![]() The 2020 postseason schedule will upend this customary dynamic. The 10 Biggest Questions Ahead of the First Round of the MLB Playoffs Luke Voit Is Baseball’s New Home Run King-and the Most Feared Hitter on the Yankees Last year, the Nationals’ top six pitchers-Stephen Strasburg, Max Scherzer, Patrick Corbin, Aníbal Sánchez, Sean Doolittle, and Daniel Hudson-combined for 83 percent of the team’s postseason innings. That same postseason, the Royals won 11 games Greg Holland and Wade Davis each appeared in 10 of them, while Kelvin Herrera threw in nine. In 2014, Madison Bumgarner accounted for 33 percent of the Giants’ total postseason innings, compared to just 15 percent in the regular season. With numerous off days for travel, a typical postseason is a staging ground for high-volume pitching heroes. Their fastballs are faster, and they’re harder to hit overall. Pitchers are better in October, with back-end starters and mop-up relievers making way for a higher concentration of innings from the best teams’ best arms. ![]() (That’s about where backup infielder Ehire Adrianza is for his career.) The average postseason run total in the decade dipped below four, to 3.99 per team per game. Offense was even worse in the playoffs in the 2010s, with the league amassing an average. 241/.314/.389 is roughly the career slash line of backup catcher Jason Castro.) 241/.314/.389 in the playoffs, an OPS drop of 44 points. In the wild-card era, scoring has dropped by about 10 percent in the postseason, from an average of 4.64 runs per game in the regular season to 4.17 in the playoffs. That’s not just a cliché or a maxim about how defense wins championships it’s a playoff fact, borne out by history.
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