Top 7 Most Frustrating Things About Your Favorite Baseball Team

When baseball returns, it’s a wonder how we survived without it.  There is something to watch every single night and (except for the day after Opening Day, making Opening Day one of the biggest teases of the year), hundreds of new numbers to look at every evening.  As Joe Morgan will tell you 7,000 times this year, there is no such thing as a perfect baseball team.  But some flaws on your favorite team are more frustrating than others.

This week’s Top 7 looks at the worst offenders.

7. Bad defense

It’s very rare that you have a team that makes an error or two every single game, instead, bad defense is more subtle.  You probably won’t notice too much that your centerfielder covers barely any ground, or that your second baseman can’t get balls to his left.  Bad defense is most noticeable when you get a new guy at a position when you’re used to one of the best guys playing there.

When Scott Rolen left the Cardinals, balls that looked like they were going to be fielded easily off the bat no longer were.

6. Stranding runners

Bases loaded, nobody out, and your team can only get a run out of it (or God forbid no runs, that’s when things start breaking around the house).  Two on, two outs, and they are go 0 for their last 44.  You actually begin to get angry with two runners on and one out because you know that you’re just going to get pissed off when they don’t score.  This happens most often with teams without several guys who can drop off bombs.###MORE###

5. Bad contracts

For this one, let’s just say that Cub fans have to deal with the fact that Alfonso Soriano is signed through 2014.

4. Bad offense

The thing about a bad offense is that you forget how easy it can be to score.  In the playoffs last year, the Cardinal offense completely disappeared.  They would hit weak pop-ups or grounders seemingly in every at-bat.  Just a few weeks prior to that, they were pounding out homers and doubles in their sleep.  I found myself screaming “SCORE!” at the top of my lungs on more than one occasion.

It can get to the point that they have such a hard time getting anything going at all that you just come to expect a 1-2-3 inning, or that if there is a leadoff guy on base, you wait for the inevitable double play.

3. Bad starting pitching

The only saving grace about knowing that your team’s starting pitching is horrible is that you can just stop going to the games.  Who wants to see your team down 6-0 when you’re only hallway done with your first beer?  I once saw the Cardinals lose 11 consecutive road games, and nearly every single one of them were ones where they were down by five or more within the first couple of innings.  When you see your team on the road, you’d at least like to have one freaking thing to cheer about.  Instead, you have to sit there and be ridiculed by everyone around you for the entire game.

2.    A Manager that Drives You Crazy

Wednesday night, Dusty Baker made two pitching changes in one inning against the Cardinals.  The first guy walked a batter and was taken out.  He then brought in a rookie, who gave up three straight hits, including one to Albert Pujols on the meatiest pitch he’ll see all year, the first one that he saw.  A tie game became a four-run deficit, and the Reds ended up losing.

Back with the Cubs, Dusty was notorious for throwing his top pitchers for hundreds of pitches and giving the likes of Neifi Perez 500 at-bats.  Dusty is probably the most annoying manager for your team to have, but pretty much hating on your team’s manager is as natural as cheering when they win.  For the level of hatred thrown at Tony LaRussa, you’d think he had managed the Pirates for the last 15 years.

1.    Bad bullpen

This one has to take the top spot because you can be good in every single other aspect on this list, and this one can ruin everything, and ruin it at the end of the game after your mood was great thinking that your team was going to win.  When your team has a good bullpen, you can casually watch the 9th inning, and even if there is a jam, you can be pretty confident that they’re going to get out of it.

If your team has a crappy bullpen, it’s zero fun.  Any tie game in the 7th inning you know they’re going to lose.  Any one-run lead in the 9th, you know you’ll have to watch with one eye or pace around the room.  Even if there’s a five-run lead, you start worrying once the first two batters reach on a walk and a hit-by-pitch.  A horrible bullpen can make a great team look mediocre.

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