Royals put the crown on a little early, pay the price

(USA Today)

http://m.mlb.com/video/topic/63106348/v36860095

Vargas thinks he took ball four

 10/25/14 | 00:36

10/25/14: Pitcher Jason Vargas thinks he took ball four and makes his way toward first base as his teammates share a laugh

To me, this was the turning point of the game. They Royals start clowning, vision of sugar plums dancing in their heads. The sugar plum being a 3-1 World Series lead, which means we're playing with house money against Bumgarner and go back home no worse than up 3-2 with two games at home to close it out. The Giants are imploding, Vogelsong knocked out, Machi looking knocked up. Why not? 

Only problem is, it's only the third inning and your playing against a former champ. Vargas goes out to the mound all loosey-gooey'd up and begins puking it up, slowly but surely. When you're in a tug of war against an equal opponent and you let up on the pull for even an instant, you can get pulled over the line yourself. IMO, that's what happened to the Royals. They lost the focus that got them in front and it cost them, big time. You can't start your touchdown dance on the 5-yard line and that's what they did. 

Leon Lett Super Bowl XXVII

Of course, Dallas still went on to win 52-17, but Leon Lett still looked like a horse's ass. Speaking of which, it reminded me of another similar moment, that being one Dusty Baker handing the World Series trophy ball to Russ Ortiz, right before the Angels rallied right to the 2002 World Series championship, blowing the doors off the Giants. 

This game was a microcosm of the Giants roller coaster season, within a two or three inning span. They started out looking like a 100-win team, they were on that pace, then the injuries and they begin looking like a 100-loss team and they played at that pace and worse. Within this game, the Giants started out looking like a playoff team, by the fourth inning they had morphed into a 100-loss plus team on the verge of imploding, and then right before our eyes went back to looking like world-beaters. 

I can't recall seeing anything quite like it. The closest parallels I could come with was ironically, the Cardinals sudden implosion against the Royals in their last World Series trip in 1985 and perhaps the 1969 Amazing Mets, in that people perceived them to still be a 100-loss team while they had morphed into a no nonsense 100-win team that just crushed their so-called "better" competitors throughout the playoffs. 

I have to admit, I was having 1985 Cardinals flash-back memories the way the Giants looked in the third inning. Fortunate they turned things around, and hopefully the hitting not only continues, but adds a heaping helping of Buster Posey. I'm sorry, his bat replaces Hunter Pence's on the milk carton. He is not hitting where he is is to turn in productive OUTS!! He is there to provide productive, RBI-filled AB's. Period!! Time to step up. 

It was good to see Hunter Strickland get back on the horse and show not just a 95+ MPH fastball, but the slider, a splitter and a change-up. Where have those pitches been hiding?

And where would this team be without Yusmeiro Petit? Sitting home watching, probably. 

The speed at which Vogelsong lost command and control of the game worries me and he was perhaps pitching for his life in SF which is too bad. I worry the same, unfortunately about Jake Peavy and to a lesser extent Tim Hudson. Adrenaline only takes you so far, usually an inning or two, than ability takes over. That leaves 3-4 inning of trouble to get to our own, over-shadowed shut down bullpen. Could see more of Petit and perhaps Timmy Lincecum. 

It's where we like the ball to be, Madison Bumgarner's hands. I don't want to under estimate the odds of Big Game James Shields pitching two sub-par games in a row, so this could be a battle of the bullpens again, perhaps going into extra frames. As is often the case in World Series games, a player you least expect to have an impact has to step forward. Where have you gone Al Weis? Or Denny Doyle.