Chronicles of the Lads

THE THREE-GAME SEASON
Two games.

That's all it takes at this point. All the furor, desperation, and exhiliration of the previous 159 games are gone, a thing of the past, a relic of baseball memory.

To get to the playoffs, two evenly matched teams will play each other in a race to see who can win two games. Evenly matched? Yes, evenly matched.

Coming into play today:

Team  OBP  SLG  EqA   ERA

ANA   341  429  263  4.32

OAK   345  436  264  4.15

Now, NetAss has been a better hitters' park than The Big A has been this year; Davenport takes that into account with his Equivalent Average, but he uses multi-year park factors that take away some of that difference.

What's interesting is, despite almost identical OBP and SLG, is this (updated through today):

Team  RS

ANA  822

OAK  789

Why the difference (through Wednesday)?

                       With Runners in Scoring Position

Team   SB   CS   GDP    PA   AVG   OBP   SLG

ANA   140   45   117   1706  277   343   436   

OAK    45   22   141   1719  261   353   411

Well, we're a little bit better with runners in scoring position, and we also gain in stolen bases (the caught stealing and the double plays basically cancel each other out).

So, a little bit of luck, a little bit of skill, and maybe even some of those silly "productive outs," though I doubt that's a big factor.

And even though they lead us in ERA, check this:

Team  RA

ANA  733

OAK  727

Not too shabby; yes, with the park involved, we're a bit worse than that, but still very close.

Add it all up:

Team   W   L   PCT   RS   RA   PythW   PythL   PythPCT

ANA   90  69  .566  822  733     89      70      .557 

OAK   90  69  .566  789  727     86      73      .541

So, it looks like we're a little bit better so far ... but none of that really matters anymore. To a large degree, analysis can be thrown out the window. It will come down to a simple battle on the field.

Well, does it get more exciting than this? Two good teams, two smart organizations with different ways of going about business, both facing off for a do-or-die trip to the playoffs ... you've got to be kidding. I'm so excited, I'm making even less sense than usual!

This is what it's all about.

Two games.

Yes We Can!