Point Blank – April 28
Does Brad Stevens have a gambit left (or is he literally 'Trapped' this time, cue Jimmy Cliff)…Will Jose Fernandez continue to be a fish out of water on the road…The Blue Jays have gone from bashers to bashed vs. left-handers (* - yes, I know it’s early)…
Brad Stevens is a great coach that may have already used up his playbook. Jose Fernandez can become a great pitcher, if he does not develop a psychological block on the road. The Blue Jays were great against left-handed pitchers last season, but have been nowhere near that level so far. Even the best performers can have some limitations, and understanding them is a big part of developing a better understanding of sport (and I don’t even want to get started this morning on the weaknesses of the QBs that NFL teams are going to draft way too high this evening).
Hawks/Celtics #6 – Does Brad Stevens have a gambit left from his chess pieces, or is he literally ‘Trapped’ this time?
Stevens has a chance to be one of the truly great coaches, a basketball tactician savant that consistently maximizes what he has to work with, and over time I hope he gets the proper appreciation for just how remarkable of an achievement it was to get Butler to the NCAA Championship game twice (that should prove to be one of the great sporting achievements of this century). But his Celtics became a theme topic here back in mid-March, with the notion being that they may have already reached the peak as to what this group was capable of. It looked that way when they fell behind 2-0 at Atlanta, struggling to get into an offensive rhythm, but then Stevens opened the court back in the Boston Garden, gave Isaiah Thomas plenty of room to operate, and it became a series again.
Until Tuesday, that is. An Atlanta defense that has been the NBA’s best since the All Star break had a counter for Thomas, double-teaming him to force the ball to be given to someone else, and it got ugly. In this case Stevens, Thomas and the Celtic offense were “Trapped”, literally, so as we sort through tonight’s matchup a little background from the great Jimmy Cliff is called for -
When the floor opened up for Thomas in Games 3 & 4 he took advantage, becoming the finisher instead of the distributor, scoring 32.6 percent of all Boston points in those two wins. Mike Budenholzer countered for Game 5 back in Atlanta, and the difference was startling
Thomas Minutes FGS Pts +/-
Games 3-4 80:02 23-47 70 +25
Game 5 29:19 3-12 7 -33
Kyle Korver details it well – “Jeff (Teague) did a great job of trying to deny him the ball as much as he could and then we had a lot of guys, our bigs are so good at coming up there and blitzing it.”
So what options are left for Stevens? To put the limitations of the offense into perspective, here is the performance for all players other than Thomas in the series –
FG% PP48
38.5 68.8
I use PP48 instead of per-game to account for the overtime session in Game 4. In other words, players other than Thomas are scoring the equivalent of just 68.8 per game, on dismal shooting. Some of that is a tribute to how good the Atlanta defense is (the bigs have been so active, helping lead to team totals of 42 steals and 40 blocked shots in the series), and the rest is the reality of the Boston personnel.
Now on to Game 6, and a rather interesting marketplace – there is no Zig Zag to be found yet. The Hawks are higher in this setting than for their two earlier games in Boston (the Celtics actually closed at -3 here for Game 3), despite the fact that Thomas’ ankle is considered to be fine this morning. That price is a bit high to me, but the tactical issues preclude an investment for now. I do believe the markets got the Total right, those 198’s being five points below the previous projections in Boston, but with merit to that off of the series flow.
Item: Jose Fernandez under the microscope
Fernandez has an opportunity to shine tonight, facing a Dodger offense that has only managed five runs through the first three games of this series. The question is will he, and that brings out the microscope for a look not at his raw stuff, but his confidence level. When you have gone 18-1 in your career starts at home, but just 5-10 when on the road, it is something that can get into a young pitcher’s head, and as noted here so often, the psychology of those that toe the pitching rubber is a major handicapping factor. In a rather ironic marketing photo op by the franchise, it can be twisted to say that he really is a fish out of water in road games…
Here is why the psychology matters – the gap between the way that Fernandez has pitched and the actual game outcomes is far too wide, and does bring the potential to be a mental stumbling block.
Fernandez Career Splits
Home Away
ERA 1.61 3.81
WHIP .91 1.19
K/9 10.7 10.5
BB/9 2.5 3.2
BABIP .252 .301
First start with the ERA counts, which indeed show a wide split, but a 1.61 does not get you to 18-1 under normal baseball distribution, nor does 3.81 lead to a 5-10. So there are some extreme pendulums at play in those outcomes. And in truth the ERA gap is an extreme as well – the WHIP, K/9 and BB/9 do not come anywhere near that. Much of the gap simply stems from that BABIP split, something that can be attributed as much to baseball’s geometry as anything that Fernandez has done all that right or wrong.
A guy with the stuff Fernandez brings can be an elite level performer anywhere, yet there was a noticeable lack of swagger in his first two road outings this season, a no-decision against the Mets and a loss to the Giants, in which he appeared tentative, walking six batters over 11 IP. The Dodger offense (two singles in 28 at-bats last night) offers an opportunity for him to step up and take command tonight, and I will be watching closely to see if he does just that, or if the lack of road success has become an issue for him.
About Last Night – On the Blue Jays and lefties
One of the great rides of the 2015 MLB season was getting behind the Toronto offense against left-handers, an instance in which logic and performance synced so early that it was easy to buy-in early and take advantage of. If you have Josh Donaldson, Jose Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion in the heart of the batting order, you are going to rake, and rake hard vs. port-siders.
But now 2016 is happening, it is mostly the same cast in that batting order, and the results have been remarkably different, capped by back-to-back home losses by a combined 14-1 to the White Sox and Chris Sale/Jose Quintana. -
2015 2016
AVG .278 (2) .225 (22)
OBP .354 (1) .280 (26)
SLG .463 (1) .382 (19)
Now the obvious * comes into play – it is early. There have only been 207 PAs against left-handers, and they have indeed run into several good ones. But while those numbers will get better, might basing power ratings vs. lefties off of 2015 be setting up the wrong model? The loss of Chris Colabello for much of the season (.308/.364/.571 vs. lefties in 2015) leaves a hole, and sooner or later they are going to have to make a decision about keeping Troy Tulowitzki in the #5 slot – at .184/.308/.355 overall, with a 26.4 percent strikeout rate, no team is getting less out of that position in their batting order.
It is easy to keep the mental image of those three key hitters at the #2-#3-#4 slots hammering away, but the rest of the cast may not be holding up their weight as much as in 2015. The early poor performances vs. left-handers will turn, but last summer’s levels will likely be out of reach, and may not be a proper standard of expectation.
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