To borrow from Mike & Mike of ESPN, here are my Baseball Post Season Predictions Sure To Go Wrong: AL WC: Kansas City Royals over Oakland Athletics NL WC: Pittsburgh Pirates over San Francisco Giants For the record, I cant stand the Wild Card. $#@% Selig. AL Divisional Rounds: Detroit Tigers vs Baltimore Orioles: This is going to be a close series. Baltimore lost their power hitting 1B due to use of a banned substance and Detroits power throwing starter Justin Verlander hasnt been right all year. Neither team is particularly hot, Detroit has the edge in pitching but Baltimore might have the edge in hitting. While the possibility of either a Baltimore-DC Series or a 1944 rematch between the former Browns and the Cardinals are intriguing, I think the TIGERS win it. Kansas City Royals vs Anaheim Mighty Angels of California or whatever the Hell theyre called: I dont like the Angels pretentious name and Im not ready to forgive Pujols for the way he handled his negotiations with the Cardinals. Yes, theyre the winningest team in baseball. So are a lot of other teams who lose early in the playoffs. Pitch Albert away and let him chase and ground into DPs all series. Dont give Trout anything to hit and go after everybody else. I promise you that David Freese doesnt have anymore post season magic in that bat. ROYALS upset! NL Divisional Rounds: St. Louis Cardinals vs Los Angeles Dodgers: Everybody is afraid of the Dodgers. Im not. Im afraid of sub-.500 clubs with soft-tossing lefties which nobody has to worry about in the playoffs. If the Dodgers had Bud Smith, Id be concerned. They have Clayton Kershaw. Big deal, 11 year old Little League girls have been calling him out, and the Cards traditionally do well against enemy aces. Of course, that all depends on whether or not the offense shows up. And THAT depends on Captain Clutch not striking out, popping up on the infield or hitting into DPs whenever there are runners on base, and Mike Matheny laying off the #$%@ bunts. Go CARDINALS. Pittsburgh Pirates vs Washington Nationals: The Nats are an enigma. They have the talent to be seriously dangerous, and yet they dont seem to be world beaters. They are in a division with a bunch of bad teams. Atlanta is not very well put together, the Mets have been injured early and often, the Marlins are perpetually rebuilding and the Phillies are all close to getting senior discounts. The Pirates, on the other hand, are pitching like every game is do or die and they have the best player in the NL in Andrew McCutchen. The PIRATES will win what ESPN calls an upset, because everybody underestimates the Pirates. I dont. They finally have a front office who knows what theyre doing and a manager more than capable of getting them there. Fear the black and gold. AL League Championship: ESPN will declare the post season a colossal failure at this point because DC, Detroit, LA and San Fran are gone already. They wont embrace the small markets, the incredible stories of the Pirates and Royals, teams that havent been relevant since I was going to junior high (Royals) and high school (Pirates). Theyll just talk about Derek Jeter like he parts seas and cures the blind. Meanwhile, meaningful baseball will be played. The Royals play a hybrid breed of NL smallball and pitch just well enough to keep their Cindarella story alive, hoping that someone actually mentions them in the World Series. Royals in 7 over Baltimore. NL League Championship: The sports radio jocks will rally behind Pittsburgh because outside of the KMOX broadcasting range everyone HATES the Cardinals. Like familiarity, success breeds contempt. See also: Dallas Cowboys, New England Patriots, New York Yankees, Michael Jackson. Pittsburgh is a good team and quite capable of knocking of the Cardinals this year. They match up well and like the Royals they might have luck on their side, something the Cardinals havent had a whole lot of this year. But they dont have Adam Wainwright, Lance Lynn, John Lackey and Shelby Miller (assuming Matheny doesnt adhere to some stupid machismo-fueled notion of starting Michael Wacha over Miller, who Id actually pitch 3rd in the rotation since they have publicly admitted Lackey has a dead arm). CARDINALS in 6 over Pittsburgh. WORLD SERIES: Kansas City Royals vs St. Louis Cardinals Queue Bowling For Soup: Bowling For Soup - 1985: youtu.be/K38xNqZvBJI Lets face it, if the baseball world hates the Cardinals, theyll REALLY hate another I-70 Series. And all their vitriol means is that the Midwest, not California, not the Northeast coast, IS relevant, that the Midwest and its small market teams do matter. After all, if these predictions make it this far that means the Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers and Giants have been sitting on their comfy couches and not the cold October dugout benches for weeks. I cant tell you how much it warms my heart to hear the bitterness of costal radio host. Of course, the mothership on cable and satellite will be to busy trying to get Derek Jeter sainted, anointing the next Johnny Football, and hoping someone punched their spouse in an elevator to not have to report on the World Series. Meanwhile, the Battle for Missouri will be hotly contested, with both teams getting a win on the road. The Royals, whom if memory serves beat the Cardinals pretty solidly in Interleague play this year ($#%@ Selig, part II), pull out the stops in their last home game, having retired umpire Don Denkinger throw out the ceremonial first pitch. History repeats itself and the Cardinals come unglued, losing big after a blown call not overturned by replay. Unlike 1985, however, they dont roll over and die in game 7. They go the distance and then some. The game goes extras, neither team scoring much as the starters both pitch the games of their lives and Matheny incredibly doesnt pitch hit with Pete Kozma in the 7th just to bunt someone over. It comes down to Matt Holliday, Captain Clutch, who, predictably, fails again. Three or four Facebook friends begrudgingly come to see the light. A couple unfriend me outright. Truth is harsh, sometimes. The end finally comes in the longest game 7 in World Series history, when Jhonny Peralta leads off with a double that just misses clearing the fence, Holliday strikes out looking on three pitches, and Yadier Molina slices a single to right to score Peralta. Molina cements his place in Cardinals history, Pujols wipes his tears with $1000 bills, and ESPN starts airing the NBA early. All is as it should be until next year when Peter Gammons and the rest of the World Wide Leader in Sports predict a Cubs vs Red Sox World Series for 2015. I swear, these people would rather see the world end than give credit to small market teams. CARDINALS over Kansas City in 7 games. Ferguson Protesters try to bring their lets disrupt pro sports because the media aint paying us no attention bull$#!% to Kansas City but they get lost and end up wandering the dust bowl before finally reaching Denver in time for their first post-Peyton Manning post season game in 2017. They try to protest but cant remember what they were mad about, since it sure wasnt Michael Brown. The Cardinals repeat as champions in 2015, the Cubs play better but miss the Wild Card on the last day of the season, and the Redbirds finally get the Red Sox monkey off their back. Matheny leaves the team for personal reasons that off-season, and the Cardinals fall back to 3rd under first year skipper John Mabry. Or, you know, it could all go another way. ;)
Posted on: Mon, 29 Sep 2014 01:53:10 +0000
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