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Post by Jason Giambi on Oct 27, 2006 16:02:19 GMT -5
whether they belong or don't belong, they are in the tournament. If they win, they beat two teams with better records. heck, the best team in the al sucked in the playoffs and won one crappy game. it's sour grapes if you think they aren't champs.
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Post by elliejay21 on Oct 27, 2006 16:07:47 GMT -5
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Post by Chris on Oct 27, 2006 16:14:21 GMT -5
My take is this...in all seriousness:
With such a small field advancing to the playoffs in professional baseball, whoever wins the World Series are rightful owners to the crown. The playoffs are part of a baseball season. If you're nothing more than a streaky team, you won't win the World Series because you probably will not have done enough to advance to the playoffs. The Cardinals did what they had to do to stay atop their division and make the playoffs. They played well enough, all season long to make the playoffs, and now in the playoffs they're winning. They belong there, they've beaten the Mets who the National League's best regular season team in head to head competition and they're beating the team that cruised past the Yankees in head to head competition. In the words of Jim Rome - SCOREBOARD! The scoreboard doesn't lie.
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MSBNYY
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Post by MSBNYY on Oct 27, 2006 16:18:09 GMT -5
It's not sour grapes. It's common sense. An 83 game team that gets there solely due to geography is not the best team in baseball no matter what they do. What's next, picking a last place team out of a hat and calling them champs if they get on a short run?
The Cards are beating a team that cheated. Big deal. It doesn't even matter if they beat better teams. They didn't belong there in the first place. No matter what happens, they are not the best team in baseball, and if anything, they will go down as the worst WS champs in history.
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Post by Chris on Oct 27, 2006 16:27:33 GMT -5
I don't know what the Cardinals interleague record was nor do I know what their outer-division games record was...but there are too many factors involved here...factors that people don't calculate...to just chalk the Cards up as a bad team.
Maybe the fact that they are an 83 win team is the result of playing in a tough division...to determine that you'd have to examine the entire divisions' records in interleague and outer-division play.
The fact is that they won that division and 83 wins is what it took to win that division. They were, AT WORST, the 4th best team in the NL (assuming that you'd consider the Dodgers a better team - I don't)...and when the top 4 teams in a league go head to head in playoff series, and one team is left standing, then that team is the best team in the league...how could they NOT be...they beat out the other three HEAD TO HEAD.
The other thing that you are not considering here is that the Cardinals took a drastically different route to the World Series than the Tigers. The Cardinals are a perpetual division winner, playoff team....they're battle tested in very tough series over the past several years. They are routinely one of the upper echelon teams in baseball over the past several seasons...and belong there. If you want to accuse any team of being a "fluke" or a "one hit wonder" it should be the Tigers.
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MSBNYY
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Post by MSBNYY on Oct 27, 2006 16:38:05 GMT -5
The only factor is that the Cardinals won 83 games and had the 5th best record in the NL. They are at most, the 10th best team in baseball.
It took 83 games to win the NL central. It was the wimpiest division in baseball.
The Cards' interleague record was a horrific 5-10. It's garbage.
The Cardinals' past years are irrelevant. The Dodgers were a better team. 88 wins.
Beating teams head to head in a very short series only means that you got hot in a very short series. Last year, the Royals swept the Yankees 3 straight. Had that been a 5 game playoff series, that team would have won. But in no way, shape or form were the Royals the better team. Same could be said about the Devil Rays who kicked the shit out of the 2005 Yanks.
Calling the Cardinals the best team in the league is laughable. But if you want to do something even more ridiculous, call them the best team in baseball if they win one more game.
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Post by grover on Oct 27, 2006 16:49:38 GMT -5
Yeah, but Balls, the Royals are NOT in the playoffs. 100 loss teams are not in the playoffs. The Cardinals are, and they are beating teams that are 'better' than they are.
Unless you can show me where being a champion of your sport is not as important as having the best record in the regular season, then your argument holds as much water as a can with no bottom.
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Post by grover on Oct 27, 2006 16:55:55 GMT -5
The only factor is that the Cardinals won 83 games and had the 5th best record in the NL. They are at most, the 10th best team in baseball. It took 83 games to win the NL central. It was the wimpiest division in baseball. The Cards' interleague record was a horrific 5-10. It's garbage. The Cardinals' past years are irrelevant. The Dodgers were a better team. 88 wins. Beating teams head to head in a very short series only means that you got hot in a very short series. Last year, the Royals swept the Yankees 3 straight. Had that been a 5 game playoff series, that team would have won. But in no way, shape or form were the Royals the better team. Same could be said about the Devil Rays who kicked the shit out of the 2005 Yanks. Calling the Cardinals the best team in the league is laughable. But if you want to do something even more ridiculous, call them the best team in baseball if they win one more game. Ok, so according to your argument, the only teams who deserve to win are the teams who win a title with the best record, correct? Also: So me the mendoza line for teams that need to make the playoffs. Show me this league minimum for wins to make a playoff series. ALSO: Denounce the 2000 and Don't make any excuses for them. Call them a total pathetic team, and call the year a sham.
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Post by Chris on Oct 27, 2006 16:58:40 GMT -5
Here's where I SORT OF agree with you. At the end of the regular season, the Cardinals may have been AT WORST (not AT MOST) the 10th best team in baseball. But the playoff and divisional structures allowed them a playoff spot. They got in the playoffs fair and square, and you can't begrudge them that.
Here's where we disagree. If the Cards were as bad as you claim, they very well may have gotten on a hot streak and squeaked past a first short playoff series. But they have gone head to head with teams that are much better than them (in your estimation) and have won in the subsequent playoff series. That totally negates your hot streak theory.
This harkens back to your anti-Giambi rants. You are doing the same thing here. A professional sports team in any given year is measured by the entirety of the season and playoffs if applicable. You are attempting to take a specified time slice of performance and make an generalized conclusion about a player or team based on that. The fact is that the Cardinals won their division and are now showing something in the playoffs that the other teams didn't have - postseason battle-tested experience - this is what allowed them to beat the Padres and the Mets...and probably the Tigers. It's fair. You may not like it, but it's fair. The Cardinals are a very good team...and while you want to chalk them up to being a poor team on a hot streak...what's to say they aren't a great team that was on long cold streak? Either way, they are where they are fair and square...and considering the fact that they too suffered injuries just as significant as The Mets, Yankees, Red Sox did...I think it speaks more to the greatness of this team, than it speaks to their perceived mediocrity, that they weathered the storm and are where they are.
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MSBNYY
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Post by MSBNYY on Oct 27, 2006 17:05:08 GMT -5
The teams that have the best records deserve to win the title. The teams that do not have the best record, like the Cardinals, who had the 5th best record in a league with 4 playoff spots, do not deserve shit.
83 wins is NOT a very good team. 83 wins is an average team.
They are only where they are because of where they play, not how they play, and that is why their title is complete malarky.
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Post by elliejay21 on Oct 27, 2006 17:10:20 GMT -5
Perhaps the Cardinals were slackers during the season... the players ARE union members, you know... the union mentality is to do the barest minimum of work that gets the task accomplished, and 83 games was all they HAD to win in order to accomplish the task. Why should they have bothered working harder in the regular season? They got to the playoffs, which is the time you need to step up.
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Post by Jason Giambi on Oct 27, 2006 17:44:57 GMT -5
sour grapes rears it's ugly head...... your team won 95 games, and then shit the bed..... deal with it. The team that wins the world series is the best team in baseball that year. NOt the 2001 mariners, not the 2006 yankees, mets, tigers or whomever you feel is the "most worthy".
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Post by MSBNYY on Oct 27, 2006 18:21:52 GMT -5
You whine and bitch about sour grapes, but it's still the truth. It has nothing to do with the Yankees, and not one of my points said that. But I guess arguing things I don't say is much easier than arguing against the truth.
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