Dan Szymborski -- who I will call “Baseball Think Factory’s Dan Szymborski” even though he’s writing this piece for ESPN Insider -- has a good column up today. In it he breaks down playoff performance by players with “playoff experience,” which we are told by so many commentators matters this time of year.
Of course, if Dan had found that playoff experience matters, he probably just would have chucked the column on the basis of no one wanting to read a dog-bites-man story. His conclusion is contrary to that, however:
In summary, while having playoff experience never will actually hurt a player or a team, it’s generally a non-factor relative to the skills of a team or a player. Put the best team on the field and hope they have a better game than your opponent -- isn’t that the way it ought to be?
So there goes one more argument for believing that A.J. Burnett will be dominant tonight. Pity.