The fall classic is set and should be a pretty good matchup between the Rangers and Cardinals. The series begins Wednesday night in St. Louis b/c of the stupid All-Star game deciding home field advantage. Look for the game one to feature CJ Wilson for the Rangers against Chris Carpenter for the Cardinals. Both teams are coming off impressive game 6 thumpings of both the Tigers and Brewers. You can argue that the Cardinals have had the much tougher road to get to the series. Not only did the make the playoffs on pretty much the last day of season thanks to an epic collapse by the Braves, but then to go through Philadelphia and an upstart Milwaukee team was most impressive. They've done a great job of putting runs up on the board and their pitching has been plenty respectable considering they've had to go through all this without their best pitcher in Wainwright. Who would have ever thought the Rangers would make back-to-back trips to the World Series. The Rangers come into the series riding the hot hitting of Nelson Cruz. Cruz was a beast in the ALCS and outshined the Miguel Cabrera who had a great series himself. The Rangers will have to deal with not having the benefit of a DH for the games in St. Louis. The Rangers really don't have any easy outs in their normal 1-9 lineup but having to mix in a pitcher will be a bit of a change. As much as Nelson Cruz was the MVP in the ALCS, a close second to him would have to be the Rangers bullpen. Scott Feldman, Alexi Ogando, Mike Adams, and Neftali Feliz have been great weapons for the Rangers. I think the bullpen actually had more wins in the ALCS than the actual starting pitchers. I'm thinking there will be plenty of offense in this series as both teams can really hit the ball. I think the Rangers are a deeper team and can get contributions from more guys on their roster, but the potential of having 4 games without the benefit of a DH could limit that depth. The Cardinals have the best pitcher in Carpenter, but after that their lineup isn't anything amazing. Both teams rely a lot on their hitters putting runs on the board than dominant shut-down pitching. I think this could be a very exciting series, but I think the Rangers learn from last year and win in 6.
Game one is in the books....Cardinals win 3-2. Both teams left a lot of runners stranded, but overall pretty good pitching and defense on both sides. The Rangers were able to get Carpenter out after 6, which was good, but the Cardinals bullpen stepped up and the Rangers were unable to capitalize. Credit to Tony La Russa, as he always seemed to be one step ahead of Washington. Lot of questions about Washington's decision to pinch hit Craig Gentry for David Murphy and even more questions about the decision after that to pinch hit Esteban German instead of Torrealba. Another point of concern for the Rangers has to be the health of Josh Hamilton. He is obviously being bothered by a strained groin and is only swinging purely with upper body. That is dramatically affecting his power. Game 2 tonight will feature Colby Lewis, who has been about the only good starter in the post season for the Rangers, against Jamie Garcia of the Cardinals.
Actually, the Rangers only had 8 baserunners all night long. 2-3-4 hitters went oh-fer, and I'd be surprised if Josh Hamilton doesn't actually have a torn groin. He looked about as non-threatening in his atbat against Arthur Rhodes as a hitter could look. And speaking of Arthur, if you had managed to get left handers out like that earlier in the year, you'd be in our bullpen. Also, I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm glad MLB eschews expanded replay. The human element is so much better. Especially when it robs us of an important at bat from Adrian Beltre because none of their umpires can see he fouled a pitch off his foot.
NP and I both thought we saw snow when they cut to the stadium lights around the 7th inning. Anyone else see it? Or were a bunch of bugs all dying at once because of a giant can of bug spray just outside the shot?
A wild end to game 2 and the Rangers have tied it up 1-1 after a 2 run ninth inning by the Rangers gave them the lead and Feliz closed it out beautifully for the Rangers. The series so far has been nothing like I would have expected. Both teams are getting great performance out of their pitching staffs and defense for both has been pretty solid for the most part. Both starters last night were really good, especially Garcia for the Cardinals. There was a bit of deja vu last night in the 7th when again Allen Craig came into pinch hit against Alexi Ogando and Craig came through with an RBI single to put the Cardinals up. Then in the 9th the Rangers did a great job of manufacturing their runs. Kinsler has a looping single to left center field. With Andrus up and threatening to bunt, Kinsler gets a great jump and steals second by just barely beats the tag on a great throw by Molina. Andrus has a clutch single to shallow right center, but Kinsler is only able to make it to third, but because Berkman threw home Andrus was able to take 2nd. Hamilton and Young both hit sac-flies to bring home Kinsler and Andrus. Feliz came in and after walking the lead-off batter made Punto look ridiculous chasing pitches, then got Shumaker, and a fly out from Furcal to win it. Great game! Game 3 in Arlington on Saturday night will feature the Cardinals Kyle Lohse vs. Matt Harrison of the Rangers.
With or without a damaged Josh Hamilton, I'll be surprised if the Rangers don't pound Lohse tonight. He gets over 35% of his outs on flyball pitches in a park notorious for the jet stream to right, and he favors the changeup over all his other pitches historically against a team that was the 2nd best team in the league at hitting changeups. Also, you can question TLR's decisions in the 9th all you want. And to be sure, there's room for that. But if Furcal straddles the bag at 2nd when he takes the throw, he could've slapped the tag down from the front part of the bag to the back just in time to nail Kins at 2nd. And had Pujols managed to come up with Jay's throw from center, he would have nailed Kinsler at 3rd. Either of those things occur, we're probably looking at the Rangers playing for their playoff lives tonight as opposed to having a chance to take a 2-1 series lead. Which 10 of the last 11 teams who won Game 3 of the Fall Classic to take a 2-1 lead went on to win it all.
I heard that the NFL game got beat by the World Series. That has to be a big victory for MLB... but considering that the Saints scored 62 on Peyton-less Indy... I watched the end of the game and it was awesome, even though the Cards were down 4 and nobody suspected they would stage a miraculous comeback. The crowd was fired up, the pitcher almost pitched a scoreless game... it was pretty cool.
Wild past couple of games. Game 3, the bats woke up for a very impressive display of hitting by both teams, but especially by none other than the great Albert Pujols. Maybe one of the greatest world series single game performances in the history of a baseball. The Rangers kept trying to climb back into it, but the Cardinals pulled away for good. Game 4 was all about pitching. Derek Holland put together an absolute Gem and almost had a complete game shut out. He had great control all night and was great against the Cardinals lineup. The Rangers got the big 3 run shot from Napoli in the 6th to really gain control of the game. Game 5 last night was huge. The Cardinals got off to a solid start with a combination of hitting, bad defense by the Rangers, and another sub-par performance by their "ace" CJ Wilson to go up 2-0 early. Wilson then had the benefit of an upper deck homerun by Moreland. Beltre followed suit with a solo homerun in the 6th. Then in 8th, which has a lot of St. Louis fans stewing about the questionable pitching decisions/mis-communication between La Russa and his staff, wound up with Motte not being ready to face Mike Napoli and Napoli made them pay with a huge 2 run RBI double to right center. If the Rangers win this thing, I don't doubt that Napoli will collect the MVP honors. He has been great both with the bat in his hand and behind the plate. Game 6 will be Wednesday night in St. Louis so it's back to NL rules. The game will feature a rematch of game 2 starters, Garcia and Lewis. Substantial rain is in the forcast for tomorrow, so it is possible that it will be pushed back a day. That could be huge for the Rangers if they lose game 6 b/c it would mean an extra days rest for Holland who I think would get the start in game 7 over Harrison.
I used to always watch the World Series, but not much baseball otherwise. The last several years I haven't even watched the World Series due to the general pro-athlete look it has got now also. I resolved to watch Game 6, and have enjoyed it alot. (just started 10th inning) My only question: Is the fielding always this poor in MLB these days? I know there's been an unusual amount of errors is this game, but this is a little shocking. Other than that, entertaining. Glad it looks like Nolan will now get the Rangers a title.
That was an entertaining and memorable game. But I hesitate to call it great considering there was an infield pop up that was dropped, a fly ball that was dropped between an outfielder and infielder, a chopper to first that wasn't turned into an out because the first baseman couldn't make up his mind, and a few throwing errors by a pitcher and second baseman. As for the comeback... Well, I'm subscribing to the belief that St. Louis needed every break possible late to win. If Cruz does a better job of tracking that line drive to right, the game is over. And if Lohse' bunt doesn't get over Beltre's head, that's possibly a series-ending triple play. At the very least, it's a double play leaving a man on and two outs. As for tonight's game, I really don't know what to expect. This team's been resilient all season long, but it's one thing to bounce back from a walk-off two run homer to Mark Trumbo in Anaheim in August. This is something that no team in major league history has ever been asked to bounce back from. I'd say they took the right attitude during the post game media scrum in the clubhouse. But how much can you really glean from that? Somehow, someway, put this loss behind you. Because your goal is still right in front of you.
Yeah that was an abnormally sloppy defensive game for both teams. Lots of errors for both teams. Nothing worse though than Cruz totally mis-judging that triple hit by freese. Nelly not only slowed down, but had no idea where the wall was. It was still a great game though. Can't believe the Rangers had the Cardinals down to 1 strike twice and the Cardinals still fought their way back both times. This isn't the first time they've held up in an elmination game, they had to do it twice against the Phillies in the first round this year. Granted that was only a best of 5 series, but it's still impressive none-the-less. This will be the first game 7 for a world series in about 9 or 10 years i think. It sounds like the Cardinals will go for a 3rd time with Carpenter on short rest this time. Matt Harrison will go for the Rangers on full rest. Be prepared to see lots of pitchers used that normally aren't because both teams used a lot of arms last night.
I have to think that just about everybody, except Colby, is available for both teams. Maybe Motte's unavailable because he threw 2 innings. But the MO for both bullpens is you'll have all winter to rest up.
I don't think the Rangers can pick themselves up off the floor. The 2 things that I would have liked to have seen happen were: 1.Wash not trying to show he can think outside the box and stick to the formula that worked so well in August and September by bringing Adams in to pitch in the 8th. I think the Rangers take a 3 run lead into the 9th. 2. Cruz catching the line drive off the wall. It would have been more than a routine play but he was already deep and it looked like he just stopped running. I think the Rangers come out flat and the Cardinals win by 4 or more runs. Washington is a players manager and apparently his players love playing for him but he is a detriment on the bench as far as late game moves.
