With just two weeks left in baseball’s regular season, one thing is certain: the past six months have been an audition for the final show. A few weeks ago that wasn’t so true: the White Sox were on cruise control, Boston had their hands on the Yankees jugular, Cleveland was an afterthought and Oakland was the darling of the AL. The only stability that remains, however, is in old stalwarts like Atlanta, St. Louis and the woeful ineptitude in the NL West. Make no mistake; I live for this.
I have often been accused of watching baseball games of no importance during the summer. I got MLB Radio because my house didn’t get cable. When the Mets were on TV, I went to Rhino for cheap wings and a glimpse of another meaningless summer tilt. But this season has proven to me the uselessness of the season’s first 150 games.
Sure, those games have their moments, but does anything matter as long as the Red Sox and Yankees are in striking distance of each other going into the final weekend? I can’t think of anything more exciting than seeing a confident Red Sox team truly try to get over the hump and win the division. I know that the Red Sox won the World Series last year, but there could be equally high drama on Oct. 2 when both teams play for the right to book the other team’s tee-time. It could be huge.
Since 1995, the Yankees have made the playoffs every year in a run that currently includes seven straight division titles. ESPN Senior Writer Buster Olney’s book chronicling the 2001 World Series loss to Arizona was titled “The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty,” but Olney may have been a little early. True, the Yankees have not won a World Series since then, but it took three years to really see the fall of the dynasty: the collapse against Boston before the Sox finally won.
The dynasty will not be over until these teams don’t play each other anymore and that may very well happen this year. Cleveland has put together an incredible second half to their season and look solid to win the wild card, if they don’t steal the division from the White Sox. That would leave the loser of the final Boston-New York series of the season on the outside. Since the Red Sox won, this rivalry has lost most, if not all, of its allure. This probably says more about the complacency of the Yankee’s faithful, but it does not make the impending clash any less a battle of the titans. If the division winner is the East’s lone playoff representative, is there anyone who actually believes that they wouldn’t be playing in the World Series?
Let’s get real about this: the White Sox can’t hit, the Indians will be happy to be there, and The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim And Close To The O.C. For Marketing Purposes already had their Cinderella moment in 2002. Additionally, since the Yankees dynasty began in 1995, the East has represented in the World Series seven times. The only time the winner of the East did not play in the World Series was in 2002 when the mess of a team name that is the Angels won, and in 2004 with the Red Sox.
In baseball, the numbers don’t lie. This time, they all point to the season’s biggest showdown at Fenway Park in a few short weeks. And if that doesn’t get you excited about baseball, you’re probably a Mets fan.
