Another vote for Trout. What an amazing season by a complete player.
Too bad the Rays were eliminated; I was hoping they’d be fighting for contention against the Orioles. Ah, well, the Yanks just need to take care of the Red Sox. That one game wild card game is scary.
I do too. No jinxes, now I hope I can’t use them because we won the next 2! I was at the game tonight, its such a shame to see so many empty seats. Attendance was 21k for a playoff clincher. As sad as it would make me, I really hope they move the team somewhere that they can draw fans who actually care about a miraculous team like this.
What a great night though. Warm october oakland evening, perfect night for baseball, nailbiter win against a tough, tough Texas team. Lets win this division!
And the AL goes from having none of its playoff teams determined, to having all of them determined, in just over 24 hours!
Hey, they were .500-ish in September and October, to go with .500-ish in April and early May. And all that stuff in the middle doesn’t really count, right?
Beating the Cubs, however? That’s easy. 
Not only that, but the Yankees went from tied for the first wild card spot to being in the driver’s seat for home field advantage.
Cubs lose, and so tonight we have it: a matchup between two 100-loss teams.
When did it happen last? You knew it involved the Cubs, didn’t you?
Yes indeed, on September 28-30, 1962, the 57-102 Cubs took on the 39-118 Original Mets. The Cubs won two out of three, leaving the Mets with that nice symmetric 40-120 record. The Friday afternoon game drew 595 people to Wrigley Field. (It wasn’t always a tourist attraction!)
I’m tempted to cite this as baseball at its worst. And yet the Cubs lineup featured three Hall of Famers in Santo, Williams, and Banks, plus the 1962 Rookie of the Year, Ken Hubbs, who might have been a Hall of Famer if he hadn’t died in an auto accident at age 22. The Mets had Hall of Famer Richie Ashburn, finishing up his career. And they had Marv Throneberry.
Adam Dunn struck out twice last night and needs four more to pass Reynolds. But with the White Sox elimiinated, who knows whether he’ll play.
Trout’s team isn’t in the postseason. Without Cabrera, it’s likely the Tigers wouldn’t be either. That makes Cabrera more valuable.
We have a separate thread about this, but you can’t gauge a player’s value that way. You are essentially arguing that Cabrera is more valuable because the rest of Cabrera’s team better than the rest of Trout’s, which doesn’t make sense. Also a problem - and mentioned in the other thread - the Angels have a better record than the Tigers do anyway. Does Cabrera deserve an award more than Trout because the Angels are in a tougher division than the Tigers?
Trout’s team has won more games than Cabrera’s. If Trout is on the Tigers and Cabrera is on the Angels - who makes the post-season?
You take Trout off the Angels, they still don’t make the playoffs. You take Cabrera off the Tigers, they don’t either. That’s how I’d cast my vote.
When it comes down to it, lots of regular season wins don’t mean shit if they don’t get you to the postseason. That’s why they play: to get to the post season. Having more wins than the Tigers is little consolation for LA when Detroit’s still playing and they’re watching from home. Did the Tigers have the easier division? Sure. But it’s not like the Angels, head-to-head, walked all over the Tigers this year. They split the series 5-5.
I assume this also holds for home field advantage for the wild card game? If the Orioles & A’s tie for the wildcard, I believe the A’s have a 5-3 advantage in the head to head matchups and would thus get home field, correct?
Uh, hey, Reds? We could use your help. Just a little two-game winning streak. That’s all we ask. The rest is up to us.
The Dodgers would need to get help from the Cardinals AND complete a 10-game winning streak in order to get to the “main” playoffs (two more wins against the Giants, a one-game play-in against the Cards AND the one game wild card against the Braves, on top of their current six-game winning streak). I’m not really holding out any hope, but I think I’m going to head to the stadium tonight anyway. Stranger things have happened in baseball.
I’m going to the Cards v. Reds tomorrow night. Here’s hoping it’s meaningless. Although I’d prefer if the Redbirds just did the job in their game because staying up waiting for the Dodgers to lose is tiring.
I wonder if anybody asked Aaron Crow what he thought about the Nationals winning the east, and gunning for home field advantage throughout the playoffs.
Well, for 21k you guys were LOUD. When Balfour came in, I could barely hear Fosse and Kuiper over the LET’S go OAKland (clap-clap-clapclapclap) chant. Loved the celebration - Coco circling the field giving high-fives, Reddick giving Melvin the pie. My kids and wife had all fallen asleep so I was jumping up and down doing a silent celebration like some kind of weird avant-garde mime impersonation.
I too will gladly give up my tickets for a division title. If it doesn’t work out, I’ll see you there… I’ll be the one in the A’s hat and jersey.
Yanks send Phelps out to try and win the division tonight. Sox have Lester. Tampa has Shields vs Os. Should be fun.
Oakland eliminates two teams with one win. I wonder how many times that’s happened.
The A’s are absolutely my #1 suprise team of the year. Never in a million years would have seen this coming.
The race for Most Disappointing is, I guess, between the Red Sox, Blue Jays… and I suppose the Phillies, who aren’t actually BAD many just assumed would be in the playoffs again.
Freddy-Hubbs perished in a plane crash. (per his wiki entry)