It is 8 AM Sunday night and I am looking forward to Game 4. What an incredible ending to Game 3. As I stated on Facebook, I think it is clear that the home plate umpire made the right call in the ninth inning. Even though the obstruction was not intentional, the third baseman clearly impeded the progress of the base runner. By the way, this was the first WS in history in which the winning run was scored on an error in two consecutive games. The third game is pivotal in determining the eventual winner of the WS because in the last 18 WS when the two teams were tied 1 to 1, the winner of the 3rd game went on to win the series 16 times.
As I discussed in my previous blog, the first World Series was in 1903 between the Boston Americans and Pittsburgh Pirates, which was won by Boston 5 to 3. What is interesting is the owner of Pittsburgh, Barney Dreyfuss, donated his ownership share to the players making the losing player’s share of $1316 more than the winning player’s share of $1182.This never happened again.
Here are some interesting facts about the WS from 2000 to 2012. Fifteen different teams (50% of the 30 MLB teams) have taken part in the WS. The 15 teams appear in the table below. The Yankees have played in four WS, the most of any team. The Cardinals and Giants are next playing in three WS. The Yankees, Red Sox, Giants, and Cardinals have the most WS wins at two. The winner of the 2013 series will then be the leader in WS wins for the years 2000 to 2013. Of the teams with at least two WS appearances, the Red Sox are the only team not to lose a WS. In fact they won all 8 of their WS games and extended their streak to 9 games and then lost Game 2 of this year’s WS. The Yankees, Tigers, and Rangers have lost the most WS at two. Of the 13 series, 4 have ended in 4 games, 4 have ended in 5 games, 2 have ended in 6 games and 3 have ended in 7 games.
I next thought it would be interesting to break down the wins and losses of WS games from 2000 to 2012. The table below presents this data.
Some of my observations from this table are:
The Yankees have both won and lost the most WS games. Based on playing a minimum of 10 WS games, the Giants have the best winning percentage of 68.75% and the Yankees had the worse winning percentage at 54.16%. After 4 games in the 2013 WS, the Red Sox have a record of 10 and 2 and even if they lose the next 2 games will still have the best winning percentage based on a minimum of 10 games.
Here are two interesting facts in the history of all WS that will cheer up Yankee fans. The record for most consecutive WS victories belongs to the Yankees who won the WS consecutively from 1949 to 1953. The record for most consecutive WS wins is also held by the Yankees. Appearing in the 1996, 1998, 1999, 2000 WS, the Yankees won 14 straight games. Since the boomer generation dawned in 1946, when the Cardinals beat the Red Sox, the table below compares .
Would you believe another strange ending just happened in Game 4? As I finished writing this blog, for the first time in the history of all post-season games, a game ended on a pickoff of a runner on first base. Why was the Red Sox even holding the pinch-runner on first base anyway? Why did the pitcher even throw over to first base? The entire ending of Game 4 goes against all baseball strategy. What strange results remain to be seen in the remaining 2013 games?
Original Comments:
1 Comment(s):
| Martin Cobern said…
Stan, There were a lot of bizarre judgments by Farrell in games 3 & 4, none of which will be an issue if they win it all. Taking Papi out turned out to be key, since I’m not sure he could have made the play on the pickoff. BTW, what time zone are you in when 8AM is in the evening? Marty October 28, 2013 12:01:04
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