Tag Archives: Barry Zito

Everything You Need to Know About the 2012 World Series

There’s a lot that goes into winning a World Series, much of it having to do with baseball. Instead, let’s evaluate the other things that you need to know about America’s Team, the San Francisco Giants. The last time I did this, the Giants won the World Series, so obviously, I needed to do it again, only with more gifs this time (there are a lot of gifs).

GAME ONE WILL MATCH CY YOUNG WINNERS OF ROUGHLY EQUIVALENT PITCHING ABILITY

The Tigers will send Justin Verlander, winner of last year’s AL Cy Young, and likely winner of this year’s award. Verlander has thrown up to 101 miles per hour this season and is currently dating Kate Upton. Barry Zito won a Cy Young ten years ago while playing for the Oakland Moneyballs, once dated Alyssa Milano and actually threw a 78 mile per hour fastball at one point this year. Here’s a graphic to make us all feel better about this:

A-yeaaaaah!

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Who Hates Moneyball?

So, the movie Moneyball came out and… it’s actually quite good? Yeah, it is. A movie about using more detailed statistics to win at baseball is actually pretty good, even if it does feature a highlight reel of A’s hitters drawing walks at one point. Good on you, Aaron Sorkin & Co.

But not everyone is happy. In fact, pretty much everyone except Billy Beane, the roguishly handsome General Manager and Father of the Year has an axe to grind with this one. I rounded up everyone who felt wronged by this movie and have sorted their complaints in descending value based on merit. Here they are, in their own words.*

Mark Mulder, Barry Zito, Tim Hudson, Starting Pitchers

Zito: You guys know I won the Cy Young, right? That didn’t warrant a mention? Oh, no, I’m sure the reason the A’s won 103 games was because Billy found that nice Christian submariner. That was it.

Hudson: And the only time I show up is when I’m getting shelled by the Royals. The motherfucking Kansas City Royals. How will my grandkids believe I was a good pitcher when they find this movie of me getting shellacked by Neifi Perez and Luis Alicea?

Mulder: Here’s our combined stats in 675 innings: 57-21, 3.05 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, .85 HR/9, 6.6 K/9, 2.53 K/BB. Our collective WAR was 17.4. By comparison, that year’s MVP’s WAR was 5.2, which is less than our average.

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