Hello my dearest readers! Time for a few predictions. "What?!?" I hear you say. "Doesn't The Beard HATE predictions? Doesn't he consider them useless and silly filler for newspapers/web sites?" You are absolutely correct, The Beard thinks predictions are stupid. What are especially useless are preseason predictions. My preseason predictions usually go like this (and I am 100% correct every single year): most teams expected to be good will be good. Most teams expected to be average will be average, and most teams expected to be bad will be bad. Some teams will surprise us one way or another. END PREDICTION.
However, the Rockies find themselves this morning 2.5 games back in both the NL West and Wild Card standings, and while not necessarily a prediction, one can take a look at the standings, and the teams involved, and see a couple of routes the Rockies can take to make the postseason for the third time in four years.
NL WEST
The NL West is currently led by the San Francisco Giants, playing very good baseball. Half a game back are the San Diego Padres, not playing very good baseball. 2.5 games back are the Rockies, playing very good baseball. I will not predict the winner of the NL West, but I predict it will not be the San Diego Padres.
The Padres have had a great season, but it's been held together with pitching. Young pitching. Young pitching wears down at the ends of seasons, and that's what we are seeing here, as the Padres have struggled mightily, and unless the Padres suddenly, after five months, begin to hit, they will play .500 ball for the rest of the year. Sandwiched between two surging teams, .500 ball won't cut it, and the Padres will finish 2nd or 3rd place in the NL West, despite being at or near the top spot for the bulk of the year.
I will also predict that the 4th-place Dodgers, useless in every way since the All-Star break, will become relevant. One way or another, the Dodgers will be the deciding factor on who finishes 2nd in the division. LA has six games remaining with Colorado, and three with San Diego... at the end of the season, those nine games will have determined a great deal.
NL WILD CARD
With the Phillies surging ahead in the NL East, the Atlanta Braves lead the Wild Card chase, with San Diego half a game back and the Rockies 2.5 games behind. Like the Padres, the Braves are struggling lately, and they seem determined to not only let the NL East slip away, but the Wild Card also. I will not predict the winner of the Wild Card postseason spot, but I will predict that the Braves will be lucky to win it. With six games remaining against the Phillies, Atlanta will have a rough road ahead of them to hold off the surging Rockies & Giants, along with a resilient Padres team who could tread water and still edge the Braves out.
THE ROCKIES
The good news for Rockies fans is that, as they have done in recent years, they are finishing strong. Very strong. The further good news is that their next six games are against very beatable teams; two sweeps would do wonders for the Rockies' chances. The bad news is two-tiered, I'm afraid: they are going on the road, and the first series is in Los Angeles. Will Dodger Stadium be a Biblical lion's den, where they're sent in to get killed but come out fine the next day? Or will it be like an actual lion's den, where the lions eat you in about ten minutes and then lick your bones over the winter?
Jim Tracy has finally settled on a lineup and a batting order, though, and I believe that will help them on this road trip. This team swept the Padres in their last road series, and the Dodgers are struggling worse than the Padres are. After this road trip, they have three home games against the Giants. A good road trip for the Rockies will make that Giant series crucial to both teams.
NL Awards
I predict that, for the fifth time in their history, the Rockies will have a player lead 2/3 of the Triple Crown stats and fail to win the MVP. Carlos Gonzalez will finish the year leading the league in average and RBI, but will not will not win the MVP, because Coors Field artifically inflated his stats.
I also predict that, for the first time in their history, the best pitcher in baseball will be wearing a Rockies uniform. Ubaldo Jimenez has had a spectacular season. However, Jimenez will not win the Cy Young award, because Coors Field artificially inflated his stats.
And so, I predict another grumpy "Postseason Awards are Bullcrap" post on this blog very soon. Hopefully, it will be tempered with a "playoff baseball is wonderful" post, but we'll have to wait and see on both of those.
Go Rockies!!!
Friday, September 17, 2010
Friday, September 10, 2010
Chipper Jones Has A Tiny Wang
Hello dear readers! It is I, The Beard, checking in once again with the latest in news surrounding the Colorado Rockies! The Rockies, despite their road struggles, remain relevant to the postseason conversation, because hey, it's September, and that's when the Rockies do their best work. Their seven-game win streak has seen them sweep two first-place teams in a row, but now they must face perhaps their greatest nemesis: a last-place team. Namely, the Arizona Diamondbacks. Needless to say, with the team 3.5 games back for both the Wild Card and the NL West lead, every game is a Big Game, but the Rockies have been coming up big so far this September.
A big part of the Rockies surge has been the stellar play of Mrs. Beard's new favorite player (supplanting the cute-yet-always-struggling Chris Iannetta) Carlos Gonzalez, who has as good a shot as anybody in recent memory at becoming the NL's first Triple Crown winner since 1937. Hard to believe, but even some national media have pulled their noses out of Albert Pujols' butt, and are including Carlos in the NL MVP conversation. But, as you'd expect, many who've never played the game discount Gonzalez' impressive numbers simply because he plays half his games at Coors Field.
And now I'd like to stop this rant before it begins, and insert an aside, if I may, about Chipper Jones. I have been asked many times why I do not care for Chipper Jones. I find the answer easy to feel, but difficult to put into words.
One good reason to hate him is that he is a grown man who goes by the name "Chipper." "Chipper" sounds like the name for that Three's Company character -- somebody's cousin, probably -- who only showed her face about every fourth episode. "Chipper" would also be a great name for the horse some 50s TV cowboy rode around on. And I can see "Chipper" being the lesser-known sidekick to Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd. I mean, I know the guy's real name is Lawrence, and that's a drag... but you can't expect anybody to take you seriously with the name "Chipper."
Or maybe, it's this:
I mean, look at that guy. Just look at him! I'm not a violent Beard, but when you see a guy who looks like that, don't you just want to rear back and punch him right in the middle of his face? I think it is a natural, built-in response: when cavemen saw another caveman with a face like that, they wanted to punch it. And then they did, because they were cavemen. I remember as a little Beardling, seeing faces like that on the little kids in my class, and even then I wanted to punch them. And it's still true: even today, it takes every bit of my inner strength to not go around punching little kids who look like Chipper Jones.
But now, we have a quantifiable and defensible reason to hate Chipper Jones. Recently, Chipper chimed in with his assessment of Gonzalez' play, and his chances for both the Triple Crown and the MVP:
The obvious message there is that Chipper does NOT give Gonzalez any credit. Chipper certainly has time on his hands lately, and he seems to have enough of a fascination with Carlos to know his stats pretty well: as of this writing, Carlos' home stats are: .387, 25, 66, while his road stats read .288, 7, 34. So his point -- that Gonzalez is a decent player made to look great by his home park -- seems to have merit, at least on the surface. But, I will refrain from re-hashing the reasons why Chipper -- like most people who mention Coors Field -- is completely wrong about it, as that's an issue I've touched on in other posts.
However, good ol' Chipper, in his haste to lob a parting shot at a fellow major leaguer, seems to have forgotten a couple things. Chipper Jones has won two individual awards in his career: the 1999 NL MVP, and the 2008 batting title. The year that he won the NL MVP award, Chipper hit .366 at home, and .275 on the road. The year Chipper won the NL Batting title, he hit .399 at home, and .325 on the road.
So, Chipper won an MVP hitting worse on the road than Carlos is hitting today, and he won a batting title hitting better at home than Carlos is hitting today. Am I cherry picking stats? Yes, I am. Does that mean that Chipper is not a jealous dick, denying credit to a young player having an outstanding season, and justifying it with reasons that, should they be applied to Chipper's own stats, cast a bad light on his greatest personal accomplishments? No, it does not. He is in fact a massive dick, and nobody likes him. Everybody likes Carlos, though, because Carlos brings us tacos.
TACOS!!!!!!!!!!!
And now I'd like to stop this rant before it begins, and insert an aside, if I may, about Chipper Jones. I have been asked many times why I do not care for Chipper Jones. I find the answer easy to feel, but difficult to put into words. One good reason to hate him is that he is a grown man who goes by the name "Chipper." "Chipper" sounds like the name for that Three's Company character -- somebody's cousin, probably -- who only showed her face about every fourth episode. "Chipper" would also be a great name for the horse some 50s TV cowboy rode around on. And I can see "Chipper" being the lesser-known sidekick to Charlie McCarthy and Mortimer Snerd. I mean, I know the guy's real name is Lawrence, and that's a drag... but you can't expect anybody to take you seriously with the name "Chipper."
Or maybe, it's this:
I mean, look at that guy. Just look at him! I'm not a violent Beard, but when you see a guy who looks like that, don't you just want to rear back and punch him right in the middle of his face? I think it is a natural, built-in response: when cavemen saw another caveman with a face like that, they wanted to punch it. And then they did, because they were cavemen. I remember as a little Beardling, seeing faces like that on the little kids in my class, and even then I wanted to punch them. And it's still true: even today, it takes every bit of my inner strength to not go around punching little kids who look like Chipper Jones.
But now, we have a quantifiable and defensible reason to hate Chipper Jones. Recently, Chipper chimed in with his assessment of Gonzalez' play, and his chances for both the Triple Crown and the MVP:
"If (Gonzalez) is doing the same thing on the road that he’s doing at home, I’d be glad to give him credit. And he’s a tremendous player, don’t get me wrong. But the numbers? He’s hitting like .390 at home with 25 homers and 65 ribbies?"
The obvious message there is that Chipper does NOT give Gonzalez any credit. Chipper certainly has time on his hands lately, and he seems to have enough of a fascination with Carlos to know his stats pretty well: as of this writing, Carlos' home stats are: .387, 25, 66, while his road stats read .288, 7, 34. So his point -- that Gonzalez is a decent player made to look great by his home park -- seems to have merit, at least on the surface. But, I will refrain from re-hashing the reasons why Chipper -- like most people who mention Coors Field -- is completely wrong about it, as that's an issue I've touched on in other posts.
However, good ol' Chipper, in his haste to lob a parting shot at a fellow major leaguer, seems to have forgotten a couple things. Chipper Jones has won two individual awards in his career: the 1999 NL MVP, and the 2008 batting title. The year that he won the NL MVP award, Chipper hit .366 at home, and .275 on the road. The year Chipper won the NL Batting title, he hit .399 at home, and .325 on the road.
So, Chipper won an MVP hitting worse on the road than Carlos is hitting today, and he won a batting title hitting better at home than Carlos is hitting today. Am I cherry picking stats? Yes, I am. Does that mean that Chipper is not a jealous dick, denying credit to a young player having an outstanding season, and justifying it with reasons that, should they be applied to Chipper's own stats, cast a bad light on his greatest personal accomplishments? No, it does not. He is in fact a massive dick, and nobody likes him. Everybody likes Carlos, though, because Carlos brings us tacos.
TACOS!!!!!!!!!!!
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Somebody has been listening!!!
Oh joy of joys, somebody in the National Press has actually had the balls to suggest that a Rockies players' home/road splits (in this case, Gonzalez's) do not tell the entire story (we've had those balls for some time, of course). Has somebody been tuning in to The Beard's wisdom? Or, is the eye test simply too tough to ignore: Carlos Gonzalez, while not as good as his home numbers suggest, is clearly MUCH better than his road numbers suggest. Either way, it is extremely encouraging to have a national, well-respected source like Sports Illustrated mention the Coors Hangover effect.
With any luck, people will begin seriously crunching these numbers and discussing this as this season winds down, and maybe, just maybe, Gonzalez will get a fair shot at the MVP without people coming out of the woodwork to mention his home/road splits. Thanks, Posnanski.
With any luck, people will begin seriously crunching these numbers and discussing this as this season winds down, and maybe, just maybe, Gonzalez will get a fair shot at the MVP without people coming out of the woodwork to mention his home/road splits. Thanks, Posnanski.
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