1974 Post-Season Review

[kaosfere]

1974 was a disappointing year for Toronto. We felt like we were starting to get all the pieces in place and were primed to finish above .500, but ended up at .481 in 6th place. That this is the fourth-best finish ever that the team has had is some small comfort, as is the fact that our Pythagorean average shows that we got screwed out of 7 games (the worst ever for this team), but we still need to figure out what went wrong and what needs to change to make us a contender.

A look at our pitching shows that we were knock-out there -- first or second in just about every stat. Our effort building a solid lineup has definitely proven effective. There is nothing to fault there. Anthony Zijm proved to be worth the gamble of making him a full-time reliever, throwing 65 innings with a 1.92 ERA. Logan Finley, who was playing AA-ball last year, was also a worthy gamble. He threw 100 innings of relief with a 2.15 ERA. The #3 - #5 starters were a bit of a let-down, with ERAs of 3.89, 3.92, and 3.98.

That the pitching was stellar is shown by the runs against stats for the CL:

Valdosta:   550
Toronto:    554
Atlanta:    605
Baltimore:  607
Rio Grande: 620
Texas:      647
New York:   703
Brooklyn:   712

However, the best pitching in the world won't help you if your offense can't score, and that is where we fell apart:

Atlanta:    713
Rio Grande: 694
Valdosta:   668
Baltimore:  636
Texas:      620
Toronto:    589
Brooklyn:   545
New York:   533

Given that I was 23-27 in one-run games, as well as 7-8 in extras, it's probably fairly safe to say that my inability to produce reliable runs is what kept me from being a top-caliber team this year.

Power clearly isn't the problem here. We have some huge bats. Abraham Lujan was #1 in home runs in the CL, with David Dunham second and Ron Lord third. Jeff Anderson came in tied for 7th to give us a full half of the CL home run leader board. We had two men on the Triples board as well. However, on the flip side, five of our players lead the league in strikeouts. That, right there, is the offense killer. As a team, we had the lowest batting average of anyone, were tied for the lowest OBP, and had the most strikeouts by far.

As a manager, I have failed by focusing too much on bringing some much needed power to the lineup, which I have done successfully, without matching it with equivalent contact hitters. This, and keeping our pitchers in shape so that massive strong point doesn't disappear, is something on which I must focus for the coming season