The American League Championship Series begins on Sunday. The Tampa Bay Rays will host the Houston Astros at San Diego's Petco Park. The Rays edged a powerful New York Yankees team and continue to play excellent baseball. They finished the season on an 8-2 run on the way to a 40-20 record, second only to the 43-17 Los Angeles Dodgers, and took the AL East by seven games over the Yanks. The Astros powered past the Oakland Athletics, a team they finished seven games behind in the the AL West.
The National League Championship Series begins on Monday. The Dodgers welcome the Atlanta Braves to the Texas Ranger's Globe Life Field. Both teams have won all five of their post-season games. The Braves have thrown four shutouts. The Braves won the NL East by four games over the Miami Marlins, the team they beat in the LDS. The Dodgers won the NL West by six games over the Padres, the team they beat in the LDS.
I was disappointed the A's didn't make it through, they have had a good club for some time now but have yet to break through to the the LCS or World Series. The Rays are a very interesting team, the way they move players around and put them in many different roles is really something. In 60 games they had 60 different lineups, and 12 different pitchers earned a save for them this season. I'm rooting for them to get to the Series.
--M.C.
7 comments:
I am usually more of a national league fan. Nevertheless I live in Florida now, and the two teams I dislike the most in the N.L. are the Dodgers, and the Braves. I hope the Braves beat the dodgers, but as a current Florida resident, I am hoping that the team from Tampa Bay goes all the way. Houston looks as if it has a new system to figure out what pitch is coming, and I wonder if Dusty is even aware of it.
That's funny!
I'm with you on the Dodgers and the Braves, I don't like either team. I'm a bit in awe of LA, they seem to have an answer for everything. I think an LA v. TB Series would be the best matchup from a fan perspective. The Dodgers have the glamour and star power and the best record and the Rays have their Legion of Underdog Nobodies, not to mention the second-best record. Rays make the perfect David to their Goliath, much like the previous round with with the Yanks.
Watching some of the Rays games in Florida, they seem to play very smart baseball. They do the little things that they need to do to win. The dodgers seem to excel, in having almost an entire line-up that is excellent at pitch selection. There are usually no easy outs, they make the pitchers throw strikes. They seem to take bad pitches, and close pitches more often than not seem to go their way. That may partially be due to the reputation that they have fostered and built. The Padres just did not get the strike zone in the playoff series vs. the dodgers that they received during their last series of the year vs. the Giants. For the most part the umpires have been very good during the playoffs. Watching games that are competently called makes the games more enjoyable. I do admit though, this being an unusual year, and not having the giants in the playoffs, I have not been watching as much as during a regular season, but I do find myself tuning in during the later innings.
WTF - now, Joe Mama is gone, too. This is a heartbreaking string of losses of all-time greats.
My Mom always says she doesn't feel old (she's 89) until she thinks about how old her sons are (I'll be 61 next month).
I think all these ballplayers dying just points out how old WE are! After all, Joe Morgan was on the 1982 Giants--he turned 39 that year--and that was 38 years ago.
Morgan's an interesting case. Just about as good of an all-around ballplayer as you could want, he could pretty much do everything as a hitter, a fielder, and a baserunner. He had a clutch reputation despite hitting .182 in 50 post-season games. (I guess WHEN you hit 'em in the playoffs matters more than HOW OFTEN you hit 'em!) Just goes to show how hard it is to "measure" clutch-ness. Even though he was near the end of his career in SF he was still an outstanding player.
I must say I could not listen to him on broadcasts after a certain point. He was so sure of himself and his opinions and so hostile to any idea in baseball (or sports) that did not conform to his world view that he became impossible to tolerate. I don't care how good you are at ANYTHING you have to grow and evolve and keep learning and people who rely entirely on their past experience (and reputation) get annoying real fast.
There were plenty of reasons to love the Giants run of World Series championships for fans like us but one of the biggest is never having to hear about Joe Morgan's 1982 home run that beat the Dodgers. The Giants fan base's biggest moment was a game that prevented another team from winning the Division? Really? Sheesh! I was so sick of that game and that moment (I was in the LF bleachers that day), I remember it being cathartic but NOT satisfying. Whenever it was replayed on TV or radio I left the damn room. When I think of 1982 I think of the missed opportunity to win the Division not the schadenfreude of "keeping the Dodgers out."
Anyway, I don't mean to speak ill of the dead. RIP, Joe.
Getting off the topic of the Great Joe Morgan, as a player, I am glad to see the dodgers slumping thus far in their series against the Braves. Perhaps the air is coming out of the dodger mystique, or perhaps even in a short season, they have hit a post-season wall. Swanson just hit an RBI Ground rule double, that was inches out of the reach of the Dodger right fielder, who we all know would have made the catch if it was a giant that hit the ball.
Braves are killing it. So are the Rays. 5-0 so far in the LCS, you'd think the two series would be closer.
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