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OT: MLB Thread

TheCountofMonteCristo said:
You clearly do not understand logic. I was not cheering against the Royals but for my team.
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Well by the same logic, everyone that was cheering for Royals last year were doing it because they dislike Giants. Hence, don't expect them to cheer for Royals this year if they are facing Jays
 
I love seeing WeHave embarrassing himself completely in this thread because he's all salty.

And no, most Toronto fans would not be cheering against the Expos. Every single baseball and Jays fan that I know, myself included, always considered themselves Expos fans and cheered hard for them as well.

I used to watch the few games that were broadcast on English television when TSN played about 25-30 games a year, have a few Expos hats, Vladimir Guerrerro and Jose Vidro baseball cards, Expos shirts, a pennant, etc.

Unequivocally, I can state with confidence that most Jays fans were very upset when the Expos left, because they had that Canadian shared experience and the sense of isolation in a league with 28 American teams. Your saltiness is just that: saltiness. Hope you enjoyed last night, because this is a superb baseball club and there's a very good chance they could go all the way.
 
WeHaveMoreCupsThanYou said:
When you commit four errors in a single inning of a do or die playoff game and it leads to the home run that ends your season you are choking. That's what happened to the Rangers. The Jays choked in games one and two; Texas in the remaining games.

The outcome of every sporting event boils down to one team choking and the other team taking advantage of it. They try to sell you on it being about achievement but in reality it's about failure. If sports were about achievement no one would bother to watch. People relate to failure more easily than to achievement because life is mostly about failure. Sports allows us to bear witness to the failure of others which in turn makes our own failures easier to process.

Jays fans want to believe that their team won but Texas fans know that their team failed. To say that your opponent beat you is to let yourself off the hook for not getting the job done. Losing inevitably comes down to failure.
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This is easily one of the stupidest posts I've ever read about sports. Shitty attempts at deeper poetry aside, an 88 win team losing to a 93 win team with a 102-60 expected pythagorean record and one of the greatest run-differentials in history, in the absolute limit of a division series, is not choking. It doesn't matter if they made several errors. The statistical probability was that the best offensive team in baseball of the millennium according to FanGraphs and ESPN, would eventually take advantage, and they did.

The Jays were the better team than Texas this year and the Rangers never should have been up 2-0 in the first place. They also had a completely unsustainable rate of BABIP and the Jays had a ton of near misses (at least five or six near-homers in the first two games that just went foul or ended up on the very limits of the warning track - see: Edwin's near-bomb at the 400 sign in game two). Baseball gonna' baseball and even out over a larger sample size. That's generally how things work. Even in a shorter five-game division series, it's very hard for two teams with the talent gap between the Jays and Texas not to have the expected winner take the series.
 
XPOFAN said:
Yep on the fans side. The players may have over-done a bit though.
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I really don't think that's the case. It was arguably the highlight of most of their professional lives. This article, posted by 101 on the Leafs board, summarizes it beautifully:

Jose Bautista does not need to “calm that down” and “respect the game”

Rangers reliever Sam Dyson is pretty good. Had a nice year (154 ERA+ in 75 appearances). He likely has a good future working out of bullpens around the league and, as far as any of us know, is a hell of a guy. Maybe a husband. Maybe a father. Good neighbor. Loyal lodge member. Let’s just grant him all of that and more, what with us really not knowing much about him.

Let us also say this about him: last night he was a big whiny baby who could have stood to take a few moments to gather himself and contemplate his shortcomings and general place in the world before spouting off.

...

This was A Moment. Actually, this was not just a moment, it was an iconic moment in baseball history, or at the very least soon will be. This was one of the game’s premier sluggers experiencing perhaps his greatest triumph, having shocked his team and nearly 50,000 screaming Blue Jays fans out of the confused funk into which they fell a half inning before, snapped them into an exuberant frenzy and carried them to the next round of the playoffs.

Sam Dyson, however, was not as impressed. He found this to be a good time for an etiquette lecture:

“Jose needs to calm that down, just kind of respect the game a little more. He’s a huge role model for the younger generation that’s coming up playing this game, and I mean he’s doing stuff that kids do in Wiffle ball games and backyard baseball. It shouldn’t be done.”

What a bunch of condescending, patronizing paternalistic nonsense. Who in THE HELL is Sam Dyson to tell Jose Bautista what he “needs” to do? What has Sam Dyson — for as wonderful a person as he may be — ever done or known to give him the right to tell a twelve-year veteran, six-time all-star, team leader and national icon — to two or three nations at this point — what should or shouldn’t be done? And even if he does have any standing whatsoever to lecture Bautista, which he sure as hell does not, how dare he offer up that most mindless, loaded of cliches: “respect the game?”

...

Bautista did not choreograph some elaborate touchdown dance here. He did not set out to insult the manliness or integrity of Sam Dyson or the Texas Rangers. He had just hit the second biggest home run in Toronto Blue Jays history and, for anyone younger than, say, 25, the biggest in living memory. Most definitely the biggest moment of his professional life. If you are the sort of person who thinks that such a thing cannot be celebrated, you should just give up trying to find happiness in life, consult an actuary about exactly how much time you have left until you die and optimize your investments accordingly. And please, as you do so, be sure your door is closed and your curtains are drawn because the very sight of such a joyless figure as yourself will bring the rest of humanity down.

Pressure + Triumph = Exuberance. If you find that equation troublesome or the concept behind it difficult to grok, you have challenges far beyond trying to get major league hitters out. If you think that some Kafkaesque, self-contradictory, thought and emotion-policing set of “game-respecting” rituals take precedence over it, you’re missing the very point of sports, entertainment and, maybe, even the concept of joy itself.

If such a set of beliefs is required for you to Respect The Game, find a different game. The rest of us will be over here marveling at one of the most exciting baseball moments we’ve ever experienced.
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http://mlb.nbcsports.com/2015/10/15...m_tags =srm[sport – mlb,brand – hardballtalk]
 
I think a good way to look at it is if the other team won and did all the things the Jays players did, as a Jays fan how would you feel? I believe some celebration is in order, but save the over the top stuff for the WS win.
 
XPOFAN said:
I think a good way to look at it is if the other team won and did all the things the Jays players did, as a Jays fan how would you feel? I believe some celebration is in order, but save the over the top stuff for the WS win.
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What exactly was over-the-top about last night? Teams always celebrate after each postseason series win. Hell, even making the playoffs is so difficult in baseball that wild card teams celebrate.

And they should. It's not like hockey or basketball where over half the league qualifies and you have teams that have no business being there getting destroyed in the first round by powerhouse clubs because of the format.
 
Look, I realize you are going to be biased, but ask any neutral observer and they will tell you that it was a bit over the top. Cubs did the same thing too.
 
XPOFAN said:
Look, I realize you are going to be biased, but ask any neutral observer and they will tell you that it was a bit over the top. Cubs did the same thing too.
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The Cubs just won their first postseason series EVER at Wrigley Field. They had never done that before in the 120+ year history of the Cubs franchise and they are one of the youngest teams in baseball that had minimal expectations of greatness coming into the season. Their franchise starting pitcher literally just had the best half-season in baseball history. I'd say that's certainly justified as well.
 
I had no issue with the Jays' celebration last night. Sure it might have been a bit over the top, but they should enjoy it.

But I also know a lot of "old school" fans hate the stir the pot antics, etc, and I think it's hilarious, so maybe I'm not the best person to ask.
 
WeHaveMoreCupsThanYou said:
When you commit four errors in a single inning of a do or die playoff game and it leads to the home run that ends your season you are choking. That's what happened to the Rangers. The Jays choked in games one and two; Texas in the remaining games.

The outcome of every sporting event boils down to one team choking and the other team taking advantage of it. They try to sell you on it being about achievement but in reality it's about failure. If sports were about achievement no one would bother to watch. People relate to failure more easily than to achievement because life is mostly about failure. Sports allows us to bear witness to the failure of others which in turn makes our own failures easier to process.

Jays fans want to believe that their team won but Texas fans know that their team failed. To say that your opponent beat you is to let yourself off the hook for not getting the job done. Losing inevitably comes down to failure.
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How you win does not matter. You win. That's it.

You did seem a little too sure they were done after game 2. you got your hopes up.

If Toronto lost 3-2 on that fluke Martin play, you wouldn't be examining it in the Jays loss.
 
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