Well they saw the intensity you have to bring to playoff baseball. Let's see what they learn from it.

The good news is Detroit now has to go to Baltimore. We're either going to get a chance to gain games on Detroit, or if they stay on fire this is going to be a 4 team sprint in the last week with 3 of those teams (Baltimore, KC, Minnesota) playing like garbage.

Baltimore has Detroit, the Yankees and Minnesota to finish. They are not a gimme to get in either, and if they do win a bunch of those games it means Detroit and Minnesota are probably losing. This is the part of the schedule we talked about where we play the NL and the AL contenders beat up on each other.
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Based the remaining schedules I think Minnesota is most likely the one on the outside looking in but then again they have to find some fucking way to score. The rotation is set up pretty well maybe get Lorenzen back for a start.

Losing Vinnie was devastating.
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I don't know what to think about next season because I can't see our starting pitching replicating what they did this season. Hopefully the offense will be better. On the bright side it's going to be hard for our bullpen to be that bad again so it should be better. Just like Seattle is going to waste great starting pitching this season we're in jeopardy of wasting it as well.
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With or without Vinny, we need to get our act together.
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This team is cooked.
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Yea, Vinny is not the reason this team is struggling. People are having a hard time separating correlation to causation. We lost a player with a negative defensive war, no speed, was tied with Salvy in leading the team in double plays until he was hurt, and statistically is only slightly, slightly above average hitting. Not that he provides nothing or that he sucks, but people are acting like we lost some first ballot hall of famer.

The far bigger issue is the complete collapse of several guys in the lineup who are contributing nothing. Garcia(.238 OBP), renfroe(.212 OBP) , Melendez(.233 OBP) , Dejong (.152 OBP), and Fermin(.250 OBP w/ a .432 OPS) have combined for 1 home run, 5 doubles, and 1 triple in September. If my math is right I believe their OPS combined is about .480. That's far below replacement level and just isn't going to get it done. To put that into perspective, Adam Frazier by himself has 1 home run and 1 triple this month. Even if Vinny was in the lineup, some of these guys have to turn it around in the last week or so of the season for us to succeed.
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Mrs. Dartgod and I went last night and left in the 5th inning. It was clear that we were not coming back in that one.
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