Wednesday, July 14, 2010 |
NL Wins, Broxton Does, Too, Sorta: NL 3, AL 1
Broxton, for his part, has fared numerically quite a bit better than his Dodger forerunner, but it's also a peculiarity of his record that despite being never asked to get more than four outs in any single game, he is overall 0-2 with a 4.40 ERA. Yet the fact that he has hitherto done appreciably worse in NLCS games (5.06 ERA) is all but exclusively due to his 2009 series against the Phillies.
Yet for me, the feeling will persist — as it did last night — that while Broxton belongs among the game's very good, it's unlikely he will break into the ranks of the elite, mainly because of his postseason numbers. I confess I was right there with others expecting him to gag up the lead; and when David Ortiz got a leadoff single, that felt like exactly the opening I and the rest of the skeptics anticipated.
But what we did not count on was Joe Girardi managing himself out of the game. Part of his problem was that he treated it exactly like the exhibition it was, and so his bench was rather depleted by the time Ortiz made first. His one option left to him — which he did not avail himself of — was A-Rod, but not only did he not pinch-run for the notoriously slow Ortiz, but he didn't have him pinch-hit for Adrian Beltre, either. There has been some talk — mostly on Twitter, from what I can tell — that A-Rod is nursing a sore something-or-other, which means Girardi was loathe to actually run the game as though it counted. And so the game, for Beltre struck out, and John Buck hit into the strangest fielder's choice you'll ever see: a 9-6 with the ball actually hitting the turf first. As Helen said at the time, Broxton owes Cub Marlon Byrd a drink or maybe several rounds, for he did the most masterful job of decoying the runner I've ever seen, getting Ortiz to think he had a chance at catching the fly. With the plodding Ortiz caught halfway between the bags, he was a dead duck at second.
So the game, with Ian Kinsler flying out to center to finish proceedings. The rest was surprisingly entertaining, though perhaps that has more to do with actually being there; I still rate this as one of the better All-Star games I've ever seen, and even have nice things to say about the Home Run Derby, too, which was far more fun in person. About the only bad thing to happen all night was the iPhone Facebook app failing about ten minutes into the game, which I at first thought was AT&T being censorious jerks; but subsequent reports from Huffington Post indicated it was a nationwide affliction, perhaps caused by a bit of bad Javascript. Also, I note in passing that the legions brought out their DSLRs, and hardly anyone seemed to have been checked for the official and ridiculously short four inch lens length. That part is nothing short of infuriating, and enough to make me renounce my season tickets.
Final bonus points: Matt Freaking Capps was the winner. SRSLY.
Labels: all-star game, recaps
Seven of eight closers in the 2009 postseason blew saves. But Broxton is the only one stuck with the choker tag.
I still cannot imagine that, if Broxton had saved one more game in the playoffs, you would still be giving him a hard time. That would be 10 of 11 successful appearances - the magic 91%.
If 91% is acceptable, and Broxton is one game away from reaching that total, then how can you say that one game isn't what you're basing your opinion on?
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