Tuesday, October 08, 2002
Underdogs shake up baseball's postseason
Fat cats lose out, this time
By Mike Lopresti
Gannett News Service
What we have here is the NFL, with pine tar. Parity? The baseball playoffs are pouring it all over your living room.
Gather round, all those who yearn to see the favorites crumble, the rich go bust, the big names agonize, the meek inherit the earth, with wet hair and empty champagne bottles in their hands.
This is the Wal-Mart October, where the bargain buyers have hit the lottery. Where conventional wisdom has been knocked out of the ballpark like a fat New York Yankee fastball.
But so the unrest has gone, from Arizona to Oakland to the Bronx.
Pitching has been the pride of the Yankee empire, but the Anaheim Angels hit .376.
St. Louis Cardinals pitching was supposedly vulnerable, while Arizona had Cy Young I and Cy Young II. But the Diamondbacks batted .184 and were outscored 20-6.
The feared Oakland A's pitchers coughed up 27 Minnesota Twins runs. The team that won 20 straight went 1-2 at home.
Even if the Atlanta Braves were to get by Monday night against San Francisco, there was still Tom Glavine's 15.26 earned run average against the Giants.
Baseball is supposed to be more orderly than this, the results dictated by checkbook and common sense.
But nearly every fact of postseason life has been overthrown. The Bud Selig Book on Baseball, where all the nickel-and-dimers die young, has been rewritten in a week.
Pending Game5 Monday night between the Braves and Giants, not one higher-seeded team survived the first round. And the Braves were the only name left from the top nine payrolls when the season began.
The wealthy have been shown the door, with a bat to their heads.
Instead, we have an American League Championship Series between the Angels and Twins. On Opening Day, their rosters together cost $25 million less than the Yankees.
“I don't know what destiny is,” Minnesota catcher A.J. Pierzynski said. “But sometimes if you play hard, you can create your own destiny.”
Or as the poster proclaimed at Anaheim, held up during one of the Yankee clubbings, “Half the payroll, twice the heart.”
There were stunning images over the weekend, especially Saturday, when the two teams who cohabitated in last year's World Series were both axed within five hours.
First, the Yankees watched the Angels celebrate. Then the Diamondbacks watched the Cardinals. The world had turned.
The clubhouse merriment has been raucous and unrestrained. It's what you get with sudden, surprising winners. The Yankees and Braves are usually much dryer after the first round. There is more business to winning at the top.
So baseball's final four will come with your choice of inspirations:
The Twins ... with their extraction from contraction.
The Cardinals ... with the memories of Darryl Kile and Jack Buck still burning and alive.
The Angels ... having to conquer not only the present but the past.
Uplifting stories are everywhere. There's probably no need mentioning how the Twins have been shopped around like a used car, and Disney has been trying to unload the Angels.
Baseball has been charmed, as the commissioner fields questions about the Minnesota team he once wanted condemned. For an unpredictable and high-scoring week, will and audacity have been what's counted. Money doesn't seem to matter. At least for the moment.
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Underdogs shake up baseball's postseason
