Dodgers or Brewers?

[mvp 78]

I’m not a troll for saying the Astros lost the series. The Sox also won it. But here’s the logic behind the Astros “losing” the series. They entered confident. They beat Sale and we’re heading into a cold weather matchup with Price after having won back home field. They watch their 1a in their rotation get racked and their pen not being able to keep it close. From then on, the Sox scored early the rest of the way and they were playing catch-up. They looked defeated from the start of game 3 on.

 

Now, this Astros team should come back for one more run. They should be healthier with Altuve and Correa getting procedures in the offseason, but the Sox punched the Astros in the mouth and the Astros didn’t recover

 

So the Sox BEAT the Astros then. If the Sox did the punching you can't say the Stros "lost it".

[TylerD]

In my opinion the Dodgers are just much better than the Brewers. Dodgers starting rotation all the way to their shut down closer is scary for any team to face. They will definitely give us a hell of a series. I haven't followed the Brewers much so I don't know much about them other than they got hot at the right time. Which can be dangerous..... I've seen way too many times a sleeper team get hot near the end of the season and go on a crazy run whether it's NHL, NFL, NBA or baseball. Both would be a tough series but I think the Dodgers would give us more fits so bring on the Dodgers. To be the best you have to beat the best!

[jacksonianmarch]

So the Sox BEAT the Astros then. If the Sox did the punching you can't say the Stros "lost it".

 

Like I said, the sox won, the stros lost. I think the Astros gave up once they found out they could bleed

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

Wade Miley, a SOX fans' favorite, is starting again for the Brewers. Is he the only starter they have?

[jung]

Bregman was inches away from a game winning double in Game 4. Price was brilliant in Game 5 and that's baseball for you.

 

I did not know the NL switched to aluminum bats.

 

That was not a very hard hit ball. But OK, lets say that drops. Bregs would have been 1-9 from lead off. Very impressive numbers. AJ should have left Bregs where he was and moved Correa and Gonzalez up and Gurriel down. He got himself halfway there for Game 5. Too late!

 

They didn't switch to aluminum bats in the NL. They just don't play baseball over there any longer. Seems like the pitcher occupying a spot in the batting order is actually now coming home to roost for the NL given the contemporary rules instituted in baseball combined with the advanced shift. What, we didn't think this stuff was going to effect the game? Now that would have been naive.

 

Bat handlers are in very short supply. Nobody bunts. Even pitchers don't move runners over with productive outs. So, the NL teams are trying to bang before they get to the pitcher's spot. What a shocker that is! The last vestige of moving runners and opposite field hitting is in the AL with teams like Boston and Houston providing the best examples.

Edited October 19, 2018 by jung

[notin]

That was not a very hard hit ball. But OK, lets say that drops. Bregs would have been 1-9 from lead off. Very impressive numbers. AJ should have left Bregs where he was and moved Correa and Gonzalez up and Gurriel down. He got himself halfway there for Game 5. Too late!

 

And it’s just as easy to point out Betts was just inches away from a bases clearing double that would have made Bregman’s at-bat a moot point...

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

Like I said, the sox won, the stros lost. I think the Astros gave up once they found out they could bleed

 

That's BS! The Astros never gave up. There is absolutely nothing you can point at to make your statement valid. The SOX were the better team against the Yankems and the Astros. I realize you're a Yankem fan, but if you have to post here, please refrain from posting this "they gave up" s***.

[notin]

Wade Miley, a SOX fans' favorite, is starting again for the Brewers. Is he the only starter they have?

 

If they keep pulling him after one hitter, he actually could start every game for them...

[jacksonianmarch]

Agree completely for this year

[jung]

Wade Miley, a SOX fans' favorite, is starting again for the Brewers. Is he the only starter they have?

 

Starter?? They have turned him into an ignition switch.

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

Starter?? They have turned him into an ignition switch.

 

Good one! I hope the Dodgers/Brewers go 7. Let them both wear out their BP's.

[d-money]

In my opinion the Dodgers are just much better than the Brewers. Dodgers starting rotation all the way to their shut down closer is scary for any team to face. They will definitely give us a hell of a series. I haven't followed the Brewers much so I don't know much about them other than they got hot at the right time. Which can be dangerous..... I've seen way too many times a sleeper team get hot near the end of the season and go on a crazy run whether it's NHL, NFL, NBA or baseball. Both would be a tough series but I think the Dodgers would give us more fits so bring on the Dodgers. To be the best you have to beat the best!

 

The dodgers have young pitchers after kershaw and hill. Gonna have to hit those lefties.

[Bellhorn04]

Like I said, the sox won, the stros lost. I think the Astros gave up once they found out they could bleed

 

They didn't give up, man. Beni doesn't catch that ball it would have been a 2-2 series and we're playing in Fenway tomorrow.

[YastrzemskI]

Starter?? They have turned him into an ignition switch.

 

You know, I thought that I had seen it all in baseball. But then Counsell pulls his starter in a

post season game after five pitches/one batter. Despite that, the game was tight

until the 7th frame.

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

They didn't give up, man. Beni doesn't catch that ball it would have been a 2-2 series and we're playing in Fenway tomorrow.

 

The Reddick catch and the Beni catch cancelled each other out.

[sk7326]

I’m not a troll for saying the Astros lost the series. The Sox also won it. But here’s the logic behind the Astros “losing” the series. They entered confident. They beat Sale and we’re heading into a cold weather matchup with Price after having won back home field. They watch their 1a in their rotation get racked and their pen not being able to keep it close. From then on, the Sox scored early the rest of the way and they were playing catch-up. They looked defeated from the start of game 3 on.

 

Now, this Astros team should come back for one more run. They should be healthier with Altuve and Correa getting procedures in the offseason, but the Sox punched the Astros in the mouth and the Astros didn’t recover

 

The Astros were so defeated that both game 3 and 4 were on the table in the 8th inning at worst.

[sk7326]

That was not a very hard hit ball. But OK, lets say that drops. Bregs would have been 1-9 from lead off. Very impressive numbers. AJ should have left Bregs where he was and moved Correa and Gonzalez up and Gurriel down. He got himself halfway there for Game 5. Too late!

 

They didn't switch to aluminum bats in the NL. They just don't play baseball over there any longer. Seems like the pitcher occupying a spot in the batting order is actually now coming home to roost for the NL given the contemporary rules instituted in baseball combined with the advanced shift. What, we didn't think this stuff was going to effect the game? Now that would have been naive.

 

Bat handlers are in very short supply. Nobody bunts. Even pitchers don't move runners over with productive outs. So, the NL teams are trying to bang before they get to the pitcher's spot. What a shocker that is! The last vestige of moving runners and opposite field hitting is in the AL with teams like Boston and Houston providing the best examples.

 

Bregman went 1 for 9 in the 2 games at leadoff. Bregman went 2 for 15 in the 5 game. Aside from the teeny tiny sample size problem - there is much more evidence that (gasp!) the Red Sox pitched him well than anything else.

 

OUTS ARE BAD ... there was a reason Boston and Houston were both near the bottom in sacrifice hits. Productive outs reduce your expected runs in almost every situation. The game will always change - that's fine.

[TylerD]

The dodgers have young pitchers after kershaw and hill. Gonna have to hit those lefties.

 

Agreed, they have been producing all year though. And they can swing the bats as good as anyone. They were even ahead of Houston in the regular season offensively. The Dodgers are such a sleeper team because record wise there was 6 teams better than the Dodgers in the playoffs. But this team is still top 5 in pitching, and top 5 offensively. They also had the best record last year and took Houston to game 7 in The World Series. This series won't be easy by any means..... If that is who we indeed get. If it's the Brewers then I dunno... lol. I honestly haven't followed them at all.

[jung]

Bregman went 1 for 9 in the 2 games at leadoff. Bregman went 2 for 15 in the 5 game. Aside from the teeny tiny sample size problem - there is much more evidence that (gasp!) the Red Sox pitched him well than anything else.

 

OUTS ARE BAD ... there was a reason Boston and Houston were both near the bottom in sacrifice hits. Productive outs reduce your expected runs in almost every situation. The game will always change - that's fine.

 

Bregman's OPS batting lead off for the 12 regular season games he played there was .741. His OPS batting from the 3 hole was 1.008. But you go ahead and live with the fantasy that it was a good idea to move him to lead off. THE MOVE was bringing Correa and probably Gonzalez up in the order behind him and moving Gurriel down, not moving Bregs to lead off. His problem was that the Sox would not pitch to Bregs, not that they needed a lead off hitter. It was a panic move and it didn't work. You only have so many chances in a 7 game series to make something happen.

 

You could say that AJ realized his team was getting thrashed. You could say that he realized that his team was not even executing their standard offensive process. If you want to credit him with that, be my guest. He made the wrong move. It clearly did not help. So it is hard to even make the suggestion that keeping Bregs at 3 and moving Correa and Gonzalez up to protect him was not the better move. But you go ahead. You haven't made your argument yet. You are welcome to keep trying.

[moonslav59]

They didn't give up, man. Beni doesn't catch that ball it would have been a 2-2 series and we're playing in Fenway tomorrow.

 

You're assuming Beni doesn't catch the ball, AND it gets by him far enough away to allow 3 runs to score.

[jung]

They didn't give up, man. Beni doesn't catch that ball it would have been a 2-2 series and we're playing in Fenway tomorrow.

 

Correct...however I was never of the doom and gloom crowd convinced that if the Astros won game 5 making it 3-2 Boston coming back to Fenway that there was some magical momentum element that was just going to do the Sox in. I would have been concerned about Sale in game 6 but with Eo going in 7 and two games in our park to win it all, I would have taken that any day. Frankly given how the two teams were playing I think the chances of the Astros winning three straight games, two of them in our park was remote at best regardless of having Cole on tap.

 

Altuve gimping around given their other injuries was likely the last straw. The only shot AJ had was to get Bregs going and he made the wrong move if that was his intention.

[Bellhorn04]

You're assuming Beni doesn't catch the ball, AND it gets by him far enough away to allow 3 runs to score.

 

I was just arguing against Jackso's statement that the Astros gave up.

[illinoisredsox]

You're assuming Beni doesn't catch the ball, AND it gets by him far enough away to allow 3 runs to score.

 

I would assume that. Beni is coming full bore in, JBJ isn't going ot get there to back him up all that quickly and Kemp, a very fast guy, was on first.

[Spudboy]

I have wanted the Brewers all along because they have not been good enough for a long time and I think it would be a nice story for them to be in the WS. Plus I like Travis Shaw.

 

Also, I hate LA and all it's teams.

 

Obviously LA in the series makes more money for MLB so I would like it to be the Brewers so as to stick it in MLB's eye.

[FredLynn]

I’m not a troll for saying the Astros lost the series. The Sox also won it. But here’s the logic behind the Astros “losing” the series. They entered confident. They beat Sale and we’re heading into a cold weather matchup with Price after having won back home field. They watch their 1a in their rotation get racked and their pen not being able to keep it close. From then on, the Sox scored early the rest of the way and they were playing catch-up. They looked defeated from the start of game 3 on.

 

Now, this Astros team should come back for one more run. They should be healthier with Altuve and Correa getting procedures in the offseason, but the Sox punched the Astros in the mouth and the Astros didn’t recover

 

After the first game against the Astros the Sox beat the snot out of their opponent. Its an incredible copout to say that the Astros gave up; they simply lost to a much better team-just like the Yankees. We played one bad game and then beat the snot out of an inferior team, on their home field no less. This team is a juggernaut. Its no accident that they won 108 games and beat your team as well as the defending champs. They did that not because their opponents "gave up" (what a joke), but because we played much better baseball. Deal with it.

[Spudboy]

It's baseball - the opponent will be tough. I think we've learned by now that any grand pronouncements of sweep or whatever is based entirely on expertise that gets pulled out of one's butt.

 

f***in' burn!!!!!!

[Nick]

I would assume that. Beni is coming full bore in, JBJ isn't going ot get there to back him up all that quickly and Kemp, a very fast guy, was on first.

 

Also, it was full count, runner on 1st was breaking with the pitch. He would have scored easily.

[TylerD]

After the first game against the Astros the Sox beat the snot out of their opponent. Its an incredible copout to say that the Astros gave up; they simply lost to a much better team-just like the Yankees. We played one bad game and then beat the snot out of an inferior team, on their home field no less. This team is a juggernaut. Its no accident that they won 108 games and beat your team as well as the defending champs. They did that not because their opponents "gave up" (what a joke), but because we played much better baseball. Deal with it.

 

Agreed!

 

Although Yankees series had me much more worried. Kimbrel was a heartbeat away from giving that game away and the Yankees tying that series up. I was nervous throughout that entire series till the end. Houston believe it or not I really wasn't...... Even though there was a couple very close games I was never as stressed as I was against the Yankees. On paper we are 7-2 in the playoffs which is absolutely dominating fashion against the likes of the Yankees and Astros. But the Yankees made that series extremely close. Closer than meets the eye.

[FredLynn]

Agreed!

 

Although Yankees series had me much more worried. Kimbrel was a heartbeat away from giving that game away and the Yankees tying that series up. I was nervous throughout that entire series till the end. Houston believe it or not I really wasn't...... Even though there was a couple very close games I was never as stressed as I was against the Yankees. On paper we are 7-2 in the playoffs which is absolutely dominating fashion against the likes of the Yankees and Astros. But the Yankees made that series extremely close. Closer than meets the eye.

 

Perhaps some of the nervousness comes from the possibility that we might have lost to the Yankees. That I could not have lived with. Losing to the Astros would have been disappointing, for sure, but I could live with that. But losing to Jacko's team and having to live with that all winter is an entirely different matter.

[Kimmi]

After this ohh so sweet win tonight, who would you prefer the Red Sox to play against in the 2018 WORLD SERIES and why?

 

I think that the Brewers would give us more problems than the Dodgers. Obviously MLB is hoping for the Dodgers but they have been the most boring team to watch this post season. That is, unless you find Machado’s antics to be entertaining.

 

I don't really care who we play, though I've become an 'unfan' of the Dodgers due some of their players, mainly Machado. OTOH, I do like Roberts and Kershaw.

 

Either way, I'm just hoping that series goes 7 games.