Friday, October 30, 2009
News Notes on Game 2 of the World Series
Posted by Mark Asch on Fri, Oct 30, 2009 at 1:03 PM
The Jay-Z performance. I am... worried? frightened? aroused? all of the above? by Alicia Keys' aggressive rap-hoochie moves, also by those pretty much armpit-high pink boots, seemingly made out of suede so soft that the calf can't have been more than a day or two old before it was butchered, for you, and me, and the crowd at Yankee Stadium.
-Would you have sent Pedro back out for the seventh? (That was a rhetorical question, Grady Little.) True, the Matsui homer was almost as cheap a shot as Utley's first one last night, but Pedro was clearly laboring, had been skirting disaster all game, and his luck was due to even out even disregarding how tired he would have been at that point, coming up on 100 pitches. A lot of high-effort two-strike pitches, or painted corners from behind in the count. (All of which was exciting and inspiring to watch in ways I won't articulate lest I bore you.) And it's not like Manuel didn't have a fully rested bullpen, or an off day coming up.
-If the Phillies face A.J. Burnett again this series, which seems likely, they may wish to consider not always swinging s'goddam early in the count. They had some good at-bats when they weren't too busy having shitty, shitty at bats that either lasted two pitches or saw them down in the count early because they didn't lay off the breaking stuff, which was nasty but definitely out of the strike zone.
-I love it when a hitter doesn't get a bunt down before strike two, the manager takes the bunt sign off, and then the hitter takes it upon himself to man up and get a bunt down—and then bunts the two-strike pitch foul, to strike out. Derer Jeter, your commitment to putting your personal sense of honor ahead of the team is just one of the reasons why every sportswriter in America wants to wake up next to you, just once.
-Since this unfortunate April incident, Eric Karros has done much better work with his high-volume combover. I can't find a picture of last night's pregame show, but he's looking practically Kennedy-esque.
Comments (3)
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yeah you know the problem was Burnett was getting a lot of first pitch strikes over and they looked like the best pitches to hit, fastballs down the middle almost. Plus he was getting strike calls on curveballs out of the strike zone, so that will be always tough.
Major talking point for me was McCarver tearing into Manuel for not starting the runners in the 8th. I mean wtf? I think the chance of a strike-out throw-out double play was way higher than a regular double play there. Just look at the stats, Mariano a SO pitcher and Utley 110 strike-out on the season. Plus Manuel said in the post game Utley hit into fewer than 5 double plays all year. At most it was a 50-50 call to make, but yeah, typical McC.
And the missed calls by the umps, did Fox get a memo to lay off the super-slo-mo after the previous two series? It seemed like it.
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"I think the chance of a strike-out throw-out double play was way higher than a regular double play there."
I'd be with you under normal circumstances, but not with Posada behind the plate.
The umpiring was as bad as any I've seen in the whole post-season. Aside from the the two possibly botched double play calls (both of which were so close I can't complain about them too much), whoever did the plate was a mess on balls and strikes all night.
The two double play calls went opposite ways, were tight and decisive. They were both wrong, but far better mistakes than the travesty umpiring has been this whole postseason. (The strike zone was all over the plate last night though.)
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