Editorial — First and foremost, shout out to my beautiful fiancé for sticking with me through another baseball season. There were points where I had a ball game on each of my two living room TVs while streaming a third on my phone. She had to hear about Kevin Newman errors, strikeout parlays and Ji Man Choi splits, but she never complained once.

Red Sox Trade On Display in MLB Final

The World Series — and the MLB season — came to a close last night as the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Tampa Bay Rays, 3-1, in Game 6. The Dodgers won their first championship since 1988. However, the championship was overshadowed by several bad decisions by managers, the MLB and a team not even involved in the World Series.

By Game 6, nobody was more frustrated than Boston Red Sox fans. The broadcast never failed to mention that the Red Sox traded Mookie Betts to the Los Angeles Dodgers. This can be seen as the first bad decision that brought us to where we are this morning.

During the 2020 offseason the Red Sox traded Betts and pitcher David Price to the Dodgers for outfielder Alex Verdugo, shortstop Jeter Downs and catcher Connor Wong. In the 2020 regular season, Mookie Betts batted .292 with 16 home runs, 39 RBI and 10 stolen bases in only 219 at-bats. He had an OPS over .900.

In the World Series, Betts batted .269, but had four huge stolen bases. He became one of only two players ever to have two hits and two stolen bases in a World Series game. The other guy was Babe Ruth. Also, his double last night is what ultimately won the game for the Dodgers.

Betts is a huge reason the Dodgers won the World Series and that trade by the Red Sox may be a huge reason why the Dodgers win several more. Betts was signed mid-season by the Dodgers for the next 12 years.

Cash Pulls Snell

The second terrible decision that caused last night happened in the sixth inning. Blake Snell was absolutely cruising through the Dodgers lineup. After giving up a single, he was set to face the top of the order, which was 0-for-6 with 6Ks on the night against Snell.

To the dismay of myself, every Rays fan on Earth, and every Twitter account I follow, Kevin Cash pulled Snell and brought in Nick Anderson from the bullpen. It was an absolute absurd loyalty to analytics.

Real sports are not video games. If you could simulate every game based on the numbers, they would not be worth playing. Anderson immediately gave up two runs and the Rays found themselves down 2-1, never to recover.

Cash will be doubted for this move for the rest of his career.

Turner Tests Positive for COVID… Twice

Finally, the worst decision of the night is potentially a deadly one. This decision went way beyond sports and should cost several people their jobs, including Rob Manfred.

Justin Turner was pulled abruptly in the seventh inning of last night’s ballgame and replaced by Enrique Hernandez. It was revealed after the game that Turner had tested positive for Covid-19 — twice.

It was later reported by Ken Rosenthal that Turner’s COVID test results from Monday were not returned until the second inning of Tuesday’s game, and then the tests from pre-game Tuesday were expedited to return another positive for Turner.

One correction to what I said on @FS1 about Turner timeline. First result, on the test from yesterday, came back in the second inning, not in the afternoon. His test from earlier today was then expedited, and when it came back positive, he was removed from the game.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) October 28, 2020

There are several questions here. Why did it take so long for Turner’s results from Monday to be revealed? Why was he allowed to play from the second inning to the seventh? And why was he on the field celebrating with the team after the game? Someone has to answer for this blatant disregard for all of the protocols put in place.

The answer is he went back out and nobody stopped him. He was asked to isolate and didn’t. https://t.co/AFyWN0Xt0b

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) October 28, 2020

Imagine being a teammate about to return home to your family, but your idiot teammate makes it all about himself. Even worse, the team and the MLB let him. It’s simply awful decision making on their part and the optics are terrible for the sport.

Concluding the MLB Season

So in conclusion, baseball is over. And, of course, it ended in a black cloud as the 2020 season should. I can’t wait to wake up on Jan. 1, 2021, and leave this terrible, awful, no-good year in the past.

The post Wolfe’s Den: Several bad decisions highlight the end of the MLB season appeared first on Pittsburgh Sports Castle.