2011 World Series Preview

Neither the Yankees nor the Red Sox are in the World Series, but contrary to popular belief there still will be a Fall Classic played this year and it starts tonight. Most of you probably don't care unless you have money involved but there will be a few really good baseball players on display.

As far as the National League representative, the Cardinals are having a UCONN type run this season. 10.5 games out in late August, they were the benefactors of that other epic collapse that nobody really talked about. The old cliche about just get in and take it one game at a time has been applicable here, as LaRussa and his boys have found themselves with home field advantage in the World Series (ironically thanks in large part to the guy they just beat Prince Fielder's domination of the All Star game). So how do the two squads you didn't really pay any attention to all year stack up against each other?

Pitching- Both teams have pretty decent starting pitching despite the fact that the Cardinals bullpen actually worked more innings than their starters in the NLCS. LaRussa is well known for utilizing as many statistics as possible and (some would say) overmanaging, so expect more of the parade of relief pitchers this series. St. Louis also employs the first ever female pitcher in Major League Baseball history, a fire ball slinging southpaw by the name of Whitney Starkington. Though little used, she's sure to dominate the pre game coverage and the ESPN human interest stories. Although St. Louis lost Adam Wainwright early in the season and Chris Carpenter got off to a snail-slow start, the starters picked it up in September and as previously mentioned, that bullpen was lights out. The Rangers aren't as imposing without last year's ace Cliff Lee on the mound but they still have a solid rotation. Also, the late season addition of Cuban dissident and midget Julio Mariposa added some grit to their already tough bullpen. Free spirited C.J. Wilson suffered a blister on his throwing hand last series but he's expect to play which is a plus for Texas.

Advantage: Rangers

Offense- Both Texas and St. Louis have ridiculously potent offenses so expect lit up scoreboards and the over to be in play every game. Most of the spotlight will be on best player in the game and one guy who Hater J actually doesn't hate: Phat Albert Pujols aka El Hombre. Pujols plays a slick first base but he's been absolutely tearing it up along with breakout star and ALCS MPV David Frees. Add Matt Holliday at DH and the Cardinals offense is looking very formidable. Rounding out the lineup is only the second Cambodian player in MLB history, Kat Tran a switch hitting chemistry major and poet laureate from Stanford. Tran burst on the scene in July and hasn't looked back since sparking Tran Fever in St. Louis. Texas's offense is no slouch though, as the Tigers learned last week. Nelson Cruz is having a 2004 Beltranesque playoffs and he's surrounded by big bats in Josh Hamilton and SS Elvis Andrus, forming one of the scarier lineups in baseball today. Someone who's been struggling lately is Johnny "Greasy J" Cifaretto, the self proclaimed "One armed guido" who despite having only one arm and being a guido has managed to hit only .075 this postseason. Ron Washington's insistence on starting Cifaretto has led to some rumors of gambling debts or other shady going ons behind the scenes. Catcher Mike Napoli has provided a lift with his big bat and sturdy defense behind the plate. Both offenses should be ready to slug it out and it will certainly be fun to watch.

Advantage: Cardinals (by a hair)

My pick: Cardinals in 6.

Play Ball!

People Who Think People Who Blame A-Rod are Idiots are Idiots

What I'm trying to say in that convoluted title up there is that the contrarian position is not always the right one. Despite what this article and other blogs and experts are saying today to prove their intelligence over the drooling masses Last night, A-rod by all definitions sucked. Whether this was due to nagging effects from his multitude of injuries this season (read: after effects of steroids use) or just his usual postseason suckiness, the fact remains that Alex Rodriguez shit the bed this ALDS. Much like he did in 05, 06, 07 and every season besides the 09 run when I'm convinced that either A-Rod was hypnotized by Kate Hudson's magical vagina or he upped his steroids dosage. Yes, Girardi's overmanaging style was again partly to blame and there was a whole list of other players who were awful this series, but a great deal of the blame falls on A-Rod's broad, useless shoulders. That might be unfair to judge him because of his contract and celebrity status, but there's a reason he garners all that attention and money: he's a supremely talented player who's put up monstrous career numbers. We expect great things out of him in the playoffs and the guy just hasn't produced in the big spots outside of that one season. Break down all the sabermetrics you want, debate the existence of "clutch", however you look at it he's failed in big moments. I nicknamed him "smoke break" a couple years ago because once he came up to bat you knew that you weren't going to miss anything if you stepped out for a Newport. Obviously baseball is a team sport and more than any other sport the final score relies on factors that an individual can't control like pitching and defense that one player can't overcome. I understand that, Joe Posnanski. But if we give out MVP awards (of which A-Rod's won a couple) based partly on team success, then the individual should also take some heat when the team is unsuccessful.

Yankees' playoff series always seem to end with A-Rod striking out, and this is because they actually do end that way more often than not. Sportscenter ran a graphic about all of the past playoff series that have ended with Rodriguez at the plate. Last night was no different as he struck out swinging in every big moment last night and the one time he was on base he failed to score despite what looked like a deep enough base hit to drive in a run (Rob Thomson held him up there and he seemed to be laboring a little while running so he gets a pass I suppose). But this doesn't excuse the rest of the series when he got precisely zero hits besides one when the game was already out of reach on Tuesday. Even the Tigers were cracking jokes.

So obviously the entire team is to blame (not to mention there is another team that is playing, wants to win and doesn't know that we have to win the World Series every year). I understand an article or blog post that says "A Rod sucks" isn't all that interesting and But, let us vent some frustration on the most famous player on the team and the one who we have signed for an astronomical price for the next 6 years of our lives. He was not good. In fact, he sucked. And I don't feel like an idiot for saying that.

Yankees vs. Tigers ALDS Preview

Seems like just yesterday I was writing about Yankees and CC Sabathia's opening day against The Tigers and Justin Verlander. Here we are 5 months, 162 games, and countless Milwaukee's Bests and utz pretzel sticks later and we've come full circle. CC vs. Bottle's pick for MVP tonight at Yankee Stadium. Tomorrow is officially the beginning of October, but the first baseball playoff game always means September's done and it's time to get serious.

Although this is a rematch of the 06 ALDS, not too much remains the same from that forgettable (for the Yankees) series. Gary Sheffield still hung out in right field, MVP candidate Curtis Granderson played was in the other uniform, Chien Ming-Wang was still considered an ace (picking up the Yanks only win of the series) and Justin Verlander was but a fresh faced albeit very good rookie. What the series is probably best remembered for in New York is Joe Torre's odd decision to bat the struggling A-Rod 8th in the elimination game 4. To be fair to Joe, A-Rod played about as bad as a baseball player could in that series (this was before his great 09 run erased all of this from our memories) and he probably deserved a demotion but that was probably not the time or place to sit your MVP. Anyway, these days Hater J's least favorite human being is an afterthought as he's barely played over the last few months. Any production out of him should be considered a bonus by the Yanks.

The big story this series will be the big, bad, scary Justin Verlander who has dominated the league this year, leading the AL in wins, strikeouts, innings pitched, ERA, winning percentage, WHIP, hits per 9 innings, national anthems sung, and bags of peanuts sold. Every outing is a possible no-hitter and/or complete game. He's kind of a throwback to an era when pitchers were expected to go 8 every start before Girardi's clip boards and La Russa's over-managing. The prevailing theory around NY and the rest of baseball was you want to avoid Detroit at all costs so you don't have to see Verlander twice in a 5 game series. He's this year's version of Cliff Lee. But, despite the gaudy numbers against everyone else, the Yanks should be able to take a little bit of comfort in the fact that they were 2-0 against Verlander this season and in both outings, he couldn't make it out of the 6th inning, something that isn't so bad for most mere mortal pitchers, but is practically unheard of in his case. If the Bombers can keep that same pressure on him during this series, they should be in good shape. And if Sabathia can recapture some of his midseason form (when he was almost as dominant as Verlander) then it could be a short series. CC seemed to struggle on extended rest this season as the Yankees experimented with a 6 man rotation in search of solid corps. But now that everything's settled, AJ Burnett is thankfully relegated to the bullpen where he can do minimal damage and Freddy Garcia is being thrown out there in game 3, CC should be back in his comfort zone. The pitching rotation has been the big question mark all season and it will be interesting to see how the Yankee's rookie sensation (Nova) and resurrected veteran (Garcia) perform in the spotlight.

As far as the offenses stack up, the Yankees have an advantage with their two MVP candidates (Granderson and Cano) leading the way. Mark Teixiera needs to improve his postseason offensive play, which thus far outside of one memorable home run against the Twins in 09 has been very dissapointing. As I mentioned before, A-Rod has gone from the focus to a bit of an unknown for this playoffs, and who knows, that might actually work in his and the Yankees benefit. Even with his monster 09 numbers, A-Rod has seemed to be affected by the attention and pressure in years past. Now that some of the burden has been shifted to other players, maybe number 13 can relax and let his talent speak for itself. As for the Tigers, they're led by a rejuvenated PTU keeping it real hero (we won't take complete credit for his resurgence) Miguel Cabrera, the Tigers have a somewhat overlooked potent offense. I say this since the spectacular play of Verlander can overshadow the rest of the team. But beware, Yankee fans, the Tigers are not a one man team. In fact, as Hater J pointed out, they were 4th in runs scored so we should expect some high scoring games over the next week and a half. I give the Yankees an edge here, though, as they have the more experienced and talented lineup.

All in all, these teams are more evenly matched than some media outlets and fans are portraying them. The Yankees cruise to a division title was really more a by product of Boston's crappyness then anything they did, so fans shouldn't be lulled into a false sense of security and smugness (something I'll sadly admit Yankee fans do better than anyone else). Hell, if Boston had played a little over .500 ball in September we might not even be talking about this today and would instead be posting about Octoberfest or something. That being said, I expect a closely contested series with the Yankees getting to Verlander tonight and then doing enough in the next 4 games to win in 5 at home next Friday.

Note: I'll be at the game tonight and will attempt to capture some magic moments in pictures for PTU. Let's go Yanks!

Shut Up, Old Man! The Wild Card is Awesome

During last night's Yankees Rays broadcast, YES Network play by play man and all around douche bucket Michael Kay was seemingly caught in his own douchiness by Al Leiter. After Kay did one of his "ahhh October baseball pennant races, ain't life grand?" routines following the reading of significant out of town scores, Leiter pointed out that Kay was against the wild card. A clearly flustered Kay shot back "why are you jumping on me?" in that classic passive aggressive "boys will be boys joking around but I realize you just OWNED me" way that he has. And herein lies the problem with the old fogey baseball "purist": He forces himself to hate change simply because it's change even if it makes the sport so much more enjoyable.

Baseball, more so than any other sport, values tradition and history almost to a comical point. The uproar over changes that obviously benefit game play and fan enjoyment such as instant replay and interleague play are clear examples of this. Just because something didn't exist when Honus Wagner was trotting around the ol' diamond and you could get a sarsaparilla and a trolley ticket for 25 cents, doesn't mean that it's wrong. And just as the speed and strength of players and technological advancements have resulted in instant replay, so to have gradual changes necessitated the wild card. The fact of the matter is, there's more teams than there were back in the old days and more fan bases that need reason to leave their home and 50 inch HD flat screen to plunk down extraordinary prices at their local stadium. Bob Costas and Michael Kay might think that letting more than 2 teams into the post season is heresy, but Major League Baseball is a business, and as a business they can't afford to lose 90% of their audience that knows they have no chance at a playoff berth by mid summer. It might make the pennant race in Boston and New York a little more tense and exciting, but since when did the rest of the country care about them?

It's not like the all inclusive system in the NBA (everyone's a winner!) where you have to be truly awful not to qualify for the playoffs. We're still talking about 8 teams out of 30 that are playing in October every season. It's easy for Michael Kay or some of the older writers and broadcasters that work at a national level to bash the Wild Card system. The Yankees are in it every year, as are most of the other big market teams (except the Dodgers). I like the fact that there's some hope in Milwaukee and wherever else every season. Kay followed the above exchange up by repeating a Bob Costas anecdote. If there was a Wild card back when Bobby Thomson hit the so-called "shot heard 'round the world", we would have heard "The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!...and the Dodgers win the wild card". It's a funny line but truthfully, if the rules were the same now as they were then, no one would care about a Red Sox-Orioles or Cardinals-Astros game this week. And the old men would sleep soundly knowing that everything had stayed the same.