August 27, 2007
Big Week
Lyflines reviews the Red Sox week and notices:
It's very rare, over the course of seven games, to see the Pythagorean say that a team should be undefeated. I don't remember ever actually seeing it before. That's how dominant the weekend in Chicago was - the Red Sox went 6-1 on the week and underperformed their Pythagorean winning percentage.
The Red Sox now have the highest run differential in the majors, 183 runs. The Yankees lost 3 1/2 games, which makes picking up a game a week moot at this point. They need to pick up two a week, which is a much tougher assignment.
That's why the "one game a week" theory is so flawed. It works fine for a week or two, and then you go 2-5 and you're sunk. Lots of good things can happen if you're winning 4-5 games a week, which is required if you're going to gain on a weekly basis. But, that requires you to be winning 60-70% of the time, a pace unattainable for all but every team well behind another in the race.