Category: sports

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Sports: College Football, Meaningless Championship Weekend.

This is conference championship weekend, with the 5 major conferences having their championship games Friday and Saturday. Instead of this being an exciting weekend, and a first step to a possible National Championship, there are only 2 teams, that the games have any kind of significant meaning. Southern California and Texas Christian must win, or they most likely will fall out of the final four. If Michigan or Georgia would lose this weekend, they most likely would stay in the top 4. Georgia for sure and Michigan most likely, unless unexpectedly they would really embarrass themselves. There are five teams, even if they win, will have no chance of getting into the playoffs. Those are Purdue, North Carolina, LSU, Kansas St. and Utah. Then you have the strange case of Clemson. The committee decided to make them the worst ranked 2 loss team. Even if they beat North Carolina decisively, it would be shocking to see them jump 6 places to get into the playoffs. Because college football puts no value on winning a conference championship, there are only 2 out of 10 teams that have a chance of making the playoffs. The playoffs are going to expand, but even that is up in the air on exactly when. Somehow, they came up with the number 12. They are going to “allow in” the top 6 ranked conference champions. There are 10 Division 1-A college football conferences. To use this year as an example, it would still be very unlikely for Utah, Purdue or North Caroline to get in if they somehow pull off the upset. All the 12-team format does is give more power to the committee. If a team is playing in a conference championship game and becomes team 5 through 12, it would mean they would play 17 games to become National Champion. So much for college football players playing too many games. Welcome to the NFL.

I have always advocated an 8-team format. To me it is simple, the 5 conference champions are in, and then the committee picks 3 at large births. Now that the powers to be have said that they want 12 teams, it would be quite easy to go to 16 teams without any extra games. In fact, the most any team would have to play is 16. To use this year as an example, we would have the 5 conference Championship games. Now take the next 6 highest ranked teams that are not in conference finals. In this case, you have Ohio State, Alabama, Tennessee, Penn St., Washington, and Florida St. They could play this week or the next week, with Ohio St. playing Florida St., Alabama playing Washington, and Tennessee playing Penn St. You would have 16 teams with the chance at the National Title. After those games you have 8 teams left and the playoffs could go on right on schedule and the committee would have been done this past weekend. In order to get better teams in the conference championship games, conferences could be much more liberal in changing the division make up every one or two years. You could also have more conference regular season games by eliminating the sisters of the poor games. You know those games, Ohio St vs Akron, or Alabama vs. Chattanooga. I always felt that championships should be settled on the field. This is an easy way to do this, and there would be more continuity to the college football season. I know this will never happen, but it does not keep me from wishing it would. It is time for a Division 1-A football conference championship to mean something.

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Pirates Morning Report: Good Early Moves

The last time I wrote about the Pirates I said they would contend for the division title in 2023. I did say a few things would have to happen for me to continue to believe that. Two of them have happened already. Kevin Newman is off the team. They have not one but two first baseman. None of the moves are earth shattering, but they made the team much better and gave more potential to the bullpen. Let us look at the new Pirates.

The Pirates acquired Dauri Moreta from the Reds when they traded Newman. At first glance it appears that the Pirates may have gotten another stiff. For the entire season Moreta had an ERA of 5.40. However, most of that was due to a horrible May. He was sent down to the minors and when he came back in mid-June he obviously found something. His last 20 appearances he had one bad outing where he gave up 4 runs. In the other 19 outings he pitched 23 innings, gave up 4 runs, 14 hits, walked 6, and struck out 22. If he can continue something like that into 2023, we may have found Dwayne Underwood Junior’s replacement. The fact that we got anything for Newman is pretty remarkable.

The Pirates signed a free agent and made a trade to shore up first base. They acquired Ji-Man Choi from the Rays and signed Carlos Santana to a one year deal for 6 plus million. Led by Michael Chavis and Yoshi Tsutsugo the Pirates had the worst WAR at first base, in the entire major leagues at -4. Both Choi and Santana had WARs of 1.2, not great but huge upgrades from what was there. For the first time in a long time the Pirates are going to have real first basemen. Choi is an average fielder, while Santana is an above average fielder. Santana gives added flexibility in that he is a switch hitter. His overall OPS+ is 100 which is league average, but his OPS+ against lefties was 124. They should be a very good tandem at the position, and both have experience at DH. Santana will be turning 37 but the Pirates are experts at giving players rest and this time they will have to.

I would say the off season has started nicely for the Pirates but there is a long way to go. They still need a catcher and a centerfielder if they are going to contend. Any pitching additions should help, as we all know, you cannot have too much pitching. The winter meetings are coming up and the Rule 5 draft. Hopefully the Pirates can maintain this momentum and get some more help to win the division. Yeah, baby.

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The 2023 Pirates, They Will Contend.

It is always hard to predict what a team will do in a coming season. There is always the unknown, such as injuries, young player performance and what if any moves the team is going to make. I feel the Pirates will be in the hunt for the division title in 2023. However, there will be a few things that will have to happen, or all bets are off. This is assuming that the Pirates will really try to win in 2023. I feel they are not going to drag this out for another year. Before I get to why I think the Pirates are going to win in 2023, let’s look at the things that have to happen, first. There are some things I would like to see happen, but I do not feel they are absolutely necessary for the Pirates to contend.

First, both Kevin Newman and Ben Gamel should not be on the opening day roster. They are 30 year old players who have shown they do not have much to offer at the major league lever. They had WAR’s of 1.1 and .1 respectively. Gamel is a horrible fielder, and both are below average hitters. If this is what’s on the bench next year, then the Pirates cannot be serious about winning. The second thing that must happen is they must get Bryan Reynolds out of centerfield. The SABR Defensive Index, which contributes to the Gold Glove Rankings, lists him as the worst fielding centerfielder in all of baseball. The Pirates have to find themselves a centerfielder. I do not know that they have to go to the extreme of getting a Jackie Bradley type, all field, no hit player, but they have got to have a big upgrade at one of the most important defensive positions. There are always trade rumors concerning Reynolds, but if that is what it takes to remove him from centerfield, then let’s do it for the right return. If Reynolds is out in centerfield on opening day, then it will be hard for the Pirates to contend. My own opinion is to put him in left field, and I think he becomes an asset again. This is a player who slashed .262/345/461, with an OPS+126, yet only had a 2.9 WAR. In comparison Oneil Cruz, who had over 200 less at bats than Reynolds, had a WAR of 2.3. Even with his defense, he came close to Reynold’s WAR in about 2/3rds of the playing time. The final part of this equation is good old free agency. Will the Pirates sign some legitimate free agents and not those scumbags they signed last year, with the exception of Jose Quintana. The Pirates could sign 3 players at 20 million a year or 2 players at 30 million a year and their team payroll would still not top 100 million. They need help at catcher, centerfield, the bullpen and even at 1st base. Getting Ji-Man Choi is a huge upgrade at 1st base, but he has not done that well against left hand pitching. Even if the Pirates do little on the free agent market, I still think they will contend. Anything they do there or the trade market that would be considered significant, I would consider a bonus, and would increase their chances of winning the division.

I feel the Pirates will contend because I feel the young talent they have is ready to step up their games and perform at a higher level than they did last year. The infield should be solid with Castro, Cruz and Hayes. It would be nice to see Hayes pick up on his hitting. He has been a below average hitter the last 2 seasons. If he can improve on that and stay healthy, he would become even more of an asset. Diego Castillo can fill in when needed. The outfield needs to find a centerfielder. Reynolds should be fine in left and Jack Suwinski is solid in right. Cal Mitchell and Ji Hwan Bae will fill in. Catcher is basically empty right now. Henry Davis could make his debut in 2023 but injuries have slowed his progress somewhat. A lot will depend on who the Pirates obtain but I do not look at this being a critical move. The starting rotation if they can avoid the surgeon’s knife should be a strong point for this team. In fact, if they make any free agent moves when it comes to the starting rotation, they could do a 6 man rotation. Right now, the rotation would be Mitch Keller, Roansy Contreras, J.T. Brubaker, Johan Oviedo, and Luis Ortiz. Bryse Wilson and Zach Thompson did little to distinguish themselves last year, even though they had plenty of opportunities. I don’t put much stock in Wilson’s final very good outing. These two may do better in the bullpen, much like Will Crow did last year. Yes, last but certainly not least the bullpen. There is no question the most volatile and unpredictable part of any ball club. Teams have spent heavily on the free agent market on relief pitchers, only to see it all go down in flames as these pitchers under performed. The bullpen had its ups and downs last year but seems to have a solid core, with David Bednar, Chase De Jong and Will Crowe. I should have put Duane Underwood Junior in my list of, if he is still pitching in the bullpen, then all bets are off. Whether it is from within or without the Pirates will have to find some arms to shore up the bullpen. There are plenty of them out there.

The main reason I think the Pirates will contend is Ben Cherington. He has the pedigree. He took Boston from worst to first from 2012 to 2013. He left Boston because of a change of ownership. He left Boston with a slew of good young players that helped them win another title in 2018. He is like any GM, he is not infallible, but the young talent the Pirates have, look pretty good at the moment. There are things that can happen that can change the fortunes of a team in the blink of an eye. I know they have the same cheapskate owner but maybe he will finally spend some money. Only time will tell. Even if he does not, the Pirates have a young core that can make things happen. The Central Division is far from a strong division. This is the year the Pirates should make their move and win their first division title in 30 years.

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The 2022 Pirate Season, Disgusting But Brilliant

The 2022 Major League Baseball season is officially over with the Houston Astros winning the World Series in 6 games. The only good thing was that Dusty Baker got that World Series Ring. The Astros proved once again that good pitching will shut down good hitting. The 4th and 5h games were the pivotal games, especially the 4th game when the Astros no hit the Phillies. I think it gave them the phycological edge. Winning the tight game 5 with some spectacular defense sealed the deal. The Pirates 2022 season ended on opening day. This is the season where management had 2 goals, get a top draft choice and keep player control until 2028. There was no question that the Pirates fielded a team that was guaranteed to lose a lot of games and then made in game decisions to cement loses. This was a team that lost games on purpose, and we will prove that point later. First let us look at what the Pirates could have done during the 2022 season and the most likely result.

The Pirates could have decided to put the best team on the field and win as many games as possible, with those new young players. We will even give them a break and say that Roberto Perez does not get hurt and plays the entire season. Oneil Cruz and Rudolfo Castro would have played full seasons. There would have been other young players who would have played a lot more games. If the Pirates had gone all out and tried to win as many games as possible this year, they probably would have come close to playing .500 ball, winning between 75 and 83 games. The bullpen was too thin, and the starting pitching was not good enough to do much better than that. They would have been drafting in the middle of the pack, unless they got extremely lucky in the lottery. The young players would have become free agents in 2027. We all know the Pirates did not do that; therefore they have control of these players until 2028. These players did gain considerable major league experience, but not enough to move up their free agency. Here is what the Pirates did do.

It has been hard for many people to get their head around the fact that the Pirates did exactly what they wanted to do in 2022, lose baseball games. They lost baseball games on purpose. As much I find this repulsive, I blame this on the MLB system, rather on the Pirates. The Pirates just played the game that MLB has set up and should reap the rewards with some pretty good seasons coming up. The Pirate management team could not come out and say they were losing games on purpose but there really is no other explanation for who they put on the field. They allowed certain players who shall remain nameless, because they have families and children, to make 1072 plate appearances. That is equivalent to two full time position players, or 22% of your starting lineup. This group of individuals had a batting average of .156, an on base percentage of .218 and slugged .230. To put this in perspective, in 2016 the San Franscisco Giants pitching staff had a batting average of .144. It was like the Pirates, instead of using a DH, let pitchers’ bat in two spots of the batting order. The Pirates allowed a group of pitchers to throw 31% of the team’s innings for an ERA of 6.31. I did not include position players pitching in that number. Many times, they put these pitchers in key moments of the game when there were much better choices. According to baseball reference the Pirates were fortunate to lose only 100 games. Despite management’s efforts, the Pirates were a respectable 21-27 in one run games. If they could have done that well in all their games, they would have won 70 games, but management made sure they did not. The 2022 Pirates did exactly what they wanted to do. The 2023 Pirates will contend for the division title. There will be a few things that will have to happen, but more on that tomorrow.

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World Series: Phillies Right on Schedule

The Phillies have started the World Series just like they started every non-Wild Card series with a split on the road, winning game 1 and losing game 2. The Phillies made the big comeback in game 1. They were able to do so because Dusty Baker left Justin Verlander in the game too long. This is not the regular season. If you have a 5 run lead and your starting pitcher is getting racked in the 4th inning, it’s time to make a move, even though he was dominant he was in the first 3 innings. The first 6 batters in the top of the 4th all hit the ball hard and the Astros were just lucky to get the second out. Verlander probably should not have come out for the 5th inning, but even if you want to give Baker the benefit of the doubt on that, the leadoff double should have been the knockout punch. Instead Verlander was left in the game to surrender the tying runs, and even finish the inning. For Houston, game 1 loss was due to poor managing. Game 2 was a typical Phillies loss where poor defense was a contributing factor. The Phillies made it interesting and if Kyle Schwarber hits a ball 6 inches to the left or about 3 feet farther, the Phillies would have been within 2 runs going into the 9th.

The Phillies will be at home for the next 3 games and in my view, it will be essential for them to win at least 2 of the games to have any chance of winning this series. I think their pitching staff is set up better than the Astros and that may make a difference. They have had bad games at the plate before and seem to be able to shake it off. It will be interesting to see if the Phillies can get right back on track with the home field advantage. It would seem very unlikely that they will sweep this Astro team, as they have in the previous two series. I think one of the key players for the Phillies will be Rhys Hoskins, not only with the bat but also on the field. He can be a real streaky hitter, but his defense leaves a lot to be desired. Another player who disappointed during the season but seems to be perking up a little bit in the post season is Nick Castellanos. He had one of hist worst seasons at the plate, but he has gotten a hit in 5 of the last 6 games and made the sliding catch in right field that kept the Astros from winning game 1, on 2 putrid bloops. Last, but certainly not least, the Phillies have to get better starting pitching. Nola and Wheeler both disappointed in the first 2 games. The good news is the Phillies won one of those games. That will be the game to remember, game 1, if the Phillies go on to win the series and beat the cheating Astholes, I mean Astros.

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Sports: World Series, Let’s Go Phillies

The World Series is set to begin Friday in Houston with the Astros taking on the Philadelphia Phillies. Some people look at this series as the super team vs. the super hot team, namely the Phillies. The Astros have not exactly been coasting along. Besides going 7-0 in the post season, they finished the season playing a little over .700 ball in September and October. Both teams, not just the Phillies are coming into the World Series at the top of their respective games. The Phillies are 9-2 in the post season and while their defense is still looking shaky, their hitting and pitching has been at the top of the scale. Looking at the teams from a statistic standpoint, the Astros are the clear favorite, and I would not be surprised to see them take the series. Rather than compare the teams’ position by position all the way down to the bullpens, I would rather look at how this series and the Phillies season bring back the memories of the 2019 Series. There are other oddities that might indicate that the stars on not really aligning themselves for the Astros to be able to redeem themselves.

The 2019 Series featured the Houston Astros coming off another big 107 win season and they were playing with that chip on their shoulder because of the sign stealing scandal of 2017. The players wanted to show the world that they could win a title without cheating. In my view they were lucky to have the opportunity, because I felt that MLB was far too lenient on the players and did not hand out any player suspensions. Their opponents were the Washington Nationals, who came back from a horrendous start to the season, to make the wild card and had a great post season going 8-2, defeating the L. A. Dodgers and then the St. Louis Cardinals 4-0 in the League Championship Series. They too came into the World Series as a decided underdog. However, due to some spectacular hitting on the road and despite scoring only 3 runs in 3 home games, the Nationals won the Series 4 games to 3, with the surprising outcome of the visiting team winning every game. This had never happened before in World Series history. The Phillies are coming off the same kind of season. On June 1 their record was 22 wins and 29 losses. In 2019 the Nationals had a 25-33 record. The Phillies turned their season around being 6 games over 500 at the All-Star break and played the 2nd half exactly the same way to squeeze into the wild card series. The Nationals just kept getting better as the season progressed and were the home team for the winner take all wild card game in 2019. Then there is the strange fact that there have been only 2 other teams to go 7-0 in the 2 leagues series. The Colorado Rockies in 2007 and the Kansas City Royals in 2014, but both went on to lose the World Series. In fact, the Rockies were swept by the Boston Red Sox. Whether all this karma will prevent the Astros from winning the series, who knows. The final unusual occurrence is that these teams ended the season playing each other. I don’t know what that has to do with the price of oranges but just another strange fact. I will be rooting for the Phillies to take it all.

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Sport: Let The Championship Series Begin, Almost

The National League is in disarray with the San Diego Padres hosting the Philadelphia Phillies as the Championship Series begins. The shocking upsets of the Atlanta Braves and the Los Angeles Dodgers has left MLB Network stunned. What they like to call the super teams are gone, finished, kaput. You would have thought that upsets never happen in baseball with all the excuses that the network gave for the surprising results. Too long of a break, one team coasted too long, another team had to work too hard to get the bye, you can’t let the air out of the season and then recharge. Batters have a routine that really gets disrupted when they have a break. They went on and on practically giving no credit to the Phillies and the Padres. Just give the ring to the Astros, who for the moment, are the only “super team” in the semifinals. There have been upsets in the baseball post season for 70 years. The Tigers in 68, Miracle Mets 69 and the Pirates in 71 and 79, just to name a few. This is nothing unique because of more teams being in the post season. A series is a series is a series and you had better be ready to play. Major League Baseball was fortunate that this did not happen in the 16 team tournament of 2020. Enough of the media bemoaning the past, let’s look at what we have in store for the next 7 days.

The elimination game for the division series between the Yankees and Guardians is this afternoon. My feeling is the Yankees will prevail and MLB Network will at least feel half good, because they will get their wish on the American League side of the playoffs. I would like to see Cleveland win but there are two things that bother me. The pitching has not been near as dominate as it was in the wild card series. The second thing is, after their dramatic win in game 3, it just felt like the Guardians were talking and feeling like they had already won the series. There was not one comment by the players and their manager of putting things into perspective. Things like, hey this was a great win, but we still have to get that third win and the Yankees are not going to lay down and just let us take this thing. I don’t even know if I would call this over confidence, but more of a feeling of accomplishment and contentment, when in reality nothing was accomplished except to go ahead 2 games to 1 in a 5 game series. We will see if the Guardians can refocus this afternoon and pull out the third shocker of the playoffs. It will allow MLB Network to come up with a ton of excuses for the Yankees.

On the National League side, the 5th and 6th seeds are playing to see who will go the World Series. The Phillies look red hot and have been the most impressive of the two teams. Being on a roll can vanish in a heartbeat. The Padres have had some gritty wins and Josh Hader has seemed to have returned to form. The Padres have had players, that had a mediocre regular season, all of a sudden come alive with the bats, to contribute heavily to the playoff wins, in both series. These teams have not met since the end of June when the Phillies took 3 out of 4 in San Diego. The fact that 4 of the 7 games are in San Diego I do not look at as a big advantage for the Padres. This team plays better on the road and showed it in the wild card round. I think one of the big keys to this series is whether Bryce Harper will stay hot, and will San Diego allow him to beat them. I think this will be one of the most entertaining 7 game series we have seen in a long time, and I do think it will go the distance. I just give the slight edge to the Padres because of all the big names they have and how well they seem to be fielding right now. As we have seen so far, nothing will be surprising in this post season.

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Baseball, The Four Run Rule

Whenever a team wins or loses a baseball game, there is a part of the team that is responsible for the outcome. It could be a total team effort, the pitching, or the hitting. Four runs is the determining factor that shows who is responsible for the outcome. If a team scores 4 or more runs, then they should win the game. If a team holds their opponent to 4 or less runs, they should win the game. If both teams accomplish this goal on the number, the game will go into extra innings and eventually one team would give up the go ahead runs. Wins and losses can be put into 6 categories: Team win, pitching win, hitting win, team loss, pitching loss, and hitting loss. Here is an example of how each category would play out for the winning and losing team. Final score of 5-4 would be an example of a team win and a pitching loss. Final score of 4-3 would be a team win and a hitting loss. Final score of 7-5 would be a hitting win and a pitching loss. Final score of 3-2 would be a pitching win and hitting loss. Final score of 6-3 would be a team win and team loss. Let’s look at 4 teams in the National League and see how this plays out.

I will look at a bad team, my beloved Pittsburgh Pirates, the best team, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Milwaukee Brewers, who barely missed the playoffs, and the Philadelphia Phillies, who barely made the playoffs. First, checking some basic year long stats, let’s see where each team finished the season. In runs per game, the Dodgers were 1st, the Phillies 7th, the Brewers 10th and the Pirates 27th. In on base percentage the Dodgers 1st, the Phillies 10th, the Brewers 13th, and the Pirates are at the bottom at 28th. In run prevention, the Dodgers 1st, the Phillies 15th, the Brewers 16th and the Pirates are 28th. In Fielding Independant Pitching, the Dodgers are 3rd, the Phillies 7th, the Brewers 15th and the Pirates are 23rd their highest ranking. No big surprises in those rankings. Here is how the games broke down for each team. In team losses the Pirates lead the way with 42%, followed by the Phillies with 35%, the Dodgers with 29% and the Brewers with 26%. These were the losses that the team gave up more than 4 runs and failed to score 4 runs. In games where the pitchers were responsible for the losses, the Brewers were at 33%, the Phillies 32%, the Dodgers 26% and the Pirates 21%. These were games where the hitters scored 4 or more runs but the pitchers gave up 4 or more runs in the loss. In games where the hitters were responsible for the loss, the Dodgers were at 45%, the Brewers 41%, the Pirates 37%, and Phillies 33%. These were games where the pitchers gave up 4 or less runs but the hitters could not score 4 runs in the loss. In team wins, the Dodgers led the way with 77%, followed by the Pirates 68%, the Brewers 68% and the Phillies 65%. These were games where the team scored 4 or more runs and the pitchers gave up 4 or less runs. Pitching wins were led by Phillies at 18%, the Dodgers Brewers and Pirates tied at 16%. These were games where the hitters score less than 4 runs, but the pitchers held the opponent under 3 runs for the win. Games where the hitters were responsible for the win, were led by the Phillies 17%, the Pirates and Brewers tied at 16%, with Dodgers bringing up the rear at 10%. These were games where the pitchers gave up 4 or more runs but the hitters were able to score more runs for the win. What does all of this mean other than the obvious that the Dodgers are great and the Pirates stink.

At least for these 4 teams it lays to rest the old adage that one part of the team can carry the team to victory on a consistant basis. Team wins occurred at least two thirds of the time and the Dodgers had team wins over 75% of the time. Losses on the other hand can be due to one aspect of the team, mainly hitting, not performing. At least one third of the team’s losses were due to a lack of hitting, with the Dodgers losing 45% of their games because of the bats not performing. It shows, that even with the best of teams that hitting can be a sometime thing. The Brewers did not support the aspects of their game well at all. Seventy-four per cent of their losses were due to either the pitchers or hitters not performing well, when their counterpart was doing the job. Only 20 of their 75 losses would be considered a team failure. When the pitchers pitched well, the hitters could not hit, and when the hitters hit, the pitchers could not keep the other team from scoring more runs. Winning seems to more about avoiding the bad performance rather than having great performances. There were a lot of one side of the ball fails for the Brewers which kept them out of the playoffs. We will see how other teams did when applying the 4 run rule.

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Sports: On To The Division Series

Tomorrow, the divisions series will start with 3 of the underdogs advancing, from the wild card round. The Padres did do in the Mets, and even though I wrote previously that I would not be surprised by who won the other 3 series, I did not predict any of them correctly. Not only would it be surprising, but it would be downright shocking if the bye teams do not advance to the championship series. None of these teams limped into the playoffs. The Yankees had the post All-Star game slump, but what went unnoticed, because of the Aaron Judge home run chase, was that the Yankees finished 20-11. The other 3 teams did not do too shabby either, with the Astros finishing 22-9, the Dodgers 21-12, and the Braves 21-10. Is there any hope for the 4 teams that have to play these juggernauts. Well, there is always hope until the plug is pulled. Which of these teams have the best chance of pulling off the big upset.

In my view, it is the Guardians. That pitching staff has to be brimming with confidence. The Yankees have been known to go into some mighty large batting slumps. Besides Judge, they have not hit that well all year. One 11 game stretch in August they scored over 3 runs only once and went 2-9. Will the Guardians be determined to not let Aaron Judge beat them? The fact that the Guardians did not have to play on Sunday gives everybody that much needed extra day off. On the other side of the coin, the Guardians bats have not exactly been on fire. In 24 innings they scored 3 runs, all of them on the home run ball. The Guardians have one to the best managers in Terry Francona. The Yankees have one of the worst managers in Aaron Boone. Since he is a former media boy, the media treats him with kid gloves, but the bottom line is, he is the king of the bonehead move. If the games are close this could be a major factor. The other team that has the best shot of pulling off the shocking upset is the Padres. The biggest factor they have to overcome is the Dodgers seem to have their number. This was going to be one of the biggest baseball rivalries, with many people thinking that the Padres were going to challenge the Dodgers for the division title in 2021. The Padres collapsed in the 2nd half of the season and did not even make the playoffs. Even this year it was a struggle as they finished the season just 16-14 but it was good enough to get the wild card. I thought the Padres would beat the Mets, not because the Padres were the Padres but because the Mets were the Mets. The Mets have a dark cloud over them, and it just got darker with that playoff loss. The Padres do have that swagger, but the Dodgers are the heavy favorite to take it all. They were the most dominate team with a staggering 111 wins. Can you believe it, they were 1-5 against the Pirates. As the old saying goes, that is why you play the games. However, if the 4 bye teams are still not standing next week it will be a big surprise.

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Sports: Let The Playoffs Begin

For a baseball fan, this is the best time of the year, as the playoffs will start today with the wild card round. To me, this round will be just a prelude to being eliminated in the division round. If the championship series are not Yankees vs. Astros and Dodgers vs. Braves, it will be very surprising. These teams have been the dominate teams most of the year, and if any of them do not make the finals of their respective leagues, it would be a major upset. The wild card round I feel is pretty competitive, and I would not be surprised at any team advancing. I do feel there is one series that is the most intriguing and should help the Braves advance to the championship round.

San Diego Padres are the wild card team of the wild card round. They play just as well on the road as they do at home. In fact, their road record is one game better than their home record. The Padres really did not set the world on fire after they acquired Josh Hader, Josh Bell, and Juan Soto. They looked like they might not even make the playoffs with Milwaukee challenging them right into the last week of the season. They are a seasoned group when it comes to playoff experience. They beat the Mets 4 out of 6 games during the regular season. The Mets are going to open with Scherzer and DeGrom, but they did the same thing against Atlanta and lost both games. The Padres have always had a certain swagger, whether it is justified or not. When you look at the teams statistically the Mets have the decided advantage. There is this perception that the Mets somehow blew the division title or limped into the playoffs. Nothing could be further from the truth. Their record before and after the All-Star break is exactly the same. For whatever reason the Mets have this aura of failure around them. If the Padres pull off the upset, which I think they will, this aura will only darken. It will just be the Mets being the Mets.