LOS ANGELES — Seven thoughts for a classic World Series that has gone seven games:
1. Conspiracy theories abound about a different version of baseballs that fly and fly, but I wonder if there should be more concern about what is going on in home ballparks.
Going into Game 7, the home team was 4-2 in the World Series and 27-10 in the postseason. That is a .730 winning percentage, by far the best of the wild-card era (since 1995) and the best overall since 1987 (15-4, .789).
The paranoia has grown in recent years about all types of shenanigans teams are using at home to particularly steal signs. As we saw with the punishment of the Red Sox for using an electronic watch in the dugout to help better relay signs, teams — as always — are pushing the envelope. It is worth keeping an eye on it.
The Astros had been Jekyll at home 8-1, 2.96 ERA, .862 OPS and should want to hide on the road: 2-6, 5.96 ERA, .642 OPS.
2. About those baseballs. This is just an extension of the regular season when pitchers and their coaches, in particular, claimed the ball was — take your pick — slicker, had lower seams, was tighter or some combination of all of that.
A record number of homers was hit this season, so no surprise that has occurred in the postseason. Even before there were two more long balls hit in Game 6, a new mark already had been set for most homers in a postseason (it was 103 through Game 6) and in a World Series (24).
Do I think the baseball is different? There is too much smoke for there not to be some fire. But I know from three-plus decades in this business that it is hard for two people to keep a secret. Think about how many would have to know that specs were ordered changed on the balls to produce the amount needed for a season and postseason. Thus, my suspicion continues to be the ball might be tighter through some subtler change in production not yet defined, but also bats are made better, hitters are bigger and stronger, velocity is greater and many hitters sell out without a two-strike approach and now have evolved into swings that accentuate lifting and launching the ball.
3. One of the results of all that launching and lifting is that through six World Series games, there were 46 singles and 46 extra-base hits. Think about that.
4. The three players who most elevated their reputations during this postseason are all Astros: 1. Justin Verlander, who probably guaranteed the Hall of Fame with his run since joining Houston, particularly in October. 2. George Springer, who showed the Astros have a Big Three with Jose Altuve and Carlos Correa. 3. Alex Bregman, who showed that it is probably a Big Four with his confident, aggressive talent on both sides of the ball.
5. There was a rush by many after his Game 1 mastery to trash the narrative that Clayton Kershaw isn’t as good in the postseason. But the numbers say he just isn’t as good in the postseason as a starter, that he does not have the percentage of bad starts from April through September that he has in October.
He has made 19 playoff starts now. That is not an insignificant amount, and he has never recorded an eighth-inning out in any of them. He has a 4.45 ERA in those starts. Unlike, say, CC Sabathia in 2009, Madison Bumgarner in 2014 or even Verlander this year, Kershaw has never had a complete postseason in which he was outstanding.
He is the great regular-season pitcher of his generation with a bunch of highs in the playoffs. But whether it is something about his body and/or mind betraying him at this time of year, he simply has not been as good.
6. On Sept. 1, Charlie Culberson played his 108th and final game for the Oklahoma City Dodgers. He hit ninth for the Triple-A club, for whom he hit .250 with a .634 OPS. He then played 15 games for the Dodgers and hit .154 with a .497 OPS.
With Corey Seager hurt and not playing in the NLCS, Culberson started three of five games at shortstop, and even with Seager back, he continued to play an important bench role in the World Series. He is 8-for-23 in the postseason (.348) with four extra-base hits in the postseason. Culberson has four extra-base hits over the last two major league seasons (49 games) combined.
The second-place hitter for Oklahoma City on Sept. 1 was Joc Pederson, who lost his center-field job and then was demoted to Triple-A, but as the starting left fielder in the World Series had three homers in the first six games.
The third-place hitter for the opposing Round Rock Express on Sept. 1 was Willie Calhoun, the key player traded by the Dodgers on July 31 to obtain Yu Darvish, who will start Game 7.
7. A season is a long, strange thing: Opening Day lineup on April 6 for Oklahoma City had Chris Taylor leading off and playing short and Cody Bellinger hitting second. Culberson pinch-hit for the losing pitcher — Brandon Morrow.