Division Street: Threading the LDSes

[Edgy MD]

Greatest choker of all time.

[G-Fafif]

Beltran could use a world championship and/or a few more postseasons to go beyond cult status where Greatest Ever territory is concerned. He's been in only four Octobers, which doesn't take away from his various rates of monster success but makes him, to a degree, more of a Pat Tabler than a, if you'll excuse the expression, Mickey Mantle in this realm. Which only matters if you're boosting Beltran for the Hall of Fame, I suppose. If he were to do what he's done in LDS and LCS play in even a couple of World Series for a couple of world champs, then he forever becomes a Winner who transcends his more earthly (if still impressive) regular seasons...and makes that last at-bat in 2006 more of a "I bet you didn't know there was actually this one time in a postseason situation where Beltran didn't come through."

[Guest Mets � Willets Point]

I kind of wonder if Beltran's post-season superheroics actually feed into the creation of the "he didn't swing" myth. The thought (if you can call it that) that goes into it is "Beltran is flawless in postseason, so if he swung the bat something amazing would have happened!" The fact that he could have popped up, grounded out, swung & missed, or otherwise made an out isn't considered even though those are more likely scenarios if you play the percentages.

[Edgy MD]

I don't know. The Beltran-hating Mets fans I know tend to either be ignorant of Beltran's general excellence or rationalize it away as not representative of the "big spot."

Then there's some blather about "that kind of money" and "least we could expect" and "racist Omar Minaya" and I just back away slowly.

[HahnSolo]

Beltran's bigger crime in that AB was staring at a straight down the gut first pitch fastball, imo. Wainwright was rattled (2 singles, K, a hard-hit line-out, BB) and was just looking to get ahead in the count. The 0-2 curveball was nasty, the first pitch? Not so much.

[Gwreck]

Tigers up 3-0 in the 6.

Verlander retired the first 16 in a row before giving up a walk.

[Guest Mets � Willets Point]

Just got home, and um, wow, Verlander is having a good game.

If the Tigers advance I'm glad the Sox won't have to face him until game 3.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

No hitter? Yo' en' is here.

Let's see about some runs now, okay, fellas?

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Impressive gas from Sean Doolittle in the 1-2-3 Tiger 8th. He could have a real future in baseball if his family's duck-call/reality-TV enterprises run aground.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Let's Go A's. Up to you to keep this season interesting...

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Verlander's being so uncool tonight, you guys. Like, totally fascist, right?

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Totally.

Well, we're abut to see an all-time 9th inning Lazarus act or we're not.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Here we go.

Tying run up, 2 out. Seth Smiff

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Shit.

[Guest d'Kong76]

Feh

[Guest Mets � Willets Point]

This basically shaken down to my 2 favorite AL teams and two least favorite NL teams in the final four.