Since I have so much to say about the Bears game, I start with the updated Pac-10 metrics.

Yet again I was 5-0 and was mostly right on how thing would turn out.  I was suprised that UCLA was able to put so many points up on Arizona and doubly surprised that OSU vs. WaZoo ended up being a defensive struggle.  If that’s really WSU’s situation this year then next week is going to be a cake-walk.  But before I get ahead of myself, here are this week’s updated numbers, all improved:

• MVD: 14.3 (down from 14.9 with new scores of 18, 2, 13, 8 and 11)
• TPD: 13.4 (basically flat from last week with scores of 10, 2, 7, 36 (ouch!) and 11)
• Winning Percentage: 84.6 (up from 82.4 after going 5-0 for the second straight week)

OK, check back later today for a review of the Bears game.

(Editors note: I’m live blogging again.  Hit the refresh button every 10 minutes or so to get updates on the game.)

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of Bulldozer Baseball.  I’m your host, Ken Crawford.  A reminder that Bulldozer Baseball is brough to you by Catapillar:

Catapiller, why bulldoze with anything else?

And Yahoo! Sports:

Yahoo! Sports, what kind of a yahoo are you?

And MLB.com:

MLB.com, from the people who brought you 10 AM playoff games.

and finally HP:

HP, inventing new ways to bend the rules.

The first inning is coming up!

First Inning:

• Haren got a shakey start, giving up 2 hits in the top of the first.  Haren is not like Zito where he seems to get in a groove later in the game.  This could be a bad sign.
• Nice to see Kendall striking out… why is it I feel like I see him strike out every third at bat and then the announcers tell me “well you don’t see Kendall strike out often”?
• A’s go down in order… ugh.

Second Inning:

• Uh oh… Morneau doubled to lead off the second.  This could get ugly.
• Man, Haren sure is cutting things close.  Men on 1st and 3rd with two outs… out of jam yet again.  The won’t hold up.  The A’s better start scoring some runs.
• CHAVEY! CHAVEY! CHAVEY!  I knew it was only so long before he found his mojo.  Hitting behind The Big Hurt pitchers will tend to forget about him.  A homer was the result. 1-0 A’s.
• OH YES!  Scutaro my man!  Just when you think the A’s aren’t going to make anything happen of an opportunity, Scutaro doubles to bring the score to 2-0!
• Inning over.  Should I make anything of the fact that our new 2nd baseman grounded out?…. nah, not yet.

Third Inning:

• Haren finally got through an inning unscathed.  Maybe all he needed was a 2 run lead…
• Man, this is looking great!  Bradley hits a 2 run homer in the 3rd (it’s amazing how much fielding errors come back to bite a team eh Twinkies? (Kotsay was on base because of a fielding error)).  A’s up now 4-0!

Fourth Inning:

• Well, after getting two outs, Haren gave up a homerun.  That’s OK, we’re still up by 3 and it means that Haren is challenging the hitters and will more likely get through his innings quicker.  A’s lead is now 4-1.
• OK, Haren got that last out.  On to the bottom of the inning!
• Good news, Kendall is up with a man on 1st and 2  out.  As Doc. Brown would say: “Do you know what this means?”  It means he physically CAN’T ground into a double play!
• I’ve got to keep making fun of Kendall before his at bats.  Every time I do the guy gets a hit.  Men on 1st and 2nd with 2 outs.  Come on Kotsay!
• Well, couldn’t quite get it done.  But it’s nice that we’re keeping the pressure on their pitching.

Fifth Inning:

• I’m sure any pitcher can tell you how much easier it is to pitch with a lead: Just keep throwing strikes.  Haren get’s through the side without much trouble.
• CHAVEY! CHAV… wait, he only get’s one for a double.  Nevertheless, Chavey came to play today.  Too bad I couldn’t see Thomas lumbering around the bases on Chavey’s double.  I’m sure he wanted to come home, but a locamotive like that doesn’t get going all that fast.  OK Payton, bring ‘em home!
• Ron Washington… I know this guy is a great coach for a young team and shares a lot with the new guys, but for crying out loud, why is he sending Thomas home on an infield ground-out?
• Inning over without scoring again.  How many times can I say “at least we’re keeping the pressure on”?

Sixth Inning:

• NOOOO! That’s the one thing we can’t afford.  Morneau and Hunter continuing to kill us with doubles.
• NICE!  Bradley threw out Hunter at home on a single.  Although the Twinkies got 1 run back, we also defused the threat.  A’s lead is now 4-2.
• OK, onto the bottom of the inning.  It’ll be interesting to see if Haren makes it out for the 7th.
• A’s go down in order… notice how the A’s score in the early innings they play “hold on for dear life!”

Seventh Inning

• Well I was right that Haren had seen his last batter in the 6th.  I’m still surprised that Macha is using Duchscherer in the 7th.  Going for the kill I guess.
• Duchscherer is perfect in the 7th. Onto the bottom half.
• OK, two outs, Thomas on first, Chavey at the plate.  Can Chavey go 3 for 3 with two homers?
• I guess not if they walk him…
• A note to the Twinkies: you can’t have 3 errors in a game and expect to win.  Payton loads the bases on a fielding error.
• OK, it’s Swisher’s last chance today to impress.  He’s been on-again-off-again for quite a while now.  It’s time to get on-again.
• A second note to the Twinkies: you don’t walk a player with the bases loaded, particularly if you’re trying to get by Swisher to Scutaro.  Come on Scoot!  Bring ‘em home!
• Scutaro does it AGAIN!  A bases clearing double!  I sure hope he gets the series MVP.  He deserves it.  A’s up 8-0.  Do I hear a fat lady entering the building?
• I don’t even care that Jimenez struck out to end the inning…

Eigth Inning:

• The Twinkies go down in order… only 3 outs to go! (post release note: somehow I missed a 1 run homer by Morneau in there… that guy definitely did his part today)
• This is where Kendall thrives: completely meaningless at bats.  Maybe he’ll hit his 2nd home run of the season.
• Eh, I guess the insulting Kendall thing doesn’t always work.  It’s probably good the A’s go down in order.  Let’s get this over with.
• Apparently they were listening… OK A’s fans, here we go.

Ninth Inning:

• First up: White.  If we can get through him, the bottom of the order shouldn’t be any trouble.
• Interestingly Macha left Duchscherer in.  I guess everyone gets a long rest after today while we wait for the other series to wrap up.
• Oops, nevermind.  Macha brought in Street.  I guess it doesn’t matter but it’s kinda stupid.  It’s not a save situation.
• Street get’s the job done!

A’s win!  The monkey is off our back!!!  What a great series.  I sure hope that Scutaro gets the MVP.  I’m also rooting for the Tigers to beat the Yanks.  Nothing like having the first games of the Penant series at home and not having to go through New York.

Now that I’ve reviewed the Cal vs. Oregon game onto my picks for the rest of the Pac-10.

Cal 38, Oregon 31: See here for details.

USC 24, Wash 20: What is it with USC in getting the schedules they need every year?  Last year they had one of the toughest schedules ever, perfect for one of the greatest teams ever.  This year, when rebuilding, they get everyone who is even remotely dangerous at home (Cal, Oregon, Notre Dame, ASU and the suprise Washington Huskies) and the toughest ones at the end of the season after they’ve had a chance to work all the kinks out.  What luck.  I’ve noticed that UW seems to play better at home and if this game was in Washington I’d be tempted to pull for the upset.  I just can’t do that down in smogsville.

Arizona 17, UCLA 24: This is a game that will help define the bottom of the Pac-10.  UCLA will leave this game with all kinds of confidence having won 2 Pac-10 games in a row.  However, they will have done it against the two most pathetic offenses in the Pac-10.  They’re going to be very disappointed the following week in Eugene, Oregon.

WaZoo 35, OSU 20: Poor OSU.  They’re going to be in way over their head with the passing attack of WaZoo.  While I think OSU has the fundamentals to win a fair number of games, WaZoo’s deep threat will keep them busy all day.  The smartest thing OSU could do is keep 2 safeties back and stop the long ball.  Without the long ball, OSU wins.  But they won’t, so they won’t win.

Stanford 10, Notre Dame 42: This game is a gift from God to Catholics around the country.  Stanford hasn’t scored more than 10 against anybody but San Jose St. and they’re not going to do it against Notre Dame.  Notre Dame will put this game out of question faster than Stanford can build an empty stadium.

OK, that’s it for this week.  Tune in on Monday for a review of the Bears game and updated Pac-10 metrics.

OK, the time is finally here.  Time for me to breakdown what is going to be an amazing game that will not soon be forgotten.

Let me start out by saying that anyone who thinks they know who is going to win this game is guessing.  There are too many wildcards and the deeper I peel into this onion the more layers I find.  Luckily that’s never stopped me from prognosticating.

The key to this game will be ball control.  Both offenses are SO potent that the team that wins will be the one that controls the game.  The key to doing that is turnovers and time of possession.

Turnovers is the easier of the two categories to break down so I’ll start with that.  Both teams are giving up 2.3 turnovers per game so it looks to be fairly close.  However, Cal is forcing 3.0 turnovers per game, much higher than their opponents (Tennessee, Minnesota, Portland St., ASU and Oregon St.) 2.1 turnovers per game were giving up on average.  Oregon is forcing 2.0 turnovers per game, far LESS than the 2.7 their opponents (Stanford, Fresno St., Oklahoma and ASU) were giving up.   I think this tips this category in Cal’s favor.

Time of possesion is a much more murky category.  Mostly this comes down to the running game and the possession passing game (short slants and outs, screens, etc.).  Oregon seems to have a statistical advantage in this category running for nearly 240 yards per game.  That’s a little bit deceiving however because 30 yards per game come from their QB and scrambling does NOT equal possession football.  Another caveat is that Oregon has played teams particularly susceptible to the run.  They’re giving up 20 extra yards per game than Cal’s opponents.

Cal on the other hand, has played against teams that are loading the box to slow down a potent run game and is still putting up 160 yards per game.  The result has been that Cal has burned them long with the passing game.  Nobody doubts the strength of the Cal running game and I expect Oregon to be more balanced in their defense than Cal’s previous opponents.  Add to these realities that Oregon is actually giving up more rushing yards per game than it’s opponents are averaging in their games (this was about the only category where either Cal or Oregon was doing significantly worse than their opponents allowed on average) and there is reason to believe that the Cal rushing game will do its part on Saturday.

There are so many areas I could review, but I keep my thoughts to a few remaining areas:

Punting.  If this game isn’t a shootout, Cal seems to have a substantial advantage in the punting game.  We’ve all seen how well Larson punts the ball and his 43.8 yard average although good, doesn’t do justice to his high booming kicks.  There is much to be impressed with Cal’s kick coverage as well often dropping the returner for losses.  Oregon’s punter on the other hand only has a 36.6. average and supposedly isn’t very consistent.  That’ll be trouble both from a field position perspective and if he ever lines one that Desean Jackson has an opportunity to return.

Scrambling.  We all know that Longshore is not a scrambing QB although he seems to be doing a good job of avoiding pressure so far.  However good avoiding pressure is, it’s not nearly the threat that Dixon is with is feet.  Containment of Dixon will be a key factor on Saturday.

Spread.  Oregon runs the true spread.  Cal has a history of struggling against the spread.  Cal also has not played a spread team thus far this year.  This is the area that worries me most about the Cal defense.  If Cal can contain Dixon and keep the spread in check, then Cal will win this game, possibly even convincingly.  If they can’t, it may be a long day in Berkeley.

In conclusion, my feeling is that this is going to be a great matchup of two very powerful teams.  Neither team is going to run away with this one, but after looking over all of the numbers, I’m convinced that Cal has what it takes to squeek this one out particularly with the home-field advantage.

Cal 38, Oregon 31.

While I’ve seen a number of “can we please move on past Tennessee please” articles this one struck just the right cord.  It was particularly good in making the parallel in regards to the Oregon vs Oklahoma game.

I propose that from now on Tennessee be referred to by all Cal bloggers as The Team That Will Not Be Named.

Just a note that I’ll do a similar live-blog like I did for Wednesday’s game for the A’s game today at 1:00 PM.

Just wanted to give everyone a heads up.

OK, I can’t STAND the previews I’m reading for this weekends game.  It’s further proof that there is a template that reporters can’t get out of.  It goes like this:

1. Team A is good/bad and looking for (revenge/vindication/playoffs/whatever)
2. Here are a bunch of stats about team A to make the point
3. Here are a couple caveat stats about team A
4. But don’t forget team B, they’re good/bad and looking for (revenge/vindication/playoffs/whatever)
5. Here’s a couple stats about team B

And that’s it.  No head to head numbers.  No comparison of common opponents.  Just team A for 2/3rds about team A and then a 1/3rd about team B.  It’s absolutely pathetic.

At least this week the articles have been balanced in that 1/2 of them have the Bears as team A and half have the Ducks as team A, but considering the matchup, a much better preview is deserved, particularly in the area of statistics.  And generally what statistics are provided are done so to tell a story as opposed to just sharing truly meaning statistics and absolutely NO comparisons are done.

Yesterday after having enough of the previews I decided to take matters into my own hands.  I was going to compile the statistics I wanted.  But not only did I want team statistics (which are easily findable) I wanted to have a way to measure those statistics against what their opponents were doing.  That took a lot more work (I stayed up WAY too late last night doing this) but here is the fruit of that labor:

Now I’d better explain these numbers.  The opp. (opponent) number reflect the opposite of what you might think.  The goal is to compare how Cal (or Oregon) did against that team, not how that team did in it’s own right.  So the numbers are flipped.  Points per game in the opponent section reflects how may points per game the opponent gave up, not how many they scored.  Or said another way, the defensive numbers are in the offensive section and the offensive numbers are in the defensive category.

What this does is make it so that you can see how Cal (or Oregon) did in relation to what the team they were playing usually allowed.  So (and I’ll get to color coding next) you’ll see that I highlighted the Cal opp box for Points per game because Cal’s opponents were giving up less points per game than Oregons, which makes Cal’s ability to run up the score, although not as absolutely high as Oregon’s, a little more impressive.

Get it?  I sure hope so, I spent all last night working on it.

OK, onto color coding.  Basically, blue highlighting is for those areas that I think reflect well on Cal, Green is for those areas that reflect well for Oregon and yellow is for those opponent fields that illuminate something about the relative difficulty of Cal or Oregon’s opponents to date.

Get it?  Well, it doesn’t really matter.  The numbers are there so you can make your own conclusions.

What are my conclusions?  Good question.  And for that you’ll have to wait for my Cal vs. Oregon preview that I’ll post tomorrow.

(Editor’s note: I’m going to try something a little different this morning: Live blogging!  Tune-in for updates throughout the game.)

Good morning and thank you for tuning in on this be-U-tiful overcast morning for game 2 of the ALDS series between the Oakland A’s and the Minnesota Twinkies.

I’m your host Ken Crawford here on thecrawfordfamily.net’s presentation of early morning bulldozer baseball.  Bulldozer baseball: all the harsh commentary you should hear but never do.

A reminder that this presentation is brought to you by Yahoo! Sports:

Yahoo! Sports, no flash, just right on time.

And MLB.com:

MLB.com, all the flashly content that keeps us from giving you real information.

And finally HP:

HP, why buy anything that we can’t plausibly deny?

The first inning is straight ahead!

First Inning: 

• It’s great to see that the A’s have come out today ready to swing.  Hopefully they’ll remember that “struck out looking” is not the way we want to go down this season.
• The twins get two hits off of Loaiza early, but fail to score.  I think that Loaiza is one of those pitchers who take a while to find their groove.  The Twinkies will be kicking themselves if they don’t score off their early opportunities.

Second Inning:

• I completely missed the second inning… this second inning blackout is brought to you by HP: we actually want you to work for a living.

Third Inning:

• The thing I love most about the bottom of the A’s order (besides Scutaro in a clutch situation) is how they make the pitcher work for their outs.  Sure they may not have the highest batting order, but they make the pitcher throw at least 5 or 6 pitches.
• YES!  Ellis singles to lead off the 3rd.  If Kendall can avoid his patented “did you even try” double play ball, we might be in business.
• Well, Kendall at least tried hard enough to beat out the double play.  Fielder’s choice. Now it’s Kendall on first with 1 out.
• Maybe I shouldn’t complain about Kendall too much.  Now it’s Kotsay who grounds into the double play… ugh.
• The Twinkies went three and out.  Loaiza’s in his grove now.

Fourth Inning:

• Man, Thomas nearly did it again.  Ground rule double!  Let’s see if we can bring him home from 2nd with 1 out.
• Well, we couldn’t bring him home, but at least we’re lining out, not popping out.
• Loaiza’s has retired 8 in a row now.  SWEET!
• So much for that, two singles in a row.  Got to give credit to Morneau.  He battled to get that first single, 8+ pitches.  Sometimes those long at bats really wear out a pitcher.  Let’s hope Kendall can manage Loaiza enough to get him out of this 2 out jam.
• YES!  End of the inning: White grounded out.

Fifth Inning:

• YES!!! Swisher doubles to lead off the fifth and my main man, Mr. Clutch himself, Scutaro is up.  Bring’em home scoot!
• YES!!! Scutaro doubles, Swisher scores… rolling rolling rolling, keep those doggies rollin’.
• OK, Ellis sacrificed Scoot to third… Kendall, I’m counting on you man.  You can’t sink us with a double play.  NO PRESSURE… Just bring scoot home!
• YESSSSS!!!!! Kendal singles, Scutaro scores. 2 to 0 A’s!
• Onto the bottom of the inning, Loaiza seems to have his groove back with two easy groundouts.
• Loaiza has had the benefit of giving up all his hits with 2 outs.  That takes a lot of pressure off because he knows he only has to get one out to get out of the jam.  Another men on 1st and 2nd 2-out jam stalled!

Sixth Inning

• Of course, just to spite me, Payton singles with two outs.  Hopefully Swisher can make something of it.
• OK, everyone DON’T PANIC.  We gave up a big home run yesterday and still won.  A’s lead is now only 2-1.
• Scratch that… PANIC!  PANIC! PANIC!  Two home runs in a row… NOOOO!
• Phew!  Macha actually got up off his butt and did something about it.  Our best reliever Calero is in there now.
• ALRIGHT.  Calero gets the job done!  Onto the 7th.

We interrupt this broadcast for this important announcement:

LUNCHTIME!!!

Ahhhhh… what a good lunch.  Just as I was leaving I saw the 2-run in the park homerun by Kotsay (there’s one I’ve got to see the highlights of) so I had the knowledge that all the A’s have to do was hold on for 3 innings.  I haven’t even looked yet but let me guess: Kennedy pitched in the 7th, Duchscherer in the 8th and Street in the 9th, now let me check… oh wow, Duchscherer pitched both the 7th and 8th.  An actual bold move by Macha.

Well, in any case, there’s nothing like coming back from lunch to see a 5-2 victory.  Nice to see that the A’s kept the heat on by scoring in the top of the 9th (always a good way to take what little life remains of the opposition).  Onto Oakland!  Go A’s!

Well, I hope you guys enjoyed this.  I’m interested to hear feedback: did anyone see it live? (I doubt it)  Is it enjoyable after the fact?  Let me know.

OK, maybe I shouldn’t be complaining about the early start time.  Apparently it was just enough to throw off the usually unstoppable at home (hasn’t lost since 8/1/2005) Johan Santana.

Way to go A’s!

…on being the STUPIDEST organization in professional sports.  A 10:00 AM Pacific WEEKDAY playoff game!?!  And it’s not even two east coast teams (for a 1 PM local start time), it’s a midwest team vs. a west coast team.  And they wonder why their TV viewership of the early rounds of the playoffs is so low.