Point Blank – June 13, 2017
Warriors, in Name and Deed…Clayton Kershaw has been very good this season, but that is actually a dropoff…What if R.A. Dickey just can’t knuckle-down anymore…
It is time to put the NBA to bed for a while, outside of the unique entertainment that this year’s draft may turn out to be, and in this instance the season was capped on a high note. One of the issues throughout the campaign was that Golden State may have been prevented from reaching full potential because the Warriors did not get challenged often, but not only did Cleveland throw down a gauntlet in Game #4, the Cavaliers also brought a lot to the table last night. They forced Steve Kerr’s team to go to a high level in order to win, and Golden State responded.
The closing of the Finals also means the end of another particular chapter, which we will get to here on Wednesday, but for now it is last call for a tribute to Gregg Allman and the remarkable impact that the band bearing his name, and that of Duane, had on the musical scene over the past 50 years. There is a fitting way to close it out, and that is to bring the influence front and center, this time from what was billed as a Gov’t Mule show, but included Allman, Derek Trucks and Trey Anastasio. Let’s go to “Soulshine”, live from 2007 to round out the tribute, the guitars coming together so beautifully to take it home despite it being the only time those particular folks ever played the song together live -
Item: When there isn’t much to be said, the best path is to not say much
Since I assume most readers were watching Game #5 closely, especially some bookmakers that dreaded the game falling on “9”, there isn’t all that much to rehash in terms of adjusting any ratings going forward. The Cavs played well enough to be in the chase deep into the second half, but the pieces just weren’t there to make stops, allowing 126.1 PP100 in the game, and 117.5 for the series. The Warriors are truly next-to-impossible to guard, but one takeaway into next season is that Cleveland was simply not a good defensive team, and there is a need to rebuild through both tactics and talent if there is to be a fourth go-round next June.
While putting heavyweights on the final stage, with the prospect that LeBron James, Kevin Durant and Steph Curry may make the league’s All-Time Top Whatever list (perhaps Top 20 fits them already, with Durant threatening to reach Top 10 and James already sitting at the final table), does the NBA face a bit of a problem next season? There isn’t all that much in the way of these same teams meeting again in the Finals, so how does a buzz get created for the regular season? This time around some of that was supplied by the James Harden/Russell Westbrook MVP chase, which creates the rarity of none of the top four players (you might be able to stretch it beyond four) in the league getting that trophy. And of course there will be the power ratings conundrum of properly gauging Golden State next season, the Warriors not needing to do much more than go through the motions to still get about 70 wins in the regular-season.
The big appreciation of the victors is one that I won’t be redundant with because it has been brought up here often - this was not just about great basketball players, but the fact that they played great basketball. While there were fears that too many scorers on one team might not mesh well, there was the magic ingredient that all of the key offensive cogs play so well without the ball, which allowed for play to flow.
If there needs to be a final takeaway I will make it about the quality of basketball that they played, and it goes back to one of the lead topics when the series began – how the impact of Andre Iguodala would rise compared to the regular season. In the two games that were decided in single-digits in the series Iggy never left the court in the fourth quarter, and in Game #5 he spent time guarding both James and Kyrie Irving, showing his versatility, and the trust Kerr has in him. So how about this in terms of measuring impact, the Net PP100 for the Warriors in the series –
Min Net
Iguodala 141 +18.9
Green 177 +10.2
West 50 +8.6
Durant 199 +8.1
Curry 189 +7.8
Thompson 183 +5.5
And of course the list would not be complete without this –
Pachulia 66 -5.7
Yet a generation from now Zaza’s grandchildren will brag to others in school about their “dyedushka” being the starting center for the greatest team of all time.
The flip side will also be a fascinating story over the years ahead – James really does not have anything left to add to his legacy except for more championship rings, but are the Warriors so good that the window is no longer open? There will be something Shakespearean unfolding on that front, albeit clouded by large swaths of today’s (and tomorrow’s) Sports Mediaverse lacking the dignity for a proper review of the play. For now I cannot help but think of the twilight for “The King” being something comparable to the physical and psychological wanderings of Lear once the throne was his no more, and the lives of even the greats summed up so well by Gloucester, in the opening scene of Act IV –
“As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods –
They kill us for their sport.”
Of course in the handicapping world we are forced to be ruthless in our evaluations; survival demands it. Which means that it is time to put another all-time great under the microscope as well…
Item: Clayton Kershaw has been really good this season, which is genuinely a decline
Alas the Eye Test is not as easy for me with Kershaw; an unfortunate aspect of living in Las Vegas is that there is only the opportunity to see him pitch on a small handful of occasions, the silliness of the MLB black-out policy extending across the decades. But let’s set up the numbers for others this evening that can enjoy Dodger Baseball.
If any pitcher had their ERA and xFIP go up by more than a half run, their FIP by more than a full run, and fall off of their previous season in each of the key rate charts, it would be a cause for alarm, and it is the sort of thing that we go digging for each day. It is also what makes the Kershaw comparisons between 2016 and 2017 so interesting -
ERA FIP xFIP K% BB% GB% SWS%
2016 1.69 1.80 2.28 31.6 2.0 49.4 15.3
2017 2.20 3.05 2.82 29.2 4.1 45.6 12.9
This marks the second consecutive season that K%, GB% and SWS% have all dropped, and what is ever so important - of the 94 pitchers that have worked 60 IP or more, Kershaw is dead last at #94 in DBF (Difficulty of Batters Faced). Yet in context if someone just looks at the bottom line from the last three campaigns not all that much would appear to be different –
W/L ERA
2015 16-7 2.13
2016 12-4 1.69
2017 8-2 2.20
This is not to suggest that there is anything wrong with Kershaw, who may well still be the best pitcher in the sport, and a candidate to someday be considered the best of all time. But we deal in degrees of perception here each day, and on the MLB diamonds just a few pennies of an event being mispriced in either direction can open the door to opportunity. Could the case be made that Kershaw is over-valued?
Here is what I will be watching closely – were those 2016 numbers a little extra good because his season was shortened, and he only had to work 149 regular-season innings, his low since 2008? Was Kershaw cutting it loose a bit more, and are we seeing someone that is pacing himself now, not only because there is a full campaign at hand, but also the likelihood of pitching in October?
I will be watching the numbers closely, even if the powers that be in the MLB front office prevent me from watching the games.
In the Sights, Wednesday MLB…
The ball was jumping off the bat at Nationals Park on Monday evening, as it often does when it gets hot in the summer. Now it will be hot again with a bit of a hitter’s breeze to right-center; the quality of the starting pitchers falls way down; and the bullpens remain just as bad, perhaps even a bit worse off of last night’s workload. That calls for #902 Washington/Atlanta Over (7:05 Eastern) to go into pocket, with 9.5 available across the board in the morning trading.
Dusty Baker has a huge headache – his bullpen is a mess right now, made worse by Koda Glover going on the DL. For the full season it has been a 5.11 ERA (#28) and 4.79 FIP (#27), but in June those counts have ballooned to 6.46 and 5.75. It isn’t as though there is anywhere to turn, which Baker openly acknowledged after last night’s defeat - “Come on man, how many times we covered this before? I’m serious … it’s been a case-by-case basis every day. We need some help. We need some help big time. We’ve been knowing that all along.” And the inconsistency of starter Joe Ross, who has failed to finish the fifth inning in four of his seven starts, does not aid that cause.
Meanwhile time may be running out on R.A. Dickey. His 4-4/4.73 does not look awful, which helps bring this price point, but there are problems galore, which FIP (5.78), xFIP (5.36) and SIERA (5.52) all recognize. There just isn’t enough movement on his knuckler anymore, his K% down to a dangerously low 12.4, and SWS% to 6.9, both career worsts by far, and the lack of movement shows in two negative categories in the opposite direction – BB% is a career-high 10.6, and O-Swing% a career-low 26.6. Opposing hitters are getting good reads on Dickey’s pitches, and simply not offering at much outside of the zone. And to make matters worse tonight, his HR/FB rate of 16.7 is yet another category that is a career-worst, making him vulnerable to the conditions. There is absolutely nothing special about the bullpen behind him, that group facing the prospect of being without Sam Freeman and Jason Hursh because of their Monday workloads.
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