It's a thin line.

 " 'You gotta be perfect, there,' Mendoza said. 'I thought the bullpen, obviously, did a helluva job piecing it together all the way to the ninth inning when we couldn’t get the last three outs.'

About Diekman, the skipper added, 'Two pitches pretty much cost him the game.'

...

The lefty continued: 'I just don’t think I'm executing well enough in certain situations. The homer, if it’s two more inches in, it might be a swing [and] miss, it might be a double down the line, but they only score one so, it’s different…  I liked how everything moved today, it’s probably more of execution.' "

Right.

Almost winning the game because you almost got the opposing batters out.

The home run could have been a double or it could have been a strikeout.

Reggie Jackson's three home runs in Game Six of the 1977 World Series. If he had missed them by two inches, they would have been strikeouts instead.