Scott Dolan Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Great thing about that is that whereas most teams have to leave a starter in for that third time through the order, Royals don't. So if you got a starter who's doing ok but is showing signs of being gotten to, you don't have to wait to see if it's going to actually happen, you can be preemptive with it, stop a rally before it has a chance to even start.And all the Royals pitchers, starters and relievers, seem to be really, really good about pitching to the situation at hand, and to the defensive alignment set up for it. That's a different type of pitching model that the pure power model, but if you can pitch to contact and the contact goes to your defensive alignment, hey, this way there be wins.Yes, exactly. Moore specifically sought out those who pitch to contact because of the huge dimensions of Kauffman Stadium, and the outstanding defense behind them. That's why you'll never see great FIP numbers for most of our pitchers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 The '69 Orioles were by any standard one of the all-time great teams - and they lost the World Series.If you don't win it all you're not and they didn't. If you want to say the Orioles from 69 to 71 were a great team, I suppose I have no issue with that. To borrow from another sport, the Bills went to four consecutive SBs but because they failed to win one they are not considered a great team. I realize it's all a little subjective. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Dolan Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 If the pundits and experts don't give them the respect you think they deserve, that's their issue, not mine. I think we all knew they were good and they demonstrated it throughout the season. They are good, a very good team but before we start calling them a great team let's see them first win this one and then do it again. When I think of recent great teams, the late 90s Yankees and the Red Sox of 2004 and 2007 come to mind. I don't even include the Giants there although they are or had very good teams. If it was me I wouldn't worry about what others think. In fact, during this year's playoffs I liked that the Mets were the underdogs. Really?When I look at teams like that I see big market, deep pocket teams that grossly overpaid mercenaries that other teams had developed for years. Just so they could have their own little All Star teams. What the Royals have done has been extraordinary. And yes, they are a great team. They don't have to beat the Mets two more times to prove that. That's kind of a silly "oh yeah! Bet you can't do it again!" argument. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSngry Posted October 29, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 I'm not one to look at greatness just in terms of "final championship", I'm just not. Too much goes into just being able to get there that to value final outcome instead of (as opposed to in addition to) overall consistency and level performance. This is where sports, or life in general, gets too Wall Street-y for me to feel really comfortable with/about. "Win or go home", like if you got a really spectacular place to go home to, you should be ashamed about doing so. Not buying into that one, no sir.Those Bills teams, perfect example - not great because no SB wins, yet going to 4 in a row? I can't/won't say that. I will say that they must have been some mathematically challenged motherfuckers to not let the odds come to them , but that's math, not greatness. How is winning four consecutive AFC championships something that a non-great team could even hope to aspire to? Not fully realized, maybe, but is greatness a question of what your final outcome is, or is it a question of where you were in order to be faced with any particular final outcome?Vocabulary determining values...slippery slope...team not winning it all = not great team potentially grows into not raising high-perfomance children = not great parents. and so forth. Gotta watch how that line of thought develops and infiltrates into general society.Beware of "great", it's not the same as great. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Dolan Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Dan Marino never won a Superbowl. I guess that means he wasn't a great quarterback. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 I can't speak for what the Yankees or other like teams may do because the Mets don't follow that approach. So you're saying that if somehow the Mets come back and win this series the Royals are a great team? Seriously? If they win this year, which they should, that's a great achievement. Two WS appearances and one championship. I consider the 86 Mets a very good team but because they didn't do it again (should have, but that's another story) they were just a very good team. These are just my opinions as a fan and if you disagree, that's no problem. We're just having an exchange of views. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSngry Posted October 29, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Or put another way - winning a championship is one particular outcome of one particular process. Greatness is more like...a collective accumulation of desirable traits and abilities within that process that exist outside of any one particular outcome.That's how I view it, anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Dan Marino never won a Superbowl. I guess that means he wasn't a great quarterback. great is different for individual players vs teams. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Dolan Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Yes. Seriously. And here are two excellent articles that help sum up why:http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-royals-are-basically-the-best-contact-team-ever/http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/13173708/the-kansas-city-royals-defense-just-good-historically-elite Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul secor Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Dan Marino never won a Superbowl. I guess that means he wasn't a great quarterback. I hate it when people say (name your quarterback) never won a Superbowl. (I realize you didn't say that, Scott.) Teams win championships - one player doesn't. In the same way, when someone says a baseball manager/football coach/basketball coach won however many championships - no he didn't - he may have contributed, but his teams won them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Dolan Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Oh, I agree. Unfortunately that's how quarterbacks are judged, though. Think about the argument that Eli Manning is a Hall Of Fame QB because he has two Superbowl rings. (!!!!)The simple fact that is an actual argument is too absurd for words! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSngry Posted October 29, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 So you're saying that if somehow the Mets come back and win this series the Royals are a great team? Seriously? If they win this year, which they should, that's a great achievement. Two WS appearances and one championship. I consider the 86 Mets a very good team but because they didn't do it again (should have, but that's another story) they were just a very good team. These are just my opinions as a fan and if you disagree, that's no problem. We're just having an exchange of views. If that happens (and look, I'm not even about to say that it's unlikely yet unless/until Royals go up either 3-0 or 3-1), I would say that two great teams met and played a great World Series. One won four games, the other didn't.I mean, I see greatness everyday in real life, sometimes in flashes, sometimes in ongoing behavior. It gets devalued on the human level because there's no bigmoneydick around to either use it or abuse it or sell it. It's just people doing a thing as well as it can be done because A) they've got the skill, and B) they've got the self-motivation to do it that way. Turn that into "no, that's not really special, anybody could and should do that, that's a replaceable quantity", well...no it's not. human history pretty much indicates that it's not, and all the Bold New World Reshapiers Of Destiny ain't gonna make it so, tyr as they so energetically try.Baseball being the "everyday" sport that it is, I think it's fair to say that the Royals have a great team right now, and that the Mets have a great rotation right now. Cumulative performance speaks to that far better than does the "what have you done for me lately" thing. Again, that's too Wall Street-y for me...how many great companies have been run into the ground by the pursuit of GREAT RIGHT NOW?Also, remember - great and greatest are not the same thing. That's a whole 'nother game, but in order to be the greatest, do you not first have to be great?I'll tell you what word gets tossed around too casually in general conversation, not sports, just in general. "Genius" as noun. There are far more moments of genius than there are actual geniuses.Maybe we could make "great" a verb, to cover it being an act as well as an ultimate condition. "Hey those Buffalo Bills really greated those four years, Too bad they couldn't great the Super Bowls even once".It's your language, use it or lose it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSngry Posted October 29, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Oh yeah, been meaning to ask this - who's the guy always in the Marlins shirt? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Dolan Posted October 29, 2015 Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 http://www.nj.com/mets/index.ssf/2015/10/unraveling_the_mystery_of_marlins_man_the_fan_who.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSngry Posted October 29, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 29, 2015 Wow, that's nuts!Spotting "characters" has gotten a lot easier with hi-def...a few years ago, it was the gorgeous Brewers lady, Front Row Amy, remember her? Kept a scorecard every game, full legit! Ended up feeling bad for her, apparently she was a normal wife and mother who just dug the Brewers, and didn't really plan for what national television "exposure" would do..Looks like she's adjusted well enough though!http://www.frontrowamy.com/#home Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 This is a question for Jim as moderator but a couple of days ago I was going to quote Scott in one of my responses (to be posted from my PC) and then had to do something else (like work!). When I went back, I couldn't get rid of the quote box so I've had to post responses from my phone. Anyway someone can help? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hot Ptah Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 (edited) KC Royals in 6 gamesLack of soda and perhaps too much candy corn has obviously turned your brain into mush. That's right, the Royals will win in four games, not six. So you're saying that if somehow the Mets come back and win this series the Royals are a great team? Seriously? If they win this year, which they should, that's a great achievement. Two WS appearances and one championship. I consider the 86 Mets a very good team but because they didn't do it again (should have, but that's another story) they were just a very good team. These are just my opinions as a fan and if you disagree, that's no problem. We're just having an exchange of views.If that happens (and look, I'm not even about to say that it's unlikely yet unless/until Royals go up either 3-0 or 3-1), I would say that two great teams met and played a great World Series. One won four games, the other didn't.I mean, I see greatness everyday in real life, sometimes in flashes, sometimes in ongoing behavior. It gets devalued on the human level because there's no bigmoneydick around to either use it or abuse it or sell it. It's just people doing a thing as well as it can be done because A) they've got the skill, and B) they've got the self-motivation to do it that way. Turn that into "no, that's not really special, anybody could and should do that, that's a replaceable quantity", well...no it's not. human history pretty much indicates that it's not, and all the Bold New World Reshapiers Of Destiny ain't gonna make it so, tyr as they so energetically try.Baseball being the "everyday" sport that it is, I think it's fair to say that the Royals have a great team right now, and that the Mets have a great rotation right now. Cumulative performance speaks to that far better than does the "what have you done for me lately" thing. Again, that's too Wall Street-y for me...how many great companies have been run into the ground by the pursuit of GREAT RIGHT NOW?Also, remember - great and greatest are not the same thing. That's a whole 'nother game, but in order to be the greatest, do you not first have to be great?I'll tell you what word gets tossed around too casually in general conversation, not sports, just in general. "Genius" as noun. There are far more moments of genius than there are actual geniuses.Maybe we could make "great" a verb, to cover it being an act as well as an ultimate condition. "Hey those Buffalo Bills really greated those four years, Too bad they couldn't great the Super Bowls even once".It's your language, use it or lose it! I've been watching baseball for 51 years, and have seen a lot of Royals games the past two years. The Royals are a great team. There is no need to analyze the meaning of the word great. By any definition, the Royals are a great team. Edited October 30, 2015 by Hot Ptah Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
catesta Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 That's right, the Royals will win in four games, not six. We'll see. Saying KC will win the next two in NY seems a bit cocky but if you're right I'll eat an entire bag of candy corn. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JSngry Posted October 30, 2015 Author Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 But...you'd do that anyway, right? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
catesta Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 Nah, I've never been a fan of the candy corn, at least not int he last 40 years. Oh sure, I did the put them on the teeth routine for a chuckle but that's it.On a side note. Yesterday some of my guys and the office staff did a cookout for my birthday. One of the guys brought an industrial size piñata, when we finally busted the thing open it was filled with candy predominately from Mexico (duh). Little tiny bubble gum, tootsie rolls etc. There was some real interesting candy in there though that I've never had. A lollipop that comes with a packet of hot candy powder was the standout. No candy corn though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 (edited) I've been watching it 53 years (got you by two ) and greatness (whether great or not) is probably best not decided in the moment but for history to judge. Let the Royals first win it before we start conferring them a royal status.If they win it in four, I will be the first to offer congratulations to Scott as I'm sure he will be on Cloud 9. However, I don't think it's going to happen. Hope it goes back to KC. I will agree that if the Mets don't win tonight, the Royals will probably win in 4 and we can start planning for next year and, hopefully, a return trip.***This was in today's New York Times: The Mets, the Royals and Charlie Parker, Linked by Autumn in New York Edited October 30, 2015 by Brad Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Dolan Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 So the previous links I posted showed you nothing? You know, the ones that had headlines referring to the Royals as an "historically elite" defense, or "basically the best contact hitting team ever"? And backed up those headline with actual stats? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 Didn't look at them. If I get a chance I'll read them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Dolan Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 Don't bother. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad Posted October 30, 2015 Report Share Posted October 30, 2015 (edited) I gave them a glance. Of course, you will post articles supporting your case. I leave those things to history. Edited October 30, 2015 by Brad Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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