Yea, I remember hearing that around the time of the trade. I wasn't aware of it at the time. Having said that, check out his 2010 splits by ballpark: http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/split.cgi?n1=leecl02&year=2010&t=p#site They're stellar in Arlington, even with that little slump he had (I'm guessing without looking that most of those bad starts occurred on the road). Check out his WHIP and OPS against ... they are 2nd and 3rd best, respectively, of all parks he's pitched in this season and the sample size at Fenway is extremely small so you could probably say best and 2nd best. Basically, he's been money at Rangers Ballpark in 2010.
Mark Teixeira is done for the rest of the playoffs. Looks like Berkman will play 1B for the rest of the playoffs. Unfortunately, the Rangers have a lefty tomorrow afternoon and Berkman has been terrible batting right handed this season.
How is Cliff Lee > Lincecum? Are you even watching the Giants? He has been just as good if not better. Both of Lincecum's wins were 1 run wins and very intense. Take into consideration everytime Lee pitches he gets a lot of run support (Rangers offense is tremendous) he can take chances and be more aggressive. Again are you even watching the Giants? Rangers pitching have done well but you forget that the Giants starting pitchers (Tim/Cain/Sanchez) have pitched 22 1/3 scoreless innings at home. They have been that dominant. Also, as Brooksball mentioned the NL team has the home field advantage in the WS this year.
Yes thank you I do watch these games. Lee is superior to Lincecum and I have no regrets saying that. Cliff has pitched better this post-season than Lincecum and is making a case as of right now to be one of the most dominating post-season pitchers in the history of baseball. And Lee gets a ton of run support? Do YOU watch the games he has pitched in? He was holding the Yankees in a very tight game until the 9th inning yesterday, whats more pressure than that? Lincecum is still young and can be eradic at times. Sorry, but I'll take the pitcher who single handedly willed the Phillies to the WS last year and is doing it for the Rangers again. And I'm highly confident that Lincecum loses his next outing when he faces off against Halladay again.
And I know I keep repeating it but that SFG offense ain't too shabby. Not even close. They quietly added pieces here and there all season long. They actually finished the season with the 6th best OPS+ in the NL and they are a much, much improved and deeper offense than at the beginning of the season before all those slick acquisitions and the arrival of Posey. Without looking it up, I bet they ranked in the top 5 or better in a lot of offensive categories in the 2nd half. That offense can win them a game or two now which was not the case when it was anemic and Astros-caliber just a year ago. They may not have as many sexy names and their top 2 or 3 hitters aren't quite as good as those of the other remaining teams but they may have more depth than anybody else believe it or not. Posey, Huff, Burrell, Torres, Sandoval, Uribe, Sanchez, Renteria, Ross, Guillen, Fontenot, Rowand, Ishikawa, Schierholtz, etc... I know guys like Sandoval and Rowand had bad to even garbage years and that quite a few of those guys have very unimpressive numbers (mid to low .700s OPS for some them and even into the .600s) but the point is that they have a whole variety of hitters that they can turn to and use that have some kind of history of success and could provide value when you least expect it. They have a lot of options and some decent ones to go with their 2 or 3 very good hitters. It's just particularly impressive when you consider where that offense was not even 12 months ago.
Do you have a grudge against Lincecum or something? To predict he will lose in his next start tells me that you have some kind of grudge against him. Don't hate the freak. What's more pressure than holding a 2 run lead into the 9th? How's about holding a 1 run lead to win the game (see Lincecum - Braves NLDS game 1). It doesn't matter who the opponent is these are the playoffs... EVERY GAME counts. You would take the pitcher (Lee) who has singlehandedly taken the Phillies last year to the world series? FYI - This is Lincecum's first post-season appearance and he is doing the same. Also, the Phillies are still in contention for the WS WITHOUT Lee. Look at the games Lee has pitched vs TB, 5 runs is a lot for a stud pitcher. Matt Cain is 11-0 when he gets 3 runs. In the playoffs anytime you can get 2+ runs for your ace you can almost put a fork in the other team.
Well to be fair, they also added Halladay and Oswalt. And don't forget Hamels wasn't very good last season. Lee and Lincecum are both great pitchers so its hard for me to say one is better than the other, but the SF Giants rotation > Texas Rangers rotation IMO.
I don't have a grudge against Lincecum, but I do oppose the idea that he is better as of right now than Cliff Lee. And my reasoning for believing Lincecum will lose his next start is because odds are Halladay will pitch better and the Philly lineup will adjust. And you do realize the reason the Phillies are still in contention without Lee is because they went out and got arguably two of the most dominant starting pitchers in the past decade. Hamels and nearly everyone in that rotation last October pitched very sub par. Lee literally carried them there. Anyone who watched the post-season last year knows that Lee put on an act for the ages, as he is doing once again this post-season. Lee is better as of right now is better than Lincecum. Look at his post-season resume and stats to see that. Two post-season starts is to small of a sample size. I'm still taking the Phillies to win the NLCS and WS.
I am a die hard Giants fan and to say that the their offense was top 5 is ridiculous. Even in the playoffs for them to manufacture a run is like a godsend. They rarely blow out the other team. Their offense is what is holding them back. If they had Bonds/Kent the world series would be there for the taking. Comparing the Giants O to the Rangers is like night and day. Torres - is in the worst slump ever, not even worth mentioning his numbers Sanchez - is batting .179 without an extra base hit Huff (Their POWER hitter) - batting .231 with no homers or extra base hits Posey (Other POWER hitter)- He has been clutch, but again low numbers .259, no homers. Burrell - .211 1 home run, more strike outs (8) than hits (4). Cody Ross - the ONLY bright spot. Singlehandedly producing all runs for the Giants. Uribe - .095, no homers, more strike outs (6) then hits (2). Sandoval - .167, no homers, no extra base hits, pretty much garbage during the season AND post-season. I must admit when they did hit it was very clutch timing. If it wasn't for Ross' unexpected break out offense and the starters owning the other team they would have been swept in the NLDS by the Braves. Also, the Giants are doing this WITHOUT their two most highest paid players (ZITO and ROWAND).
I agree that Cliff Lee was the man last year during the post-season... but what I don't understand is why if he is/was so great how did he jump from the Indians, Phillies, Mariners and now to Texas (IN ONE YEAR)? And at the same time, the Phillies are still where they want to be when he left them last year (even though they got Halladay & Oz). Doesn't this tell you something? If he is that great wouldn't you think teams would be lining up for him and not letting him go? Lincecum is one of THE MOST untouchable players in the game. Lee on the other hand not so much? Regardless it is pointless debating this topic. We'll see how this goes in a couple of weeks.
He's been moved around a lot because those teams knew they couldn't afford to keep him. He is probably going to be the highest paid pitcher in the offseason. The Phillies made a mistake in dumping Lee but they got lucky that the Astros were willing to part with Oswalt.
If Lincecum made it known to the Giants that he had no interest in staying there and would be willing to test the free agent market, they would be moving him also for a huge haul of prospects. I know you are a Giants fan and there is no question that Lincecum is an elite pitcher in the game right now. But you really are downplaying how good Lee really is. Every single team would love to have Lee right now.
Well in the case of the Indians they were sinking fast and figured might as well ship him off, such as in the case of Roy Oswalt. The Phillies traded him to Seattle because it allowed them to get Roy Halladay who had publicly announced he wanted to play for the Phillies, and there inability to agree on a reasonable contract played a factor as well. Then Seattle traded him to Texas because they like the Indians were going nowhere and wanted to get prospects before he hit the FA market and signs on with a team like NY. Man the landscape of the playoffs would of really been different if the Yankees had landed Lee during mid-season like they were so close to doing. Anyways Lee is gonna get a fairly long-term deal and fat contract this off-season. Highly doubt he will be moving anywhere soon after this year.
To be clear, the reference where I used "top 5" was in the NL, not in MLB. And that may have been an understatement. They finished in the top 6 in OPS+ and that includes the stretch of games before Posey and all the other minor upgrades they made along the way. The Giants offense was performing better than at least 1 of the other 4 NL teams that made the playoffs over the last month of the season. Maybe I'll dig into the numbers tomorrow but if they were top 6 in OPS+ throughout the entire season, they were likely even better than that after Posey and all the other additions. Even if not, they did finish top 6 in that very meaningful offensive statistic. That's a fact. And they have a more talented and deep set of hitters than they did to start the season. As far as postseason performance, it's such a small sample size and they aren't the only team that struggled to score runs. The Phillies went through a long stretch without getting a single hit w/ RISP in these same playoffs. Bottom line: This is a much improved offense from where it was less than a year ago when it was in Astro-level suck territory. They were a better than league average offensive team this season after being near the bottom. That's an amazing improvement considering how little they sacrificed.
I'm not downplaying Lee I agree he is the man I was just comparing him to Lincecum. If anything people here are downplaying Lincecum. Both are elite pitchers, the thing I hate to see in people's posts is "Lee > Lincecum" and then write irrelevant information/stats/excuses for their reasoning.
An even better example of not reading too much into small sample sizes was the Reds getting shut down by the Phillies. That's an even smaller sample size and they faced an unbelievable set of pitchers but that's pretty much the point I'm making. The Reds were far and away the best offense in the NL this season and if not for Oswalt having command issues that day, it could've been even worse. There is also the entirely random nature and "luck factor" in baseball, which is why you should never read too much into small sample sizes for an individual or a team. And even an entire playoffs is a pretty small sample size. I've seen Pujols struggle over 100 ABs and Tim Lincecum struggle for an entire month.
Again, comparing them from last year to this year isn't saying much. They were horrible the year before and at best "average" this year. It wasn't like they made a HUGE jump forward to an elite offense. Here is the stats: http://espn.go.com/mlb/stats/team/_/stat/batting/seasontype/2/league/nl/sort/runs/order/true 2010 (NL) #9 in total runs scored. #7 in BA. #8 in OPS. 2009 (NL) #13 total runs scored. #11 in BA. #16 in OPS. The main reason why they improved so much was because of Posey, Huff & Torres breakout seasons. Look at the other teams that are in the playoffs they are all top 5 in offense - it's unreal that the Giants are still hanging on.
