In a small Midwestern town, there are two kids with lemonade stands, across the street from each other. The kid on the northern side of the street wants to sell his stand. He’s had it for a long time, and he’s done well with it, but his lime-aid stand and chutney squishee stands are hemorrhaging money, so he decides to sell the lemonade stand to recoup his losses.
Two streets to the south, there’s a kid that sells grape juice. His stand is wildly successful, and while the kid is a little obnoxious, his customers love him because he wants to give them the best damn grape juice possible. The grape juice kid would love nothing more than to buy the lemonade stand that’s up for sale. He knows that he would be inheriting a loyal fan base that has wanted the lemonade stand owner to sell for years. The grape juice kid approaches the seller and expresses an interest in buying his stand.
Just then, the owner of the stand on the southern side of the street comes over.
“You can’t buy his stand,” he says.
“Why not?” asks the grape juice magnate.
“Because I don’t want you owning a lemonade stand,” he says.
“What do you care?”
“I don’t think it’s in the best interest of the rest of the lemonade stand owners.”
Leave it to our friends at Super Deluxe to spin the Barry Bonds “moral quagmire” in a way that no one has considered yet. And the sad part is that it does not seem at all beyond the realm of possibility that this is how Bonds would react, if given the choice in real life that he’s given here. Ladies and Gentlemen, “It’s a Wonderful Game.”
Well, at least I got the “______ in 5” part right. The guy holding the sign in the new Busch Stadium wasn’t kidding when he said, “Hit it to the pitcher.” Ye gods. Kenny Rogers was surely hitting cameramen off-camera after what he saw on the field tonight.
The game had two goats in place, depending on how it turned out. If the Cardinals lose, then your goat is Chris Duncan, who booted a routine fly out to right field when Jim Edmonds invaded his space and freaked him out, causing Duncan to take his eye off the ball. One pitch later, Sean Casey deposits a ball into the right field seats and gives Detroit a 2-1 lead. Later, Duncan misplays a ball at the wall – also hit by Casey, his second double of the night – but that does not come back to haunt the Cardinals in any way.
The goat for the Tigers, on the other hand, is undoubtedly Brandon Inge, despite his lofty batting average during the Series. He made the throwing error to first that allowed the first run to score. Then, after hitting a double, he was caught in a rundown between second and third after running on contact to a ball up the middle, which Jeff Weaver picked off and hurled to third to begin the rundown.
And then there was the worst play of the game, which will make sci-fi geeks the world over wonder if the Matrix really does exist (well, the sci-fi geeks that watch sports, anyway). With runners on first and second, Justin Verlander, who was toooooooooootally overexcited for this game, fielded a come-backer from Jeff Weaver, the freaking pitcher, and threw to Inge to get the force at third. Only problem was, he threw about three feet to the left of the bag, just like Joel Zumaya did in Game 3. If you combine the two official errors, and the unofficial baserunning error, Inge was involved in all three plays.
I did say at the beginning of the playoffs that the Tigers were a year early, that they weren’t ready to compete yet. Still, I have to think that the Yankees would have put up a better fight than this in the World Series. Maybe there is something to be said for the LDS being seven games instead of five. Until that day, congrats to the Cardinals, and World Series MVP David Eckstein (!), for proving us experts horribly, horribly wrong. Only five more months before the Cubs begin breaking my heart once again.
The camera doesn’t lie. Fox caught a shot of Kenny Rogers’ pitching hand that spoke a thousand words. Analyst Tim McCarver seemed to be giving Rogers the benefit of the doubt at first, calling it “discoloration,” but we were all thinking the same thing: dude’s got pine tar on his hand. The only way this gets better is if George Brett leaps from the stands to get in the face of the umpires.
Not that it would have mattered if Rogers left a jar of Vaseline on the mound next to him: the Gambler was, um, dealing tonight, limiting the Cardinals to two hits over eight innings (he washed his hands after the first inning, so even if he was cheating in the first, the Cards still couldn’t hit him for seven “clean” innings) and running his consecutive scoreless innings streak to 23. Jeff Weaver, to his credit, pitched very well, striking out five and walking one. But he basically lost the game the second that Craig Monroe hit that towering home run in the first inning, Monroe’s fifth of the postseason. One run was all that Rogers needed, though the Tigers added an RBI double by Carlos Guillen and an RBI single by Sean Casey.
Speaking of Rogers, every time they showed a close-up of him on that camera behind home plate, I thought of Henry Rollins. I half expected him to say, “I’m Kenny Rogers, and this is Off-Road Tattoo!” The close-up shots of Weaver, on the other hand, were like watching the Honkey Cam. He made a face that, to paraphrase Bill Hicks, was the human equivalent of showing a dog a card trick. Durrrr.
When Casey was in the batter’s box, I kept thinking, “What’s with the tongue?” He’s got some Michael Jordan thing going. Then Fox cut to a shot of four men wearing baseball-shaped masks over their faces, and I thought, “Hey, Los Straitjackets is here!” A very entertaining game all the way around, even if very little happened on the field until the ninth, when Todd Jones nearly blew the game after recording two quick outs and then giving up a single, booting a routine grounder, coughing up a double and then plunking a guy. Yadier Molina, the ninth inning hero of Game 7 against the Mets, grounded out weakly to shortstop. Game over. Yikes. Maybe send Joel Zumaya out for the next game that’s on the line?
Monroe gave a Yogi-ish quote in the post-game interviews, saying, “Living out this dream is what every kid dreams about.” No kidding?
At last, the Big Show has arrived and, despite the predictions of many, it is 100% New York-free. Anthony Statler and David Medsker break down each team, position by position, and offer their brilliant, armchair expert analysis on who takes the prize. (Keep in mind that at the beginning of the season, Medsker predicted the White Sox would beat the Mets in the World Series. Whoops.)
Catcher:Yadier Molina vs. Ivan Rodriguez
Johnny Bench is in hog heaven. Pudge and the youngest Flying Molina Brother are the hardest catchers to run against in baseball. The similarities, however, end there. Despite Molina’s heroic two-run homer in Game 7 of the NLCS, he’s actually a lousy hitter (.216-29-6-49). Look at that batting average again: it’s 84 points below Pudge’s average during the regular season. Plus, Pudge has been here before, winning it all as a member of the 2003 Marlins. He’ll be the calm in the storm for the Tigers youngsters. Edge: Tigers
First Base:Albert Pujols vs. Sean Casey
If Casey is healthy (he missed the final two games of the ALCS), he is extremely hard to strike out and provides the Tigers a nice line-drive hitter from the left side of the plate. With no disrespect to Casey, however, Pujols is the best pure-hitter in this series and possibly in all of baseball. Pujols can hit for power, average and is amazing in the clutch (he hit .397 with runners in scoring position in the regular season). Edge: Cardinals.
Second Base:Ronnie Belliard vs. Placido Polanco
Polanco has the edge in terms of batting average and fielding percentage (six errors to Belliard’s 11), but Belliard has considerably more pop than Polanco, hitting 13 home runs this season to Polanco’s four. The Cards get another edge, but this Series will not be won or lost by who’s playing second base. Edge: Cardinals
To see the rest of the World Series preview, click here.
There is no joy in Metville, for the mighty Carlos has struck out. Looking. On a 55 mph curveball.
The baseball gods will surely punish me for being so pun-heavy – God knows, I smack around the BE writers when they get out of control with them – but someone needs to ‘splain to me how Carlos Beltran, a Cardinals killer if ever there was one, could stand frozen, with two strikes, on the most hittable curve ball in the history of playoff baseball. For crying out loud, at least pretend to swing at the damn thing. Otherwise, you render fellow outfield Endy Chavez’s incredible catch of Scott Rolen’s home run in the sixth – which Chavez turned into a double play – completely pointless.
To be fair, it’s not as though Beltran is the only one that didn’t come through in the clutch in Game 7. Cliff Floyd, pinch hitting for losing pitcher Aaron Heilman (can’t really blame him for throwing a belt-high fastball to the youngest Flying Molina Brother, when only nine pitchers got away with that all season), was also frozen by an Adam Wainwright curveball. And let us not forget the bottom of the sixth, right after Chavez’s incredible play (which Floyd never, ever would have been able to make). After a throwing error by Rolen with a runner on first – loved his joke post-game about hitting the bull, a sly “Bull Durham” reference – Jeff Suppan intentionally walks Shawn Green to load the bases. Jose Valentin strikes out, and Chavez, the most eager beaver you’ve ever seen, swings at the first pitch, only to hit a meek flyout to Jim Edmonds in center field.
While the Cubs fan in me is angry to see the Cards advance, I have to take my hat off to them. Everyone said they were the weakest team that La Russa’s brought to the postseason in years, maybe ever. Well, maybe that’s what it will take for them to win it all. After all, the Yankees have proven that the biggest lineup isn’t necessarily the best one. Are the 2006 Cardinals the 1996 Yankees in disguise? We’ll find out Saturday.
You know, it’s funny. I just remembered that my friends and I were all rooting for the Yankees in that Series, because the Braves were the heavy favorites and we wanted to see the underdog Yankees win. How odd to call the Yankees underdogs at anything. But that’s what they were, and they won it handily. Note to Detroit: don’t get complacent. You have a much more difficult Series ahead of you than you think.
And so it’s come to this: the least of New York’s pitching (pick an Oliver, Perez or Darren) against St. Louis’ most aggressively average (Jeff Suppan). Home teams have a substantial edge in Game 7’s, but I attended the Game 7 at Wrigley between the Cubs and Marlins, so you know, anything’s possible.
Give the Mets credit; they sent rookie John Maine out to battle Chris Carpenter, arguably the best pitcher in the National League, and came out on the winning end. In fact, the Mets won both games that Carpenter started in this series, a most impressive feat. Jose Reyes leading off the game with a home run was a good start.
The Tigers have to be loving this, watching both teams exhaust their pitching staffs like that. Then again, could the lengthy break make the Tigers pitchers rusty? Personally, I’ve never bought into that idea. There is no way extra rest at the end of the playoffs could hurt anyone, especially pitchers who are almost out of gas.
Everyone thought this was New York’s year. The only thing the Mets are hoping for is that tonight is their night.
The Mets have to be shaking in their boots right now, down 3-2 and staring down Chris Carpenter on the mound for the Cardinals. There was always a risk of the Mets being in this position the moment the news leaked that they would be losing not just Pedro but El Duque as well. Tom Glavine’s dandy, but Pedro’s mean. And mean is what wins in the playoffs.
It would be a shame, really, if the Mets came this far, only to fall apart before taking their shot at the brass ring. It would be an even bigger shame to lose to the weakest Cardinals team in years. Though to be fair, the Cards remind me of the mid-‘90s Yankees teams, the ones that had some star players (Paul O’Neill, a young Derek Jeter), but more importantly, they had a clutch supporting cast of guys like Scott Brosius and Shane Spencer. Notice that the bigger the Yankees got, the sooner their fortunes would turn in the postseason? Just a thought.
Fox is surely rooting for the Mets, not just because it would mean an extra game of playoff baseball, but because it would mean more New York baseball. As much as fans love seeing teams like the Tigers, White Sox, Marlins and Angels appear out of nowhere and win it all, Fox hates not having one of the New York teams in the Big Show. Detroit and St. Louis are ranked #11 and 52 respectively in population. Tulsa is actually bigger than St. Louis. Who knew?
I wonder how much the strike zone is going to grow/shrink tonight…
Mets SMASH! Carlos Beltran homered twice and Carlos Delgado hit a clutch three-run homer (along with a 2-RBI ground rule double) to break a 2-2 tie. After that, the Mets never looked back, blowing it open in the sixth inning when the first seven batters reached safely. Single, single, walk, double, walk, single, double. Three outs later, this game was over.
The Mets needed this in the biggest way imaginable. They were staring down elimination in Game 5, and having to bring Tom Glavine back on three days’ rest to not just keep them alive but save the series. This way, they get some semblance of momentum as both teams head back to New York.
Either way, the Motor City Kitties are relaxing in Day-trois awaiting whichever NL team decides to attend the slaughter.
And just like that, the Mets are in big, big trouble. The Mets’ bullpen threw about four times as many pitches last night as the Cardinals pen, and tonight, starter Steve Trachsel had to leave after loading the bases without recording an out in the second inning. He even started the second by giving up a solo home run to Cardinals pitcher Jeff Suppan (!). Two more runs scored on a wild pitch and a fielder’s choice, and that was more than enough for the wheeling and dealing Suppan, who would scatter five hits over eight innings. Not that there was any need to watch after the second inning. Oh, and who knocked in those two runs in the first? Scott Spezio, with another 2-RBI triple. Think he’s playing for a fat new contract?
After four innings of sluggish hitting on the part of the Mets, I started to drift toward my TiVo queue, so I watched the back halves of the first two “SNL” episodes from this season. Man, is that show in a bad way. All of that talent in the cast, and they can’t write a skit to save their lives. Come back Tina Fey. You’re sorely missed.
The Mets send the erratic Oliver Perez (3-13, 6.55, 102K/68 BB) to the mound for Game 4. And at once it hits me that the Mets may not play another game in Flushing this year. Good pitching always beats good hitting. Go ask the AL champion Detroit Tigers about that one.
