A quick football post

If you didn't watch Indianapolis rally in the final four minutes to beat New England tonight, you missed a fantastic game. More importantly, you missed an amazing decision by Bill Belichick. Here's the setup:

The Patriots had a 13 point lead with just over four minutes to play. Peyton Manning, unfazed, marched the Colts down the field for a touchdown in less than two minutes without using any of Indy's three remaining time outs. With the two minute warning also remaining, Indy decided to kick it deep to New England and trust their defense to get a stop. New England could not convert a third and two from their own 28, and so were facing a fourth and two with just over two minutes remaining, deep in their own territory.

Belichick decided to go for it.

I loved this call. Absolutely loved it. Let's look at the possible outcomes. If you punt, you give Peyton Manning the ball with what amounts to an eternity for him: over two minutes with two clock stoppages (the two minute warning and one timeout). Yeah, you're probably still likely to win, but he's Peyton Manning. Furthermore, there's some evidence that your defense is worn out. I really think this is a shitty position to be in. Maybe that's just the fan in me, but no one wants to see their team playing Peyton Manning when all he needs is one touchdown drive to seal the game.

If you go for the first down conversion and you make it, the game is basically over. You might need to get one more first down, but if you don't and still have to punt, the two minute warning will be long past and the Colts will have burned their last time out. That is an astronomically harder situation for Manning. Furthermore, you've been having your way with Indy's defense all night. The probability of converting that fourth and two is extremely high.

But most importantly, the cost of not converting is just not that high, in my opinion. You're talking about a forty yard difference compared to punting, but that forty yards is highly likely to be made up by Manning in less than a minute, given the way defense is played in that situation. Furthermore, because you are up by six, even if the Colts get the touchdown, it's impossible for them to end up ahead by more than two points. This means that you could win the game on a field goal.

In other words, the worst case scenario for the Pats was not that Indy would get a touchdown. The worst case scenario is that Indy would get a touchdown with no time left on the clock. This scenario is far more likely if you punt than if you fail to pick up the first down (and of course, getting the first down is the ultimate win).

This call took a lot of balls and I think it was the right one. I just don't think that the forty yards you'd net on the punt matter all that much in that situation. Peyton Manning is just so highly likely to make those yards up and still have plenty of time to win it that the price of failure is easily offset by the reward of success.

It didn't work, of course. Indeed, New England then made what I think it was their truly critical mistake (other than wasting their timeouts earlier in the half): they let Indy run time of the clock by tackling Joseph Addai inside the five yard line with about a minute to go. At that point, your best chance to win is to let Addai score and play for the field goal. You just are not that likely to deny Peyton Manning and the Colts with four cracks at the winning touchdown inside the five. Far better to let Tom Brady have a chance to get into field goal position at that point.

Anyway, I wish Belichick's gambit had succeeded because it would make other coaches less reticent to try the same thing. I firmly believe that NFL coaches treat fourth downs too conservatively. Belichick lost this time, but hopefully he's not naive enough to let the result of one play (and the ensuing media backlash) alter his conviction. In the long run, that style of play will pay off.

**EDIT** I should note that the call should have worked. The receiver on the play, Kevin Faulk, bobbled the ball and thus did not receive forward progress beyond the first down marker. Had he not bobbled the ball, he would have gotten the first down. Furthermore, he still may have converted it, but the spot by the officials was not favorable to New England and with no timeouts they were unable to challenge the decision.

**EDIT #2** According to this website, the failure to convert knocked New England from a 77% chance of winning to a 66% chance of winning. If we assume that New England would have won 90% of the time if they had converted, we find that New England needs to convert that play only 50% of the time for it to be the right call. I guarantee that New England is likely to convert that play better than 50% of the time. Almost any NFL team is likely to convert that play better than 50% of the time, and this is one of the best offenses in the league. It was a good call.

**EDIT #3** The website linked above put up this post also defending Belichick's decision.

World Championship Thoughts

• Wow. I've got a whole bunch of actual non-Yankee baseball thoughts kicking around in my head, but I think I'll save those for a later date.
• This is the fifth Yankee championship that I've experienced. The win in 1996 was amazing simply because it was so unexpected. The Yankees really haven't been the underdogs since. In 1998, winning was something that had to happen. You can't win 114 games and not win the World Series. The victory was as much about not screwing up as it was about making the case for being the greatest team in history. In 1999 and 2000, we were building a dynasty. This time I can't really describe how I feel. My perspective on baseball is completely different from nine years ago. The Yankees were the best team in baseball this year, but that's been the case for many of the years we didn't win. Winning here is as much justification of the 103 wins during the regular season as it is anything else. I also feel vindicated personally for seeing my faith in A-Rod (which is to say my faith in talent over superstitious mumbo-jumbo) pay off. I feel great for him.
• Part of me is also annoyed that we managed to win in 2000 and 2009, but couldn't manage a win in 2001-2008, which happen to correspond to exactly the years Mike Mussina was pitching for us. I know it's just a freak coincidence, completely random, but it's still sad to me that we managed to completely bookend his stay in New York. I'm sure that I'm exactly one of two Yankee fans that feel this way, but I loved me the Moose. Sorry, Mike.
• Joe Girardi is going to get plenty of accolades for his managing because he won. Some of those will be deserved: going with only three starting pitchers, aggressively using Mariano Rivera, using Damaso Marte over Phil Coke; others will not: benching Nick Swisher, burning through relief pitchers like crazy, overmanaging for small advantages at the expense of the big picture. It's important to remember that all these things were true ex ante. They aren't any more or less true simple because the Yankees won.
• Fox sucks. It's just amazing how much advertising they can cram into each broadcast. I can't get over how progressively absurd their "Keys to the Game"-type feature kept getting. They had a handful of good moments, but mostly it was all lost in a sea of advertising.
• You couldn't ask for a better face for your team than Derek Jeter. It was sweet seeing him hoist the trophy again. I can only imagine how sweet it feels to be back on top after all that early success and the subsequent failures. And as usual, he made me happy to be a fan of him and of the New York Yankees. I get tired of the doe-eyed fawning over Jeter that seems to never cease, but I really do love the guy, not because he's clutch or calm or a great leader. Nah, I love him because he's a great player who doesn't seem to have the affectations of one. His personality is such that he makes you think that he's the guy you'd be if you were as awesome as him at baseball. I couldn't even begin to identify with Derek Jeter, but Derek Jeter makes me think that I can. Who knows why that is (I certainly don't), but whatever the reason, I can't not feel anything but awesome every time Derek talks about winning championships for the New York Yankees.
• I'm tired. I got work tomorrow. I'll be digesting this one for weeks. But for now:

THE NEW YORK YANKEES ARE YOUR 2009 WORLD CHAMPIONS!

Quick World Series Thoughts

• A-Rod now holds the New York Yankees' RsBI record for a single postseason. No joke.
• How can you give Cliff Lee the Player of the Game award for his Game 5 start? He pitched decently, but he only won because his team scored eight runs. I mean, WTF does Chase Utley have to do?
• Speaking of Chase, at this point there's a decent chance that he could win the World Series MVP award without the Phillies winning the series. The Yanks are in an odd position where no one has really stood out. A-Rod has had big hits, but is still only hitting around .200. Damon's been great offensively, but a liability defensively (not that I expect the voters to care about that part). CC's pitched decently, but would probably need a good to great Game 7 to win it. It's a really funny situation.
• From The Department Of Things That Mainstream Analysts Will Ignore While Lauding Derek Jeter, I couldn't help but notice that Cap'n Clutch hit into a devastating double play with two on and no one out trailing by three runs in the ninth inning today. It's just baseball, folks. There's nothing special about clutch situations in the postseason.
• The Phillies forcing a Game 6 is good for baseball. You really can't keep having the World Series decided in five games or less year in and year out.
• Is this the year that people will realize that home runs and doubles (as opposed to bunts and stolen bases) are what wins baseball games in October? I suspect not.

Further ALCS thoughts

• What a performance by A-Rod and CC Sabathia so far this postseason. There's not much I can really say. The media will do a fine job of lauding them without my help. But still: damn.
• Good to finally have a bit of a laugher, though even still this game was tight and exciting until the eighth.
• The bad umpiring (and man was it bad) continued in Game Four. Fortunately, two of the bad calls (the blown Swisher pick off and the blown Swisher tag up) mostly cancelled each other out, and the stunning what-the-hell-was-that-how-are-they-not-both-out call at third didn't lead to anything, but still... not great. I don't like the idea of using instant replay NFL-style. I don't like the idea of adding challenges to the strategy of the game. No, baseball needs two things: a lighting fast, deadly accurate ball-strike system that can be invisibly relayed to the home plate umpire who will call them as normal, and a dedicated replay umpire with the ability to overturn any call at any time without the field umpires having to stop play. These two measures would be completely invisible as long as the right calls are being made. The game would look and feel the same. Nothing would change, except for the quality of the umpiring.
• I don't know why the Yankees have Freddy Guzman on the roster. Joe Girardi prefers to use Gardner, even when he's pinch running for the DH, negating Gardner's defensive value. The Yanks clearly don't want Guzman hitting, since they chose Cervelli over him in Game Three. They don't want him playing left field, since they chose to lose the DH rather than play him there. Eric Hinske, on the other hand, would actually have been useful in almost 1,000,001 situations in Game Three. Another baffling management situation from the Yanks.
• I wonder if the mainstream media will pick up on just how much this postseason has demonstrated the importance of hitting home runs and not giving them up. The ability to strike at any time is so much more important than any of the "small ball" skills even in a close game, but only long ball skills let you put the game well out of reach.
• I hereby authorize use of the term "Girardiproof" to describe games in which a starting pitcher carries his team for eight or more innings while his offense accumulates a lead of five or more runs. Apologies to anyone who may have already started using this term. What a relief not to see Joe deploying his quick hook over and over and over again tonight.

ALCS Thoughts

Bullet point style!

• Man, Game 2 was amazing. It really felt like one of the Yankee playoff games from 1996-2000.
• I can't decide if Joe Girardi is some kind of mad bullpen genius or a poor bullpen manager. His pattern of plowing through relief pitchers even in the face of extra innings is maddening, but on the other hand, it's also working. It's entirely possible that the way the probabilities break down, the right play is to burn through pitchers in an attempt to keep the game scoreless and accept that you will basically have to forfeit if the game goes too long. I'm not sure that's the case, but if Joe's strategy keeps working, I'll have to give him the benefit of the doubt.
• Tim McCarver's impassioned defense of Derek Jeter from all the people out there proclaiming him "done" last year really rubbed me the wrong way. First, no one claimed he was "done;" no one sane anyway. Second, most of the performance analysts who were saying he was on the decline were at the front of the line to talk about how great he's been this year. Third, many, many people, even in the mainstream media, have talked about how much better his defense has been this year. This implies that it was worse in previous years.
  Therefore, it was fantastically ironic that both Joe and Tim agreed that if you wanted a groundball hit at one guy with two outs in the ninth of seventh game of the World Series, it would have to be Derek Jeter. Not only does this bizarre and idiotic platitude not have anything to do with Jeter's range, but later in the game he booted a groundball hit right at him. I guess one out with a runner on first in the eighth inning of a tie game in the ALCS isn't clutch enough for him.
• In that same vein, let me be the first to point out that Alex Rodriguez is not clutch, not in any meaningful way. Yes, there is evidence that clutch skill exists, but the effect is very, very tiny. No, Alex is mostly the same player in the postseason that he always has been: one of the greatest of all time. He's more likely to succeed in clutch situations mostly because he's simply so much more likely to succeed in general.
• I understand why the Angels were so mad about the ruling that Erick Aybar didn't touch second base. The so-called "neighborhood play" is really common. Nonetheless, he didn't even make a hint of an attempt to touch the base, nor did he ever come close to doing so. Furthermore, he did this on purpose in order to not have to deal with the oncoming runner. There has to be a line drawn somewhere, and I think that this play was on the other side of line. You've got to at least pretend to try to touch the base. Yes, I know I'm biased because I'm a Yankees fan.
• Returning to Joe Girardi's bullpen usage, I do want to give him special props for his usage of Mariano Rivera. Mo pitched efficiently, and Joe used this efficiency to stretch Mo out over 2.2 high leverage innings. Brilliant. Now let's work on doing the same with Phil Hughes.
• Jerry Hairston actually screwed up when he scored the game winning run. If Chone Figgins had simply picked the ball up cleanly after Aybar threw it away, Hairston would have been dead meat at home plate, turning a bases loaded, one out situation into a second and third, two out situation. That's a critical mistake. Aybar's throw was bad, but Figgins' failure to simply pick the ball up was just as costly, if not more so. The Angel's screwed up twice on that play and Hairston was the benefactor.
• Bobby Abreu played the right field wall really well in these two games. Where the hell was that last year, Bob?

Misleading journalism

I don't know why, but for some very poor reason, I found myself reading this piece by Wallace Matthews of the New York Post.

There's no need to go through [Alex Rodriguez's] October numbers once again except to say that he did more in the three games of the Division Series against the Twins than he had done in his four previous Yankees postseasons, at least after Game 3 of the 2004 ALCS.

Let's try to forget for a moment that this piece is the predictable response on a good series by A-Rod: a backhanded compliment designed to remind the reader of how much A-Rod sucks and to set up the story line in case A-Rod plays poorly in the future. Baseball writers just can't get enough of the "A-Rod is a choker" story, so they're gonna try to keep it alive at all costs.

But let's try to forget about that for a second. The real highlight of the above quote is the way Matthews deliberately skews the reader's perception of Alex Rodriguez's past postseason performance with the New York Yankees. You see that last dangling clause there" The one that says, "at least after Game 3 of the 2004 ALCS"? That phrase does three things to poison the well against A-Rod:

1. Conjure up memories of the 2004 ALCS, every Yankee fan's worst nightmare.
2. Sweep away games before Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS as being irrelevant to the discussion.
3. Leave the impression that the period before Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS only barely alters the argument.

There's only one problem: Matthew's claim is completely unsupportable if one considers the period he's trying to exclude! The impression that he's deliberately attempting to leave is completely at odds with the facts, and it's not close! A-Rod's performance before Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS was incredible. He hit .421 against the Twins in the ALDS that year with three doubles, a home run, three runs scored, three RsBI, and one very clutch stolen base. In the first three games of the ALCS, Alex accumulated six hits, including a home run and two doubles, scored seven runs, and picked up three RsBI.

So, yeah, if we ignore some minor games where A-Rod got fourteen hits, five doubles, two home runs, ten runs scored, and six RsBI, then his series against the Twins in 2009 obviously dwarfs all his previous accomplishments.

Also, it should be noted that in Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS, Alex hit a two run home run in the third inning while the game was scoreless. You'd have been forgiven for thinking that Alex was a one man postseason wrecking crew at that time. He didn't start playing poorly until Game 5.

Remember: never let facts get in the way of a good story.

Postseason thoughts

• Don't be distracted by the media throng clamoring to tell you why it's different for A-Rod this time around. The story is not about how he' s more relaxed, more focused, having more fun, doing more of the little things, or feeling less pressure. The story is that anything can happen in a small sample. Given enough time, the real A-Rod was going to show up in the postseason, as he has in the past.
• Sentences like these: (emphasis mine)
  "With Weaver picking up right where Lackey left off for the Los Angeles Angels, not even Josh Beckett could keep the Boston Red Sox off the brink of playoff elimination."
  "Erick Aybar followed Izturis' RBI single with a two-run triple during the Angels' two-out rally in the seventh to break up a stellar pitching duel between Weaver and Beckett, Boston's ace and most reliable playoff pitcher."
  make me wonder if anyone actually paid attention to the postseason last year, when Beckett was stunningly awful and crushed the Red Sox' chances to win. As with A-Rod, the story with Josh Beckett is that he is very good pitcher when healthy, not that he has some magical postseason powers.
• I've absolutely had it with Joe Girardi's bullpen management. He has a decent idea of who to pitch in particular situations, but he manages like any relief pitcher that throws more than five pitches must be removed from the game. Seriously, what the hell was he going to do if the Yanks hadn't won in the 11th last night? He had used every relief pitcher except Chad Gaudin! This is not uncommon. Girardi burns through pitchers in a quest to win the most marginal of advantages by matching up against hitters. It's got to stop. At the very least, your relievers must be able to through complete innings, sometimes even against both right and left handed hitters.
• Baseball has an umpiring problem and it's getting embarassing. The biggest issue is with the erratic strike zone, but it's affecting every area of the game. You have to feel for the Twins, who got robbed of a potential lead in the 11th inning on maybe the worst call I've ever seen. Tigers fans will perhaps see this as poetic justice, but baseball needs to see it for what it is: a big, big problem that needs to be addressed in the offseason.
• TBS has been a mixed bag for me broadcasting. I like that their HD broadcast has PitchTrax displayed for every pitch. They've gotten some great reaction shots from players. On the other hand, the commentating has been atrocious (and getting worse) and there isn't a single thing to which they won't attach an advertisement. *sigh*