Battling Bucs : Shortening The Season

At the beginning of the year if you were to have asked me what the chances of the Pittsburgh Pirates playing better than the St. Louis Cardinals were over the 162 game season I would have said something like maybe 5%. That scenario while it wasn't impossible to imagine did seem highly unlikely. If you were to have asked me at the beginning of the year the random but possibly poignant question of what are the chances the Pittsburgh Pirates outplay the Cardinals in a 28 game stretch this year. I would have said very likely and probably put the odds of it occurring for at least one 28 game stretch at over 80% if not more. Even if you would have specified a 28 game stretch I would still have likely gave them at least a 1 in 3 chance of doing so.
The point of all of this should be quite clear. A win by the Pirates tonight and the monumental task of out playing the Cardinals for 162 games is no longer what they are staring it. They would essentially wipe the slate clean and be looking at the much more realistic task of out playing them for just 28 games. I think there is little doubt the Cardinals are probably the better baseball team; the gap in talent appears to be far less than it initially appeared so at the beginning of the year but the fact i there is still a small gap present. With a win tonight that distinction really wouldn't matter all that much.
There is a reason baseball seasons are a long grueling 162 games instead of a short compact 28 games and that is because over the course of 162 games the cream is supposed to rise to the top while the rest while they may enjoy some hot stretches will at one point or another fade. In a 28 game season though that isn't the case. Baseball is a game in large part determine by chance. Things such as a ball hitting the edge of the grass and taking a funny hop happen, players stumble occasionally, bad calls go in your favor sometimes, hitters blister balls only for them to be right at the fielders while others hit weak pop ups that happen to fall into no man land. Over the course of 162 games as the expression goes these things tend to even out. For 28 game though that is less true.
In reality a good baseball team which the Pirates and Cardinals are can do just about anything over 28 games. They could lose 20 games or they could win 20 games and if it was in the course of a season it wouldn't really be too noteworthy. That is sort of my point a win tonight and all of the sudden the rough month of August the Pirates have had is meaningless, hell the first 134 games would be meaningless. The Pirates would in essence turn this 162 game marathon into a 28 game sprint to the finish line. Could this Pirates team we see out there right now win a 162 game marathon run against the Cardinals we see, probably not but you know what they can win is a 28 game sprint.
Tonight's game is huge quite arguably the biggest in PNC Park history but of course that very well may be the case every night from here on out. This Pirates team has a chance to shorten this race and get a likely superior opponent into an environment that will neutralize a lot of their advantages. A win tonight not only even things up in the standings but it evens things up on the field.