Baseball Update
The playoffs have sucked up to this point. And that’s a huge dissapointment.
In 2003, we had all kinds of amazing playoff scenarios. 2 of the 4 division series went the full 5 games, which gave way to the Yankees and Red Sox revisiting their rivalry for the ALCS while the Chicago Cubs, another storied team, played the Marlins in the NLCS. Of course, all baseball fans remember the Cubs 3-1 lead in the that series, followed by the Bartman incident, and so forth. Eventually, the most exciting playoffs since the the Wild Card era began gave way to a fairly eventless World Series played by two fairly uninteresting teams, the Yankees and Marlins. The Marlins won in 6.
In 2004, the playoffs were fairly uninteresting. In the ALCS, the Yankees went up 3 games to zero on the Red Sox and the curse of the bambino seemed intact for yet another season. Then the impossible happened. The Red Sox pulled of four straight victories to take the ALCS and then beat another storied franchise, the St. Louis Cardinals, in the sweep to claim their first title in 86 seasons.
In 2005, we had the White Sox make a run to claim their first title in 88 years.
And then there’s 2006. In the division series round, the losing teams managed to win a grand total of 2 games. 2 series went 4 games while the other two were sweeps.
In the championship series, the Tigers rolled over the Athletics. Due to scheduling quirks and weather delays, the Tigers were up 3 games to zero before the Cardinals and Mets threw a pitch.
And then there’s the NLCS. The Cardinals and Mets are playing game 7 today in New York. It’s 1-1 in the top of the 8th innings and this game is shaping up to be a classic. We’ve already seen a Mets outfielder reach over the fence and snowcone a fly ball to save a 2-run homer and in the following half inning Jeff Suppan of the Cardinals pitch his way out of a bases loaded jam with one out.
Whatever comes of this game and the world series, one thing is for sure: Major League Baseball will crown its seventh champion in seven years this year. How is that for parity? Since 2000, the World Series has been won by the Yankees, Diamondbacks, Angels, Marlins, Red Sox, White Sox, and now the Mets/Cardinals/Tigers.
