CHAMPIONSHIP GAME TEAMS SEASON WRAPS/R.I.P.S
1980 TOURNEY CHAMPION OAKLAND A'S (12-8/2nd)
(and please note runner-up wrap for Cardinals below A's wrap)
How about this for Amazing, even though we are not talking about the Mets. In their 20 games in this replay, Finley's boys threw 6 shutouts, 9 additional quality starts, and held opposing batters to a .201 BA! The team also won its last nine games in a row after a miserable 3-8 start!!
....But get this, perhaps the EOBHR MINDBLOWER to end all EOBHR MINDBLOWERS!!! (at least for now0
In the A's last seven games of the season, all victories, including their four successful Tourney Games, the A's pitching and defense EITHER shut their opponents FLAT OUT (5 contests)...or, faltered a bit, allowing ONE and ONE ONLY lonely, single, worthless tally (2 contests, 3-1 over Texas G15, 2-1 over Milwaukee G19)!!!!!!
While I will have my staff of nose-picking, thick-spectacled, anorexic statisticians and amateur Figure Filberts review this finding for possible errors.... I know it is correct. But, it will be a good exercise for them anyway, and I can ask them to report other oddities they may find along the way.... But not ones like:
Figure Filbert Birt Filche: 'BOSS... BOSSS!!! Boss..... Bosss..... Bosssssss!!!!! FORGET YER LAME FINDING!!! I gotta hot one.... A REAL FLAMING HOT ONE....THE BIGGIE TO SHAME ALL PRIOR BIGGIES!!'
But here's the counter-oddity to toss on top of the A's brutal, relentless, batter-starving dominance of the last seven games... Namely: Overall, the A's outscored their opponents by a mere, competitive Big-Ten-college-basketball-game-like 71-60!!
Cause? Well, while Charlies' Boys were outscoring opponents 27-6 (+21 runs) in their last nine games, all wins, these 'undefeatables' were only averaging 3 runs a game themselves, and they suffered, for instance, a 10-5 loss to Texas on Opening Day, a 5-2 reversal to Milwaukee in Game 5, and an even worse 15-3 shellacking by mighty Kansas City in Game 7!! In just these three games, the A's were -20 on runs... wiping out the effect of their generally British Soccer like scoring victories in their last nine games.
The two amazing aces of the A's pitching staff were Mike Norris (4-1/0.60/45IP/19H/29K:7BB/1HR) and similarly 4-1 starter Rick Langford (4-1/1.35)!! Mainly using just four starters, their other two rotation members -- Steve McCatty (1-1/2.17) and Matt Keough (2-2/2.32) were also very strong but not as W-Lucky.
With this kind of starting pitching, little relief was needed in this short 16+ contest replay... and the A's relievers weren't very good anyway... Except for Bob Lacey, a strong long reliever who was 1-0/2.40 in his 15 innings of work across 5 contests, and was proud to be winner in relief of the Tourney Championship game!
Batting-wise, we are speaking of a .246-batting team with meagre 26-2-10-64 power, a mediocre 106K:53BB ratio, but good team speed (20 for 24 on stolen bases)...although really, now I thunk about it, without Rickey Henderson, they were just 2 for 2 on swipes (crucial steal by C Jeff Newman in the Tourney Championship Game plus steal somewhere along the way by Mario Guerrero, their .161 batting, 10 for 62, 3 runs scored, 1-0-0-4 <no> power, .966 fielding shortstop.)
A'S STARS OF THE GAME (WINS ONLY)
These Amazin' A's (Mets... buzz off...in 1980 EOBHR you could have only gotten an A for being boring!) lost their first five games of the mere 16 game Regular Season... then were 12-1 thereafter...
Rebound from an 0-5 start, each of the three Game 2-4 losses the demoralizing 1-run type.....Already four games behind Seattle (4-1) in the West, the 0-5 A's the only winless team in either league? Never could it be done!! Or could it...
GAME 6 CA 0 OA 7 Rick Langford 6-hitter improves A's record to 1-5
GAME 7 OA 5 CL 0 Mike Norris (1-1/0.50) 2-hitter
GAME 8-9: Yes folks, but after these A's started 0-5, then won 2 games...they lost 2 more in a row to become a laughable, pathetic 2-7!!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha what cha ha hance can they ha ha ha ha have?
GAME 10 OA 13 CW 5 C Jeff Newman 3-6/D/HR/5RBI
Then these 3-7 A's lose Game 11 15-3 to the Royals!!! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha what cha ha hance can these A'sses ha ha ha ha have?
GAME 12 SE 1 OA 2 W- Well, here they do end their latest loss string around with a nail-biting one-run win fueled by a 2-hitter by Mike Norris
GAME 13 OA 8 TO 3 And here Wayne Gross' (.471 after game) 3-3/2HR/5RBI/BB/league-leading 3rd sac fly grosses out the Jays with his unnecessary display of 5 RBI
GAME 14 CA 0 OA 1 Rick Langford (3-1/1.74) 4-hit 2-walk shutout
GAME 15 OA 3 TX 1 Steve McCatty (1-1/2.78) goes 7 2/3 for win
GAME 16 OA 4 KC 0 Mike Norris (3-0/0.50) 6-hit shutout
TOURNEY
GAME 17 OA 2 CW 0 Rick Langford (4-1/1.35) 3-hit shutout
GAME 18 OA 4 KC 0 Matt Keough (2-2/2.59) 2-hit, 31 batters faced whitewarsh
GAME 19 OA 2 MB 1 Mike Norris (4-1/0.60) 5-hitter
GAME 20 OA 1 SC 0 in 13 C Jeff Newman (.254) clean single, 2-out steal T13th, Rob Picciolo lines walkoff single
George Finley, A's Owner:: Everyone Now Can Get in Line to Kiss My A's!!!
1980 N.L. East Champion
ST.LOUIS CARDINALS (12-8/1st in NL West)
Both the N.L. East Cardinals (5-5 in 1st ten regular season games) and Pirates (3-5 in 1st eight games) in heated up with 7-3 finishes, grabbing 1st and 2nd place in the Diivsion as a consequence.
Of course, no team in the balanced to the point of boredom N.L. East had a final record worse than 8-8 (the actual World Champion Phillies as well as the Cubs finished 8-8 and were summarily shut out of the Tourney as a consequence).
Cardinal games were generally low scoring affairs, as they outscored (relatively speaking) their game opponents by 69 to 60... Meaning that the Redbirds averaged only 3.5 runs a game and opponents only 3.0 runs. Almost all of the Cardinals' modest 9-run advantage was gained in the late innings, from the 7th on.
One blatant statistic that explains the Midwesterners late inning success is the Cardinal relief pitchers' combined 5-2 record and miniscule 1.04 ERA, with just one home run allowed in 28 appearances amounting to 52 innings! Jim Kaat, lefty great, a starter most of his career, but a long reliever in 1980, was particularly sensational. 'Kitty' had a 3-1 record with one save and no blown saves, carrying an outstanding 1.50 ERA in his 6 appearances, 4 of which were game-finishers.
Kitty's antithesis in the Cardinal bullpen was John Littlefield. I was unable to find whether this John L. was related in any way to Dick Littlefield, a prominent, noteworthy swingman (already having appeared in two 1950's decade seasons' EOBHR replays, 2-5/4.50 so far in EOBHR) , most famous for pitching for ten different MLB franchises (out of a grand total of 16) in the real MLB 1950's, including these Cardinals in '56... As well as hurling for the old A.L. St. Louis Browns, now the Baltimore Orioles, in '52-'53... the only team of the 63%(10) of (16) MLB teams Dick L. relieved for, for whom Dick pitched in consecutive seasons... albeit pitching part of '52 for the Tigers). But I couldn't easily locate any evidence that these two Littlefield relievers were related...
Anywho, in this '80 replay, John Littlefield was a workhorse, the Cardinal hurler pitching the most relief games (9), relief innings (17 2/3), allowing the most hits (19) as well as runs (5) and earned runs (4), tying for most K's (8) and, in a bullpen where the other members had no more than one walk apiece, walking an outrageous (given that context) 8...and having the highest/i.e. worst ERA (2.04!!) indicating just how crazy-effective the Bird relievers were (5-2/1.04 as a group!!)....
Well, that is except maybe for John Littlefield. He had a fine 2-1/2.04 stat line....But his 4 Blown Saves not only topped all relievers... But all other teams' NL or AL blown save totals!! Incidentally, aside from Kaat (1.50) and John Littlefield (2.04), each of the four other Redbird relievers had ERAs of 0.00 and a total of two saves.
This low-profile group, led by John 'Lend me' Urrea, Don Hood, Jim Otten, and 'Rascally' Roy Thomas made 13 appearances, amassing 21 1/3 innings pitched... Allowing just 14 hits, one lonely run, and no earned runs, fanning 18 and walking only one (whoa...craazzeee).
Keith Hernandez (N.L. MVP) was the N.L. leader in the Sabrmetric Runs Created (22.8) measure, which is what EOBHR uses as it clinical, objective method for selection of league MVPs, just as it uses the Sabrmetric, robotic Earned Runs Prevented (ERP) measure to pick out the Cy Young Award winner without any subjective judgment and hair-splitting (I abhor those split ends, but only in my blonde shock of hair, not in the NFL!!) involved.
Keith richly deserved the MVP as he was the offensive leader of the N.L. East Champ, batting .377 with a mind-blowing 2-5**-4-13 power line, leading to a NL-tops .725 sluggng average , a 5K/11BB contact to free pass ratio, and his 16 runs scored and 26* hits in 69 at bats!
Part-time OF Dane Iorg led the N.L. hitters with 7 two-baggers in just 42 at bats, although, sad to say, the 2-bagger specialist, who also had a triple and just one walk, somehow scored a mere 2 runs while driving in only four....Thereby seeming to give doubles a suspect image as far as a batter's sole specialty.
7-hole batting fielding buff and contact hitter Cardinal 3B Ken Reitz was also a doubles fancier, smashing 5 doubles while hitting .243 in his 70 at bats. But perhaps offset by his mere 4 walks (he had only 4 K's as well) and team-leading 4 GDPs, poor Ken scored only 3 runs and drove in but 5 in his 70 abbies, again raising the doubles talk... National Enquirer Headline: Doubles....are they really that much better than Singles or even just going for a walk???
From a Runs Created standpoint, powerful, athletic RF George Hendrick batted .294 with a pretty 3-0-3-7 power line and 9 runs despite drawing but 4 walks. Also relatively strong on the RC measure was, of course, perennial good hitting C Ted Simmons. Ted only batted .247 but his 3-0-3-8 power with 8 walks drawn were laudable stats under any circumstances.
CARDINAL STARS OF THE GAME (WINS ONLY)
GAME 1 SC 6 SF 4 in 12 George Hendrick
GAME 3 SC 4 CN 2 Ted Simmons game-tying 2-run HR T3rd, 2-out go-ahead single T7th
GAME 6 NM 0 SC 2 Bob Forsch 6-hit shutout of dangerous Expos
GAME 7 HA 0 SC 2 Pete Vuckovich 6-hit shutout of Astros
GAME 9 AB 4 SC 5 PH Mike Ramsey loops last gasp game-tying single B9th... and Mike scores walk-off run when Dale Murphy drops Ted Simmons deep, towering fly
GAME 11 SC 4 NM 2 After tripling home the Cardinals' 1st run, Keith Hernandez unloads go-ahead HR T4th
GAME 12 PH 0 SC 3 Silvio Martinez 6-hit shutout
GAME 16 SC 3 PT 2 Reliever Jim Kaat wins (one hit, 5 outs, no runs): now 2-0/1.17
GAME 17 SD 2 SC 5 Reliever Don Hood swings into starting role and pitches 7 1/3 innings of 2-run, 5 -hit baseball for win
GAME 18 SC 4 ME 3 George Hendrick is 3-4/2D/R/2RBI, including go-ahead double to RCF wall T1st and re-go-ahead double T8th... into the RF corner!
GAME 19 SC 8 PT 3 Keith Hernandez (4-5/D/HR/3R/5RBI in this game), who had just 2 homers in 188 previous EOBHR replay at bats entering this 1980 replay jumpstarts Cards with 3-run go-ahead liner over RF fence T3rd
GAME 20 SC 5 HA 2 5 for 35 Leon Durham (.162) hope-crushing 2-run tape measure HR with 2-out T6th after also driving in go-ahead run T1st
Cardinal Rule in West? Cardinals rule!