Before his start in game four of the World Series, Clay Buchholz said, “I haven’t been 100 percent for a long time now and pitched less than 100 percent for the last couple of months. What’s one more?”
His nonchalant demeanor was obviously meant to downplay the fact that the one more in question was the biggest game of the year, and one that could decide the fate of his ball club.
But Buchholz’s statement also points to an interesting hiccup in baseball’s war of numbers versus clichés. Funny how his use of a percentage was accepted as a working form of measuring his readiness to play, even by a lot of folks who would otherwise dismiss such a concept outright. After all, less than 100 percent of what — a guaranteed great outing?
Then again, Buchholz’s candid, honest comments about his diminished health got me thinking. I’ve heard Hawk Harrelson and other commentators throw out concepts like grit, hustle, heart and the will to win, and I’ll admit that I’ve done my absolute best to destroy them, waving the banner of “unquantifiable!” as I charge across the baseball-production battlefield. David Price did call me a nerd, remember.
Still, I can’t help but wonder sometimes: What matters more, being at peak best physical health to take the field, or the desire to be out there no matter how much it hurts? I know from my own playing days that measurable production is only one part of that athlete formula.
When I was playing in high-A ball (I spent a lot of time at that level) my coach for two of those years was current Padres bench coach Rick Renteria. We called him Renty, and we all loved him. He was one of the first “player’s managers” most of us had experienced to that point in our young careers.
Renty cared about how we felt — a rare trait among coaches. He cared what our goals were, how we saw ourselves in the game, and what baseball meant to us. He felt that by knowing those things he could better put us in situations to succeed. Obviously every player wants to do well, but not every player has the same reasons.
Some players want to do well because they’re afraid of failure — because they, or someone intimately involved in their life around the game, berates them when failure happens.
Some players want to do well because they want to be stars — because they want everything that goes along with being a celebrity in a sports-crazed society.
Some players just want to beat the odds, no matter what they are, no matter how they’re feeling, because it’s personal — because they’d rather retire than back down. They are the bulldogs of their respective sports. They are the ones that were made to play.
Renty tried to set each of us up in situations that best fit our strengths, or shielded us from our weaknesses. The only thing he asked from us in return was that we give him 100 percent of what we had to give. I say “had to give” and not the more poetic — if cliché — “100 percent” followed by a period because Renty knew the professional-baseball season was a gruelling one and guys are rarely fully healthy.
Instead, he asked us to give him 100 percent of whatever level we were currently operating at. “If you’ve only got 50 percent in the tank, give me 100 percent of your 50 percent,” he’d say.
I grant you, that math is Berra-esque, but it’s the concept behind it that matters.
As sabermetrically inclined as I am, there is still a place in the game for intangibles. And this World Series has been full of them. In fact, this time of year is full of it, for this is the time when bodies ache and muscles fail and talent has started to spoil, and yet, on they push, with something more than just talent.
The more I watch the Red Sox and Cardinals play, the more I see the value of what you can’t capture on a stat sheet.
Don’t get me wrong. Just because I brought up Buchholz and his flagging body doesn’t mean I’m calling the Sox the underdogs, or accusing the Cardinals of not giving it their all, or saying they’re not more talented than another team that’s pushed itself this long and hard.
Actually, I’m praising the resilience of both squads. And where there is no resilience, I am praising their ability to give anything they have left to give.
The Sox lack the deep and effective stockpile of pitchers the Cardinals have. They’ve relied mainly on two over-worked relievers — Craig Breslow and Koji Uheara. In fact, their bullpen is so bereft of options they brought in John Lackey for an inning in game four. In the field, meanwhile, Dustin Pedroia has been playing all year with a torn ligament in his finger.
And, of course, there was Buchholz’s latest and final outing of the Series — four innings built on sinkers in the 80s is a far cry from his early-season dominance. Only four innings, and yet no one is saying he didn’t give his team a chance to win.
For the Cardinals, Allen Craig is playing through an all-but-immobilizing foot injury. Carlos Beltran, despite a set of bruised ribs, refuses to rest. David Freese and Matt Holiday are both banged up.
If Buchholz’s comments concerning how players feel after a season of abuse is true for him, how much more true is it for Adam Wainwright, who threw the most innings of any pitcher in baseball this season with 241, and has logged 28 in the post-season heading into his start tonight.
It’s a punishing schedule. And while the baseball-analyzing community may not feel that there’s much value in intangibles, I’m finding it more and more difficult to think that way after watching these two teams play through an extended spring thanks to the World Baseball Classic, 162 games plus the post-season, nine months and three changes of the seasons — from cold weather to cold weather.
For all the talent on display in this World Series, what’s making these games even possible is the desire of the players. Each team’s grit, heart and — as much as it pains me to say it — will to win is on full display for anyone willing to see them. And there’s incredible value in that, even if you can’t add it up on your calculator.