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 Post subject: Just hit the bloody ball
PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 12:52 am 
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Joined: Mon Mar 10, 2003 1:01 am
Posts: 2266
Location: New Jersey
From a bizarre NYT story about social scientists say that "decentralized" teams (such as the Yankees allegedly are) fare better than "tight-knit" teams (such as the Red Sox allegedly are):

If the Yankees do go down to the wire again with the Red Sox, a single signal or word from Posada, Jeter, or Torre may be enough to change a game or turn the tide in a series. And no researcher can predict at that point which system will prevail, the centralized passion of the Red Sox or the diffuse professionalism of the Yankees.

Maybe that's because the team that will win is the team that is better at scoring runs and denying the other team runs, and not the one with the better "chemistry."


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PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 1:40 am 
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Location: Southern California
You don't think chemistry has anything to do with scoring? That amounts to a sad life, methinks. Just kidding.

But the energy of your teammates and your fans can, and often does, translate into success. Watching the division championships in college basketball this weekend should've proved that.

Pitching and defense wins baseball games, but there's something to be said for energy on the field, chemistry among the players.


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 Post subject: Re: Just hit the bloody ball
PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 2:43 am 
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Joined: Thu Jul 15, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 968
Location: Champaign, Ill.
Matthew Grieco wrote:
Maybe that's because the team that will win is the team that is better at scoring runs and denying the other team runs, and not the one with the better "chemistry."


On the other side of the coin, you weren't in the bar I was in during games 6 and 7 of the NLCS; it was rowdier than Busch Stadium. You could tell after Pujols got on base and Rolen smacked that dinger that put the Cardinals up in Game 6 that the fans, and the electricity of the place, had something to do with it. In fact, most leagues rely on this concept when they award home-field advantage during the playoffs -- there's a reason it's a reward for a job well done in the regular season.

Sometimes, the team that wins overcomes impossible odds to do so -- yet I was on the court celebrating with the rest of the fans at Mizzou Arena this afternoon after my 14-15 Missouri Tigers took down the No. 7 Kansas Jayhawks (oh, how sweet it is!). It's almost impossible to explain why the Tigers had as much as a 15-point lead during that game; our stats coming in to the contest were terrible, and we'd just come off a 19-point loss to Iowa State where we turned the ball over 22 times. And yet, every player was focused on one thing that game -- beating Kansas. One of our sports reporters interviewed the entire starting lineup about today's game individually and they all had the same response: Screw the rest of the season, screw the .500 record, screw the we-might-not-make-the-postseason-for-the-first-time-in-forever outlook; we want to beat Kansas. They didn't care about anything else. I think it's that drive that helped two players put up career-high efforts in scoring and another pull down 14 boards on his way to a double-double.

But I digress, since I was getting to basketball. I think what the writer is alluding to here is that the Yankees are, in all respects, as close to an all-star team as can be hoped for in the bigs, but that's probably going to be the team's downfall, because too many egos will clash.

Just my two cents.


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 Post subject: Re: Just hit the bloody ball
PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 4:09 am 
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Joined: Mon Apr 08, 2002 12:01 am
Posts: 1775
Location: Baltimore
Matthew Grieco wrote:
If the Yankees do go down to the wire again with the Red Sox, a single signal or word from Posada, Jeter, or Torre may be enough to change a game or turn the tide in a series. And no researcher can predict at that point which system will prevail, the centralized passion of the Red Sox or the diffuse professionalism of the Yankees.


I agree: it may or may not happen; researchers can't expect to predict this accurately.

Two questions:
1. What's the point of the story (which i'm not going to read)?
2. Did Posada, Jeter or Torre give that single signal or say that word last fall during the series against the Red Sox?


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 Post subject: Re: Just hit the bloody ball
PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 11:41 am 
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Joined: Tue Feb 15, 2005 6:03 pm
Posts: 103
Location: Illinois
ndugan1 wrote:
Matthew Grieco wrote:
Maybe that's because the team that will win is the team that is better at scoring runs and denying the other team runs, and not the one with the better "chemistry."


On the other side of the coin, you weren't in the bar I was in during games 6 and 7 of the NLCS; it was rowdier than Busch Stadium. You could tell after Pujols got on base and Rolen smacked that dinger that put the Cardinals up in Game 6 that the fans, and the electricity of the place, had something to do with it. In fact, most leagues rely on this concept when they award home-field advantage during the playoffs -- there's a reason it's a reward for a job well done in the regular season.


Baseball's home-field advantage is the strategic importance of having the last at-bat.


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 Post subject: Re: Just hit the bloody ball
PostPosted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 3:40 pm 
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Joined: Thu Jul 15, 2004 12:01 am
Posts: 968
Location: Champaign, Ill.
KyleJRM wrote:
Baseball's home-field advantage is the strategic importance of having the last at-bat.


That's what I was meaning to say; after nine hours on the desk, my train of thought was sputtering a little.


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