Things aren't looking great for the Red Sox, White Sox, Phillies and Cardinals. All 4 are teams that are considered powerhouses; it's a safe bet that at least 3 of those teams are going to make the playoffs every year, based on the last 10 years. In fact, these 4 teams are the 4 teams that have won the last 5 World Series between 2003 and 2009 that didn't include a Yankees appearance: Boston in 2004 and 2007, Chicago in 2005, St. Louis in 2006, and Philadelphia in 2008 (and they lost the 2009 championship to the Bombers). And yet, all 4 teams stand a good chance at having their postseason hopes destroyed within the next few days. While they may be salvaged, it'd take a lot for any of these teams to make a big comeback.
First, as I've stated in all my posts mentioning Boston, the Red Sox have been plagued by far too many injuries, most of them happening to everyday players that are responsible for the team's strong offense and defense. However, at no point this season did the BoSox have a hold on 1st place in the division after Opening Day when they beat the Yankees. Worse for them, they spent most of the first half behind New York, Tampa Bay, and even the Toronto Blue Jays. THE BLUE JAYS WERE AHEAD OF THE RED SOX. What is this, 1993? Even after overtaking the Canadians in the standings, they found themselves anywhere from 5 to 7 full games behind the two on top. Could this still be the intimidating, dominant team that's won 2 championships in the past 10 years, 2 more than the franchise had won for almost 9 decades beforehand? David Ortiz, for all his power offensively, can't carry the whole team on his shoulders. Offseason acquisition Adrian Beltre could be doing more to help his new team out defensively. Jonathan Papelbon, while recording 33 saves, has also blown 6 saves this year, tying his career high. Beckett, Buchholz, Lackey, Lester and Matsuzaka have all certainly seen better days: while they all have winning records, Beckett's ERA is high enough to keep him out of any Cy Young talks, and Matsuzaka has fallen prey to injury multiple times this season, in the same vein as most of his teammates. With their loss to the Rays tonight (meaning they dropped 2 games in this crucial 3-game stint), it seems Boston is facing the same kind of outcome they became accustomed to in the 86 years between 1918 and 2004: disappointment.
As far as the other Sox go, they finally got Manny Ramirez off waivers and probably expect him to push them past Joe Mauer and the Twins to win the AL Central. Does that make sense to anyone else? Because I don't understand why the Chicago brass believes that an aged, underperforming vet will suddenly create a surge propelling them past Minnesota. The Twins have been unsurprisingly good in the past few weeks and months, even with Orlando Hudson and Justin Morneau spending time on the DL. Carl Pavano has 15 wins, the most he's gained in any season since 2004 (and his ERA, 3.56, at a comparable point). Even Alexi Casilla and Danny Valencia have stepped up with big hits to help the Twins to get to their current 4.5 game lead over the ChiSox. And, of course, it doesn't help Chicago that Joe Mauer has finally found his power source recently and began performing better than he had early in the season. With a floundering rotation (Buehrle, Danks and Garcia all have winning records, but the lowest ERA between any of the 5 starters is 3.65, above average) and a lineup that provides little help (aside from Paul Konerko's best year since 2006, and his batting average at the highest in his whole career, he's getting minimal support from A.J. Pierzynski and Gordon Beckham, two players would haven't been spectacular when it would have been benificial for them to be), it's going to take more than Ramirez's diminishing health and abilities to bring them back to The Show for the first time since winning it in 2005. Although, I can't say I'm sad that things won't work out for old Ozzie Guillen.
In defense of Philadelphia, they have managed to come back within 2 games of the Braves after spending most of the season behind them and, more embarrassingly, the other New York team, and now have a tenuous, 1.5 game lead over the Giants for the NL Wild Card. But with the Reds in the NL Central and the Padres in the NL West both posing big threats, it's hard to imagine that the team that's been to both World Series in the past 2 years and won it in 2008 will even make it to the NLCS to potentially face their NL East superiors. They too have had unfortunate injuries: they had to spend the bulk of August without their best first baseman, Ryan Howard, and lost second baseman Chase Utley in the same manner from the end of June to the middle of August. Jayson Werth and Placido Polanco have both been putting up good numbers, but can't seem to find the power they're known for. If it weren't for Roy Halladay, they probably would be further behind in the standings than they are. In my opinion, that was one of the best moves they could have made this offseason: Doc has always been an incredible pitcher (he's been an All-Star 7 times in the past decade, pitched a perfect game this year, won the Cy Young in 2003 and is poised to be in the running for a second one this season), but you wouldn't know it because he's been not only on the Blue Jays his entire career, but in the hitter-friendly American League instead of the pitcher-dominant National League, where he's really belonged all this time. It didn't hurt that he joined a team that, like I said, has played in the 2 most recent World Series. However, even Halladay's career year may not be enough to push the Phils into the postseason. If they can stave off elimination by not getting too far behind Atlanta (and if San Francisco experiences a major losing streak), they just might make it back to the playoffs for the fourth time in as many years.
Even though I'll always be a Yankees fan, the Twins and Cardinals tie for my second favorite teams, which makes their recent abysmal performance hurt me personally. Now, in a World Series matchup between New York and St. Louis, even the casual reader of this blog knows I'd root for the Yanks, hands down, but I want the Cardinals to win it all against any other MLB team. And really, can you honestly not like this team? Albert Pujols alone is reason enough to be a fan: The Machine recently hit his 34th home run of the season (which, aside from helping him towards a possible Triple Crown with that number being the highest in the National League, also happened to be his 400th career bomb) and still shines in the field; Matt Holliday may be a more mediocre version of Pujols, but considering what that entails, it still makes him a great player; Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright have combined for 31 of the Cards' 69 wins to date and both of them doing it with ERAs lower than 3.00 (2.93 and 2.30 respectively); and Skip Schumaker, Colby Rasmus, Randy Winn and Yadier Molina can all be counted on for run support (that is, when they're all healthy). So why is this incredibly strong team not only 5 games out of the lead in their division, but 3 games behind the Phillies and the Giants for the wild card with only a month left of the regular season? Why are they 4-6 in their last 10 games, despite Pujols' milestone and a moderately good defensive showing? Why is the team that won the World Series in 2006 and made it into the 2009 postseason with 91 wins possibly going to miss the October festivities this year? Until they can address why the past few days have been so unkind to them, their playoff hopes could further slip into the forgotten realm of also-rans this season.
No comments:
Post a Comment