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One of the most shocking moments in this year's actual MLB playoffs was when one of the best relievers in the game, Emmanuel Clase, gave up a shocking back-to-back homers to the NY Yankees who simply had his number.
The Statis-Pro playoff series between the Guardians and Twins featured the same type of moment.
In the ultimate pitcher's duel between the Twins Joe Ryan and Guardians Tristan McKenzie, there had been only three hits in the entire 0-0 tie when Clase entered with two outs in the 8th inning.
An error had kept the inning alive, so to take "no chances," Clase entered with two outs and two on to get the Twins No. 9 hitter Kyle Farmer and keep the score tied going into the bottom of the 9th.
As you can see from the cards above, Clase's card is even better than last season's card. He was once again a PB 2-9, meaning one of the top 5% of all pitchers and controls action five out of six times - only leaving one in six batters a chance at a pitch they can drive for extra bases. This years card allows two fewer hits, only 10 hits on 64 possible random numbers on his card (11-22 in the 11-88 base-8 range), and even fewer walks (just 4 in the 43-46 range.
On the one in six chance of a 10-12 on the two die roll (or fast action card) Farmer's card was improved with his home run range improving from 27-28 to this year's card of 28-32, which in turn meant the DEEP drive range that might go out improved from 31-33 to 33-35. And therein lies the difference in this game and potential series.
Our Clutch Batting (BD) range turns a single (11-21) into a base clearing double and an extra base hit OR deep drive (22-35) into a home run. And that made all the difference.
If just playing with dice there would have not been a clutch batting, but just action on one of the cards, but we were playing with Fast Action Cards and instead of a 2-12 number one of the rare BD readings came up meaning if men are on base (which two were) the next Random Number of 11-88 would be applied against the BD range instead of the pitcher or batters normal ranges.
And it happened - a "34" that was a 3-run homer and propelled the Twins to a 2 games to 0 lead in a best-of-five series but would have been just a foul ball if playing with dice or with last year's card.
Not only that, it turned out Farmer's projected card is quite a bit better than his actual season. His projections improved because of a career high 0.725 OPS last year - but in fact if the card above was based on this year's actual stats then his 0.647 OPS would have resulted in the BD 34 as a foul ball.
After the rare blown saves in the actual series against the Yankees, Clase's stunning allowed home run gives the Twins a chance to advance in Statis-Pro if they win at least one of three at home.
Farmer's homer made a winning of Ryan, who went an incredible 7 innings with only a hit and a walk allowed, and then the PB2-8 Brock Stewart getting the hold and closer PB 2-9 Jhoan Duran getting the final six outs for the win.
In a Game 3 match-ups of PB 2-8 pitchers left, former Oriole Alex Cobb will try to keep the Guardians alive against the Twins Chris Paddock.
The Guardians will need to get some support after scoring only one unearned run these first two games, as even future Hall of Famer Jose Ramirez continues to struggle in the year's Statis-Pro playoffs but always a danger to erupt.
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