Featured Let's Go Royals" II

That seriously might have been the best complete World Series performance ever with Bumgarner. I figured they might use him as a two inning stop gap but after awhile I just sat back and enjoyed his brilliant performance for what it was. I was hoping the Royals would pull it out but it was a great World Series and Game 7 didn't dissapoint.

 

I watch Bumgarner pitch and I don't see anything special besides his pinpoint control. He's got a so-so fastball, an OK curve. He really lives on the corners and the paint of home plate. He doesn't have a "go-to" out pitch. Maybe it's his funky arm angle that messes with batter's minds. Royals batter would help him out a lot by swinging at balls.

I know I just watched the most dominant three game pitching performance in my 50 some years of watching the World Series but it doesn't seem like it.

 

It's not just the speed of his fastball. He is 6'5" and his arm angle and top down perspective to a hitter is decpetive. He can also make that fastball dance out there. Great tailing action. He also mixes speeds exceptionally well and doesn't tip his pitches. The Salvador Perez at bat in the ninth was a nightmare to watch though. He looked totally helpless up there.

 

Most of the Royals are overly-aggressive swingers, and not just with Bumgarner. Escobar especially. Lorenzo Cain and Billy Butler were the only two guys I saw that actually looked at some pitches, trying to work the pitcher.

The 2nd inning when they scored their 2 runs there must have been 6-7 hitters and I bet Hudson threw less than a dozen pitches. It worked out for them but that aggressiveness at the plate failed them more often than it worked for them in this game.