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Just mentioned this in a PM to Dan, but here's my own "curse" theory regarding the Yanks and why they will lose to the Marlins. Ever since being purchased by George Steinbrenner (who faced criminal charges for financial skulduggery related to Nixon contributions), they have been unable to win a World Series whenever a Republican president is in office:

Year President World Series

1976 Ford ® Cin 4, NY 0

1977 Carter (D) NY 4, LA 2

1978 Carter (D) NY 4, LA 2

1981 Reagan ® LA 4, NY 2

1996 Clinton (D) NY 4, Atl 2

1998 Clinton (D) NY 4, SD 0

1999 Clinton (D) NY 4, Atl 0

2000 Clinton (D) NY 4, NYM 1

2001 Bush ® Ari 4, NY 3

2003 Bush ® ????? :o Doesn't look good for the Yanks!

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FYI - Jon Miller and Joe Morgan are doing the ESPN radio broadcast of the Series. It frees us from the annoyance of the lame Fox announcers and and irritating sound effects.

It's just the opposite for me. I don't care much for Morgan and Miller.

I think Fox has an entertaining bunch at this time.

The sound effects are a different story, I could not agree more with you on that.

Edited by catesta
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Just heard a little blurp of Garciapara explaining that the fans should be thankful and proud because no one out there realizes or quite understands the tremendous stress and pressure they are under every single day. Oh, I guess I forgot they're making multi-millions playing a kids' game.

Excellent point.

The stress cry baby shit ranks up there with when they complain about the grueling travel schedules and the fatigue associated with it. :rolleyes:

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I just wish this would put an end to the Yankee VS. Red Sox Rivalry. To be a rival, you have to have won ONCE against your rival when it counted. The Red Sox fans should have known that if your best pitcher is a nearly 40 year old knuckleballer(And he was great!) your chances were slim and none to win. If the Yankees had not gotten Conteras, and he had been on the Red Sox staff, The Red Sox most likely would have won....hell, the Boss was pissed the team hadn't gotten Ortiz during the offseason, just to be a pinch hitter....The Boss will get whatever free agent pitchers he can keep the Sox from getting, a right fielder, more middle relief and the Yankees will win again next year. :tdown The Sox won't hit as well,(how could they?) and Pedro is skinny and older, and will totally break down sooner, rather than latter. The Red Sox are just another version of the Washington Generals, no way will they ever beat the Yankees..... I'll put sportscenter on a few times next week to see if the Marlins beat the Yankees. Hope the ratings tank now.... time to start watching womens Ice Skating..... :w

Edited by BERIGAN
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I'm a Yankee fan(OK, go ahead and flame away, but I've been a fan since '64, and I've suffered through the Horace Clarke era, Stump, etc.), and I think Little deserves the Baseball Bonehead of the Year award, with Dusty Baker a close second.

I thought Pedro was coming out after seven, as he rarely pitches beyond the seventh inning anymore and his pitch count was way up there. Little had a rested bullpen and plenty of guys he could use. The bullpen had also performed beautifully, better than the Yank bullpen(With the notable exception of Rivera.) For Chrissakes, he could have gone matchup on each batter for two innings! Rare is the player who is honest about whether they are gassed or not- the overwhelming majority will say that they are fine and can get the next guy.

Little managed himself out of the game, and Torre made a few good moves to save the game from being a rout. Once he saw that Clemens didn't have it, he turned to Musiina, who pitched brilliantly in relief. Bringing in Wells backfired, but I could see the logic behind it. Keeping in a guy who was getting rapped around like Pedro was is absurd.

In '86, McNamara left Buckner in when he had a better defnsive player in Dave Stapleton on the bench because he wanted Buckner to be part of the on-field celebration- curse, anyone?

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Berigan get your head out of your ass.

It wasn't Pedro. It was Little!

You are hereby invited to join all the Yankee fans and

EAT SHITANDDIE

Head up my ass??? Who gave up the hits???? I don't care if he had thrown a whole 115 pitches!! Thats nothing for most starters that have been coddled all season!!! Jack Morris would have an ERA around 3.5/4 during the regular season, pitch 240+ innings yet he and Smoltz battled for what, 10 innings in the 91 WS???? Jack Morris was 36!!!! Actually, wasn't Pedro hitting 95 in that last inning? It was 5-3, and then a jam job bloop hit, anyone could have given that up. The Red Sox should have gotten one run off of Rivera .

Jack McKeon had Josh Beckett pitch a complete game(why???) then come back a few days later and pitch four innings in relief...if he screwed up, it would have been all Jack McKeon's fault, but he now looks like a genius......

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BTW, Africa Brass -- has the formerly familiar head-of-a-cat morphed into a

post-season play couch creature??? Now with 150% more catfish???

av-51.gif

Was he a Red Sox or Cubs fan? Poor guy. Hope it doesn't take TOO many beers to drown his sorrows!

Edited by maren
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Sorry, but you either read the vibe right or you don't. Little didn't. That's not to say that if he had pulled Pedro that whoever he brought in would have aced it, because there's no way to say that. But he obviously stuck to the changes on the chart rather than listening to the what the rhythm section was feeding him. Baseball requires improvisation, not studio work. Wanna be a bureaucrat? Fine. Just don't do it and expect to win pennants.

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Jim is 100% correct.

Berigan, your head remains firmly implanted in your ass.

Who gave up smoked hits that happened to luckily land in someone's glove in the seventh? THAT'S THE WHOLE FUCKING CLUE YOU NEED.

IF PEDRO PITCHES A PERFECT SEVENTH WITH MORE WEAK-ASS FLY BALLS, ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY HE SHOULD GO OUT THERE FOR THE 8TH.

But he didn't.

Little says Pedro was the best pitcher on the staff at that moment and that's a pathetic crock of fucking shit.

TIMLIN HAD AN ERA OF ZERO.

WILLIAMSON WOULD HAVE HAD AN ERA OF ZERO EXCEPT FOR THE FACT THAT HE GAVE UP A SINGLE, NO-BIG-WHOOP SOLO JACK TO A PINCH-HITTER IN A THREE RUN GAME BACK IN BOSTON.

AND FUCK THE LITTLE FISTED BLOOP. IN SUCCESSION, JETER, WILLIAMS AND MATSUI CRUSHED PEDRO'S PITCHES.

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I thought Pedro was coming out after seven, as he rarely pitches beyond the seventh inning anymore and his pitch count was way up there. Little had a rested bullpen and plenty of guys he could use. The bullpen had also performed beautifully, better than the Yank bullpen(With the notable exception of Rivera.) For Chrissakes, he could have gone matchup on each batter for two innings! Rare is the player who is honest about whether they are gassed or not- the overwhelming majority will say that they are fine and can get the next guy.

Little managed himself out of the game, and Torre made a few good moves to save the game from being a rout. Once he saw that Clemens didn't have it, he turned to Musiina, who pitched brilliantly in relief. Bringing in Wells backfired, but I could see the logic behind it. Keeping in a guy who was getting rapped around like Pedro was is absurd.

In '86, McNamara left Buckner in when he had a better defnsive player in Dave Stapleton on the bench because he wanted Buckner to be part of the on-field celebration- curse, anyone?

I agree.

Bad managing. (on the Red Sox side)

When Clements was removed after 4 runs, I thought that was great managing.

Musina got out of 2 jams later, that keep the score close.

Yankees deserved to win. Boston was mis-managed.

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  I thought Pedro was coming out after seven, as he rarely pitches beyond the seventh inning anymore and his pitch count was way up there. Little had a rested bullpen and plenty of guys he could use. The bullpen had also performed beautifully, better than the Yank bullpen(With the notable exception of Rivera.) For Chrissakes, he could have gone matchup on each batter for two innings! Rare is the player who is honest about whether they are gassed or not- the overwhelming majority will say that they are fine and can get the next guy.

  Little managed himself out of the game, and Torre made a few good moves to save the game from being a rout. Once he saw that Clemens didn't have it, he turned to Musiina, who pitched brilliantly in relief. Bringing in Wells backfired, but I could see the logic behind it. Keeping in a guy who was getting rapped around like Pedro was is absurd.

    In '86, McNamara left Buckner in when he had a better defnsive player in Dave Stapleton on the bench because he wanted Buckner to be part of the on-field celebration- curse, anyone?

I agree.

Bad managing. (on the Red Sox side)

When Clements was removed after 4 runs, I thought that was great managing.

Musina got out of 2 jams later, that keep the score close.

Yankees deserved to win. Boston was mis-managed.

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The real reason why the Yanks won Thursday night: the pizza sent that very afternoon to the gravesite of Babe Ruth.

SPORTS OF THE TIMES

Red Sox Cursed Themselves

By HARVEY ARATON

Published: October 18, 2003

HAWTHORNE, N.Y.

JIM DIODATI, 23, drove up from Yonkers to hang his red college baseball socks on an overhanging bush. John Traynor, 31, jumped out of bed on a few hours' sleep, on the morning before his bachelor party, to lay a bouquet of flowers with a card that said, "Dear Babe, thanks again."

Someone left the stub of a ticket from Game 7 on Thursday night. A ball with the inscription, "Let the curse live on," nestled by the base of the headstone. The New York City tabloids, with their caustic and celebratory headlines, were spread about. The Westchester County Fife and Drum Corps came to play "God Bless America."

Gratitude flowed like Champagne in a pennant winner's clubhouse yesterday at the Gate of Heaven Cemetery, where Babe Ruth shed about as much light on the latest crushing Red Sox defeat as Manager Grady Little did after his team was confirmed dead early yesterday. By daybreak, Yankees fans were streaming off the parkways in quiet northern Westchester to pay their respects to the man they were more convinced than ever had catered another funeral postgame spread for Boston from his final resting place.

On those familiar Ruthian subjects of consumption and curses, all we really knew was that the piping hot pizza delivered to the gravesite the previous afternoon went uneaten and turned colder than Boston Common on the cruel morning after, before being carted away. "Someone actually sent him a pie," Bill Lane, the cemetery's assistant superintendent, said while on the lookout for those who might view this shrine the way Pedro Martínez eyed Karim Garcia, as a convenient and juicy target.

18ARAT.jpg

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Jim, I don't disagree with your commemnts often but I think you are off base in your analogy regarding Grady Little. The established plan all season and into the playoffs has been to pull Pedro when he got to around 100 pitches. Especially in the playoffs Timlin and Embree have handled the 8th and Williamson the 9th for pretty much every game the Sox had a lead in. Sticking with Pedro was the improvisation, going against the established pattern.

Dan, as a long, long time Red Sox fan I fell your pain. However, even as I feel Little should have gone to the bullpen I also firmly believe that he is the best guy to manage this team. His handling of the Manny Ramirez unofficial suspension was perfect. It's sad that the entire season is reduced to one bad call (shades of '86) but I for one hope Little is back next year. Manny, endorsed him too.

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Tom, as I come down from the pain and anguish, I begin to understand and almost agree with your opinion of Little. I think he is the right guy for the clubhouse and over a 162 game season. In that regard, he is exactly like Dusty Baker-great to create a winning season, crappy on strategic decision-making. There is a fine column about this in today's Boston Globe-available at http://www.boston.com

which argues effectively that no one should make a snap judgement on whether to retain Grady Little, and to think in terms of whether you can find someone who will bring both the season-long handling of a group of 25 men AND the strategic decision-making you need. And think about what his replacement will walk into, a situation where he can say to his new bosses, "OK-the old guy won 95 games, got the team to game seven of the LCS and lost in the 11th inning. If I do anything less, I'm a failure?" Its a good point, as well as the point of how well Grady handled Boston and the media and the expectations. There aren't a lot of managers who would do as well in that killer cauldron as Grady Little did.

Nevertheless, he's a FUCKING MORON!! ARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!

;)

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Tom, Dan and Philly Q have made some very good points so I won't elaborate on them too much. I may have missed this in some of the posts but when Pedro came out in the seventh, he pointed to the sky; that is the sign that he's done and secondly, he was being congratulated by Nomar and the other players. He believed he was coming out after seven.

I don't believe Grady is coming back and he shouldn't. For all the good things he may have done, when it gets down to crunch time, he's got to use his head and he didn't. Yesterday, on WFAN in the New York are, Bob Ryan of the Globe was interviewed. He said that there's no way Grady will get his contract renewed. All of Boston hates him. He'll be reviled all next year. The ownership is image conscious and he doesn't see how they'll be able to tolerate what will happen. In his view, this is worse than '86 because although they were one strike away, here they lost to the Evil Empire in their own fuckin' stadium. That's what going to do him in, according to Ryan.

Do you know how sweet that would have been for this Yankee hating Mets fan, it would have been beyond sublime, to stick it to every Yankee fan on Friday?

One more thing, I've come to agree with Dan, there is no curse, just bad luck and stupid decisions. That's your fuckin' curse.

Regarding the World Series, I think the Marlins can beat them. This could be a replay of one the 1990 WS where nobody gave the Reds a chance to beat the mighty A's. It could happen. Everybody laughs at the Ms beating the Evil Empire but why not. I like McKeon's attitude. With that attitude, they could.

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jack mac made some very pointed remarks in the local paper. if you remember, he won 96 games with the reds in 1999 (only to lose a 1 game playoff to the mets - damn that al leiter - still the highest win total not to make the playoffs since the creation of the wildcard - but i digress). he said that he could be doing the same things here if management had only left them alone. he indicated that getting griffey, and allowing larkin and griffey free access to the gm ruined things. unfortunately that looks to be the case. i hate to say it, but go marlins.

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Jim, I don't disagree with your commemnts often but I think you are off base in your analogy regarding Grady Little. The established plan all season and into the playoffs has been to pull Pedro when he got to around 100 pitches. Especially in the playoffs Timlin and Embree have handled the 8th and Williamson the 9th for pretty much every game the Sox had a lead in. Sticking with Pedro was the improvisation, going against the established pattern.

You are of course correct as it pertains to the Red Sox season-long game plan.

I was referring to the cliche of sticking with your "big guy" in critical championship situations, no matter that the immediate plain-as-the-nose-on-your-face reality clearly dictates otherwise. It's such a cliche and such a buying into of the whole Romantic notion of athletes as super-humans that it's doomed to fail far more often than it succeds (otherwise darn near EVERY great player would be wearing a championship ring). Little's post-game comment that Pedro was the best pitcher on the team leads me to believe that he bought into the cliche rather than confronting the reality. It doesn't matter who the "best" pitcher on your team is, what matters is who is the best pitcher (or quarterback, or point guard, or whatever) at that moment (hardly a unique observation at this point, eh? ;) )

When face with a make-it-or-break-it moment, Little fell back on the cliche os Superstar as Superman, whereas Torre, wjo like I said learned his lesson the hard way in several seasons managing Atlanta, kept a clear head, saw Roger Clements for what he was, a future Hall of Famer who was having a crappy day, and got him the hell out of there before the game was beyond salvation. Hero worship is for kids. Making clear-headed decisions in clutch situations is not. I'm the type of sports fan who enjoys the action at least as much for the human drama as for the actual game. Competition can and does quite often create dramas worthy of Shakespeare (well, Mamet, anyway :g ), and this was no exception. We saw a man's mnanagerial mettle tested, and this time, he failed the test due to a "classic" character flaw - blind hero worship. (Which is not the same as Blind Hero worship, which would have resulted in a starting rotation of Charles, Wonder, Shearing, & Feliciano or some such ;) )

It's this tendency to fall back on the cliche of an unrealistic (and probably unconscious) "hero worship" in a point-of-no return situation that I was referring to, not the regular season Red Sox game plan. I definitely think that Little deserves to keep his gig, IF he does the requisite soul-searching about how he handled this situation. Really, if he had pulled Pedro for the 8th and the bullpen still blew it, you KNOW he'd be getting heat for taking his ace out when the game was on the line. But the facts of the moment would support that call a LOT more than the one he made, which for all the world looks to me like he got into a big-time-crossroads situation, got stars in his eyes, and saw Pedro as a Saviour rather than a guy who was basically out of gas. In other words, the manager turned into a starry-eyed fan, and that, of course, is not his gig.

So yeah, he screwed up, big time, and on a pretty fundamental level. But people can learn from their mistakes. I hope we have a chance to see if he has or not in next LCS, and then the World Series. Same for Baker, but he's been to the crossroads more than once, and from what I hear, this buffet is NOT all-you-can-eat...

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Really, if he had pulled Pedro for the 8th and the bullpen still blew it, you KNOW he'd be getting heat for taking his ace out when the game was on the line.

Oh so true, and yet, after Pedro's rocky sixth and seventh, no one would have questioned it because of how well Timlin and Williamson had pitched. If they had come in and proceeded to blow it, I think the attitude would have been, "how appropriate, the bullpen had been crappy, then it performed tremendously, and now with the World Series at stake, it reverts to crappy form. That's the Red Sox-can't do it when its on the line."

But seriously, I do not believe the "why didn't he keep Pedro in" second-guessing would have lasted long. I think everyone not in the Red Sox dugout felt that Pedro should be out and would have totally agreed with turning it over to Timlin (ONE HIT ALLOWED) and Willamson (ONE RUN ALLOWED).

I do think the Fish can beat them-the Marlins play a great deal like the Angels of last year, small ball, run, steal bases, bunt, great defense ... the Marlins are definitely good enough to win.

And God I hope they do, because the bloodletting in the Bronx will happen, just as if the Sox had done it themselves.

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