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| Baseball is America's past time for a reason |
The last time the two top teams from either league had met up in the World Series, was when I was a sophomore in high school and playing all of the sports my grades would let me play. The Red Sox and the Cardinals seem to be, almost mirror images of each other, at least speaking on behalf of the playoff road taken to get to the World Series.
The Red Sox had taken three games out of four in the NLDS, from the Tampa Bay Rays. For game 1, they completely lit up Rays' left-hander, Matt Moore, scoring 8 runs, 7 earned, off of 9 hits, through 6 1/3 innings. In game 2, David Price did not fare any better, giving up 7 runs -- all earned -- in 7 innings. One has to wonder if that will hurt his market value, come this winter.
The Rays seemed to be coming alive with a dramatic 9th inning win, with a walk-off home run by catcher, Jose Lobaton. But in the end, the Red Sox had proven to be too much for the young Rays, as they handed them a plane ticket each to go to their respective homes; Red Sox take the ALDS, 3-1.
Up next: Detroit in the ALCS. You just knew that this was going to be a series that would, at the very least, go to game 6. If game 1 was foreshadowing the rest of the series, you would have thought that it was going to come down to one thing: the team that scores first, wins. Well, you'd be wrong, as the Bo-Sox managed to score 20 runs in 6 games-- not too shabby.
One teams pitching performance did not overshadow the other, but I guess an argument can be made for the Red Sox pitching staff because they were able to keep the Tigers high-powered offense to a total of 17 runs throughout the series.
Now, you would figure that scoring 17 runs in 6 games would be more than enough to advance to the next round, but that only averages out to about 2.83 runs per game, so that is actually not too bad.
As I've said before, I was rooting for the Bo-Sox since I am a fan of just about anything Boston, but I had thought Detroit would pull it out in 7 games.
Now, onto the NL; the Cardinals had a little bit more of a tougher time getting through the NLDS, as they were facing the resilient Pittsburgh Pirates. Aside from game 4, this series was a slug-fest. The theme was: who can score the most runs?
There was no shortage of runs here, with the Red Birds scoring, roughly, 4.2 runs a game and the Bucs averaging 3 runs a game. However, game 4 was a completely different story; enter Michael Wacha. This 22-year-old took a no hitter into the 8th and absolutely looked like a 6-year veteran that's been pitching a game 7 every year of his pro career; in sports jargon, the kid looked like a stud.
Regardless of how many games it took, the Pirates were just over matched in the series.
The NLCS was a completely different story; this series was a perfect match up on paper. But as we all know, paper is only a distraction on the field, especially in October.
I really don't care what anyone says; Dodgers or Cardinals fan, this was a great series. Yes, Cardinal players and fans had issues with Dodger players and Dodgers players and fans had issues with Cardinal players, but it shouldn't take focus away from an incredibly played series.
For comparison, if you remove game 6 from the series, both teams played a very tight, hard-fought game and as the Red Birds scored 12 runs in 5 games, the Blue Crew had scored 13 runs. But, game 6 cannot be removed from the books and our minds, for that matter, as the Dodgers were thoroughly man-handled in said game and were sent home for the winter.
All that is left is the two BEST teams in the league, which have the records to reinforce the point, and you can bet it's going to go down to the wire. Yes, it's going to be another slug fest and anyone who doesn't watch, for at least one inning, should not call themselves a fan of the game.
It shouldn't matter which team you bleed for, it's still going to be a great series and that's all we, as baseball fans, can ask for. So go ahead, if you’re a Dodgers fan, and cheer for Boston. Or if you’re a Tigers fan, cheer for St. Louis; just as long as you're cheering for someone.
I understand you may be hurting; we all are for those whose teams have been knocked out, but we shouldn't be so scarred that it prevents us from enjoying the game we love.
Especially if it means watching the Cardinals lose. Apologies, I couldn't help myself on that last one.
First pitch is at 7:30 PM EST in Fenway Park. Taking the hill for the rubber match is Cardinals' ace, Adam Wainwright against Red Sox sort-of ace, Jon Lester.
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