Motivational Poster

Baseball's Greatest Games: PHI at MON, Sept. 21. 1981

This game represents one of the most fascinating box scores I have ever encountered. I originally stumbled upon it when looking at the roster of the 1984 Chicago Cubs and noticed that many of them used to play for the Phillies. I tried to find games in which they were all playing, and this was one of the ones on the list. After noting the long duration, I decided to take a closer look. What I discovered can be found after the jump.

Notes on Portland's Drubbing of San Antonio Last Night

Portland: 137 points

• Most by POR since 11/14/97 (139 in 4OT vs PHO)
• Most in regulation since 3/7/94 (137 vs GSW)
• Most points allowed by SAS since 11/7/90 (153 by DEN in a SAS 161-153 win)

Portland: 40 point margin of victory

• Second 40-point victory of the month (defeated CHA by 44 on 2/1)
• Worst margin of defeat by SAS since 3/5/97 (42 point loss to CHI)

Gerald Wallace (POR): 19 pt, 10 reb, 6 ast, 3 blk

• First such game by a POR player since 1/20/93 (Cliff Robinson had 22/14/8/4 vs MIN)

Kawhi Leonard (SAS): 24 pt, 10 reb, 5 stl

• First such game by a SAS player since 2/9/00 (Tim Duncan had 24/13/8 vs DEN)
• First in a loss since 1/8/91 (David Robinson had 35/16/5 vs ATL)

Notes on Tonight's Thunder-Nuggets Game

Kevin Durant: 51 points

• First 50-point game of his career
• First 50-point game in NBA since Carmelo Anthony had 50 on 2/7/11 vs. HOU
• First Oklahoma City player to reach 50 points (Ray Allen had 54 for SEA in 2007)
• Third highest total in franchise history going back to '85-'86

Russell Westbrook: 40 points

• Second 40-point game of his career (had 43 points on 11/26/10)
• With Durant, just second game in NBA regular season since 1986-87 where teammates had 40+ points (2 other examples in postseason)

Serge Ibaka: 14 points, 15 rebounds, 11 blocks

• First such game in NBA since Shawn Bradley had 22-22-13 on 4/7/98
• First 10-10-10 block game in NBA since JaVale McGee had 11-12-12 on 3/15/11
• First 10-10-10 block game in franchise history

Underrated Player: Wilson Betemit

Yankee fans may remember Wilson Betemit, who played first base part time for the team in 2008. Since then, he has bounced around the AL Central, playing for the Royals, White Sox and Tigers, and this season is projected to be the starting DH for the Baltimore Orioles. To be honest, the O's might be better off moving him to third and making Mark Reynolds the DH, given Reynolds's noted defensive struggles, although Betemit isn't much better. Anyways, I wanted to look at Betemit today because I feel that he truly is underrated as a platoon player. Read on to see the proof.

2011: Baseball's Greatest Season

With spring training just around the corner, I thought it might be a good time to recap last season. 2011 was arguably the greatest season in league history. Between several great individual performances, two nail-biting pennant races, and the best postseason in years, here is my argument for why no other can top it:

NBA All Stars by Win Shares

Given the fact that everyone has their own opinions about this year's NBA all stars, I thought I might as well weigh in myself. I decided to take a more objective approach to the teams, so I used basketball-reference.com's win shares to create the rosters. The results are below the fold.

Great Infield: The 2009 Tampa Bay Rays

Given the recent return of Carlos Pena to Tampa Bay, I thought it would be a good idea to take a look back at one of the best infields in recent years, the 2009 Rays. That season, the team went 84-78, good for 3rd place in the AL East. The infield consisted of Pena at first, Ben Zobrist at second base, Jason Bartlett at short, and Evan Longoria at third. Here are their numbers (stats from baseball-reference.com):

Carlos Pena - 39 HR / 100 RBI / 87 Walks / 91 Runs
Ben Zobrist - 27 HR/ 91 RBI /.297 Average / 91 Walks / 17 SB / 91 Runs
Jason Bartlett - 14 HR/ 66 RBI / .320 Average / 30 SB / 90 Runs
Evan Longoria - 33 HR/ 113 RBI / .281 Average / 44 Doubles / 100 Runs

All four players were named all-stars, and Longoria also received a Gold Glove and Silver Slugger. This is all quite good, but when we use some sabermetrics, the infield becomes historically great. (Continue reading after the jump.)

2011: Greatest Sports Year Ever?

In December, I was looking back at the year in sports and realized that it had been quite fascinating. On one hand, off the field incidents and scandals rocked the sports world. Between lockouts in both the NBA and NFL and the Jerry Sandusky scandal, many fans became disillusioned with their favorite leagues and teams. On the other, the on the field dramatics and performances seemed better than in years past. In college sports, we saw a thrilling BCS title game and not one but two Cinderella runs to the Final Four. The Super Bowl came down to the wire, and the NBA Finals was among the most talked about in years. Even non-traditional sports such as the NHL and women's soccer made big headlines. However, to me, and likely to most true sports fans, the real icing on the cake was baseball's amazing year, arguably the greatest in league history (more on that later). Despite all of this, no one in the media or on the web made much note of the year as being great. Was I just imagining things? I needed to find a way to quantify it, so I came up with a crude evaluation. The end results of it were almost shocking. (See after jump.)

Welcome!

My name is Andrew. I am currently a sophomore in high school and an avid sports fan. I mostly follow pro baseball, football, and basketball, although I occasionally watch other sports as well. This blog will mostly be used to post any of my personal thoughts and research about sports, but I'll also throw in some politics and other stuff as well. I do hope you enjoy reading!