Playoff Desipio Game Cast Schedule

Tuesday, October 3
(Click to go to the GameCast)
Noon – A’s at Twins 
3 p.m. – Satanic Fowl at Padres

Wednesday, October 4
Noon – A’s at Twins
3 p.m. – Dodgers at Mets

Thursday, October 5
3 p.m. – Satanic Fowl at Padres

Friday, October 6
3 p.m. – Twins at A’s

Six months ago, the world was a happy place. Thirty baseball teams had a chance to contend for the World Series. Sure, probably 20 of those teams only believed in their chances if they were popping mushrooms, but still, it was “possible.” Now we’re down to seven. Seven teams with a chance at winning the whole thing. Seven teams who are just 11 wins away from a pointy gold trophy with lots of metal flags on it. Seven.

Huh? Eight? No, I think you’re wrong. The NL Central didn’t send anybody this year. The Astros would have gone but Andy and Roger got caught injecting each other in a bathroom stall. The Reds found out that after all their trades they had playoff eligible roster of two starting pitchers, three position players and twenty bullpen guys.

The Cardinals? They went 4-10 to finish the season and lost on the last day of the year. No way are they going.

Huh?

American League Playoff Matchups

Detroit Tigers (Wild Card) v. New York Yankees (AL East Champs)

Game One: Nate Robertson, DET (13-13, 3.84 ERA) at Chin Ming Wang, NYY (19-6, 3.63 ERA), Tuesday, October 3, 7 p.m. CDT, Fox

Game Two: Justin Verlander, DET (17-9, 3.63 ERA) at Mike Mussina, NYY (15-7, 3.51 ERA), Wednesday, October 4, 7 p.m. CDT, ESPN

Game Three: Randy Johnson, NYY (17-11, 5.00 ERA) at Kenny Rogers, DET (17-8, 3.84 ERA), Friday, October 6, 7 p.m. CDT, ESPN

Game Four: Saturday, October 7, TBA at DET
Game Five: Sunday, October 8, TBA at NYY

So it turns out that all Detroit had to do to win the AL Central and get home field advantage in the first round against Oakland was to win one of three games against the hapless Kansas City Royals, at home, over the last weekend of the season. They didn’t win a single one. Though they did lead Sunday’s game 7-1. Ouch, babe.

Instead, now they’re off to the Bronx to play the Yankees in front of Tim McCarver and the rest of the baseball world. The Tigers come into the postseason after a great season, but with five straight losses. Their best pitchers are rookies, their best hitters are either chronically injured or about half the size they were at their steroided best. So the Yankees are going to walk, right?

The Yankees have the AL MVP in Derek Jeter. They have one of the game’s premiere leadoff men, they’ve got the most talented player of his generation batting SIXTH and playing out of position. They’ve got the greatest closer in the history of the game.

They also have a pretty shaky pitching rotation. But, if they get a good effort out of Mr. Wang (Hey Wang! It’s a parking lot!), in game one, they know they’ll get a solid effort out of Mike Mussina in game two, and then it’s up to what’s left of the Big Unit in game three. They could sweep.

But if Detroit can touch up Wang (Me and Wang just bought land by the Great Wall of China. On the good side!) and steal one tonight. Then anything can happen.

As much as I enjoy a good Wang touching up, this one smells like Yankees in three.

Oakland Athletics (AL West Champs) v. Minnesota Twins (AL Central Champs)

Game One: Barry Zito, OAK (16-10, 3.83 ERA) at Johan Santana, MIN (19-6, 2.77 ERA), Tuesday, October 3, Noon CDT, ESPN

Game Two: Stevie Loaiza, OAK (11-9, 4.89 ERA) at Boof Bonser, MIN (7-6, 4.22 ERA), Wednesday, October 4, Noon CDT, ESPN

Game Three: Brad Radke, MIN (12-9, 4.32 ERA) at TBA, Friday, October 6, 3 p.m. CDT, ESPN

Game Four: Saturday, October 7, TBA at OAK
Game Five: Sunday, October 8, TBA at MIN

The Minnesota Twins were in first place for as many days as the Chicago Cubs this year. They just picked the right day. Winning the AL Central was huge for the Twins, who played the best baseball in either league for the last three months of the season. They get home field for a round in that stupid inflatable space ship they play in, and if Detroit would somehow beat the Yankees, the Twins would have home field throughout the playoffs. They also have the best pitcher in the game and baseball’s best bullpen.

Ozzie Guillen is so fond of the way the Twins play offense that he gave them a cute little nickname, ‘piranas.’ Assuming that small biting fish with huge teeth can be cute. Like most Cubs’ fans, I spent the last month rooting the Twins on, hoping they could keep the White Sox out of the playoffs, and they did just that. To watch them play is to admire them. They play great defense, run the bases aggressively and well, and don’t need much out of their non-Santana starters to win games. I have a hunch that this is the best team in the American League. Period.

Oakland, though, has proven the vagaries of the playoff system. For several years around the turn of the century (this one, not the olde one) they fielded teams that were as good, if not better than any other baseball, and they didn’t win bupkus. Their critics said it was because they lacked speed and defense. Which was crap, because though they were built around great starting pitching, their postseason offense was actually more productive than their regular season offense was. The A’s blamed it on the role that luck has on the playoffs. Over the regular season a better team has plenty of games to prove it. In the playoffs, things can turn on a dime. One bad game can sink your entire season. One bad play. Jeremy Giambi not sliding and getting thrown out by an incredible and ludicrous Derek Jeter play. Miguel Tejada getting lost on third base against the Red Sox. Jason Giambi leaving his vials and syringes in a Minneapolis hotel room…huh? Never mind.

You kind of wonder if this A’s team, one that’s good, but not as good as those Giambi-Tejada-Mulder-Hudson-Zito teams won’t get to enjoy the benefits of a five game series this time around. It would seem fitting.

I think we have a better chance of them narrowly missing a series win, and of Milton Bradley going nuts and killing an umpire with his bare hands. Twins in five.
National League Playoff Matchups

St. Louis Cardinals (Fraudulent Champions of Nothing) v. San Diego Padres (Defenders of all that is good and right for 2006)

Game One: Karen Carpenter, STL, 15-8, 3.09 ERA at Jake Peavy, SD, 11-14, 4.09 ERA, Tuesday, October 3, 3 p.m. CDT, ESPN

Game Two: Jeff Suppan, STL, 12-7, 4.12 ERA at Chris Young, SD, 11-5, 3.46 ERA, Thursday, October 5, 3 p.m. CDT, ESPN

Game Three: Saturday, October 7, TBA at the New Urinal Cake
Game Four: Sunday, October 8, TBA at the New Urinal Cake
Game Five: Monday, October 9, TBA at SD

It seems that the chic opinion to have these days is that the Cardinals are “just like” the White Sox were last year going into the playoffs. People remember that the Sox struggled in September, yet went nuts in the playoffs and went 11-1 and won the World Series. (Or so I’m told. I never actually saw the World Series, and would just like to pretend it never happened.) Far be it from me to defend the Sox, but while they did struggle in September, they didn’t do anything close to what the Cardinals did.

The Cardinals had an 8.5 game lead over the Astros with 12 games to go and watched it dissolve down to a half game with three to play. They lost seven in a row and 10 of 14. They needed a split with the worst road team in the NL to get into the playoffs and didn’t even win on the day they clinched.

The White Sox last year went 19-12 in September (and two days in October), won their last five regular season games and played a frisky Indians team who was in the playoff hunt until the last day. The only thing the slump cost the Sox was a 100 win season. They still went 99-63 (which would have been 12.5 games better than the current Cardinals), had home field throughout the playoffs and kept on rolling. The Cardinals have no momentum, no offense, a lousy bullpen, and the third fewest wins of any playoff team in baseball history.

Scott Rolen started his annual October choke job two weeks early. Jim Edmonds is so loopy he can’t remember what day it is or what time to drive to the airport to pick up his hairless, 14 year old Thai “exchange students.” Plus, it’s not like Tony LaRussa playoff teams ever overachieve. Had the Astros made it to the playoffs, they’d have been a threat. The Cardinals? Not so much.

As for the Fathers, they’ve had to play well just to stay ahead of the Dodgers down the stretch. They have the deepest pitching in the NL, now that Jake Peavy has figured out how to throw strikes again. And this year he didn’t break any ribs during the post-championship celebration.

If you want to get worried about the Fathers, how about the fact that they’ve played Geoff Blum, Todd Walker, Mark Bellhorn and Russ Branyan at third base in the past month? Not at the same time (though that might work.) But they’ve got an emerging star in Adrian Gonzalez, old favorites like Mike Piazza and Brian Giles and play good defense where it counts behind Mike Cameron and Chip Caray’s flaxon haired rubout target Khalil Greene. They got swept by the Cardinals last year. Not his year.

Fathers in two.

Los Angeles Dodgers (Wild Card) v. New York Mets (NL East Champs)

Game One: Derek Lowe, LAD, 16-8, 3.68 ERA at Orlando Hernandez, NYM, 11-11, 4.66 ERA, Wednesday, October 4, 3 p.m. CDT, ESPN

Game Two: Greggie, LAD, 15-14, 4.20 ERA at Tom Glavine, NYM, 15-7, 3.82 ERA, Thursday, October 5, 7 p.m. CDT, Fox

Game Three: Saturday, October 6, TBA at LAD
Game Four: Sunday, October 7, TBA at LAD
Game Five: Monday, October 8, TBA at NYM

I started to get intrigued by the Dodgers right about the time in February when they signed Nomar Garciaparra.  They’d already stolen Rafael Furcalholic from the Cubs, signed former Cub (and former everybody else) Kenny Lofton and taken a potential Cubs manager off the market in (functional retard) Grady Little.  They even had a former Cubs PR wonk as their GM.  What was not to like?

Well, for one, they’re the Dodgers.  When I was a kid I hated them for all kinds of reasons, not the least of which was that they let Steve Garvey go and he ruined my childhood in 1984.  They had Steve Sax and had the temerity to pretend he was in the same league as Ryne Sandberg.  But most of all, and for reasons I still don’t understand or remember, I hated Ken Landreaux.  Hated him.  Why?  I have no idea.  Plus, they gave the Cubs Rick Monday.  I mean what kind of crap was that? What did we deserve that for?

So now they have Greg Maddux.  I wished Greg ill for a while when he left the Cubs to go to Atlanta, but not this time.  I was pretty fired up to see him pitch on Saturday and beat the Giants to put the Dodgers in the playoffs.  With Greg on board it’s safe for me to root for the Dodgers now.  So I’m breaking out the pom poms, and for the next three weeks or so I’ll even fight the urge to punch out a picture of Joe Don Baker and Tommy Lasorda.  Ugh.  I hate Tommy Lasorda.

At least they’re playing the Mets.  How can you like the Mets?  I’m sure Cliff Floyd and David Wright are good guys, but I don’t care.  I hate New York on principle and the Mets are a huge part of that.  They’ve stumbled towards the finish, but that’s not such a big deal.  Them not having a healthy Pedro or Carlos Beltran (something wrong with his legs, and he hit .203 in September) will hurt them.  So will their shaky bullpen.  They lost Duaner Sanchez for the season when he hurt his shoulder in a taxi cab.  Didn’t Tom Glavine slam his hand in a NYC taxi once?  Can’t these guys just take the hookers up to their rooms like everybody else?

As poorly as the Mets have played, they were clearly the best team in the NL this year.  Their offense is imposing, they play pretty smart baseball, and they don’t need great pitching to get through the National League half of the playoffs.

I hope I’m wrong, but Mets in five.