TCB's League Championship Series Preview
When the season began waaayyyyy back in March, and waaaayyyyyy over on the other side of the
Completing the ALCS match-up, are the plucky, overachiev…nope, Tampa Bay didn't get here on good karma. They have a quirky manager who actually studies statistics (gasp!), and a roster full of power pitchers who aren’t intimidated by anyone. Hell, they won the best division in baseball- and nearly did it wire to wire. They may have thoroughbreds in the rotation, but their offense is a mosaic of players. From the vagabond slugger (Carlos Pena), the Japanese import (Akinori Iwamura), the young stud (Evan Longoria) and of course…the veteran presence (Cliff Floyd), the Rays have a blend of players that has propelled them beyond any of the expert’s predictions. If that’s not enough for ya, think of the
Over in the NL, it’s a East-Coast vs. West-Coast duel. The Dodgers have endeared themselves to me based solely on their sweeping of the Cubs. Manny. Joe Torre. We know them. What should we know about them, is just as important as the big names that came from out east. LA has a young nucleus of players (Blake DeWitt, James Loney, Andrew Ethier, Matt Kemp, Russell Martin, Chad Billingsley) that has provided a boost to a team that signed a few too many big name free agent disasters (Jason Schmidt, Juan Pierre, Andruw Jones) over the past couple off seasons. Their closer goes down early in the season? No problem- former set up man Jonathan Broxton steps in and performs well. Joe Beimel is their fire fighter coming out of the bullpen. With Rafael Furcal missing a majority of the season, and Jeff Kent finally showing some signs of aging, the Dodgers offense sputtered for a great deal of the season. GM Ned Colletti had a big payroll that was almost all of his doing, and his franchise was looking at a 21st straight season without a post season series win. Enter Casey Blake, who at 35, is having himself a career season. Then in a true 12th hour move, Colletti landed the biggest fish of them all- the elusive, finicky Manny. I don’t know if he calmed down the clubhouse, made the team looser or helped the guys in front of him see more fastballs. What I do know, is that Man-Ram slugged .743, hit 17 homers and amassed an OPS+ of 213 in his 53 games as a Dodger. Colletti could have saved his job with that move, but he most certainly saved his team’s season.
3,000 miles away in
2) Improved starting pitching
3) Improved bullpen
4) Chase Utley
5) The Phillie Phanatic stopped wearing clothes under his costume in the beginning of August, thus bringing about good karma
6) Ryan Howard
Ok. I’m done quasi-bashing Ryan Howard. This is only important to me because I have a terrible feeling that he may get more votes for MVP than Lance will. Personal vendettas aside, the Phillies did what smart teams do in the off season (This part is for you, Drayton): Improve their pitching staff. Pitching wins. None of these teams rank outside the top five in their respective leagues in ERA. LA is first in the NL, and the Rays are second in the
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Do What?
Cole Hamels may be the best left handed pitcher in the NL not named Santana.
No respect or love for CC?
The Crawfishboxes
A good friend of mine used to say, "This is a very simple game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains." Think about that for a while.
i dont
really consider him a member of an nl club, at least not anymore. he’ll be pitching in the al again in no time.
by Evan Hochschild on Oct 8, 2008 2:48 PM CDT up reply actions
I don't think "may be"
is the correct usage.. he is definitely the 2nd best in the league.
Go 'Stros!
it's not just pitching, but fielding
http://www.detroittigertales.com/2008/09/offense-as-important-as-pitching-for.html
Beyond the Boxscore // Calling BJ Upton lazy is lazy.
definitely
no doubt that a good offense is just as important…i mean, the mistake of a lot of teams in the past has been to play small ball all year, and then when they fall behind to the teams that mash, they cannot compete. my point was that the phillies already had a pretty good offense, but a poor pitching staff last year. this year, they addressed that by adding lidge, which not only solidified their closer, but allowed brett myers to (eventual) return to the starting rotation. Chad Durbin and JC Romero were great out of the pen as well. Ditto Madson.
by Evan Hochschild on Oct 8, 2008 4:58 PM CDT up reply actions
Gee I feel bad
I picked the Angels to go to the World Series. I didn’t know that put me on a Bonzai sized limb. It seemed like an obvious choice at the time. Poor Angels.
I did get the other three teams in LCS correct.
But alas, with the Angels out, my World Series pairing is already shot – I’m down to rooting for the Dodgers to give me at least one positive bit of feedback on my choices.
At least I had enough common sense to see the Dodgers beating the Cubs.
Astros fan for life
by Joe in Birmingham on Oct 8, 2008 4:26 PM CDT reply actions
How were the Angles the obvious choice?
The Crawfishboxes
A good friend of mine used to say, "This is a very simple game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains." Think about that for a while.
by Stephen Higdon on Oct 8, 2008 5:01 PM CDT up reply actions
i thought
at the beginning of the season, the top three teams in the al were:
1) red sox
2) rays
3) angels
So, I can see where Joe was coming from.
by Evan Hochschild on Oct 8, 2008 5:04 PM CDT up reply actions
Yeah at the beginning of the season
But coming into the Post-Season there’s no way that the Angles were The Team to Beat.
The Crawfishboxes
A good friend of mine used to say, "This is a very simple game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains." Think about that for a while.
by Stephen Higdon on Oct 8, 2008 6:09 PM CDT up reply actions
Reason for my Angels choice
My disclaimer: I pay less attention to the American League so My analysis is not that informed.
I saw an Angels team that was very good in 2007 and improved in 2008. They added strong players in Hunter and Teixera. It seemed all season they were in condsideration fo rthe top spot in Power rankings as one of the top teams in the baseball.
They were solid.
Boston did not have the aura or feel of a team of destiny it had in 2007. Injuries, loss of Ramirez, not able to eclipse the Tampa Bay Rays, etc made them seem like a loser in the first round to Angels.
I had no clue abouit the matchup with Rays,except since I had decided the Angels were the strongest team in the AL I figured they’d beat Rays in a 7 game series.
And ta-da – they’d beat the Dodgers in the World Series.
Astros fan for life
by Joe in Birmingham on Oct 8, 2008 6:42 PM CDT up reply actions
no worries, Joe
refer to the bottom of the page to see how closely i watched the angels series itself….the only reason i paid any attention to them was because I had Tex and Ervin Santana on my fantasy team.
by Evan Hochschild on Oct 8, 2008 6:45 PM CDT up reply actions
If I had to worry about something
Should I worry that
(1) I was proved wrong on my pick to win the AL Championship or
(2) my personal and my employer’s pension plan assets are going down the toilet and my (our) non-baseball future might be a scary place?
Astros fan for life
by Joe in Birmingham on Oct 8, 2008 6:51 PM CDT up reply actions
PS - How's this for a worry?- I just received this email from a friend.
New South cut its work force by 12% in September and included my position in the jobs eliminated.
Astros fan for life
by Joe in Birmingham on Oct 8, 2008 6:54 PM CDT up reply actions
Seriously
I’ll keep you in my thoughts. Good Luck.
The Crawfishboxes
A good friend of mine used to say, "This is a very simple game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains." Think about that for a while.
by Stephen Higdon on Oct 8, 2008 8:42 PM CDT up reply actions
Not me - my friend
I still have a job, at least through next May (teacher) – who know what happens after that .
My friend is (was) a compliance officer for a bank. I talked with her tonight. She’s using the events to start her ow bank consulting business. She is certified in all kinds of bank compliance programs. I think she’ll rebound but it is a scary time for her and the 50 or so other people (and their families) let go.
Astros fan for life
by Joe in Birmingham on Oct 8, 2008 11:04 PM CDT up reply actions
OH
Reading throughly…I skill I’ve yet to master.
The Crawfishboxes
A good friend of mine used to say, "This is a very simple game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains." Think about that for a while.
by Stephen Higdon on Oct 8, 2008 11:27 PM CDT up reply actions
Add not making stupid typos to that list as well.
The Crawfishboxes
A good friend of mine used to say, "This is a very simple game. You throw the ball, you catch the ball, you hit the ball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes it rains." Think about that for a while.
by Stephen Higdon on Oct 8, 2008 11:27 PM CDT up reply actions
I know - Close question
but you picked the same answer I did.
Astros fan for life
by Joe in Birmingham on Oct 8, 2008 7:05 PM CDT up reply actions
impressive
cause 3 out of 4 ainnnttttttt badddddd….meatloaf? anyone? i’ll stop with that, but, i think the angels are an awesome regular season team. they have a GREAT starting rotation, and a good bullpen plus k-rod. leading the world in saves is one thing, but looking behind the save totals reveals he wasn’t as great as you may expect. their offense got a huge boost with tex, coupled with torii hunter, this was a team that knew their strength coming into 2008 was pitching and they sought to solidify their offense. still: vlad struggled in the post season (as did soriano for the cubs, for what its worth), and the small ballers couldn’t get it done. chone figgins, izturis, kendrick struggled. when your game is advance the runners, bunt, steal bases, it’s hard to win against a team like the sawx. especially, when you made as many baserunning mistakes as the angels did in that series- or at least two big ones in late inning situations.
by Evan Hochschild on Oct 8, 2008 5:03 PM CDT up reply actions
My ass.
Vlad struggled in the post-season…he hit pretty well at .467, but made that baserunning mistake. Izturis didn’t even play.
The big difference was Howie Kendrick,. who totally sucked the house by leaving countless men on base and butchering everything at second base (he was responsible for messing up that Ellsbury popup in Game 3, and then messed up the DP in Game 4 that would’ve prevented Pedroia from driving in a run with his double.) And of course, K-Rod.
whoaaaa
easy there, dude. sorry i confused mistyped and said izturis instead of aybar…..eh and i was wrong about vladdy….this year at least: http://www.bostonherald.com/sports/baseball/red_sox/view.bg?articleid=1122915

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