, that they tended to foul off a few more pitches, both being slightly behind hittable fastballs and being prepared for a breaking ball.
I guess Houston stole signs in 2019 for the Nationals in game 5 of the division series when he coughed up the lead with his poor pitching. He’s all around a poor playoff pitcher so far in his career. The media would love to blame Houston for that.
The first pro-Astro article in any significant media, expressing the fact this team could win it all in 2020, naysayers be damned
Here’s an LA Times story analyzing the numbers and concluding that the Astros did not benefit from cheating and were possibly hampered by the scheme:
Most importantly, the signaling was not perfectly accurate. Arthur calculates that bangs accurately foretold breaking pitches 93% of the time, and no-bangs foretold fastballs only 65% of the time.
That’s key, because a wrong signal hurt immensely more than a correct signal helped. On correctly-signaled pitches, the Astros as a team improved their batting average by seven points, to .289, and their slugging percentages (total bases divided by at-bats) by 25 points, to .503. As Arthur wrote, “25 points of slugging is a material boost.” On-base percentage didn’t change.
But on wrongly-signaled pitches, the damage was severe. They lost 45 points of batting average, 52 points of on-base percentage and 93 points of slugging — “certainly much worse than the incredibly-talented 2017 Astros lineup should have been able to hit,” Arthur wrote.
Duh, and no bangs is a terrible signal for a FB. It also could mean “fuck if I know?” No wonder Mark found they were late on hittable fastballs.
For the record, Will Leitch wrote a very fair article for NY Mag a week or so ago. Joe Sheehan has been even-handed since the beginning. I don’t mind people protecting the game from electronic nonsense. I do mind people thinking the Astros are unique in this way or people don’t cheat in a bunch of other old fashion ways.
that sounds so non biased…how did that get through