Postseason Thread

KB21 said:
I really like this Royals team, and I really like how Dayton Moore has put this team together. It's a very balanced team. The line up has some pop in it with Hosmer, Moustakas, Morales, and Cain. They don't strike out much. This team had the fewest amount of strike outs of any AL team this year. The pitching staff had the 3rd best ERA in the AL.
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What I like about the team is the balance. They have 8 hitters and 3 pitchers with WAR of 1.5 or higher. And that doesn't include guys like Cueto and Zobrist they picked up at mid-season. That type of balance is a less risky way to construct a winning team than having a couple megastars and a bunch of scrubs. It is a well understood principle of diversification. Don't put all your eggs in one or two baskets. It allows you to survive disappointing performances/injuries (Infante, Guthrie, Vargas, Duffie). Of course, a career year from a key player (Cain) doesn't hurt. But the Royals would have been good without it.
 
nsacpi said:
What I like about the team is the balance. They have 8 hitters and 3 pitchers with WAR of 1.5 or higher. And that doesn't include guys like Cueto and Zobrist they picked up at mid-season. That type of balance is a less risky way to construct a winning team than having a couple megastars and a bunch of scrubs. It is a well understood principle of diversification. Don't put all your eggs in one or two baskets. It allows you to survive disappointing performances/injuries (Infante, Guthrie, Vargas, Duffie). Of course, a career year from a key player (Cain) doesn't hurt. But the Royals would have been good without it.
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To me, that team is built like the Braves teams during their impressive run of division championships and consistently putting itself into position for championships. Obviously, their pitching isn't as high level as Atlanta's starters were, but the strength of their pen cancels that out some.

This is the model that I believe the Braves are trying to get back to. There is still a lot of work to do, but hopefully, some of the prospects the Braves are getting will develop and realize the potential they have.
 
Predicting what players will have what kind of seasons is hard. And putting them all together and them gelling and having that type of chemistry is mainly luck. If it were that easy every team would be doing it. The Royals have sucked for a long time to finally get some guys together that have the type of chemistry they have.
 
KB21 said:
To me, that team is built like the Braves teams during their impressive run of division championships and consistently putting itself into position for championships. Obviously, their pitching isn't as high level as Atlanta's starters were, but the strength of their pen cancels that out some.

This is the model that I believe the Braves are trying to get back to. There is still a lot of work to do, but hopefully, some of the prospects the Braves are getting will develop and realize the potential they have.
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Just one thing to keep in mind is we don't have the #1 payroll in baseball anymore like we did for most of the streak.

Remember the Braves were the #2 bidder in the original 2000 A-Rod sweepstakes. There's just no way we're gonna be the high bidder on any elite free agent unless the team really wants someone like Price.

We're a mid to lower half payroll team now. Coppy is going to have to get really creative.
 
What's up with all of these Cubs and Mets players sporting these full turtle necks with masks? It's not that cold there, nearly 50 degrees.
 
nsacpi said:
What I like about the team is the balance. They have 8 hitters and 3 pitchers with WAR of 1.5 or higher. And that doesn't include guys like Cueto and Zobrist they picked up at mid-season. That type of balance is a less risky way to construct a winning team than having a couple megastars and a bunch of scrubs. It is a well understood principle of diversification. Don't put all your eggs in one or two baskets. It allows you to survive disappointing performances/injuries (Infante, Guthrie, Vargas, Duffie). Of course, a career year from a key player (Cain) doesn't hurt. But the Royals would have been good without it.
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Let's not forget to point out that nobody on the team had more than 22 homers in the regular season. The top 3 on the team were 21, 22 and 22. Two of those three were Kendrys Morales who had a surprising bounce back year (the type of player we should take a flyer on) and Salvador Perez who had a .700 OPS to go along with it. Just an argument against those who said power is everything and you must have power hitters to win in the playoffs. I guess it's helped that they have 9 homers in 7 Postseason games, your hitters have to hit in the playoffs to win.
 
nsacpi said:
What I like about the team is the balance. They have 8 hitters and 3 pitchers with WAR of 1.5 or higher. And that doesn't include guys like Cueto and Zobrist they picked up at mid-season. That type of balance is a less risky way to construct a winning team than having a couple megastars and a bunch of scrubs. It is a well understood principle of diversification. Don't put all your eggs in one or two baskets. It allows you to survive disappointing performances/injuries (Infante, Guthrie, Vargas, Duffie). Of course, a career year from a key player (Cain) doesn't hurt. But the Royals would have been good without it.
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It's how some of the recent Giant teams were built as well that won it all. And there is certainly some merit to that. It will be interesting to see what they try to do with Gordon and their other players when they start to hit FA.
 
NYCBrave said:
Let's not forget to point out that nobody on the team had more than 22 homers in the regular season. The top 3 on the team were 21, 22 and 22. Two of those three were Kendrys Morales who had a surprising bounce back year (the type of player we should take a flyer on) and Salvador Perez who had a .700 OPS to go along with it. Just an argument against those who said power is everything and you must have power hitters to win in the playoffs. I guess it's helped that they have 9 homers in 7 Postseason games, your hitters have to hit in the playoffs to win.
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Yea that's true regardless of the type of hitters you have.
 
The Don said:
Just one thing to keep in mind is we don't have the #1 payroll in baseball anymore like we did for most of the streak.

Remember the Braves were the #2 bidder in the original 2000 A-Rod sweepstakes. There's just no way we're gonna be the high bidder on any elite free agent unless the team really wants someone like Price.

We're a mid to lower half payroll team now. Coppy is going to have to get really creative.
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Basically if we're going to be successful, we're going to need to get high level contributions from our farm system until they get too expensive and then replace them with more talent from the farm. Not surprising we spent so much on hiring the right people in scouting this year.
 
Years in the Wilderness (ie seasons without a post-season appearance) is an interesting benchmark to keep in mind when assessing our own rebuild:

Pirates (21, 1992-2013)
Cubs (17, 1998-2015)
Royals ((29, 1985-2014)
Blue Jays (22, 1993-2015)
Mets (9, 2006-2015)

Each situation is a little different. It should be easier to get back in the playoffs for the big payroll teams, who have the option of adding guys like Lester to supplement their young core. It should be easier for teams who keep a foundational player like David Wright during their rebuilding period.

The Braves are a bit different for having a more extensive core (Freeman, Simmons, Teheran, Miller) at the major league level. I would say our period in the wilderness should be shorter than the above. But I wouldn't be surprised if it were 4 or 5 years.
 
nsacpi said:
Years in the Wilderness (ie seasons without a post-season appearance) is an interesting benchmark to keep in mind when assessing our own rebuild:

Pirates (21, 1992-2013)
Cubs (17, 1998-2015)
Royals ((29, 1985-2014)
Blue Jays (22, 1993-2015)
Mets (9, 2006-2015)

Each situation is a little different. It should be easier to get back in the playoffs for the big payroll teams, who have the option of adding guys like Lester to supplement their young core. It should be easier for teams who keep a foundational player like David Wright during their rebuilding period.

The Braves are a bit different for having a more extensive core (Freeman, Simmons, Teheran, Miller) at the major league level. I would say our period in the wilderness should be shorter than the above. But I wouldn't be surprised if it were 4 or 5 years.
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Uh. The Cubs beat us in the playoffs in 2003, and they also made it again under Lou.
 
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