New ‘Crimes Against Closer Usage’ Index Not Friendly To Cardinals

Do you like the Cardinals? Of course you do. You love the Cardinals.

What about Mike Matheny?

A nice size portion of you really dig the skip. Think he’s a bold leader of men. The type of manager that men respect and boys look up to. An all-around hunk.

If that’s the case, you’re not going to like anything below.

Because The Ringer’s Ben Lindbergh created a new index to showcase the worst pitching moves of the postseason (or crimes against closer usage, as he calls it) from the past 20ish years.

After filtering out some examples that didn’t fit the spirit of the search, we’re left with nine painful, non-Britton/Dyson examples. I’ve listed them below, in ascending order of Championship Leverage Index, a measure of how much the game affected each team’s odds of winning a World Series. The CLI values are calibrated to a baseline where 1.0 represents Game 1 of the World Series, and lower numbers equal lower stakes.

Did any of Matheny’s moves make the cut?

Yes. Yes they did. Three times, to be exact. Or 33.3% of the entire list, if you want to get technical. Depending on how dark your mood is today, video below:

2012 NLDS GM4

2014 NLCS GM5

2014 NLCS GM3

Pardon me while I throw up a little in my mouth.

If you’re really a masochist, I highly encourage you to visit The Ringer and read the full descriptions for any of the games above. It’s a trip down memory lane.

Photo: Sports On Earth

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