February 10, 2010
Order Now Get "The world champ of baseball annuals." The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2010 features articles by THT's staff as well as Bill James, Tom Tango and Craig Wright and contains much, much more. Please support THT and use this link to purchase the Annual.  Get the fantasy book that everyone's raving about! Edited by THT Fantasy's Rob McQuown and Michael Street, and featuring our own Matt Hagen on prospects. Shipping now from ACTA! 
Pat Andriola
Rich Barbieri John Barten Brian Borawski Craig Brown Evan Brunell Chuck Brownson Kevin Dame Joshua Fisher David Gassko Jeremy Greenhouse Brandon Isleib Chris Jaffe Max Marchi Bruce Markusen Dan Novick Harry Pavlidis Alex Pedicini Jeff Sackmann Nick Steiner Dave Studeman Steve Treder Bryan Tsao Tuck! Geoff Young John Brattain And here's the full roster.
Or you can search by:
Gear up for baseball season with Chicago White Sox tickets and New York Yankees tickets. LA Angels tickets, Houston Astros tickets, and Atlanta Braves tickets are hot sellers! You can get Boston Red Sox tickets, San Diego Padres tickets or Chicago Cubs tickets for your favorite baseball fan. Coast to Coast Tickets has the best MLB tickets like Minnesota Twins tickets, LA Dodgers tickets, Milwaukee Brewers tickets, New York Met tickets and St. Louis Cardinals tickets. Find premium Chicago Cubs tickets and other Chicago tickets at JustGreatTickets.com. Chicago Cubs Tickets Chicago Tickets  All content on this site (including text, graphs, and any other original works), unless otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons License. |
Why the Red Sox lost to the Angelsby Troy PattersonOctober 12, 2009 Watching the playoffs is all about expecting that your team, no matter how good, could easily be headed home very soon. This is even more prevalent when the two teams are so closely matched and the series ends in the blink of an eye. This series took place completely between Game Two and Game Three of the Phillies and Rockies series. The Red Sox and Angels were very close to each other this year, and the playoffs came down to getting the balls in play to fall. The Red Sox had a BABIP of .166 in the first two games, which led to a very quiet offense. This wasn't the only reason they are headed home, but it is definitely one of the bigger ones. Jon Lester had trouble with control in Game One. After a 3.25 strikeout-to-walk ratio in the regular season, he managed only 1.25 in October. This happens from time to time, but when it happens in the playoffs it is even more glaring. Lester wasn't the only one to lose his control. Jonathan Papelbon in his Game Three appearance also walked three in just one inning. The Red Sox staff really struggled with walks on top of everything else. This shouldn't sound like a bunch of excuses for the Red Sox, because the Angels deserved to win this series. They played up to their skills and even suffered a bit with a decreased BABIP at .265. The Red Sox also made poor decisions like allowing Ramon Ramirez a chance to pitch in a game when only down three runs and throwing an intentional walk to Torii Hunter. Joe Posnanski gives seven reasons why that intentional walk was a bad idea, and I have to agree. The result of this series came down largely to the hitting and defense since both pitching staffs on the whole had similar K/BB numbers. The Red Sox staff had a total K/BB of 18/10 and the Angels had 16/8. It truly came down to their ability to get hits on the balls in play. Some players on both sides really struggled this series. The Angels had to deal with Scott Kazmir walking three batters in his Game Three start plus Chone Figgins striking out six times in 12 at-bats. This was not enough for the Red Sox, as they had to deal with Papelbon and Lester throwing six walks to six strikeouts combined. Then Jason Bay and David Ortiz had seven strikeouts in a combined 20 at-bats. The Red Sox have to be disappointed with this result, but management knows how the playoffs work. The front office has some holes to fill with Jason Bay becoming a free agent and some players to address, like Jacoby Ellsbury's sudden drop in defense. Filling out the pitching staff is another issue. On the other side we saw Lester become the ace of this team with Beckett still an elite starter. Clay Buchholz has established himself as a starter in the majors and will head in to 2010 confident in his spot. The offense will have a full season of Victor Martinez and Ortiz, who had a 128 OPS+ in the second half. Check out more work from Troy at RotoSavants and Fire Brand of the AL. You can contact him with questions or recommendations email me
David Zirk said...
I think they have had their run, time to dismantle the ‘nation’ and start another 80+ yr drought. Their team defense needs work, they need another starter, and will need some power to replace Bay and Ortiz. Posted 10/12 at 01:49 PM
Page 1 of 1
Commenting is not available in this weblog entry. Do you have a general question or comment for one of THT's writers? Send it in to our weekly mailbag We also welcome unsolicited op-ed pieces of approximately 500 words for consideration. We reserve the right to edit for length, clarity and consistency of style. Please include your whole name and location to be considered. If you have a comment about this specific article, please email the writer. Next Article: Why the Angels beat the Red Sox>> <<Previous Article: Cooperstown Confidential: Mets madness, playoff rosters and Marichal-Roseboro | ||||
I can’t wait to see Martinez back for a full season but I am far from trusting Ortiz to continue his second half power surge.