Pete Carroll throwing the ball mattered

A football coach matters a lot.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

That 3-5 was lights out in the first 4 or so months of the season. The reason they are here is the back end of the rotation.

_________________
O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

aaaah....what?

_________________
Ба́бушка гада́ла, да на́двое сказа́ла—то ли до́ждик, то ли снег, то ли бу́дет, то ли нет.

yep

_________________
O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

I don't understand Beardown's thread, but in general, there are two ways to look at a current critique of Joe Maddon...

1. You agree with JORR that managers matter very little, if at all. If you believe in this train of thought, then Maddon wasn't responsible for the success during the season or any "struggles" in the playoffs the last two games.

2. You believe the manager does have an impact. But if that is the case, what is there, based on this year, to criticize him about? This was his first year, and the team was, what, 25+ games better than last year? And they made the NLCS. Of course, Maddon's not solely responsible for this if you believe he is responsible at all, but we're now looking to criticize the guy after this season, of all seasons? Performing above "expectations" is probably the best measure of a manager, which basically tells us there aren't any good, objective criteria with which to judge a manager.

I understand people being angry about the outcomes of the last two days. I have been a train wreck watching both games, and the Cubs' performance has been objectively poor. Their best two pitchers, including the guy who is most responsible for being at this point, have given up multiple runs early, which put them in a hole which they could never recover from. No team will win a World Series when their top two pitchers are being outperformed when it matters most. And the goal right now is a World Series, without question. When you're this close, anything short is disappointing.

But once we are able to take a step back, to act like the season was this failure with a ton of blame to go around is ridiculous. If they don't win the World Series, they don't win it, but it's not like the Cubs lost 100 games. It's been an impressive year. There were callers on Mully and Hanley this morning ready to fire the whole management team... and they haven't even lost the series yet! (though it looks grim). I mean, Jesus, once the game is over and if they lose the series, once the series is over, have a little perspective. I'll be disappointed for awhile, but I still realize this was a good year. I haven't seen one of the teams I follow win a championship since '98, so a trip to the Conference Championship, in relative terms, is pretty good.

_________________

My biggest beef with Maddon is letting Jake throw too many pitches-innings in meaningless games down the stretch..he seemed more concerned with getting him the CY instead of keeping him rested for important games in October.

_________________

I don't think Arrieta's performance has anything to do with his innings count. I think it has more to do with how much energy he is expending on the day of the game dealing with his adrenaline.

That's exactly what I said. And it's true even though Maddon will deny it.

WRONG. Travis Wood was mostly bad and was taken out of the rotation, Wada had a couple decent starts, though he couldn't go deeper than 5 innings and then got hurt. When he returned he was awful, then hurt again. Dallas Beeler? Did you admire the work of a Dallas Beeler? Haren was a mixed bag, but better than the ones that came before him. Hendricks was bad a lot in the first half, but did better after the All-star break. Hammel is the one guy you are right about. he was outstanding in the first half. Probably the most consistent starting pitcher in the first half. But after his injury, he has been bad more than good. Not sure if it was the injury alone or just another 2nd half fade, as he had last year after being dealt to Oakland.

_________________
Go Cubs!!!!

pull up hendricks' first half numbers

_________________
O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

I think I could manage in MLB, but my inability to hit fungos might cost me some respect.

_________________
Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

His velocity is down. Id tend to think thats more workload than adrenaline. Adrenaline could be responsible for throwing the first pitch away though.

You have coaches do that

You think Lasorda was doing that? Frank Robinson?

I know Lasorda threw batting practice and loved Connie's Pizza.

So he had those two things going for him.

MLB managers are like high school gym teachers... just throw the equipment out on the floor and say 'go play' then disappear in the office and drink

“Of course Rocky did set a great example for us in 1976,” Maddon said. “When you get behind the eight ball a little bit, just go and pound on some big slabs of beef in a cooler. All of the sudden you come back, and you are fine.”

Joe. Maddon. GETS IT.

_________________