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HankthaTank

2011 MLB Season Thread

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I hope Carlos isn't out for long. I don't assume that he'll be in the staring lineup in the post season, but his bat has been waking up, and it would be nice to have that available.....

Here's to hoping the boys go deep....

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I don't think I want the Rays to catch the Red Sox. Playing at Fenway scares me because the Red Sox offense is so lethal, but the Rays rotation is very deep. Verlander obviously washes out Lester and Fister is pitching better than Beckett. The Red Sox seem to be wearing down as the season progresses while the Tigers are picking up steam.

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I don't think I want the Rays to catch the Red Sox. Playing at Fenway scares me because the Red Sox offense is so lethal, but the Rays rotation is very deep. Verlander obviously washes out Lester and Fister is pitching better than Beckett. The Red Sox seem to be wearing down as the season progresses while the Tigers are picking up steam.

Yea you never want to wish for an opponent, but the way things are going now, I'd take the Red Sox over the Rays.

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Yea you never want to wish for an opponent, but the way things are going now, I'd take the Red Sox over the Rays.

Agreed. It could really go either way. I can't decide if I want the Tigers to play a team who limped into the playoffs or a team who had to play their best baseball just to get there.

The Rays pitching staff is spooky scary, though, and the Tigers offense could hang with the Sox'.

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and we still could play the Yankees in the 1st round based on how Texas plays.

Mariano-Rivera-FNL-BT-3.jpg

Mo(st).

I'm glad to see that Boston fans will have to pull for the Yankees for a while.

After all my favorite sports teams (Wings, Tigers, Roughriders, Pistons, Lions, and Spartans), the Yankees are the other team I follow. Congrats to Rivera, and Jeter, for their achievements this season. Hopefully after they win the East, all their achievements this year comes to an end :lol:, Lets Go Tigers!

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OK, no Brad Penny please on the playoff roster. He can't get outs and a relief role would be no different.

I'd be surprised if Penny made the playoff roster. Especially after tonight's masterful performance.

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I'd be surprised if Penny made the playoff roster. Especially after tonight's masterful performance.

Yea the only way I see Penny makes the post season roster is to be the long man out of the bullpen if a game gets out of hand.

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Can someone explain to me OPS? It doesn't really make sense to me. What's a good OPS? 800 and over? The only thing I see it's useful for is to compare it to other OPS's on a team and see who the best all around hitter is on that team. For example, Cabrera is top on the Tigers, Avila is second, and V-Mart is third.

Range factor doesn't make much sense to me either. It counts how many balls are hit to a position. It doesn't take into account how many strike outs a pitching staff has, and if they're fly ball or ground ball pitchers. I think people just use range factor to try and tell us Jeter isn't a good shortstop, even though he's played behind a pitching staff that was continually the top in the league in strike outs. Obviously Jeter won't have as many ground balls hit to him when Clemens, Cone, Mussina, Rivera, etc. are pitching, because they're combining for 8-10 strike outs a game, leaving only 19-17 more outs for the fielders.

I'm a numbers guy, but Baseball has to many numbers. The geeks have taken over my favorite sport!

Edit: I like what Jeter said when he won his first Gold Glove and his range factor increased, "I'd like to thank our pitching staff for letting the opposition hit more grounders to me".

Edited by Barrie

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.800 is a pretty good OPS. A really strong OPS is generally considered to be at least .900. Cabrera is close to 1.000 which is exceptional. I don't get real hardcore into the different stats, but I do think the more commonly used stats such as batting average and ERA can be a bit flawed. OPS is a pretty good one because it factors in total bases.

The Tigers will be going with 14 position players and 11 pitchers at least for the ALDS. After last night especially, I don't see where Penny has any role on the team.

Avila, Martinez, Cabrera, Santiago, Raburn, Peralta, Betemit, Inge, Young, Jackson, Ordonez, Kelly and Dirks I would say are all locks. That leaves one spot open for either Santos, Worth or Rhymes. My vote goes to Worth as he's far better defensively than Rhymes, neither can hit and Worth can also play short or third. I could see carrying Santos to have another catcher, but it's not like Avila is going to get a game off anyways. I'm also assuming Guillen isn't healthy by then or else I would probably pick him just for his bat off the bench.

Verlander, Fister, Scherzer, Porcello, Valverde, Benoit, Coke, Al Al (if healthy), Schlereth are going to be on the roster. Two spots open with Penny, Below, Pauley, Perry and Marte to choose from. I'm taking Below and Pauley if the decision is up to me, but I suspect the Tigers will choose Penny and Perry. Perry's wildness scares the s*** out of me and Pauley has been somewhat decent lately and he can chew up multiple innings if needed.

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.800 is a pretty good OPS. A really strong OPS is generally considered to be at least .900. Cabrera is close to 1.000 which is exceptional. I don't get real hardcore into the different stats, but I do think the more commonly used stats such as batting average and ERA can be a bit flawed. OPS is a pretty good one because it factors in total bases.

The thing I don't like about OPS is that the hits are factored in twice since all it is is adding OBP and SLG together. It would make more sense to me if they had an average where they added BB and HBP into SLG. Take total bases, including BB and HBP, and divide that into Plate Appearances.

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Fister will start Game 2 in the ALDS regardless of opponent/venue according to Jimmy Leyland.

I'm somewhat conflicted by that decision. Fister is definitely the second best pitcher on the team, but what happens if the Tigers split those first two games? Scherzer pitching at Fenway Park or Yankee Stadium may get very ugly and Porcello following up in Game 4 isn't exactly reassuring.

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I don't mind Fister going in game 2. Why not put our two best pitchers out right away? Best case scenario we win our first two, and the opponent needs to sweep, going to clinch against JV in game 5. If we split, well, its the playoffs and people need to step up and play like they deserve to be there.

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I like how the Tigers are battling for the 2nd seed in the American League, there's been no drop off after we clinched the division. There's still something to play for here!

Also I like how in Baseball the final few weeks of the regular season the main focus is on the best teams in each league, and who's going to win the wild card. One thing I don't like about the NHL, with 16 teams making the playoffs, the thing that gets the most attention are teams with losing records, and which one of them is going to finish 8th. It make for a better finish in Baseball before the playoffs, because Baseball wild card teams actually have a shot at winning the World Series, the 8th seeds in the NHL don't.

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I guess the Tigers would rather open at Yankee Stadium than at home against a team with 5 wins in September. :unsure:

Orioles are hot right now, and you can't expect JV to be perfect every night. Even if the Tigers can pull into a tie with Texas, Detroit gets home field, too.

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