Six times this postseason, Gleyber Torres has walked to the plate in the first inning to get things started for the Yankees. Five times this postseason, that opening opportunity has equaled an opening salvo: walk, walk, double, single, double. It’s a small picture of Torres as the catalyst, and presents […]
In the very first game of the very first World Series, Pittsburgh’s starter, Deacon Phillippe, did something that, to this day, has been replicated only 20 times: he issued no walks while fanning double-digit batters (he had 10 K’s). No one matched Phillippe’s feat for 46 years, until Brooklyn’s […]
Two innings after Willie Mays saved the day with The Catch, there was still no guarantee that Mays’ brilliance – likened to an optical illusion – would be remembered as an instrumental pivot in a Giants’ victory or a footnote in a loss. After all, this was Game 1 of […]
Seven years ago, Francisco Lindor walked to the plate in the bottom of the sixth inning, the glare and tension of postseason baseball emanating all around – a reality throttled up by a line score showing the home team losing and running out of outs to make up the difference. […]
Entering the contest in the top of the ninth on October 8, 2022, Guardians right-hander Emmanuel Clase had a straightforward mission: hold the opponent scoreless and give his offense an opening in which a single run would win the game (and in this case, the series). Clase did his part […]
By the simple laws of math, a postseason baseball game matters more than one from the regular season. After all, we’re talking 162 games for a team spread over half a year versus maybe 20 games across a single month. But it isn’t the math that gets our senses tingling […]
With another flurry of deadline deals having come and gone, I got to thinking – no, not about whether Jazz Chisholm would kick-start the sluggish Yankees offense, or which team “won” the deadline – but about how this particular junction of the baseball calendar came to be. After all, […]