World Series Talk #2

From: Tim Carney
To: Alex Massie, Michael Brendan Dougherty
Subject: Advantage Rays

Game 2 confirmed my suspicion after Game 1: The Rays are the better team.

The Phillies can keep hitting the ball around, and can have a lineup that's Yankee-like in its top-to-bottom fearsomeness, but the point of baseball is to score runs. The Rays didn't simply have more luck in that department--they're better at it.

Only one of the Rays' four runs last night was knocked across on a hit; the others were manufactured (and, man, does a World Series squeeze warm my heart). The Phillies, meanwhile, over two games, have gone a dreadful 1 for 28 with men in scoring position, leaving 21 runners on base.

You can talk about their "not hitting in the clutch," but you don't have to get so abstract and airy as that: they don't run the bases, play small ball, or simply put the ball in play as well as the Rays. With the teams otherwise being equal, such fundamentals are going to make the difference.

And, yes, Jimmy Rollins got robbed when he didn't get awarded the base when that pitch hit his jersey in the 9th, but let me say, Rollins is partly to blame. Getting hit by pitches while looking like you are trying to get out of the way is a skill--and it's one not in large supply in the majors. (I could give Rollins some lessons on this, by the way.)

Had he turned his back more, and dodged his torso back less, he would have been plunked in the kidney rather than skimmed on the jersey. Down three in the ninth, with only one man on base, a batter has no excuse for not simply wearing a pitch like that. Evan Longoria would have done it right.

Prediction: Rays in six games, with Cole Hamels picking up the the Phillies' only two wins.