Power surge: Home runs more than half of scoring in playoffs

ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — For all the talk about pride in advancing runners and manufacturing runs, teams in the postseason have really dug the long ball.

Home runs drove in 235 of the 456 runs in the postseason through World Series Game 4, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. That comes to 51.5%, up from 46.6% last year and highest since the postseason expanded beyond the World Series in 1969.

Tampa Bay has been more reliant on the long ball than most. The AL East champions became the first team to homer in four consecutive innings of a postseason game during a thrilling 8-7 comeback win over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Saturday night that tied the Series at two games apiece. Brandon Lowe’s three-run homer off Pedro Baez gave the Rays a 5-4 lead in the sixth, and Kevin Kiermaier tied it at 6 with a home run against Baez in the seventh.

That gave the Rays 33 homers in the postseason accounting for 52 of 76 runs (68.4%).

“I think it’s more part of the trend, When we win, I couldn’t even tell you how we scored the runs: via home run, walk, hit, error or whatever,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “I think it’s harder to do anything offensively in this game because the pitching is so talented, just the electric arms that these teams have and definitely in the postseason. The reason they’re in postseason, playing postseason baseball is because a lot of that coincides with great pitching and that’s what we’re seeing. So that is what makes it tougher to score.”

Los Angeles has been far less dependent, hitting 25 homers that drove in 40 of 94 runs (42.6%).

That is a reversal from the regular season, when the Dodgers were second in the majors at 51.3% and Tampa Bay was 20th at 41.5%. Cincinnati was the most long-ball dependent at 59.7%, according to...

source https://www.chron.com/sports/article/Power-surge-Home-runs-more-than-half-of-scoring-15674096.php