cmh6476

You should reward the best teams of the regular season, and that's essentially what they are doing. Top seed gets to rest (which can be a blessing or a curse) and doesn't have to use pitchers like all the other teams do. Then they reward the other two division champs AND top record that's not a division winner with home games, which probably gives a slight advantage and additional revenue to those teams. And the last two still have a decent chance of moving on. The thing that I'm not finding fun is not knowing when your team will play. Trying to make plans Wednesday when I have kids in school, while we likely won't know until the night before when the nl game 3's are decided are a major pain in the ass. And playing all the wild card games during the day, again with very little notice), makes it tough on employees and employers. I was out of town so it didn't impact me much (also have less people to report to and a more flexible schedule) but definitely sucks for hourly associates or those who are on a point system.

I don't mind the new playoff format. If you don't like it, win your division.

I'd talk about the Chiefs and Royals less

Yeah I used to wish we had this team, or want to play that team... when Trent Green, Alex Smith etc were my teams qb. Now we have mahomes and I don't care or think about who is next. In my scenario, my outlook changed where I want the best at their best, because I know with Mahomes we have a good chance. I'm the same with baseball now. I know matchups favor certain teams, ballpark play better with certain lineups and pitching options. But I don't care. Bring on the Yankees and let's take our shot

That didn't help any of my guys #lookatme

Yes please, moar points for Bijan, Evans and Mclaughlin!@!@!

Damn

Finally seeing entertaining tnf

Not a look at me, but several of you have reached out and I certainly appreciate it. And not to leave people hanging I may update here or there as things progress because some of you genuinely seem to care. I had a work trip planned this week, which didn't leave my daughter many options but my mom has taken her in and she seems to be responding well. It seems like she understands the consequence of her actions, but she's also dealing with the fact that not many people trust her (really just me and my mom left at this point, and even we don't see eye to eye on everything). My wife has been listening and understanding and trying to see where I'm coming from on this. Because I think she knows that my daughter needs her dad, and she doesn't always react well to triggers, that she has a go bag to stay at her mom's for a night if my daughter needs a place to sleep at our house. I realize that's not ideal, but we also don't think leaving my daughter without options is a good idea right now either. I think I've got my daughter to agree to see a counselor. And I'm trying to explain to her that building back trust of others is a process, won't be quick, will be hard and any setbacks mean your start back at ground zero. In terms of figuring out how to settle out the totaled car, identifying an attorney, and working on her next car (I know, short term goals) she's very independent and handling much of that without any of my assistance. I say that cognizant of the opportunity that exists for me to be enabling to her, which I'm trying to avoid. But she is independent, head strong and doesn't always need help from others. At least I think she likes to think that's the case and seems to appreciate the attention of making others think she's completely on her own on everything. Still need to with through long term plans like housing and career goals and whatnot, but I feel better than I did Sunday. I appreciate those of you who have offered me support and encouragement. It means a lot.

My wife wants to do it but I told her to wait till this game is over

Figured this would get lost if I just bumped the other thread. I think this suddenly becomes a bigger deal for the NFL now.

You all will need to make a choice on Monday night... do you watch the Chiefs and Saints, or are you going to watch the royals and Yankees.

I'm going to say fock it and ignore those saying they don't want to hear more about the Royals. Just because maybe HT or others who are rooting for the Yankees might be interested in some additional insight heading into the series. Plus, this is an MLB thread and there's only a handful of teams still playing The Yankees have much bigger names, so most of us know or have heard of Judge and Soto and Gerrit Cole, but honestly other than knowing the lineup top to bottom is probably the most stacked in the league, I don't know much about the Yankees either and would be interested in reading what those who do really perceive their strengths and weaknesses to be. For the Royals, I think everybody at this point knows Bobby Witt, Jr. but may not know a lot about the rest of the team. Starting Pitching The Royals being where they are, in my opinion, is a result of the starting pitching more than anything else. Seth Lugo's name was in the running for Cy Young for most of the year, Cole Ragans has been a tremendous asset and Michael Wacha has pitched well all year. Lugo had an ERA of under 2 for the first two months of the year, where i think 11 of his 12 starts were quality starts. Since he hadn't been a starter for a full season there were questions about his durability, and his ERA did elevate in July and August but 3 of his 4 starts were quality starts in September. He pitched extremely well last night, but I'm guessing we see Ragans and Wacha for two starts if the series went to five games, and Lugo will only get one. The Yankess are the toughest out for any starting pitcher I think, but at his best he keeps hitter guessing when he's using about 12 different pitches. Wacha is kind of the opposite, where his ERA the first two months was over 4, but for July through September his ERA stayed closer to 3. He finished the season really strong with a 2.60 ERA in September although he didn't get get past five innings in most of those starts. I assume he'll get game 1 since he didn't pitch in the wild card series. Ragans has probably been the most consistent, even as well as those other two had pitched. He had a 1.08 ERA in September through 4 starts going 6 or 7 innings in each, giving up 14 hits on 25 innings with only 3 runs allowed. This 3-man rotation is the biggest reason I have a lot of hope going into the divisional series. The Yankees may very well be the toughest out for the Royals to make it back to the World Series, but if there's a team that's capable of doing it, I feel like it can be Kansas City. Relief Pitching The bullpen wasn't very good early in the season, and has obviously been the weakest link. They've been frustrating, have blown leads and couldn't find ways to close out several games. Opening day roster included: Will Smith, Chris Stratton, Nick Anderson, John Schrieber, Matt Sauer, James McArthur, Angel Zerpa and Jordan Lyles Wild Card roster included: Angel Zerpa, John Schrieber (the only two relievers from the opening day roster), Brady Singer, Kris Bubic, Sam Long, Daniel Lynch, Lucas Erceg and Michael Lorenzen And the results, for the Royals bullpen in September they had: ERA: 2.77 (5th) FIP: 2.73 (2nd) K%: 29.4% (4th) BB%: 7.7% (6th) GB%: 45.9% (12th) Granted, that's not facing the Yankees every day but it's still a pretty damn impressive turnaround from where they came from. Erceg and Lorenzen have been tremendous additions, calling up Bubic and Lynch from the minors and moving them from starters to relievers has served the team well, and moving Singer to the pen adds yet another arm. Another thing I noticed watching the series against the Orioles was how masterfully Quantraro used his bullpen. They are using tons of analytics and data to select the best matchups to put them in a position to win. Something the last manager we had to endure (Mike Matheny) would have never done for us. They are looking at the types of pitches their opponents have the most success with (or lack thereof) and it's really worked well. The results were that the Orioles scored 1 run in 2 games. That's pretty damn impressive. Position Players Bobby Witt, Jr. That's all I really need to say about him. Getting Vinnie back in under five weeks is huge, provides some protection in the lineup behind Bobby and plays well with the short right field of Yankee Stadium. Salvy is still the man, although I wish he wouldn't chase so many bad pitches. He still has to have the highest batting percentage swinging at pitches more than a foot outside of the zone The Royals have struggled with (an a key offseason priority will be) identifying a decent leadoff hitter. Michael Massey, Maikel Garcia, Tommy Pham have just struggled to consistently get on base and provide an opportunity for the top three hitters to drive them in. As you rounds out the roster there isn't a lot of star power, but the Royals have options to match up against righty/ lefty splits, and have players they can turn to for different situations late in the game. If you want to DH Salvy you can put Fermin behind the plate. If you want to DH Vinnie (might be highly likely as he's still going to be nursing his thumb) you can play Salvy or Gurriel at first. You can play Garcia at second or third, and gives you flexibility with Massey (left handed bat) at second or DeJong (right handed bat) at third). And you have some options in the outfield between Melendez, Pham, Renfroe and Isbel. None of those dudes are going to set the world on fire, but they give you options. And then you have Dairon Blanco in your back pocket, who seems to be our Jarrod Dyson of the team and can basically swipe a bag at will. History Win, lose, and I guess you can't draw, but whatever happens this has been a fun season to follow, and anything from this point is just gravy. This has been awesome as a fan, and I have tickets for both Wednesday and Thursday games nest week and will likely be in attendance for both if they both end up taking place. The Royals and Yankees have quite the postseason history going, and I'm looking forward to seeing it continue next week NSFW language:

It's not you that keeps bringing it up

Braves making it interesting

Well I think it's dumb. Especially for Braves and Mets not knowing till late the day before. That screws a ton of people.

What are your guys' thoughts on these early wild card start times? Made it a pain in the ass for a lot of people who didn't have a lot of time to plan for work purposes, I'm assuming.

I really liked this place in our early days because of the football insight (and other sports) through fandom. To me instead of it being dull and redundant it made me appreciate other fan bases and learn more about other teams. I don't have the bandwidth or capacity to follow all the other mlb or nfl or ncaa teams. But when my team plays it goes in my calendar (literally) and i watch most if not all their games so I have a better understanding of their strengths and where they are susceptible that others could glean from. But the only time I really see other teams, is when they play my team and most of the time (unless it's a divisional rival) it's often few and far between.

Landed just in time to get it on my phone on the tarmac, still on the phone on Bluetooth for the half hour car ride home, then phone on the bleachers at my daughters high school volleyball game, then finally in the living room with my son for the last inning and a half. Oh, and I went out and grabbed my own postseason hoodie and the son a new cap

I could bore you all with a really detailed and fair analysis of the royals. But no one cares and will just say I talk too much about my own team. So I'll spare you all and just say fock the Yankees

Also 3 of 4 teams left from the central on the al side, yet out only happened because white Sox

Baltimore must hate KC

Says the guy whose team who's in because they have 8 guys who can hit 500 foot bombs with a short porch in right to take advantage of.

Looking forward to that royals/Padres ws matchup