NL Teams Can't Touch the Talent of the AL

by Kindred @ Purple Row on Oct 9, 2007 1:25 AM MDT

It was an interesting article to read, but seriously, what is this guy smoking. Basically it boils down to, the top AL teams have more wins therefore they're better. Of course the best of the AL East went a combined 1-5 against the Rockies this year, but that's irrelevant and ignored. Here's a newsflash for the wonderfully informed fan of an eliminated team, the two leagues don't play each other for most of the season. Thus you have two separate, we'll call them "leagues" that are almost completely isolated from each other. In light of this maybe it is possible that it is not that the difference in Win totals is caused by a difference in quality, but rather a difference in parity.

It must be hard accruing 96 Ws when you have to play 60 games against the D-Rays the Os and the Blue Jays. Maybe, just maybe, the shit stinks a bit more in the AL than the NL.

Eat. Drink. Be Merry. But the above FanPost does not necessarily reflect the attitudes, opinions, or views of Purple Row's staff (unless, of course, it's written by the staff [and even then, it still might not]).

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I couldn't even read that crap

I skimmed it. Once I hit the worn-out Team Jesus stuff in the middle, my brain disengaged.

It was interesting, in the way a horror freak show is.

There's only way to shut 'em up.

Let's do the damn thing.

Get Demented. Standing by my guys forever.

by Silverblood on Oct 9, 2007 1:44 AM MDT reply actions

Oh indeed,

Personally I'm hoping for the Sox. The only thing that stopped us from sweeping earlier was Wakefield, and I believed he's injured and wouldn't be in the rotation anyway.

Still, we must be pretty awesome when the only thing he can come up to diss us with is the fact that someone somewhere said that only Christians are allowed on the team. You'd think he'd be able to come up with something against our baseball.

But to be honest, why is being a "Christian team" the worst possible thing? Better than being a team with confessed steroid users right? Are Christians that evil in the States that they must be treated like Klan members? I certainly didn't get that impression from Helton, Holliday, etc.

by Kindred @ Purple Row on Oct 9, 2007 3:37 AM MDT reply actions

Didn't read

that crap.

But, when did being a Christian become a BAD thing? Sad state of the world I guess.

"You will be hated because of My Name."

Resign Kazuo Matsui! Hurdle is still an idiot!

by Redhawk on Oct 9, 2007 7:29 AM MDT up reply actions

I guess

it became a "bad" thing when the Jerry Falwell types started using Christianity as an excuse to spew hatred of different groups, and many in the media just assume that all Christians are like that.

The Coors Effect... thinking about changing the name to The Humidor Effect.

by Rox Fan in TN on Oct 9, 2007 7:34 AM MDT up reply actions

Who's this guy calling creepy, anyway

That picture of his with the look that he's trying to figure out which of the voices in his head to trust, the one that says "light the match and burn it" or the one that says "scream and run away."

Of course, I'm just basing this on a picture, and not any first hand knowledge of the guy, similarly to how some might read a smear article about a team without talking to anyone associated with it and consider it all at face value 100% without a doubt true, but that's just a hypothetical which I'm sure doesn't happen in the real world.

by Rox Girl on Oct 9, 2007 8:03 AM MDT up reply actions

Voices in his head

"Kiiill Clint Hurdle!! Kiiill Bob Melvin!!"

DbacksSkins... I hail from here and here.

by DbacksSkins on Oct 9, 2007 12:13 PM MDT up reply actions

Hmmm.....

Broken record. I seem to remember hearing this song over and over again last year, before the Cardinals kicked the Tigers' asses...

DbacksSkins... I hail from here and here.

by DbacksSkins on Oct 9, 2007 4:10 AM MDT reply actions

perhaps it's a joke?

I have to say, when your entire article is undermined by your own sentence - that the NL champ is going to go the way of last year's Cards (who oh by the way won the World Series) - it makes me think you're playing some sort of bizarre joke. But then again, the Sun isn't much of a paper.

I have to say, just looking at what each team brings to the table in terms of lineup, defense, starting pitching, relief pitching, and chemistry, I would say that Boston and Cleveland have the strongest teams. In other words, if I'm a general manager and someone offered me any of the four current rosters in exchange for my own mediocre team's, with the understanding that they want me to play out a 162 game season plus playoffs I'd take those two first. But the rest of the AL isn't any better than the top NL teams, and even the Mighty Red Sox (shaky set-up men) and the Mighty Indians have vulnerabilities (Joe Borowski anyone?).

by jakester @ Purple Row on Oct 9, 2007 12:00 PM MDT up reply actions

He's using the Cards to disparage the NL.

Trying to say that the whole "83 win" thing means they didn't deserve to be there. HELLO?? They won, dumbass.

The more I read of this arrogant east coast bullshit, the more I just want the Dbacks to sweep the AL champ. (Or Rockies. ;-) )

DbacksSkins... I hail from here and here.

by DbacksSkins on Oct 9, 2007 12:15 PM MDT up reply actions

La la la... I'm not listening

Another New Yorker who is convinced of the superiority of the AL. Big surprise there. The Tigers were better than the Cardinals, right? Oh, wait. How about those 2003 Florida Marlins against the Yankees?

Since the Yankees' last title in 2000, the NL has won three of the six World Series. This is despite the new rules that basically give homefield advantage in the World Series to the AL every year (an NL team hasn't had homefield advantage since 2001!) The NL lacks the high-powered overlords that the AL does. While the AL has the Yankees and Red Sox, the NL has the Mets and Dodgers, big-market teams that can't get their act together. The biggest difference, though, is that the bad teams in the NL are better than the bad teams in the AL. Sure, the best teams in the AL had 96 wins, while the NL's best had just 90, but the worst team in the AL (the Devil Rays) went 66-96. The worst team in the NL was the Pirates, at 68-94, and they were the only NL team with less than 70 wins; the AL had three. The AL's best teams look better because of all those games against the Devil Rays, Orioles, and Royals.

They also fail to notice that there were four teams in the NL West that were over .500. No division in the AL had fewer than two teams who were under .500. Do you think it makes a difference that the Rockies and D-backs played a bunch of games against the Padres, Dodgers, and Giants, while the Indians had all those games against the White Sox, Royals, and Twins? The NL is much more balanced, while the AL has the overlords of the Yankees and Red Sox who mostly have dominated the league since the mid-1990s.

The Coors Effect... thinking about changing the name to The Humidor Effect.

by Rox Fan in TN on Oct 9, 2007 7:30 AM MDT reply actions

I was actually keeping track of this all season

over at the 'Pit. Of course, this isn't the be-all end-all of divisional strength, but it should at least be taken into account before writing idiotic articles. Here's each division and its final record:

AL East
408-402 .504

AL Central
404-406 .499

AL West
333-315 .514

NL East
405-405 .500

NL Central
459-513 .472

NL West
422-390 .520 (includes play-in game)

The NL West had far and away the best record in baseball, even better than the AL East, who had the Red Sox (most wins in baseball) and AL WC Yankees. When you boil it down, both teams got fat against the awful Orioles and Devil Rays, both of whom had worse records than the Giants. The AL West is deceptive, because there are only 4 teams. If there were a fifth, you'd expect it to be about .500, which would significantly return them to the mean.

...And of course, everybody turn and laugh at the NL Central, the Mets, and the Padres.

Here's the final regular season standings. Somebody should forward them to this moron before he tries to use his pen again.

DbacksSkins... I hail from here and here.

by DbacksSkins on Oct 9, 2007 12:34 PM MDT up reply actions

Need more anecdotal evidence?

Take a look at the NHL. Detroit (and recently, Nasheville), get to beat up Columbus, Chicago, and St. Louis every year, leading to inflated point totals and stats...then they collapse in the playoffs.

Meanwhile, the Northwest division teams spend all year beating the crap out of each other...just like the NL West.

I wish both the Rockies and the Avalanche could get a few cream-puff teams in their league/division...

~Uffdah

by DiscoStu on Oct 9, 2007 3:12 PM MDT up reply actions

Terrible

I think we can all agree- whoever wins the NLCS, they need to blow the AL team out of the water in the World Series. Not that it'll make idiots like this shut up, but I'll enjoy it anyway.

I'm getting pretty sick of editorials like this, which really should just be summed us as "Wah-wah, a team in a smaller market is doing well! Why can't they just award the title to whoever wins the season series between the Red Sox and the Yankees?"

Friendly visiting D-backs fan from Out in the Desert

by Devin on Oct 9, 2007 2:44 PM MDT reply actions

The truth of the matter...

We probably increased that site's traffic by 500% by linking to it. People like that are to be looked at, judged, and then thrown away into the societal scrap heap.

President of the Kazuo Matsui Fan Club

by MattTheRock on Oct 9, 2007 3:37 PM MDT reply actions

Maybe the NL needs to pull an NFC

and win 14 straight World Series championships. Maybe that'll help.

Just kidding. I know better.

by A.J. Haefele on Oct 9, 2007 5:51 PM MDT reply actions

Ugh

That article...

Just ugh. I think it's hilarious how the media is getting whiny and upset because the Yankees are out of it. Now they're just milking this whole Joe Torre thing.

Sign from Sat night:

"Attention East Coast Media. There is a baseball team in Colorado."

www.myspace.com/notthisday.com

by Squeaky on Oct 9, 2007 5:53 PM MDT reply actions

Yeah

Notice how there was a lot more press this weekend given to the teams that LOST... Yankees, Cubs...

The Coors Effect... thinking about changing the name to The Humidor Effect.

by Rox Fan in TN on Oct 9, 2007 6:41 PM MDT up reply actions

MLB.com

Even though there are two CS' happening within a couple of days, the Yankees STILL make it onto the top 6 stories on MLB.com. I couldn't care less if Steinbrenner fires Torre or if he makes him put on a feathered hat and do the Macarena while whistling Dixie.

I'd much rather hear about the team with the best fielding percentage in MLB history that went on a near-record setting 15 game run to make it to their first CS. Or how about the team that last won a World Series in 1948, and has had a share of first place in their division since August 15th, and in no less than 2nd since April 24th? How about the team with a closer who has 47 saves this year, a 79.6 save percentage, and is throwing with an ERA of 2.66? This is also the team that had a 26 game stretch in which they went 21-5, starting 3.5 games back on their division leader and ending up 5 games ahead.

But no. Apparently the drama dance in the Yankees clubhouse is more important.

Give me a break.

by oo_nrb on Oct 10, 2007 1:39 AM MDT up reply actions

Maybe if we're lucky,

they'll talk about the Red Sox a little bit more.

DbacksSkins... I hail from here and here.

by DbacksSkins on Oct 10, 2007 10:31 AM MDT up reply actions

Haha

Well, at this point, I'd welcome anything not Yankees. Check back with me in a couple of days, though :) .

by oo_nrb on Oct 11, 2007 2:03 AM MDT up reply actions

Fox Sports headline, submitted without comment

"Why Boston may not win the World Series"

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/7318240?CMP=OTC-K9B140813162&ATT=49

Third paragraph:

"With that in mind, today's task still seems fairly difficult. Without conjuring any problem-solving curses, I've been challenged to make a World Series case for the three surviving Major League teams not named the Boston Red Sox.

This means I have to establish why the Cleveland Indians or Colorado Rockies or Arizona Diamondbacks have a reasonable chance to triumph over Red Sox Nation."

Get Demented. Standing by my guys forever.

by Silverblood on Oct 10, 2007 1:30 PM MDT reply actions

I read the article

and then I read the comments. I'm glad Rockies fans have class. Maybe I'm overstating my point here. Perhaps only twirps respond to an article like that. Anyway, I find it humorous that there is no mention of the Rockies taking 2 of 3 from Boston in Boston! No that's not a piece of information that should relate to this article at all.
Go Rox

by Blake20th on Oct 10, 2007 2:56 PM MDT up reply actions

10-8, 11-4

22-12.

What is that record? The Rox interleague record over the last two years. That's not a fluke, considering that AL has a better record over the last two years against the NL.

And, just like everyone else says, its nuts they don't mention that the Rox took 2 of 3 from Boston......it's even more nuts they don't mention it because it was AT Fenway, and against their ALCS #1 and #2 starters.

Whoops.

by roxintober on Oct 11, 2007 8:11 AM MDT reply actions

Thought I should add...

We didn't squeak by Beckett and Schilling either.

12-2 and 7-1 respectively. I got money that if you look up both of their game logs...we gave them both their worst starts.

by roxintober on Oct 11, 2007 8:14 AM MDT up reply actions

Did the research

Here are the gamelogs for Beckett:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/pi/gl.cgi?n1=beckejo02&t=p&year=2007

and Schilling:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/pi/gl.cgi?n1=schilcu01&t=p&year=2007

Schilling's worst game actually came right after ours at the hands of the Braves, who coaxed 10 hits out of him in a 6 ER, 2 BB, 0 K game. Our game against Beckett was definitely his worst, however. 10 hits, 6 ER, 1 BB, 1 K as we routed them.

But the AL is so dominant, and their pitching is amazing, and nothing can stop Red Sox Nation, blah blah blah...

by oo_nrb on Oct 12, 2007 12:31 PM MDT up reply actions

A snooping fan

Even though I am an AL fan, I'm liking what I'm seeing from the Rox. Reminds me of the teams in the AL not called the Yankees, Red Sox, Angels, or Tigers. Sadly the D-Backs look kinda rough and I have to think that either of the AL teams would look better against the Rox. Despite this, I see the NL team (likely the Rox) at least winning 2 games in the WS. No sweep from either side. Who I'll cheer for depends on the Red Sox and that non-east team series.

Sure the regular season counts for nothing in the post season (ask the Yanks), but a strong showing against Red Sox helps.

Here's to a non-Red Sox-Rox WS.

by kova on Oct 15, 2007 1:25 AM MDT reply actions