Is this good?

Dr. Giganto

Sports Moderator

I was just looking up a player's performance in the past, in a certain situation, and this is what I found:

23 games, .362 BA, .400 OBP, .648 SLG, 1.048 OPS, 6 HR, 16 RBIs, 16 runs scored, 3 stolen bases

Extrapolated out to 162 games: .362/.400/.648, 42 HR, 113 RBIs, 113 runs scored, 21 stolen bases

Not bad, right?

Those are Alex Rodriguez's playoff numbers through Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS. Think maybe his "non-clutchness" is a little overexaggerated, based on two bad series?

Blitzkrieg

Administrator

This gets brought up every year by someone and while it's a fair point to make, everything is magified in New York. The only thing New Yorkers know is that A-Rod has never done anything to help them win a key game or come up with a huge hit to help them win a series, etc.. It also doesn't help that in those two series and in '04 after the blowout game, A-Rod has not just been bad.. he's been horrible..

Dr. Giganto

Sports Moderator

So, basically, A-Rod was AWESOME for his first 23 playoff games, and he's been really bad his last 12 games. Is it unreasonable to assume that his poor performance has to simply do with random fluctuations in his performance? Every player goes through slumps, and even the best of player's are bound to have slumps during important parts of the season. It's inevitable

Here's another small smaple of one player's playoff numbers:

13 games, .130 batting average, .216 on-base percentage, .217 slugging percentage, 1 home run, 1 RBI, 3 runs scored.

That's Mickey Mantle in the 1961-1963 World Series.

Here's another:

12 games, .136 BA, .188 on-base percentage, .205 SLG, 1 HR, 3 RBIs, 3 runs scored, 0 stolen bases, 1 caught stealing.

Wanna venutre a guess who that is? Captain Clutch himself, Derek Jeter, in the 2001 ALCS and World Series

Dakstang

MMA Moderator

I don't know.

Is it good?

That jumble of numbers means nothing to me.

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Blitzkrieg

Administrator

I see your point, but again.. people think if someone can't do it in Boston or New York then they are worthless. A-Rod hasn't done it in New York and I don't think it's because he's going through a slump, I think it's because he's let the media and fans get to him.

Lets think about this for a sec. In the regular season A-Rod has gone through slumps and been booed by the fans, criticized by the media, but he's always been able to overcome it. Why? because he gets to face a lot of soft pitching, horrible teams, and go on long road trips away from home.. He's too great of a player to not overcome a slump in the season when he has these said opportunties.

In the playoffs, A-Rod for the most part is facing great pitching. If you aren't yourself and are letting the fans and media get to you, good pitchers are going to eat you up more so then some AAA ballplayer..

A-Rod only needs one big hit in the playoffs and it'll all turn around for him.

Dr. Giganto

Sports Moderator

you're right about him not being himself. Last year, the fans and the media were obviously in his head. But the reason why they were, is because they seriosuly overreacted to 8 bad playoff games, which followed 8 very good games as a member of the Yankees.

By the way, the pitchers he faced in those 8 good games after joinging the Yankees include: Johan Santana (twice), Pedro Martinez, and Curt Schilling. The other 4 were Bronson Arroyo, Derek Lowe, Brad Radke (all legitimately good pitchers), and Carlos Silva (not quite so good)

Jayman

Super Moderator

But the same members of the Yankees all faced the same pitchers, not just A-Rod. He needs to realize that if he is going to get paid for what he is worth, he needed to start producing. Whether that's more practice, or getting focused somehow, I don't know.

You can't blame the pitchers. I assume that list of pitchers were from the playoffs? If so, that's what makes the playoffs - you are going up against the best in the league, and you need to excel.

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Dr. Giganto

Sports Moderator

that list of pitchers I named were the ones that he played against in his first 8 playoff games with the Yankees, against which he batted .368, OBP'ed .455, and slugged .789

Doing that, in a Yankees uniform, against Johan, Radke, Silva, Johan, Schilling, Pedro, Arroyo, Lowe is impressive. Take that in, because apparently you misunderstood the first time. In 4 games against the 3 best pitchers in the AL at the time, plus 4 other games against good pitchers, A-Rod batted .368 and OPS'ed 1.244...IN A YANKEE UNIFORM!

My point is, if you gave A-Rod 1,000 playoff games, in whatever uniform/city/media market you choose, his overall numbers would probably end up being similar to his regular season numbers.

Captain Clutch, Derek Jeter's career regular season batting average is .318. His career playoff batting average... .314. Regular season OBP: .390, playoffs: .384

Bernie Williams is another player that everybody loves to point out as being really clutch during the Yankees playoff run. Regular season OPS: .857, playoff OPS: .851

David Ortiz playoff OPS: .935, regular season OPS: .929

See a pattern here? Over time, almost all players' numbers in the playoffs end up being similar to their overall numbers. But if you havent played THAT many playoff games, it's easy to be significantly better or worse than your career average.

Blitzkrieg

Administrator

Again you raise a fair point Tom, but I don't think it's quite as easy to look at it like that. It's the playoffs, he's A-Rod, and he has everyone hating on him including his own fans.

I really think it's in his head when he goes to the plate. I don't think this has been a regular slump.. I think it started out like that, because before game 4 against Boston he played very well but then he went into a usual and otherwise normal slump which I believe has been compounded by the fact that everyone was so quick to jump on him.

Freak

Personally, I think Tom is 100% right, but the simple truth is that the only way anyone else will agree is if A-Rod has an outstanding playoffs and leads the Yankees to the World Series. And that's because people -- especially baseball fans, and definitely Yankees and Red Sox fans -- are bullheaded as fuck.