Baseball: The Final Four.

Well, baseball made it to the final four. No major surprises on who the final four are. The Houston Astros are the biggest surprise, based on the their regular season record. They benefitted from getting two playoff jinxed teams, Minnesota and Oakland, in the first two rounds. Minnesota lived and died, by the home run again as they could only muster 2 runs in the two games against the Astros. Oakland still can’t seem to get any playoff love since they went to Moneyball. Maybe it should be called Non-Moneyball. They barely escaped the White Sox, and they were no match for the Astros. Tampa Bay is the other American League team as they eliminated the Yankees with a typical 2-1 victory. Typical, that in 65 plate appearances for both teams there were only 31 balls put in play, 27 for outs, 2 errors, and 3 hits that stayed in the ballpark. There were 24 strikeouts, 7 walks, and 3 home runs that accounted for all the scoring. This is what baseball has declined down to, a game of swings and misses, walks and home runs. The National League really went according to plan, as both top seeds rolled into the championship series undefeated with each one only having one game that was really close. This may affect the outcome of the championship series, but more on that later. With this new expanded playoff system, baseball lucked out, where the best teams are playing for the World Series. Where baseball did not luck out, was that the games, for the most part were not that exciting. There were only 4 one run games, out of the 34 playoff games played. The best game was the elimination game between Tampa Bay and the Yankees, even though it lacked balls in play, it was still a good tense baseball game that went down to the wire. The most memorable play, was the Cody Bellinger catch, of Fernando Tatis’s deep fly to center field, which kept the Padres from grabbing the lead, in game 2 of their 5 game series. That play just sucked the life out of that team, and allowed the Dodgers to go on to sweep the series. Other than that, not much was memorable in these 34 playoff games, as 7 of them were won by 5 runs or more. So what is going to happen next.

The Astros should be taken care of by the Tampa Bay Rays, clearly the best in the American league. I can not see the Astro pitching holding up much longer. I will be surprised if the series goes more than 5 games. The National League should provide a much more interesting series, provided one thing happens. The first two games of the series are split. Both of these teams are hot, and brimming with confidence. If one of the teams wins the first two games then that team’s confidence level should skyrocket. If the games are split then I think it will be a dog fight and go 7 games. I don’t have a good feel who will win this series. The Dodgers are the heavy favorites, but the Braves seemed to have learned their lessons, from previous playoff failures, and seemed to be poised to make it to the World Series. Hopefully, the League Championship Series, and the World Series can create some excitement, that has been lacking in the playoffs, so far. No matter what happens, I will be watching.