That anguished moan you are hearing is coming from baseball fans in Los Angeles and New York.
And also from television executives everywhere.
They were this close to having the two largest media markets battling it out in the World Series. Imagine the ad dollars!
But, after running away with their division, and looking like a lock to win the pennant, the Dodgers' manager seemingly forgot about Clayton Kershaw's history of failing in the playoffs. Maybe a wizened old bench coach is needed to keep Dave Roberts from some of his, oh, let's call them unusual, pitching decision. "Uh, Dave? NO."
And the Yankees? Well, their starting pitching was suspect all year long...and Aroldis Chapman is definitely not Mariano Rivera. Why they added another bat, Encarnacion, when they needed another arm is a mystery. Then their much vaunted bullpen got the shakes. Plus, Houston has a really good team, with vastly superior starting pitching, so...
The better team won in this case.
Nationals versus Astros it is.
And what will that mean? Houston has much better starters than any team in the AL. But Washington's top 3, Scherzer, Strasburg, and Corbin, match up very well against Cole, Verlander and Greinke. Throw in Sanchez and you might even give an edge to the Nationals. The bullpens look pretty equal, though after what the Astros' pen did to New York, it would be hard to bet against them.
Starting lineups would seem to favor Houston--but starting lineups also clearly favored Los Angeles, and they're at home now, trying to figure out what happened. Very strange things can happen in a short series.
All in all, it looks like it could be a great World Series, decided by which team makes the exceptional play and which team doesn't, assuming they both make all of the routine ones.
The safe bet is Houston in 6 games.
No comments:
Post a Comment