Tuesday, October 12, 2004
NIGHT MOVES
Just a couple things before I sleep here...
-- Bill Bavasi says that the Mariners' are down to a "very short list" of managerial candidates. The only three names mentioned in Dave Andriesen's article are Jim Riggleman (ugh), Lee Elia, and John McLaren. None of the three claim to have been contacted by the Mariners. McLaren is "very, very interested" in the job.
-- Rookie Robert Swift is getting thrown around at the Sonics' training camp. From getting knocked to the floor by Vitaly Potapenko to getting a bloody nose from a Reggie Lewis elbow, Swift is apparently leaving an impression on coach McMillan (he likes the toughness) as other leave impressions on him. Well, Swift says he likes contact, and that's good considering the Sonics haven't really had a guy that likes to bang down low in a long time. I know Vin Baker sure as hell wasn't that guy. Sonic fan during Vin Baker era: "Vin Baker should drive to the basket more." Vin: [passes up open lane, pulls back for an 18-foot perimeter shot, goes home, eats, gets bombed]
-- Terreal Bierria "couldn't even sleep." Grant Wistrom, largely held at bay on Sunday by Orlando Pace, feels "sicken[ed]." Coach Holmgren didn't blow up on his players, and had to answer some of the media's questions about the late play-calling. Some KJR callers were ticked off, citing lack of preparedness after a bye week as the reason the Seahawks lost, which would be completely ignoring the first 50 or so minutes of the game, which were pretty impressive. The bottom line is that the players played 50 minutes instead of 60, and this Thiel article brings up a list of little things, that, if they had been executed or had gone the Seahawks' way, the game more than likely would have been over. I've run through the game log, and seconded what Mike Gastineau brought up today. Of the first 26 plays from scrimmage in the second half, the Seahawk offense was on the field for only four of those plays, getting one first down on a 41-yard run across midfield before the drive stalled with 7:06 to go in the 3rd quarter.
-- I've got to straighten out something John Levesque has said. In his article deriding the WNBA's playoff system (high seed gets games 2 and 3), he tries to use the Mariners' 1995 ALDS against the Yankees as an example. The point that I know he's trying to make is that this scenario should always be possible: the higher-seeded team could lose all their road games, and win all their home games, and never be behind in the series. This is why someone always complains when the NBA Finals are going on, because the 2-3-2 format is (or was, if it's since been replaced) used in the Finals, though not in the previous rounds (2-2-1-1-1). In another note, baseball has used the 2-3-2 format in seven-game series for as long as I can remember. In 2001, if the format was instead 2-2-1-1-1, Lou Piniella wouldn't have had to make his guarantee to bring the series back to Seattle for Game 6 because the Mariners would have come back to Seattle for Game 5. This would have been moot though because it still would have been Aaron Sele on the mound in the playoffs in an elimination game, instead of a certain young'un named Joel Pineiro.
Now that I've totally strayed from my point, Levesque says this...
Major League Baseball, for example, changed the format of its best-of-five League Division Series to give a fairer shake to the higher-ranked team. When LDS games were introduced in 1995, the team with the better record hosted the first two games, and the "lesser" team got to host each of the final three if a full five games were necessary.
In fairness to the New York Yankees, the game that "saved" baseball in Seattle, Game 5 of the 1995 American League Division Series, should have taken place at Yankee Stadium.
But this isn't really correct. The deciding game would have been in Seattle anyway because Seattle was the division winner, and New York was the wild card team (the Angels were out of the playoffs because the AL West winner had a worse record than the Yankees), and the Wild Card team never had the "home-field advantage," per se. If that series were held under the current format, the Mariners would have had games 1 and 2 at the Kingdome, had games 3 and 4 in the Bronx, and then hosted Game 5 at the Kingdome. It wouldn't have had quite the same lustre if the Mariners had blown a 2-0 series lead, or failed to win games at the Kingdome in the series. Let's just be glad that that's the way it was, and move on with it.
-- If a Phil Garner-managed team wins a World Series, I don't know what I'll do with myself. That said, Carlos Beltran is freakin' good. And congrats to Craig Biggio and Jeff Bagwell, finally winning their first postseason series and getting the monkey off their backs, all the while playing with heavy hearts due to the loss of ex-teammate Ken Caminiti, who was an Astro for all or part of ten seasons since 1987 (Biggio was a teammate for nine of those seasons, Bagwell for six). Off the wire after the game, Biggio said, "I think I felt his spirit out there," while Bagwell said, "I know he's smiling somewhere."
This is the part of the show where I sleep. Have a good Tuesday, everyone.
-- Bill Bavasi says that the Mariners' are down to a "very short list" of managerial candidates. The only three names mentioned in Dave Andriesen's article are Jim Riggleman (ugh), Lee Elia, and John McLaren. None of the three claim to have been contacted by the Mariners. McLaren is "very, very interested" in the job.
-- Rookie Robert Swift is getting thrown around at the Sonics' training camp. From getting knocked to the floor by Vitaly Potapenko to getting a bloody nose from a Reggie Lewis elbow, Swift is apparently leaving an impression on coach McMillan (he likes the toughness) as other leave impressions on him. Well, Swift says he likes contact, and that's good considering the Sonics haven't really had a guy that likes to bang down low in a long time. I know Vin Baker sure as hell wasn't that guy. Sonic fan during Vin Baker era: "Vin Baker should drive to the basket more." Vin: [passes up open lane, pulls back for an 18-foot perimeter shot, goes home, eats, gets bombed]
-- Terreal Bierria "couldn't even sleep." Grant Wistrom, largely held at bay on Sunday by Orlando Pace, feels "sicken[ed]." Coach Holmgren didn't blow up on his players, and had to answer some of the media's questions about the late play-calling. Some KJR callers were ticked off, citing lack of preparedness after a bye week as the reason the Seahawks lost, which would be completely ignoring the first 50 or so minutes of the game, which were pretty impressive. The bottom line is that the players played 50 minutes instead of 60, and this Thiel article brings up a list of little things, that, if they had been executed or had gone the Seahawks' way, the game more than likely would have been over. I've run through the game log, and seconded what Mike Gastineau brought up today. Of the first 26 plays from scrimmage in the second half, the Seahawk offense was on the field for only four of those plays, getting one first down on a 41-yard run across midfield before the drive stalled with 7:06 to go in the 3rd quarter.
-- I've got to straighten out something John Levesque has said. In his article deriding the WNBA's playoff system (high seed gets games 2 and 3), he tries to use the Mariners' 1995 ALDS against the Yankees as an example. The point that I know he's trying to make is that this scenario should always be possible: the higher-seeded team could lose all their road games, and win all their home games, and never be behind in the series. This is why someone always complains when the NBA Finals are going on, because the 2-3-2 format is (or was, if it's since been replaced) used in the Finals, though not in the previous rounds (2-2-1-1-1). In another note, baseball has used the 2-3-2 format in seven-game series for as long as I can remember. In 2001, if the format was instead 2-2-1-1-1, Lou Piniella wouldn't have had to make his guarantee to bring the series back to Seattle for Game 6 because the Mariners would have come back to Seattle for Game 5. This would have been moot though because it still would have been Aaron Sele on the mound in the playoffs in an elimination game, instead of a certain young'un named Joel Pineiro.
Now that I've totally strayed from my point, Levesque says this...
Major League Baseball, for example, changed the format of its best-of-five League Division Series to give a fairer shake to the higher-ranked team. When LDS games were introduced in 1995, the team with the better record hosted the first two games, and the "lesser" team got to host each of the final three if a full five games were necessary.
In fairness to the New York Yankees, the game that "saved" baseball in Seattle, Game 5 of the 1995 American League Division Series, should have taken place at Yankee Stadium.
But this isn't really correct. The deciding game would have been in Seattle anyway because Seattle was the division winner, and New York was the wild card team (the Angels were out of the playoffs because the AL West winner had a worse record than the Yankees), and the Wild Card team never had the "home-field advantage," per se. If that series were held under the current format, the Mariners would have had games 1 and 2 at the Kingdome, had games 3 and 4 in the Bronx, and then hosted Game 5 at the Kingdome. It wouldn't have had quite the same lustre if the Mariners had blown a 2-0 series lead, or failed to win games at the Kingdome in the series. Let's just be glad that that's the way it was, and move on with it.
-- If a Phil Garner-managed team wins a World Series, I don't know what I'll do with myself. That said, Carlos Beltran is freakin' good. And congrats to Craig Biggio and Jeff Bagwell, finally winning their first postseason series and getting the monkey off their backs, all the while playing with heavy hearts due to the loss of ex-teammate Ken Caminiti, who was an Astro for all or part of ten seasons since 1987 (Biggio was a teammate for nine of those seasons, Bagwell for six). Off the wire after the game, Biggio said, "I think I felt his spirit out there," while Bagwell said, "I know he's smiling somewhere."
This is the part of the show where I sleep. Have a good Tuesday, everyone.
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