Rick Hurd, Contra Costa Times on XM--forgets likely cause of Indians frazzle in ALCS

On Baseball Beat, Rick and Chuck happen upon what makes winners and losers in the post season. Rick made a point of saying even if a team (specifically a lower payroll team) gets to the post season they still might not go very far just because they're not there often enough to get a winning mentality.

• He cites 2007 ALCS Indians v Boston, and earnestly says he thinks the Indians looked around when ahead 3 games to 1 and said in effect, Who? Us? Holy smokes, this is heavy, can this really be happening to us, after all we're just the Indians not used to the post season much in recent years. Hurd believes that's the probable reason the Indians fell apart late in the series.

No mention in the conversation of the single event that literally caused the Indian team to fall into chaos on the night of the deciding Game 7. ESPN employees had published Paul Byrd's drug use in the San Francisco Chronicle--often word of these major events leaks out a little earlier. The Indians team was forced to handle a swarm of media, which might have altered their mental outlook a bit--if Rick Hurd wants to explore the mental aspects of winning, that would've been worth mentioning.

Tweet Stumbleupon StumbleUpon