You Can't Unring a Bell: World Series Game 2 - Caretaker Exclusive

[Matthew Trueblood]

The Dodgers have a commanding lead in the World Series—except, they now face the prospect of a cross-country trip into the toughest place for visitors to play postseason baseball, their pitching is wearing thin, and the best player in baseball might be gone from the top of their lineup.

Image courtesy of © Jayne Kamin-Oncea-Imagn Images

You can't unring a bell, because there's no way to reverse sound waves. Waves are waves and they make sounds, and there's no backward and forward to them, except in cases where we expect a highly organized set of sounds. You can tell if I say this sentence backward to you, but you won't hear a difference if a bell rings backward. Most importantly, too, you can put all the atoms that make up the air right back where they were, but it won't change the fact that the vibrations passed through them.

That's how baseball works, too. Carlos Rodón didn't pitch all that badly, for most of his outing. He retired eight of the first 10 batters he faced, and the last two, and he was lifted early as much because the World Series is a high-stakes environment requiring special measures as because damage seemed imminent again. The problem: in between his strong start and those solid couple of batters to finish, he allowed a double, two home runs, and another double. The Dodgers, who are just lethal this way, rang the bell loud and hard. 

Basketball doesn't really have an analog for this, but the other major team sports all do. Within any game, there will be strongest and weakest stretches for you, and that's fine; it's unavoidable. The quality of your opponent determines your margin for error, though, and if your worst stretch is a little too sloppy and your opponent is really good, the rest of it might not matter. Football games can slip irretrievably away because of one bad turnover that the opponent turns into points. Even more akin to baseball is soccer, where the scoring baseline is low enough that a lapse of just a few minutes can render 85 minutes of hard fight and sound plans meaningless.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto never had that prolonged slip. He gave up a solo home run to Juan Soto, just as Rodón did to Tommy Edman, but he never had another bad stretch on which the Yankees could capitalize. Blake Treinen nearly did, but New York's inferior lineup depth denied them the ability to seize their opportunity the way Los Angeles had.

There's a better metaphor for the unrung bell that we have to talk about, though, because if this Series makes it back to Dodger Stadium from here, one big reason will be a play that didn't involve Rodón or Yamamoto or Treinen.

 

View full article

[TopGunn#22]

Matthew, this is an interesting article, but clearly, you don't watch enough basketball games, especially college basketball, though even in the NBA a key play or two can change momentum.

The play Ohtani was injured was just kind of a freak thing.  The man stole 59 bases this season and he played in all 162 games and every playoff game.  As it is, he probably dislocated his shoulder but I believe it's been popped back into place and that he will be right back in the lineup tonight for the Dodgers.  I could be wrong, but he hasn't been ruled out for sure.  It would be interesting to see Ohtani in batting practice to see how he's swinging.  

The Yankees have their back to the wall but the real key to this game is which Walker Buehler takes the mound for the Dodgers.  Will it be the guy who has been a shell of his former self since his Tommy John surgery?  Or will Buehler be able to give the Dodgers 5 solid innings, like,  only one run given up.  The pressure is on New York, especially Aaron Judge.  If he doesn't come out of his funk, the Yankees chances are not good.  If he suddenly gets hot, the entire series could change.