Over the course of the last month of the season, the Red Sox have done everything possible to prove that they are incapable of repeating as World Series Champions this October. They lost their closer Keith Foulke for the season. Last year’s postseason hero and ace of the pitching staff Curt Schilling has continued to pitch ineffectively coming back from injury. The rest of the pitching staff struggled to pick up the slack and as a result, despite an absolutely ridiculous September by David Ortiz (11 HRs, 29 RBIs and like 2 million game-winning hits) the Sox managed to blow a 4 game lead in the division to the surging Yankees in the last three weeks. They barely squeaked into the playoffs as the wild card team by taking two of three from the Yankees and benefiting from Cleveland inexplicably falling apart in the last week(time to forget about my man crush on Travis Hafner…..for this year at least). So why am I still riding this bandwagon(at least to win the American League pennant) besides the obvious, that I am a die-hard Red Sox fan?
In all reality, there are only two teams capable of winning the pennant this year: the Red Sox and the Yankees. For the third consecutive season, they will meet each other in the American League Championship Series. As in each of the past three seasons, they are two very similar and evenly matched teams. It appears as though every pitch in this series, every at-bat could swing things in favor of either team. But, when all factors are taken into consideration, I can say that I am pretty certain that Boston will prevail.
New York and Boston both finished with identical 95-67 records, but the Yankees were awarded the division by winning the season series with the Sox.Their reward? They get to fly all the way out west to California to face the Angels, the hottest team in the league down the stretch(14-2 in their last 16 games). Meanwhile, the Red Sox get to take a short flight to Chicago to play a mediocre White Sox team that played .500 ball the last 2 months of the season and was in serious danger of missing the playoffs before Cleveland’s bizarre freefall. The Red Sox will swiftly dispose of their white namesake while the Yankees will win out in an extended series with Anaheim( or should I say Los Angeles of Anaheim? For the record, this is the most awkward/unnecessary/stupid team name ever). The ALCS will go to the team who is better-rested which will most definitely be the Red Sox. I tell you this with absolute certainty despite the fact that Boston finished 4th to last in the American League in ERA at 4.74 and their closer(Mike Timlin) hasn’t had a postseason save since 1992.
I realize that pitching is important, but the only two pitching staffs in the AL who scare me at all reside in Oakland and Minnesota and they will be watching the postseason unfold from the comfort of their living rooms. Buerhle and Garland have shown us in the second half of the season what they and the White Sox are really made of as they have both all but disappeared after the all-star break(a combined 11-10 during that span). The Angels? They are led by potential Cy Young winner Bartolo Colon with his league-leading 21 wins. Colon is also third in the AL in WHIP(walks plus hits per inning pitched) and has kept his ERA under 3.5(albeit barely) which is more than Buerhle and Garland can say. However I have a long memory and I remember back to his inconsistencies with the Indians in the postseason which was why they were willing to let him go way back in 2002. He has yet to pitch in the playoffs since then when he got rocked in all three of his postseason starts. I also seem to recall that despite his 18 wins last year, his ERA was an ugly 5.01. As long as we’re picking on Colon, despite the fact that he throws upwards of 98 mph, the guy has not struck out over 200 batters in a season since 2001. He’s a power pitcher who doesn’t use his power to his advantage. Mostly because his fastball is flatter than Nicole Kidman. I for-see Gary Sheffield taking him deep a minimum of twice in this series. After him, their rotation is a patchwork group of no-names. John Lackey(14-5, 3.44 ERA) has come out of nowhere and had a decent year but let’s see him prove his mettle in the playoffs. Personally I think he is the equivalent of the Yankees’ Aaron Small, a no-name pitcher who has come out of the minors and had surprising regular season success but who is completely unproven and who will likely fall off of the radar again by this time next year. Speaking of the Yankees, whose rotation is anchored by Small…. They likely have the most abysmal pitching staff of the four AL playoff teams. Their best two pitchers in the regular season were Small(10-0, 3.20 ERA) and Shawn Chacon( 8-10, 3.44 ERA), who was picked up in a July trade from the Colorado Rockies, at which point he was the worst statistical pitcher on the team with the worst pitching staff in baseball. This patchwork rotation held together over the last two months of the season but neither of these guys have what it takes to hold down the juggernaut that is the Red Sox lineup. If the Yankees are to overtake Boston and make it back to the World Series then they need Randy Johnson to pitch like the Randy Johnson of old, not like the average pitcher with deteriorating velocity that threw for them this season(17-8 3.80 ERA, 211 Ks, his lowest total since he was with Seattle). The problem is, age has finally caught up to him and I think this is all he has left in the tank. His former teammate in Arizona, Curt Schilling, has been absolutely awful for the Red Sox this season(ERA above 5) but he has been struggling coming back from injury. He shut down the potent Yankees offense in the regular season finale, and has shown signs of life in his last few starts. Despite their inferior regular season stats I would take a rotation of Schilling, David Wells and knuckle-baller Tim Wakefield over the Yankees' aforementioned top three, because they have all proven that they know what it takes to win in the postseason. At closer, disregarding 379 career saves including 43 more this year, it is pretty much a toss-up. Mariano Rivera may be the best closer in the league against every team not from Boston, but as we saw last October and this April to begin the season, he looks like Byun Hyun Kim against the Red Sox.
The Yankees threesome of 100 RBI men, Hideki Matsui, Alex Rodriguez and Gary Sheffield, are pretty intimidating, but in the last four games of the ALCS last year we saw how quickly they can disappear when the pressure heats up. Meanwhile Ortiz is currently the most clutch player on the planet, with more game-winning hits in the last two years than ARod has had manicures. Manny Ramirez and Ortiz are the most fearsome duo in the league, becoming the fourth pair of teammates to each hit 45 or more homeruns in the same season. Despite an obviously disappointing September, the Red Sox find themselves exactly where they want to be, with a realistic chance of repeating as American League Champions.
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2 comments:
Gregory may make comments about being poor forever because he is an English major. However, you can always be a sports writer. Not much money but I suppose a fun lifestyle.
...or a high school english teacher.
ALthough I hate to admit this, I do agree that the Red Sox do have a legitimate chance to win the AL Pennant. None of the other teams in the Al have shown anysign of dominance relative to the rest of the contenders. It quite simply may break down to a battle of veterans gutting it out. It will be interesting to see if Small is the next El duque.
Two drawbacks to your post. You need to give Mo a little more respect than what you wrote in your article. The man has been a cornerstone to the entire Yankees success this season. While I do aggree that he struggles against the Red sox, nevertheless his travails against our Beantown Meatheads does not put him equal to Mike Timlin.
Furthermore, I would be betting the deed to my house (if i had one) on the Red sox winning the pennant, if they had a better bullpen. The current bullpen situation (more like fiasco) leaves me waking up in cold sweats. I forsee a series blown by timlin and Co., or at least a few games.
Another note of lesser importance. You compared Small, and John lackey as both being "guys that came up from the minors". While Lackey MAY have come up from the minors this season he has had quite a bit of major league experience. Perhaps you should use a different reference as that common expression refers to rookies entering the "bigs"
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