So I was looking at the standings today with the midway point past and the All-Star Game coming up. There are three teams headed for a possible 100 win season at this point but none of them have been dominant. None of them looks like a dynasty team. None of them won more than 88 games last year. What's happened to the great teams in baseball? The dynasties that win close to 100 games most seasons? The great teams that win 104+ games and serve notice in the regular season that they're the big favorite going into the post-season? No team has won more than 103 games since the Cardinals won 105 in 2004, 10 seasons ago now. This may not seem like a big deal but since 2005, 9 seasons ago, there have only been 3 teams in all of baseball that have won 100 games in a season. That's a huge difference from the decades that preceded this era. In the 9 seasons from 1997 to 2005 16 teams won 100 or more games in a season and 2 teams won 114 or more. You also had a 105 win team and a 106 win team in that span. Great teams were great. Now in the last 9 seasons just 3 teams have done it and none have won more than 103 games. That's just a huge drop-off in performance at the top end. What's going on? Is it parity scheduling?
How about pitch counts and limits? The Nationals won 98 games last year with Stephen Strasburg shut down in September. They went 16-12 in the month, which was their second worst monthly record of the season. Maybe teams just aren't milking their pitchers as much as they used too and it's much harder to assemble 5 or 6 good pitchers than the 4 man rotations of old?
The NFL still has a 13+ game winner most seasons. There have been only 3 seasons since 1980 in which no team won 13+ regular season games. The run by MLB lately has been the equivalent of having a 12 win team at best win the NFL every season. The sample size is huge in baseball compared to football given the 10x longer schedule and the tendency to drag teams towards the mean that produces. Still it's not like baseball hasn't had great teams even fairly recently. They're just not producing great teams now and have not been for like a decade.
Parity. It's a young man's game, big-ticket FAs are falling flat on their faces, it's about developing prospects now and that gives everyone a shot.
It just occurred to me that the last two teams that just tore up baseball both had really significant players from previously untapped resources, and by extension they had some of the best talent available. The 1998 Yankees had Hideki Irabu and Orlando Hernandez, from Japan and Cuba respectively. The 2001 Mariners had Ichiro Suzuki and Kazuhiro Sasaki.
Irabu did nothing on that 1998 team and while El Duque eventually became a big part the Yanks were already running away w/ it by the time he started a game and there have been tons of foreign players that have made an impact but those teams weren't very good.
1998 Yankees went 16-11 in September (and that includes ending the month with four wins against the 99-loss Devil Rays).
He used Hideki Irabu as an example why the '98 Yanks were so great, I think we can stop talking baseball w/ him:up:
As bad as Irabu was, overall, this is just false. In '97, Irabu was horrid. In '98, he was more than serviceable. He was as good - if not a little better than - Pettitte that year. The difference is that in '98, Well, Cone, Hernandez, and Mendoza all pitched incredibly well. I don't think it's fair to say that a guy who gave you 170+ innings of 4.06 ERA in the AL East (during the height of the steroid era, no less) is "nothing." You'd be happy to get that from your #4 pitcher any year.
If Hideki Irabu is not on that team they still win a million games and win the WS. I don't even think he was on the postseason roster. he gave them some innings and was serviceable, that was about it and the original comment made it seem as though the Yanks had that historical season in part b/c they acquired Irabu.
I believe there are a number of teams which could win the w.s. parity is a great thing and I am glad to see it in baseball.
