Crazy Crabbers | Giants Baseball Blog: NLCS

Showing posts with label NLCS. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

My World Series Sob Story

by at 10:18 AM

So tonight by the cruelest of coincidences I have a class tonight from 6:30 to 10. What makes it even worse is that skipping it isn't even an option as tonight is the date of the midterm in my graduate International Economic Development class.

So at 6:15 I will have to turn off KNBR and head into class and take a test while doing my best to keep focused on the task at hand and not wondering what the hell is going on in the game.

The baseball god must be punishing me for something, I wish I knew what it was.

Plus, this is not the first time I have had to deal with the torture of being cut off from the rest of the world during a playoff game. My last class coincided with game 4 of the NLCS. The game that many have described as the most exciting playoff game ever played by the Giants.

That one worked out a little better because it was during a regular class and I could follow along on game cast but low and behold the baseball gods again decided to plot against me with my battery dieing with runners on 1st and 3rd, 1 out in the bottom of the 9th with Juan Uribe coming to bat. That was my last update and then kaput.

I had no idea if the final run came in or if the game was still going and of course there seemed to be no one else in the room who was a Giants fan or cared to deviate from the discussion on the world bank to announce that Juan Uribe had won the game the Giants.

It was the worst hour and a half of my life, I was more nervous waiting then during any part of the playoffs to date.

To sum it all up, baseball gods, Giants hitters, Giants pitchers, there is nothing wrong with jumping out to a 10-0 lead and making the game a laugher. It will make taking my test infinitely more enjoyable.

That is all I ask.

If your on Twitter you should definitely follow the . If you're not you should really consider joining, lots of good stuff going on there.

Saturday, October 23, 2010

The Odds of the Giants Going to the World Series

by at 4:35 PM

Warning Math ahead.

I was a little nervous that the series is heading back to Philadelphia. One of the things that calms me down is to look at the numbers, and in this case the numbers look decent. Not as good as before the last game but much better then I would have first thought.

The Giants chance of winning one of the next 2 games is 65.7%. That is pretty dang good. It would be very nice to get those odds in Vegas on any table game.

The Giants chances of winning tonight are not great, only about 39.4%. They figure to surrender on average about 4.45 runs per game and only score 4 runs.

If it goes to tomorrow things look a little bit better. The Giants would figure to win about 43.4% of the time. They would give up 4.3 runs and score again 4 runs a game.

Even with these relatively low odds in each game the chance that they lose both is much smaller. To figure this out you multiply the expected loss percentage together and then subtract that number from 1. That gives you 0.6057 x 0.5653 which comes out to 0.3424 (the odds of losing both games) and if you take that number and subtract it from 1 you get 0.6573 or that the Giants still have a 65.7% chance of making the World Series.

Don't fall into irrational pessimism yet. There is time for that tomorrow. Go Giants!

If your on Twitter you should definitely follow the . If you're not you should really consider joining, lots of good stuff going on there.

Friday, October 22, 2010

Small Sample Size Fun: Giants Playoff Edition

by at 8:26 AM

Let's keep this light hearted after last nights game. This addition of Small Sample Size Fun™ we look at the Giants home playoff record when they hand out "Rally Towels" vs. "Rally Pom Poms."

With the Rally Towels: 3-0

Game 1 of NLDS, Games 3 and 4 of NLCS

With the Rally Pom Poms: 0-2

Game 2 of NLDS, and Game 5 of the NLCS

Wait there's more ->

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Revisiting the Battle of the Big 3’s

by at 12:04 PM

The Phillies and the Giants both have a claim to having the best top 3 starters in Major League Baseball and now that they have squared up each other head to head it is time to revisit the two staffs.

Before the NLCS began I said that the Giants may not have the same love in the national media or have the cool nick name like H2O but in the postseason they have been just as impressive.

Well the Giants pitchers have not disappointed in the NLCS and have stood toe to toe with the defending champs and have put themselves in a great spot up 3-1.

All the talk about it was an illusion of facing the Braves and they would shrink when they faced "real" hitting has been proved false.

The Giants have shut down the potent Phillies offense and quited the haters at the same time.

Here are the updated numbers for each "Big 3":

	Giants	Phillies
ERA	1.26	2.42
WHIP	0.79	0.76
K/9	10.70	9.28
BB/9	2.73	1.21

The Giants have more then held there own and have excelled in keeping the Phillies off the scoreboard while racking up the strikeouts.

The Phillies have an edge in the walk rate but the WHIP is nearly identical due to the Giants giving up fewer hits.

You may miss this if you only listen to the national media but the Giants pitchers have matched everything the Phillies pitchers have done and have actually performed better then them in nearly every category.

Round two of the marquee matchups begins tonight with Tim Lincecum against Roy Hallady and the Giants just need to keep doing what they have done for the last 2 months.

Halladay vs. Lincecum! Part Duex

by at 11:30 AM

The first pitching match up of the century wasn't exactly everything that the hype made it out to be, luckily we have another chance to see two of the top pitchers duke it out with huge implications.

Pitching	IP	H	ER	BB	SO	HR	ERA	BF	Pit	Str	GB	FB	LD	GSc	WPA
	7	6	3	3	8	2	1.69	29	113	71	7	11	3	58	0.133

	7	8	4	0	7	2	2.25	29	105	73	10	12	2	52	-0.113

Neither pitcher could be described as awesome and that sure left me disappointed after the 5 days of constant build up and hype.

This time around the perpetual hype machine hasn't been building things up in our minds, the emotions of last nights game could carry over and the desperation of an elimination game all ad to the already large playoff atmosphere.

Both pitchers are rested and ready to square off and I am excited.

Sequels are almost never as good as the original but I have a feeling that this one could be even better. The huge stage and a real ball park should make up for the "dud" that was game one.

Set your DVRs for this one. It could be an instant classic.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Giants Win a Laugher against the Phillies

by at 4:36 PM

Normally a 3-0 win is nothing special but for the Giants scoring 3 runs is an offensive outburst and in this ball park that is a huge deficit that could not be overcome.

did everything in his power to shut down the Phillies. The Phillies had some chances putting Cain in some tight spots but the Giants were able to wiggle out of them. The big difference in this game is that the Giants got the timely hitting and the Phillies did not.

This has been the Giants formula all freaking season. Great pitching and some timely hitting, score a few runs and then hold on.

The Giants played their brand of baseball and were able to beat the Phillies and now the pressure is squarely on the Phillies shoulders, down 2-1 with 2 more games in San Francisco where there are no cheap homeruns like you saw in the first couple of games.

The Giants need 2 wins in the next 4 games to go to the World Series.

Yes that is right 2 wins away from the promised land.

A tip of the hat to you continues his magic, who had good at bats in the lead off spot and started the rally that put them ahead. who hit a double and played good defense and who showed veteran savvy at 26 to shut down the Phillies for 7 innings.

Go Giants lets take a couple more here in San Francisco!

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