You can't call a guy an ace if you have to start him at home because you're terrified of what will happen to him if he pitches on the road.

Is Kershaw not an ace because they're afraid to put him in during the 7th inning?

Semantics. Whatever. He pitched two 2 hitters in the 2015 postseason, and a historic complete game in Game 2 of the World Series.

Call it whatever you want to, but Cueto was unhittable when he was on that postseason, and we likely don't win the 15' series without him.

I would still think duffy would have been ahead of him I might be wrong but it seems like Verlander hasn't been good for a couple years and just recently found it again. Could be wrong etc just seems like people are talking like this is Verlander of 10 years ago.

This

But that's not what the Grantland study showed. That was the entire argument: they found almost ZERO correlation between regular season and postseason performance since the 1969 expanded format

Verlander finished second in the Cy Young voting in 2016 after putting up a 6.6 bWAR season.

And let's be real, he should have won.

Yes. Because Rick Porcello is really garbage.

Kate Upton was rather upset. She thought she was the only person who got to **** Verlander.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I hope those two Tampa writers who voted when there was still two weeks left to the season were banished to Siberia.

I am not arguing that the best pitchers in the regular season are always the best pitchers in the postseason. I'm fairly sure that's not true. Just look at Clayton Kershaw.

I'm saying that most teams who win have an true ace pitcher who they can either A) hand the ball to and trust to go 8-9 innings or B) is so good they bring him in relief on short rest because he's such a good pitcher. Even in this era of power bullpens every winning team this decade has done that. Jon Lester won game 5 then pitched 3 innings of relief last year in game 7 on short rest. Cueto threw one of the best starts in recent playoff history. We all know what Bumgarner has done. The Cardinals could hand the ball to Chris Carpenter and he'd deliver.

I'm pretty sure every one of those guys is a multi-time All-Star and has finished 1st or 2nd in the Cy Young voting... except for Bumgarner, who might be the best postseason pitcher of all time. But go ahead and say he's not an ace pitcher.

We paid a high price for Cueto so we could have an ace that we could hand the ball to in the World Series.

Ultimately, he responded by pitching a two hitter and giving us a championship. He did exactly what we were hoping he would do.

And, ultimately, the price ended up being a pittance.

A fringe major league player and two relievers...


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Oh absolutely. The fact that there is still any lingering disappointment over Cueto is baffling to me. The dude was simply legendary in a do or die game and on the game's biggest stage just two weeks later. Cueto's contributions to our championship are criminally underrated in KC.

Seriously, I highly recommend everyone re-watch either Game 5 of the ALDS or Game 2 of the WS. I had forgotten how dominant Cueto was in those performances, and to borrow a premonition from Hootie, I don't think KC had an ace-like performance like that since the Greinke era (though one could make an argument for Shields in August-September of 14').

Love you always, Cueto.

https://mudshvlst.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/kc72.jpg

I'm glad we got him but you conveniently left out his so-so regular season for us, his poor start vd HOU and his absolute firebombing in toronto

The regular season stoof is white noise to me, I honestly wouldn't have cared if Johnny posted a 135.00 ERA in the regular season. He was brought in for one reason, and that was to deliver in the playoffs. Johnny did just that. IIRC, Madison Bumgarner got firebombed in the September of 14', but I doubt any Giants fans are left ruminating on that.

As for the first Houston start and the start against Toronto, after watching the likes of Kershaw and Kluber get rocked in the postseason, bad starts against top-tier lineups are bound to happen, I think (your own analysis about postseason aces applies here). However, I think what separates truly dominant performers from the fact is found in their dominant starts - and Cueto delivered two of those with the highest stakes in the game.