General 2022 MLB Postseason Thread

v. sad

I know it’s kind of passé to complain about the astros cheating but maybe that penalty from a few years ago wasn’t harsh enough

I can't even remember what their penalty was...monetary, I assume, or did they lose draft picks?

i love christian vasquez so much. that throwout was magnificent, pin-perfect. and with his ribbies this feels like his game as much as javier’s, who has been a pleasure to watch. i feel like it’s unusual days to see a pitcher just get guys out over and over again with his fastball - and while he throws it hard it’s not like he’s throwing 99

As someone who had both Javier and Cole on his fantasy team, I can attest to Javier being a pleasure to watch and also Cole being an inconsistent dope.

i like cole -- and props for absolutely hating trevor bauer first -- but i liked him better when he wasn't a yankee

xp

As a result, Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow and field manager A. J. Hinch were suspended for the entire 2020 season for failing to prevent the rule violations. The Astros were fined the maximum allowable $5 million and forfeited their first- and second-round picks in the 2020 and 2021 drafts. No players were punished because they had been given immunity by MLB in exchange for their cooperation.[1] The Astros subsequently fired both Luhnow and Hinch on the day their suspensions were announced.[2] MLB's investigation also determined that Boston Red Sox manager Alex Cora helped mastermind the Astros' sign stealing while serving as Hinch's bench coach in 2017. The Red Sox and Cora mutually parted ways the following day and MLB suspended him through the 2020 postseason, although the Red Sox rehired Cora after his suspension ended. Carlos Beltrán was the only Astros player from 2017 who was specifically named in the report; he had been hired to manage the New York Mets in November 2019 but parted ways with the team after the results of MLB's investigation were announced.

biggest consequence related to on-field performance is losing the first and second round picks for 2 straight years. that is a significant blow, i guess, but it's also one that by definition doesn't damage the MLB club for at least a few years into the future. and...i guess i get that? one could argue that, as a penalty, you also wouldn't want to impose a penalize that would significantly damage the astros team in the immediately following year, because then what do you have in august? a team that should have been good that sucks and low attendance, low revenue etc etc. i don't know.

as wikipedia mentions, beltran was the only player named, and conveniently he was 40 years old and retiring anyway. maybe one approach mlb could have went with was penalizing other players a bit more, or at all

Dusty Baker, Olympic toothpick gymnast

Are the Yankees losing in 2022 cos the Astros stole signs 4 years ago? That’s one for my thread.

the yankees are losing because their fans aren't rooting hard enough

To me, that seems reasonably harsh (the draft picks especially) at a team level. They could have been harsher with individual players, but at least a couple--Altuve and Correa--will possibly pay the penalty down the road of not getting into the HOF.

Padres off to a great start

Well fuck, this is going to be a good game

has to be some sort of record for both starters combining for two outs

Yeah, really. Don't remember seeing a playoff first inning like that before. What can you say, baseball

today's yankees lineup in this series. i mean barrison hader can only do so much

https://i.imgur.com/IkAp9pI.jpeg

This game is nuts

Great Philly crowd.

Philly doin a lot of cool things out there

seriously what the fuck is going on with these ads???

KYLE SCHWARBER CAN'T STOP HITTING HOMERS 💪

(via @MLB)pic.twitter.com/Sr4NiX6Ec4

— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) October 23, 2022

It was all set up for the Padres, score four in the first and took the crowd out of it.

apparently this ties the largest comeback in postseason history which doesn't seem right to say given it was 4-3 after 1

maybe one approach mlb could have went with was penalizing other players a bit more, or at all

That’s really interesting. I didn’t know that.
The only guy going unpunished I’m annoyed about is Altuve, since it sounds like he really pushed the whole thing further than anyone else with the, if you believe it, electronic buzzer, allegedly, under his shirt.

just fwiw the astros cheating scandal had nothing to do with the yankees managing three hits in their home ballpark tonight

I’m sorry I brought it up

Are the Astros even going to lose a game in the post season?

they say in the postseason variance swamps everything but i’m not sure it can swamp this astros pitching staff

No players other than Beltran were named in the report, but it's impossible to imagine that Altuve (and every other Astros' hitter) wasn't a fully active participant. They are all equally guilty IMO.

Cora and Hinch are managing again, the Astros franchise does nothing but win (albeit not another WS, at least not yet), but Beltran lost his managing job and probably won't get another chance, he paid the biggest price for the scandal.

OTOH, I find it hard to get too worked up over sign stealing, for years the Jays were known as the sign stealing team (example: https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/astros-cristian-javier-stymies-yankees-again-holds-bombers-to-one-hit-in-alcs-game-3/), much like the Astros, it's the kind of thing that gets brushed off a lot of the time when a team starts winning.

The Astros paid a heavy penalty in draft picks, but it's not like it gutted the franchise. That said, a lot of teams have talent on paper and still underachieve and don't have to deal with the biggest MLB cheating scandal in decades, I think Dusty absolutely deserves credit for righting the ship.

Sorry, the link above should be this: https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/blue-jays-stealing-signs-one-royal-says-they-got-a-guy-in-center-field/.

And there were plenty of reports about the Jays' "man in white" and other supposed sign stealing schemes over the years.

has any team cleaned house of their manager and gm after reaching a league championship series?

asking for a friend

Theres a transaction embargo until after the WS so not officially

I think it’s been said before, but Yanks have felt very one-dimensional (home run or bust) the past month or so, and all the Judge theatrics kind of overshadowed how poorly the rest of the team has been hitting.

Definitely true of the Yankees, but didn't they say yesterday that almost all the Astros post-season runs have come via the home run too?

That seems true too, especially the clutch home runs. I wonder what percentage of at bats have been the three true outcomes this postseason.

Checked the Astros:

vs. Mariners - 10/13 runs via HR
vs. Yankees - 8/12 runs via HR

Last night was the first time most of their runs (3/5) came without a HR.

it’s been pretty conclusively demonstrated that homers are what tend to win games these days.

they say in the postseason variance swamps everything but i’m not sure it can swamp this astros pitching staff

yeah. something about the postseason - an error, a bobble, a bad read, and suddenly you get a little bit of the stink of death on you

both of those homers were crushed

Great Philly crowd.

― sometimes you have to drink to kill the paranoia (PBKR), Saturday, October 22, 2022 10:04 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Looks like I missed one hell of a game.

Would not have given up an out there

Would not have given up an out there

Yeap, cost them

Well maybe the Phillies can win one game in the World Series.

not sure who was on the bench, but someone should have hit (and not bunted) for grisham

Glad I have no horse in this race.

Agree, mookieproof

The Phillies have a puncher's chance against the Astros, their offense is doing everything right and they have three good to great starting pitchers. This run reminds me of tge Nationals in 2019.

Dave Dombrowski has taken four teams to the WS as a GM (could have been five with the Expos), is that a record?