Let me get this out of the way: the Royals were the better team than the Mets and deserved to win the World Series. Despite that, New York had multiple chances to win games and take the Series. The better team doesn’t always win.
Game 1 – Mets lead 4-3 in the ninth. Mets closer Jeurys Familia gets cute in the inning and tries to quick-pitch Gordon after quick-pitching the previous batter Salvador Perez. Alex Gordon is anticipating this and not only is he sitting on it, but Familia’s slider flattens out as a result of his hurried delivery and Gordon hits it out to deep center, sending the game into extra innings. It cost the Mets a chance at a split in KC, for they would get crushed the next day in Game 2 , a 7-1 score with Johnny Cueto of all people, pitching a complete game two-hitter against them.
Game 3 – which the Mets won handily 9-3 but Manager Terry Collins brings in his closer, Familia…with a SIX-RUN LEAD!?! So…essentially Collins gives the Royals a nice, long look at his closer for no good reason, a terrible decision that bleeds into Game 4, when Collins feels unable to use Familia to get the last six outs, because he had used him the night before.
Game 4 – Collins lets his starter Steven Matz bat in the bottom of the fifth. Why? The Royals have been killing the Mets’ starters the third time through the lineup. Matz gives up a run in the fifth and a run in the sixth cutting the Mets’ lead to 3-2. Collins also lifts Michael Conforto, who’s hit two home runs in the game, for a defensive replacement, leaving Yoenis Cespedes in the game, who’s done nothing with the bat in the Series, and who has cost them defensively in the field, most notably letting Escobar’s leadoff inside-the-park home run clank off his glove in Game 1. Cespedes, who’s been a big gaping hole in the lineup at cleanup, manages to get himself doubled up on a soft liner to kill a ninth inning rally and end the game.
Game 5 – Against a team known for late rallies, Collins leaves his starter in and lets the Royals tie it in the ninth. Harvey shouldn’t have pitched the eighth, let alone the ninth! Let alone he walks the leadoff batter and Collins leaves him in there to give up an RBI-double! Collins says Harvey didn’t want to come out. Well, who’s running the team, Terry? You or him? If young athletes could coach or manage themselves, there would be no need for coaches and managers. That’s why they put adults in charge! He ain’t Madison Bumgarner. Not by a long shot. Bumgarner won his first Series game at twenty-one-years-old in 2010. He had a lot of big postseason notches on his belt before making his historic appearance in Game 7 of the 2014 World Series.
And…to top it off, it was Harvey’s fourth time through the lineup. He was skating on thin ice in the eighth. Collins was acting as if Harvey was some kind of lucky charm. That’s not managing, that’s wishful thinking. The more the Royals saw Harvey the less effective he was going to be. Its like in football, when a coach or QB goes to a favorite play one time too often. What was effective previously is no guarantee of success in the moment; especially in a championship game where everything you do is being closely scrutinized (and adjusted to) by a top-level opponent.
People often contend that managers have little influence on the game.
Having watched the Giants win three World Series victories in the last five years, I beg to differ. Bruce Bochy manages circles around his opposite numbers, especially in the postseason. He is keenly attuned to the moment and does nothing by the book.
In 2010, in the NLCS against the Phillies, Bochy, knowing that his starting pitcher for the decisive Game 6, Jonathan Sanchez, was an extremely volatile individual liable to go completely nuts at the drop of a hat, already had multiple pitchers lined up ahead of time to close out the game, including two other starters, Lincecum and Bumgarner. Inevitably, Sanchez melts down in the third inning, plunks Chase Utley, who inflames the situation further by tossing the ball back to Sanchez. The benches clear but when the dust settles, Jeremy Affeldt, the Giants’ crack lefty reliever is ready to come in and start the elongated process of closing out the game just as Bochy foresaw. Affeldt, normally is an eighth inning setup guy, covers the third and fourth, followed by Bumgarner in the fifth and sixth. Javier Lopez, another top lefty reliever, covered the seventh, then Tim Lincecum, the Giants’ ace, took the eighth before giving way to the Giants’ closer, Brian Wilson in the ninth. Brilliant and only possible because of Bochy’s pre-game planning.
In 2012, Bochy uses Tim Lincecum, who’s been having a rough season as a starter, as super-reliever in the postseason. Lincecum excels in this new role( 8 and 1/3rd innings pitched, one run allowed) providing shutdown innings and a bridge to late inning relief. Bochy goes one step further by allowing Barry Zito to open the World Series against the Tigers’ ace, Justin Verlander. Despite Zito’s spotty previous record with the Giants (which includes being deactivated all through the 2010 postseason), Bochy has watched Zito come up big against the Cardinals in a Game 5 elimination game of the NLCS and feels confident enough to trust him with the crucial Game 1 start. Not only does Zito pitch well, he manages to get a bunt-hit and an RBI off Verlander.
This brings us to 2014, when Bochy, saddled with one of the most feeble rotations in recent memory, is able to lean on his ace, Madison Bumgarner for five innings of relief to win Game 7 against the Royals, a terrific and unimaginable feat that Bochy could not have possibly anticipated. The genius of Bruce Bochy was not so much in allowing Bumgarner to go pitch those historic five innings of relief, but in knowing ahead of time that his Game 7 starter, Tim Hudson, was pitching on fumes by this point and telling lefty Jeremy Affeldt to be ready early (it was early all right, Bochy gave the ball to Affeldt in the second).
Bochy was managing in the moment. He wasn’t worried about Hudson’s feelings or Affeldt’s or whoever’s. It’s a team game and the object is to win. It isn’t to gratify this guy’s wishes or that guy’s. Terry Collins said after losing Game 7 that Harvey argued to stay in and Terry loved and trusted his guys so he let his heart overrule his gut and so he left Harvey in. Which is pathetic. (It sounds like Collins should have been up in the stands with a foam finger on one hand and a beer in the other, chanting, “Harv-ey! Harv-ey!” with the other yahoos). In Game 6 of the 1986 World Series with the Red Sox on the verge of their first Series win since 1918, manager John McNamara left Bill Buckner in to play first base when he normally would have lifted him for a defensive replacement. The Mets stage a two-out rally to win the game, which culminated in the infamous grounder between Buckner’s legs. The Mets went on to win the Series and Buckner, a near Hall of Fame player, is unfairly castigated to this day as a goat. McNamara’s reasoning for leaving Buckner in? He wanted Buckner to be on the field when the Red Sox won it all. You think Buckner might be happier today if he had watched the final decisive out from the dugout and had to join the celebration on the field afterwards? Jeez, fellas. The point is to win. Win the game first. Everything else is secondary.
Yeah, I agree: Collns made a number of key mistakes! Absolutely.