Sometimes it is good to lose
by David Rocksteady 7/22/09
You might call me crazy, but part of me is happy to see this 10 game winning streak end.
In the game of baseball, consistency is the key. If you asked managers across Major League Baseball whether they would like a streaky ballplayer or one that is consistent, I would bet almost all of them would take the consistent player. Pat Burrell and Raul Ibanez are a great example. Both players ended up with similar numbers each year, but Burrell was streaky and Ibanez was not. Yeah, it was nice when Burrell was hot, but when he was cold, he was COLD and a major hole in the middle of the lineup.
The same is true for a team. When they are red hot, good things seem to just happen. But when a team is cold, it seems that nothing they do seems to work.
I worry when a team comes out of a serious winning streak that they "forget" what is was like before the streak and forget just how tough the game of baseball can be. When winning comes so easily to a team, they may not need to be 100% focused because they just know that they will win. But baseball is a 162 game marathon that requires , all of your focus. Teams do not win based on their best and worst streaks generally (except maybe the Rockies of two years ago). They win it on the games in between.
I think this Phillies team over the past few years has been so successful because they don't get too high and don't get too low. That is what it takes down the stretch, and that might be a big reason why we dominated so much in the playoffs last year.
Eventually you need to get back to business, and that is exactly what the Phillies have to do tonight.
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