Ben Lindbergh and Jeff Sullivan banter about Yellowstone-explosion sensationalism and discuss the improbability of the Cubs’ 277-minute NLDS Game 5 victory over the Nationals, the game’s umpiring oddities and errors, the Nationals’ and Cubs’ reputations and legacies in the wake of the series, and what to do about instant replay and slides.
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Baseball can be really weird, but the game has rarely facilitated action more unusual than the sort that occurred in the fifth inning of Game 5 on Thursday night between the Nationals and Cubs.
I have never seen a sequence like this… probably because I'm guessing literally no one has ever seen a sequence like this, ever. pic.twitter.com/rlkEteveUk
— Mike Petriello (@mike_petriello) October 13, 2017
The inning in question produced a series of four events that had never happened consecutively in the game’s recorded history, covering some 2.3 million half-innings.
None of the 2.73m half innings in our db have even had all 4 of these events. 22 w/ 3. Only 5 games had all 4.https://t.co/ntifpJIb6n
— Baseball Reference (@baseball_ref) October 13, 2017
Craig Edwards dove into a potentially overlooked batter-interference call that would have stopped the Nationals’ hemorrhaging in the inning, held the deficit at one, and perhaps have allowed the team to keep playing this October.
In a win-or-go-home game that finishes 9-8, there are going to be a lot of important moments. Big plays made or not made by players. Important decisions made or not made by managers. Huge calls made or not made by umpires. We never want to focus on the umpires if at all possible because it takes away from the more important and more entertaining aspects of the game. At some point, however, it’s impossible to omit them from the conversation.
In the top of the fifth inning of last night’s deciding Division Series game between the Cubs and Nationals, the visiting team had runners on first and second base. With two outs and an 0-2 count, Max Scherzer threw Javy Baez a pitch in the dirt. Baez swung and missed for strike three, but the ball got past Matt Wieters, allowing Baez to run to first base. During Baez’s backswing, his bat made contact with Wieters’ helmet.
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: Hello friends
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| 9:05 |
: Welcome to Friday baseball chat
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| 9:05 |
: Technically my second Friday baseball chat of this Friday, for you east coasters
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: Hello, friend!
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| 9:05 |
: Hello friend
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| 9:06 |
: Jeff, thanks for chatting last night and being back again now. It was a really tough loss for Washington, but, as in every elimination game, it isn’t one play that ends a season. That said, I think there are multiple issues surrounding instant replay that the league will have to address after last night’s game. Is baseball still a game of inches? Or, with instant replay, is it now a game of millimeters?
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The Cleveland Indians’ season concluded on Wednesday night. The team that had thrilled fans with their September winning streak and entered the postseason as the oddsmakers’ favorite to win the World Series was eliminated by a very good New York Yankees team. You can argue how fair it it that the Indians, by virtue of being the best team in the American League this year, had to face the Wild Card-winning Yankees, perhaps the second-best team in the the American League. In any event, that’s the way the playoffs are set up: the Yankees won and the blame game can begin.
People will look to the young star hitters Jose Ramirez and Francisco Lindor, who combined to reach base at a .227 clip, strike out 13 times, and record just a single extra-base hit over the five games. Others will (foolishly) question the Indians’ mental fortitude after dropping six consecutive potential series-clinching games in the past two years. And yes, many will place blame at the feet of Indians ace Corey Kluber, who was as rough in this year’s playoffs as he was brilliant in last year’s.
Back when he was a minor leaguer, Didi Gregorius hit a combined total of 26 home runs. Gregorius is now the regular shortstop for the Yankees, who are a major-league franchise, and last week, he hit his 26th home run of this year alone, off of Ervin Santana. In Game 5 of the ALDS, Gregorius hit home run number 27, off of Corey Kluber. Two innings later, he hit home run number 28, also off of Kluber. Gregorius hits for power now, and while this feels like a fairly sudden development, it hasn’t been so sudden that Gregorius hasn’t been able to perfect the subtle bat flip. By now, Gregorius has hit enough home runs that he knows what they feel like right away.
In one of the craziest, weirdest, most bizarre baseball games anyone has ever seen, the Cubs beat the Nationals 9-8 tonight, advancing to the NLCS. The game had everything you could think of and then some: catcher’s interference, RBI strikeouts that maybe shouldn’t have counted, Max Scherzer hitting a batter to force in a run, and Michael Taylor hitting a bomb on a pitch at his eyes. But, unfortunately, the lasting memory of this game might just be that MLB’s replay rule on slides into a base still sucks.
Episode 775
All of baseball’s division series are complete or nearly complete. Managing editor Dave Cameron discusses them exclusively or nearly exclusively.
Don’t hesitate to direct pod-related correspondence to @cistulli on Twitter.
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Audio after the jump. (Approximately 43 min play time.)
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CLEVELAND — In a spartan, fluorescent-lit conference room adjacent to the home clubhouse of Progressive Field sat Corey Kluber early this morning. The night before, he’d started — and lost — Game 5 of the ALDS to the Yankees. It was clear as Kluber pitched on Wednesday that something wasn’t right. It hadn’t been right in his Game 2 start on Friday, either.
Surrounded by a swelled press corps containing local and national reporters, he was asked what was wrong, what had gone wrong. Inevitably, the topic of his health arose. Despite producing a Cy Young-caliber season, Kluber had also visited the DL from May 2 to June 1 with a back strain.
By the end of the series against New York, Kluber had allowed nine earned runs and 13 baserunners — including four home runs — in 6.1 innings over two starts. Two of the home runs he’d conceded were off his curveball. He’d allowed only two homers off the curve all season, a sample of 811 pitches.
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: Hello friends |
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: Welcome to NLDS Game 5 Live Blog |
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: Currently just trying to get my stream to actually work, so in the meantime, let’s entertain ourselves with some polls! |
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: Who do you think is going to win?
Cubs (70.2% | 165 votes)
Nationals (29.7% | 70 votes)
Total Votes: 235
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| 5:09 |
: Who do you actually want to win?
Cubs (38.8% | 96 votes)
Nationals (61.1% | 151 votes)
Total Votes: 247
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| 5:11 |
: Well right now I’m being frustrated by my own technology so I hope you’re having fun! |
