For my weekly feature every Sunday, I will say which player I feel had the strongest postseason performance to benefit their team and which player had the weakest performance hurting their team the most. For this week, it will be who helped their team's playoff chances the most and who hurt their team's playoff chances the most.
Strongest performance-C.C. Sabathia
C.C. pretty much single-handely has turned around the Brewers. But today, he stepped up in his biggest start this season. He pitched his 7th complete game as Brewer giving up just 1 run on 4 hits and walking only 1. All this on his 3rd straight start with just 4 days rest. Milwaukee might have some solid players in the likes of Braun, Fielder etc. but this team is now a playoff team because of Sabathia. Also at the beginning of this week as well, Sabathia won over the Pirates pitching 7 innings and giving up 1 run on 4 hits again. He has stepped up and gotten Milwaukee into the playoffs and has easily earned my strongest "postseason" performance of this week, in that he definitely did the most to help Milwaukee's playoff chances.
Weakest performance-Javier Vazquez and Justin Morneau
It's very tempting to say the New York Mets for this category but instead I'm going with two players from the horrible AL Central.
Ozzie Guiellen challenged Vazquez to step up and deliver them a win against the Twins this week. He said that Vazquez basically has never won a big game. For most players that would challenge them to step up and deliver when the team needs you the most. Instead, all Vazquez did was validate Ozzie's comments. In his start against the Twins he went just 4 innings giving 5 runs and 7 hits in a 9-3 loss, which would be his 15th of the season. But he was not done losing. In his start yesterday against Cle. he went just 4 1/3 innings and gave up 7 runs on 5 hits in a 12-6 loss which gave him 16 losses on the season and in total has bumped his ERA up to 4.67 When your manager calls you out and you make yourself look worse, that is why he is tied for this week's weakest performance.
I'm not just singling the Sox out however. My other weakest performance goes to Justin Morneau. Morneau is being considered as a candidate for AL MVP but after this weekend, there is no way I would give it to him. The Twins had prime opportunity to wrap up the AL Central but lost 2 of 3 at home to KC of all teams. And Morneau didn't contribute at all. He went just 1 for 12 in this series driving in just 1 run. Overall, he is 1 for his last 17. MVP's deliver in clutch situations especially during the end of the season in a pennant race. There is no way Morneau should get MVP after this pitiful performance. And that is why he was picked for the other weakest performance this week.
Fortunately, for those two players one of them will still be a part of the postseason. I find that pathetic and disgusting that either the Sox or the Twins will make the playoffs. Both of these teams are completely undeserving with how they finished the season. They're the examples of how not to play down the stretch of the season.
Next week, this will officially turn into the strongest and weakest performances of the actual playoffs for each week. Get ready because it's playoff time now. And it's who steps up and who doesn't that will determine each team's playoff fate.
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3 comments:
Thank God the playoffs are here!The season has dragged on for way too long. CC was clutch, pitching his 3rd consecutive start on three days rest to get the Brew Crew in the playoffs.Ultimately though, this is going to cost them, as they are going to lose to the Phillies 3-1 because CC can pitch game 2 at the earliest.
Ok tell me honestly--deep down, how excited were you the Brewers actually won?? I know many Cubs fans swallowed their pride today and really did want the Crew to make it to the playoffs. CC has proven to be the best thing for our team, probably for years to come. His contract next year is going to be huge--it's unreal.
Ya,I honestly thought they could beat either the Mets or LA but I didn't wanna face Santana. So ya I did want Mil to win so We'd be facing LA because now in my mind if Manny doesn't completely dominate, we won't lose once.
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