I felt the Kintzler trade hurt their chances, but didn't kill their chances. It feels like 7-dimensional chess to think F & L knew that trading Kintzler would put the team back in the WC race. I like you did that research, by the way.
Good point. Instead of "fold", I chose to describe those competing teams as "didn't make a run" and I called it surprising that other teams didn't make a run, although I think the Angles did make a good run at it, until their schedule got difficult.
Other posters addressed this up thread. I still think the word "folding" is misleading, but yeah I was surprised no other team made a strong run--although you could argue the Angels did make a strong run, but ran out of gas.
SEA, BAL, MIN, KC, LAA, TEX, TOR, TB These teams didn't fold. They were all struggling to play .500 at the deadline, and are struggling to play .500 at the finish. Only KC really went in the tank. Not the others.
I'm sorry, but this plays right into the Twins hands with their left handed batting lineup... https://twitter.com/AndrewMarchand/status/913233296720519168 ...actually, no, not sorry
Great comparison. Hard to believe the lead was only 1.5 games lead a week ago. With the magic number now at one, the Twins have retired the first two batters and the Angels are down to their last strike. The crowd is on its feet!
This is fascinating to know, and promising, and very different from the 2009-2010 Yankee team that was taking the foot off the gas late in the season in order to get a #2 seed, so they could play the Twins who were the 3 seed.
Great call by Molitor in the 8th, to pinch run Granite for Mauer when Mauer advanced to second on Polanco's single. The next batter hit a single to left, which Mauer would not have been waved around on, but Granite was waved around and made it home with time to spare. You don't see it work so perfectly very often!
Slept on it. Still am disappointed. 40% of our rotation consists of guys who have no stamina to go six innings and usually need to be pulled between the 3rd or 5th inning, another 20% of our rotation consists of Kyle Gibson, and the other 40% are good pitchers who are not getting wins right now, when wins are all that matter. Gonna be a bumpy ride.