A-Rod is too unclutch, take 2

Game 4 was riddled with "A-Rod is 1-11", "A-Rod is 1-12" and "A-Rod is 1-13" in the world series talk. It's too bad that 0-8 of A-Rod's "slump" came in consecutive games, one of which was pitched by Cliff Lee, who shut down everyone except Derek Jeter in Game 1. How come nobody is ragging on Teixeira, who is hitting almost as bad as Nick Swisher? Can't we lay off A-Rod, who has been an absolute beast in the post season outside of two games? No one has ever had 8 bad at bats in a row before, right?

I wonder if it does any good to mention that A-Rod had an "unclutch" 2-R HR in game 3 and game winning double in the top of the 9th today. I guess hitting in the clutch doesn't count as being clutch. It's all about being David Eckstein and hitting .400 with a .390 OBP and .400 SLG.

Cause you know, WPA is a bullshit stat made up by nerds in their mother's basements, right?

(also, how is this the first use of the unclutch tag?)

____

For the record, here is A-Rod's WPA by game in the WS:
1: -.096 (Teixeira and Damon weren't much better and Cliff Lee pitched an amazing game)
2: -.090 (Pedro, Howard, Damon and Utley were all worse; Werth had a -.087 WPA in game 2)
3: +.165 (third best amongst all players in game 4)
4: +.280 (second to only Pedro Feliz in game 4)

That's a cumulative +.259 WPA in the World Series. Four of those = 1 win; by proxy, A-Rod's .259 WPA showing over four games means that he's helped the Yankees win one of them. Please Tim McCarver. Keep complaining.

12 comments:

saBEERmetrics said...

Also, quite untrue to the site's infamous Jimmy Rollins OBP graphic, JRolls WS OBP is .500 on the dot. Too bad he's only hitting .214 because OBP doesn't count.

saBEERmetrics said...

(all of this info is courtesy of Fangraphs)

((also, FUCK, I am definitely logged into the wrong Blogger account...))

David "MVP" Eckstein said...

I wonder if Johnny Damon and A-Rod just Pujolsed Brad Lidge. Stay tuned.

The 'Bright' One said...

I love how McCarver was going on and on about how great Joba's fastball was tonight. and when he got 2 strikes on Feliz, McCarver said Joba should stay away from his secondary pitches and keep attacking Feliz with the old heater. Next pitch, heater down the middle, yard.

Thanks for the insight Tim McCarver. And how is McCarver not a tag for this post? Sacrilidge(get it Lidge)

Cubsfan4evr said...

Tim McCarver made a few comments that made me go "What?" during the game.

David "MVP" Eckstein said...

TMC has been added to the tags. Is Tim McCarver our official hatguy?

He makes me so mad

Also, what a great example of stuff that goes wrong in baseball games today was.
-Ryan Howard stole a base standing up
-Ryan Howard scored by not touching the plate
-Melky Cabrera ALMOST scored not touching the plate
-Chase Utley taught every little league kid why you don't glove flip baseballs in important baseball games
-Jeter proved that even his visits to the mound are unbelievably and unquestionably clutch.

David "MVP" Eckstein said...

let's play that game SexyRexy did w/ TV show characters earlier in the year w/ baseball figures who suck and we can decide who sucks most. I nominate Tim McClelland, Tim McCarver, Joe Buck, Hawk, the guy who does radio announcing for The Reds who hates Cubs fans, John Kruk, Eric Young and Cal Ripken Jr (an experiment which failed horribly)

One rule: Dusty Baker, Joe Morgan are excluded but can face off in the own bracket (for that would be the inevitable outcome) and steve phillips dont count bc he's not employed anymore!

David "MVP" Eckstein said...

We can make four brackets:

ESPN Announcers/Analysts
FOX Announcers/Analysts
Regular TV Announcers
Baseball Managers/Umpires

Cubsfan4evr said...

Tim McCarver could be the sportscaster I can’t stand the most. To me he seems to make the worst comments out of all of them. In this World Series there was something he said the other day that I was like no that is not even close to accurate. One of his comments was about Jeter going to the mound. There was so many I should start writing them down…………

Adam Kaplan said...

If a person makes Cubsfan go "WTF" then you know he's bad hahaha j/k

saBEERmetrics said...

ha ha ha.

Also, i never write the kinds of posts that require pictures...maybe ill just add random ones like A-Rods face photoshopped over a supermodel's body...

saBEERmetrics said...

or half naked pictures of althletes named Tim Lincecum