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September 06, 2005
Guessing Games
I was just looking at the remaining games for the Red Sox and Yankees - and where they are to be played, etc. - and guessing at how many games each team might win. This is an update to what I did a week ago. Here's what I came up with:
If the Yankees win 18 of 26 - and the Sox win 16 of 26 - that would leave the Yankees just one game out of first at the end of the year.
Ouch.
Posted by Steve Lombardi at September 6, 2005 02:59 PM
Comments
I happened to notice that, at least according to Baseball Prospectus, the Sox's 4 rotation mainstays (Wells, Wakefield, Clement, and Arroyo) are among the top 14 luckiest starters in all of MLB - with Clement the luckiest. (If you're a subscriber, click on my name for the link.) This seems to jive with what you said before, Steve, about how many runs they've scored lately. Every offense goes through down times, so perhaps this luck will run out soon?
Posted by: Shaun P. at September 6, 2005 03:53 PM
I'm not sure that the Sox offensive output at Fenway has anything to do with luck.
Posted by: Steve Lombardi at September 6, 2005 04:07 PM
The Run Support numbers are interesting:
Wells Bos 8.07
Clement Bos 7.59
Arroyo Bos 5.50
Wakefield Bos 5.31
Mussina NYY 5.86
Johnson NYY 5.42
Seven-to-eight runs a game does a pitcher good.
Posted by: Steve Lombardi at September 6, 2005 04:16 PM
I've been harping on the Sox run scoring machine for the past several weeks, because I don't think I've ever seen anything like it with so many wins. Sure, the Rangers and Rockies can go through stretches where they score this many runs, but in general it's accompanied by matchingly horrible pitching. So either the Sox have been lucky, or their pitching, while bad, is not quite bad enough for them to lose!
Posted by: Paul in Boston at September 6, 2005 05:37 PM
they also don't have a manager who decides to play small ball for no apparent reason in the first inning of a game against a pitcher who would eventually throw almost 60 pitches to the first 10 batters he faces. Yeah, double steal with almost 300 RBI set to bat and nobody out. I'm sure that impressed Lou Piniella no end. Clever guy, he must have thought...that's why he's got those four rings and gets the big bucks. it's also why he turned an early KO into another painful late inning defeat...where everything seemed to backfire on the Yankees. that's the big difference between the Sox and the Yankees. Francona at least gets out of the way.
Posted by: JohnnyC at September 6, 2005 10:54 PM
I thought Jeter went on his own
Posted by: Raf at September 7, 2005 10:32 AM