First Round Reckoning

Dave Paisley

My esteemed Strikethree.com colleagues have been giving you their views on the division series, and before we get too deep into the Championship Series, here's mine.

After the long hard grind of the regular season, it was nice to get to serious meaningful games again with the four Division Series. Apart from the last week frenzy in the NL Central and wild card, the regular season ended with fizzle rather than sizzle. The four Division Series each had a distinct flavor too, which made them all the more interesting. For your reading pleasure, I've characterized each series with a pithy title that captures, for me at least, the essence of what each one was about

The Speed Bump Series - Rangers-Yankees
Did anyone really expect anything other than a yawner in this series? I didn't. I wasn't so much rooting against Texas so much as I just knew they'd roll over. The Rangers have been a total loss in the postseason all three times they made it -- nothing had really changed. The old cliché "good pitching beats good hitting" was out in full force, as the good but not great Yankee pitching staff crushed what turned out to be a fragile Texas offense.

Gonzalez and Palmeiro managed five hits in 22 at-bats, only one of them for extra bases (Gonzalez' home run in Game Two, the only Texas run of the series.) Throw in two walks and you have a combined .655 OPS for the two big boppers. And they were the good part of the offense.

The Texas pitching wasn't awful, but Aaron Sele, Rick Helling and Esteban Loaiza aren't the guys who are going to lead you to the promised land, especially if the trail leads through the Bronx, and especially if the offense and defense don't cooperate.

The Heimlich Series - Braves-Astros
It can be argued that the Rangers choked, but in all seriousness, nobody expected them to do very well. The Astros, on the other hand, have a potent offense and a very good pitching staff, so there was ample hope that they could knock off the ho-hum Braves. Of course I was rooting for Houston here, but ultimately to no avail.

Bumping off Maddux in Game One was a huge boost, but the 'Stros just couldn't take advantage. The killer Heimlich moments came, of course, in Game Three, when they stranded base runners all day long, culminating in being unable to score in the tenth inning with the bases loaded and nobody out. Too bad.

The Johnson Jinx Series - Mets-Diamondbacks
The Randy Johnson postseason jinx continues. Six straight postseason losses for three different teams has unfairly hung the collar on a great pitcher. It's not his fault that four of those six losses have all featured serious tanking by his offensive brethren. However, spread over three different teams, you have to wonder whether there's a correlation there somewhere. Throw in an inept bullpen and some bizarre managing decisions and it's no wonder he hasn't won in the postseason in four years.

Despite the fact that Johnson was a Seattle icon for years, I was captivated by the Mets and their run through the last weekend of the season. They have a very solid team, unlike the flukey D-Backs, who finally ran out of luck.

The Titanic Series - Red Sox-Indians
Baseball as fairy tale sprang to life in the Sox-Indians series. I love heroic comebacks, and this was one of the best. When Pedro Martinez left Game One, and the Sox went on to lose that game and the next, it looked for all the world just like Speed Bump Series Two: jinxed team packs up tent and goes home.

Much as I wanted the Indians to lose, just for being too cheap to go get real pitching, I didn't hold out much hope after two games. Sitting pretty, the good ship Cleveland was sailing majestically for port LCS, the crew patting themselves on the back and wondering why on earth they'd ever want real pitching. Game Three was only a mild shock, as they lost Dave Burba to injury and the game to a lousy bullpen. "Never mind," they must have said, "We'll get 'em tomorrow!" as they continued dead on course for the as-yet-unseen iceberg to be known forever as Game Four: The Day the Pitching Died.

The Indians staff took blow after blow below the waterline, coughing up all kinds of bad postseason records in the process. Having lost that game by a couple of touchdowns, and with a severe list to starboard, the Tribe headed back to home port, certain they could win the series in five. But they reckoned without the secret torpedo Boston had been hiding. When Pedro Martinez came into the game, it was far from a foregone conclusion that the Sox would win, but with a leaky, overworked bullpen, the Indians were no match for the best pitcher in the game and Ireland's favorite baseball player, Troy O'Leary.

The Tribe have resisted getting a quality number one starter almost every year, and every year they decide Charles Nagy is good enough. This year they figured maybe Bartolo Colon was good enough. D'oh!

And so it's on to the LCS, where the Mets look like they're running out of gas, but the Red Sox look like they might at least be competitive with the Yankees.

about the author

Dave Paisley would be happy to buy one of the 6K empty seats at Turner Field, but when he asked about shipping the Braves office staff got confused. Ask if he wouldn't have more luck purchasing a slightly-used Chief Noc-A-Homa on Ebay at drdjp@strikethree.com.

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