Rich, re your last comment about IKF. I'm preternaturally puzzled over why there is such an obsession with the play at the plate, when the fact is that if Ernie's drive to the wall in left centre (with two outs, yet) had been directed differently by a matter of the same few inches by which IKF was called out, we wouldn't be talking about poor Izzie at all. That night truly crowned baseball as the "game of inches". Much as I hate to admit it, them's the breaks of the game. We need to leave Izzie, and Carlos Febles, and even Daulton Varsho, alone.
Respect your opinion. But I will continue to disagree and point to the play at the plate. I don’t care if it’s something they practice on the second day of spring training. This is World Series and you are 90 feet away from a championship. Time to be aggressive not passive.
Rich, agree (be aggressive) and disagree (fluke play) with this. He absolutely could have got a step more or so off third (if Febles allowed it, which he didn’t). But the chances of scoring on a ground ball with less than two outs, bases loaded, infield in are likely less than 1%. Jomboy did analysis of this and, in the last 10 years, zero runs have scored on a grounder in this situation without an error. Now, this play nearly had three: a Rojas stumble, double clutch and Smith’s foot inexplicably losing the plate. All three are enormous flukes. IKF was four feet out when Smith caught ball (the inches narrative is only when he came back down) and that was after the Rojas stumble and double clutch. It’s not a scoring play. It’s fair to say IKF should have been told to be more aggressive by coaches (or run through bag, though, interestingly, Mookie slid feet first in exact same situation top of 10th), but really, you’re being aggressive for a wild pitch/passed ball, not a ground ball. All in all, ya, there’s a world where IKF woulda/coulda scored but it would have been a massive fluke. My fan fiction is that Barger pulled a legal version of Naylor’s jump, head down/no jump/no slide at second on double play. At best a 50/50 shot of Mookie making a good throw to first base. Imagine that hockey style ending with Barger with a black eye and Guerrero scoring to tie! Great coverage this year man.
So what you’re saying with this article is that the Jays are the Rodney Dangerfield of baseball.
Jays new 2026 social media hashtag is #NoRespect. Plus wherever Santander will be playing defensively is the danger field. So yeah.
Rich, re your last comment about IKF. I'm preternaturally puzzled over why there is such an obsession with the play at the plate, when the fact is that if Ernie's drive to the wall in left centre (with two outs, yet) had been directed differently by a matter of the same few inches by which IKF was called out, we wouldn't be talking about poor Izzie at all. That night truly crowned baseball as the "game of inches". Much as I hate to admit it, them's the breaks of the game. We need to leave Izzie, and Carlos Febles, and even Daulton Varsho, alone.
Respect your opinion. But I will continue to disagree and point to the play at the plate. I don’t care if it’s something they practice on the second day of spring training. This is World Series and you are 90 feet away from a championship. Time to be aggressive not passive.
Rich, agree (be aggressive) and disagree (fluke play) with this. He absolutely could have got a step more or so off third (if Febles allowed it, which he didn’t). But the chances of scoring on a ground ball with less than two outs, bases loaded, infield in are likely less than 1%. Jomboy did analysis of this and, in the last 10 years, zero runs have scored on a grounder in this situation without an error. Now, this play nearly had three: a Rojas stumble, double clutch and Smith’s foot inexplicably losing the plate. All three are enormous flukes. IKF was four feet out when Smith caught ball (the inches narrative is only when he came back down) and that was after the Rojas stumble and double clutch. It’s not a scoring play. It’s fair to say IKF should have been told to be more aggressive by coaches (or run through bag, though, interestingly, Mookie slid feet first in exact same situation top of 10th), but really, you’re being aggressive for a wild pitch/passed ball, not a ground ball. All in all, ya, there’s a world where IKF woulda/coulda scored but it would have been a massive fluke. My fan fiction is that Barger pulled a legal version of Naylor’s jump, head down/no jump/no slide at second on double play. At best a 50/50 shot of Mookie making a good throw to first base. Imagine that hockey style ending with Barger with a black eye and Guerrero scoring to tie! Great coverage this year man.