Baseball Playoff Time

Once upon at time, there was no doubt, October was the best sports time of the year. Baseball playoffs. NFL underway. Nothing could beat it. Also used to be...or at least felt like...the bay area had something going on. For years it seemed like the A's or the Giant's had something going on during the postseason - at least for large parts of my youth. And at the very least, the 49ers could always be relied upon to be good. No more. Besides the amazing Giant's run of last year and the 2004 A's playoff team, there hasn't been much to celebrate in Bay Area sports since I moved to LA. Nevertheless, playoff baseball is another beast all together and I'll watch any teams play. Even the other night, I watched basically the entire Braves meltdown game where Tim Hudson went out and gave his boys a great chance to win, but they just didn't have it in them. Their meltdown story would have been bigger if it weren't for the Red Sox and Tampa Bay storyline.

I don't follow too much baseball during the year...I mostly just read about it. And I like it that way. So my predictions should be noted as foolish, and they are more wishes than predictions, but here we go:

In the AL, I'm rooting for anyone but the Yankees to go forward. I like the Tiger's chances against them because once the Yanks pitch CC, they have no other proven playoff pitcher at their disposal. I know they have a great line up that can wear down teams and keep them in any game, but I'm guessing Verlander can beat them twice and the Tiger's can eek out one other game against a shitty Yankee pitcher.

I'll find it hard to root against the Devil Rays or the Rangers. I don't know any of these Ranger's pitchers, but I have to admit to kind of liking their team. Some folks say they are better than last year, but that makes no sense to me after losing essentially the best pitcher in baseball. It's a toss up - do you take the hot team or the talented team? Smart money is on the talent (Rangers), but last year everyone lost money betting on the talent.

In the NL, I'm rooting for the Brewers and don't see why they can't pull it off. I believe they have two good starting pitchers and two of the best bats in the league. Also, this is their window as they'll lose Fielder next year, and I like rooting for teams with a limited window. I know the Phillies are an obvious choice. They will likely win because they have to feel like the favored team in every single game they play because of their pitching match ups. Even last year, when the Giant's had an excellent rotation, the Phillies were without Lee, they still had good match ups. And no one this year in the National League can match the Giant's rotation of last year. So we'll see. No one is talking about the Diamondbacks, which may be good for them and they can sneak under the radar. But I like Milwaukee for some reason. I feel like they could pull off an upset here.