October baseball

I missed out on posting before the baseball playoffs began last week, which turns out to have been mostly inconsequential as the four division series combined went only one game over the minimum. The Red Sox, Diamondbacks, and Rockies swept the Angels, Cubs, and Phillies respectively, while the Yankees only managed one win against Cleveland. What promised to be a fascinating divisional round with only one repeat playoff team from 2006 (a fact you would have heard much more about were this the NFL) was largely anticlimactic.

The National League pennant will be decided between two teams from the Mountain time zone deploying mostly home-bred young players sprinkled with a random assortment of journeymen. The Colorado Rockies are the whitest and most Jesus-y team left in the playoffs, and by far the hottest, streaking to 16 wins in their last 17 regular season game to force a one-game wildcard tiebreak, then swept Philadelphia in the division series in a matchup featuring two teams making their first playoff appearance since the mid-90s (again, baseball; no parity. Remember that). Arizona fulfilled this blog's prediction of having the NL's best record, though they went about it in an unorthodox fashion, with a season-long run differential in the negative numbers. The Snakes did the world of favor by dismissing Chicago's North Siders in the first round, a result not likely to ease us of Cubs Nation's pathetic monasticism, but which was necessary nonetheless.

We are not out of the woods, however, as over in the heavyweight division American League, the Boston Red Sox, Evil Empire Lite, remain alive and kicking, that designation made more salient by the howls of protest it elicits from the Sawx faithful, forever denying, however futily, the club's increasing resemblance to the Hated Yankees. Facing off against the Sawx shiny, store-bought monolith is a Cleveland team that. like the two National League finalists, consists mostly of young, cheap talent groomed through its farm system. Eventually baseball owners will see a pattern here in about, oh, thirty years. But they need a salary cap, y'know, 'cause low payroll teams can't compete.

Both series are close calls. Both NL teams have major questions after their No. 1 starter, but at least Arizona has veterans, though the Colorado offense is a legitimately all-terrain powerhouse. Nevertheless, the Rocks will have to cool down eventually, and they've had several days off to do so, a fate that felled the streaking Tigers in last years' World Series. Plus, their mammoth home field edge will be negated somewhat by facing a very familiar opponent. 'Zona in six.

Cleveland has a good recipe for postseaon success; two dominant starters in C.C. Sabathia and Fausto Carmona which make them the favorite to win four of the seven games. Unfortunately the other three starts will be made by the much less inspiring duo of Jake Westbrook and the anachronism Paul Byrd. They also have a problem lurking at the back of the bullpen. Thanks to the Proven Closer fallacy, the possibility of a handing one or more key games to Joe Borowski is too great to feel comfortable about. Damn Sawx in seven.