AL East

[Frayed Knot]

I swear I've never seen that big dork have a clean inning.
The Sawx finally get to Rivera only to have Papelshit, after getting Jeter to fly out to start the inning, go single, single, walk, single to re-tie the game again.

[seawolf17]

It sucks that I've spent the last hour watching this game, concocting ways that this game can end without Robinson Cano and Marco Scutaro scoring fantasy points for my opponent while I watch Papelbon's score (for me) tick down with every hit. That Cano AB was the most stressful baseball AB (for me) that I've watched since Carlos Beltran in 2006.

Eff you, baseball.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

F

[Guest Edgy DC]

So, that Carlos Delgado thing didn't quite shake out, huh?

[metirish]

How about that Girardi and his managing over the last few weeks , from what I have been reading it reeked of over managing and then panic.

[Frayed Knot]

Dead tie going into the last weekend thanks to the Rays losing to KC last night (at least it was a Greinke start so they get a partial pass).

Yanx are in Boston while the Rays finish up with the Royals so it sounds like advantage TB.
Minnesota is one game behind the record of both of them as they host Toronto for three more.
Two more HRs for Bautista in last night's Minny game (54).

[Frayed Knot]

I should also mention that in the case of tied records the division title goes to the Rays on the basis of season-long head-to-head.

... and it looks like they may need that seeing as how they're getting 2-hit thru 7 by Bruce Freakin' Chen and it's 7-0 Royals.
One of the things seldom mentioned about the Rays is that their offense isn't very good most of the time and even more so now that Evan Longoria is out. He should be back for the post-season although who knows.

And why does it always seem that the Yanx are disgustingly healthy every October while their potential opponents have one or more stars ailing: Morneau (def out of the 1st round at this point) Mauer, Hamilton in Texas (playing tonight for the 1st time in a month), and now Longoria? I know why it seems that way ... because it's always the case, that's why.

Yanx v Boston still not underway and still being listed as 'Delayed', not postponed.
If postponed they'd have to play two tomorrow and that would fuck with FOX's schedule.

[Frayed Knot]

Been catching peeks at the Yanx/BoSox DH today ...

- First of all, what a freakin' joke. They got rained out last night and were the 4PM FOX game today. So instead of making it a regular DH, Sox mgmt didn't want to get stuck with refunds and/or credits so made it a separate admission DH with start times of 4:10 & 9:05. That's 4 hours 55 minutes in between games by two teams who routinely take 4-1/2 hours to play. And guess what? -- They did. Game 1 ends at around 8:40 (10 innings) and so they have to clear out the entire stadium to get the new fans in who have already got to be at the gates where the game 1 fans need to file out. Amazingly enough they did all that in around 45 minutes and got game 2 started just before 9:30, but that's a 9:30 PM start ... in New England ... in October.
The Wilpons would get skewered (and rightfully so) for pulling something like this.


- These have been two of the worst played games I've ever seen. The Sox get 11 hits and 8 walks in game 1 and were lucky to get 5 runs out of it. Pettitte sucked again but Boston let him off the hook repeatedly by leaving runners on all over the place, hitting into DPs, making errors, had runners thrown out at home despite two Yanqui overthrows, and generally sucking all over. And after all that I think they still out-played the Yanx.
Oh yeah and Papelbon sucked again.

- They're now an hour into game 2 and they just started the 3rd inning. Well, it's Burnett & Matsuzaka, whaddya expect?
Yanx are up 3-1 and I think they have 2 hits. There are more HBPs & BBs so far than balls hit out of the infield.
Now 4-1. 3 more MFY baserunners on 1 hit.




Rays finally beat KC, but if the Yanx take game 2 tonight they'll take the one game lead into tomorrow.
Rays still win in case of a tie but they'll need double good fortune tomorrow to do that.


Nice 9th inning comeback win for Minnesota today (esp after losing 7 of their last 8) but it looks like a #2 seed for them no matter what.

[Gwreck]

Minnesota clinched seed #2 with their loss this afternoon.

Red Sox up big late in their game, which will hand Tampa the division crown.

[Frayed Knot]

Only if Papelbon can get the final out before surrendering 4 more runs ... I'd say that's about 50/50 at this point.


oe: although Tampa has tied up KC in the 9th, so maybe they won't need it.

[Gwreck]

Tampa tied up their game and unless the Royals win it in the bottom of the 9th, that game will go to extras. If Boston has already won by that point (edit: they just did), one would think Tampa would have little motivation to keep playing hard in extras.

[Gwreck]

Texas at Tampa
Yankees at Minnesota

are your first round matchups.

[Frayed Knot]

TB still has to fight hard so they don't get stuck with a co-Division Champion flag next Spring

[Gwreck]

There's no such thing. The tie is broken by head-to-head record during the season, for which they hold the lead.

[Frayed Knot]

Officially there's no such thing (and I was really just trying to be funny there) but there have been a couple of instances where the 'losing' (hence WC) team has raised a co-Champ banner the following year, amid some grumbling from the real winners.
I think Boston did it one year where they tied w/the Yanx (I remember Bill Madden yapping about it) and I know StL did so following a year where they tied w/Houston.

[Frayed Knot]

Rays win in 12th, finish one full game ahead of Yanx and with best record in AL (96-66)

[Valadius]

Somewhere, Vince Naimoli is saying "Why the hell did I sell that team?"