jung

Cards commenting again that they never felt like they were out of that 6-0 game against the Nats....in this game they never really looked like they were in it even at 0-0.

Well if this finishes as it appears, I guess we will know who the disciplined hitting team will be and and which will be the team of free swingers. Giants have really worked counts, got Lohse to get the ball up in the zone and just pounded out hits on him and anybody else the Cards have tossed out there tonight. They have put on a clinic so far tonight.

Funny how two teams will have a different perspective on a series. Card's manager commenting that there was a "different" feeling in the Cards dugout for game 6 with Hamilton out of the game....almost sounded like they felt like the baseball gods had deserted them. I thought the Giants took tremendous momentum and confidence out of seeing Zito go out there and dominate in game 5. In fact, since game 5 absolutely nothing has gone the Cards way and everything has gone the Giants way.

Scutaro continues to hit and moves Pagan to 3rd with a hit and run single to the opposite field. How come we never get players like that?

Pitching is so critical in the post season. I actually think that if the Giants pull off the seven game series win, the turning point will have been the game 5 Zito pitched. The Giants had lost a little faith in Zito. Stuck Tim in the rotation ahead of him cauae they just did not feel like Zito would get it done. They come back almost on a hunch with Zito in game 5 and he just throws an absolute beauty of a game with Giants backs against the wall.

Its done now so it hardly matters. Hopefully Farrell learned something in Toronto. There is every chance that it turns out to be a BB/Pats kind of thing as I posted above. I am just so tired of the Sox putting up some front like they are actually going through some process of pairing down candidates when they are obviously doing nothing of the sort. Best advice for Farrell comes from Betty Davis..."Fasten your seat belts......its going to be a bumpy night".

Well I am was neither a Farrell for Manager fan or an Aviles at SS fan. However, Mike is not chop liver. He was/is a serviceable utility player and probably could have netted back a serviceable utility player in trade or been made part of a package deal. On the one hand that may sound like a big who cares but I am struggling with Farrell on two counts: I really don't want somebody part of the recent past of this Red Sox organization for one. For another, Farrell has not proved out as a Manager. Now I suppose it is possible that Farrell could be the next BB (bust as head coach in Cleveland, becomes monster head coach in NE). Plus as I had posted earlier this smacks of another no process process by the Sox. They wanted Farrell, put up a facade of having done some amount of due diligence while in fact doing none. These guys are just itching to be the worst organization in baseball. They already might be the most phony baloney organization in baseball.

What a game Zito is pitching tonight (game 5). Location is unreal and he is throwing a big breaking curve ball for strikes anytime he wants to. Has not missed with the FB either. One of the best control pitcher performances I have seen in a long time at least so far.

No place to put this comment really but watching Scutaro in the NLCS is truly galling....another lousy decision by the Sox FO. Heck I remember at the time that most of us simply wondered why.....he seemed like a value, not a salary dump candidate. Then when we saw what we ended up with at SS we really wondered why, especially since the resources referred to that could be spend "more efficiently" I think was the term used, were never spent by the Sox. Anyway...Scutero had a great September 2011 while the rest of the Sox were pure s***. So I wish him well and wish we still had him.

Any comments from Yankee fans regarding all the talk about Long and whether or not he got the Yanks prepared for post season pitching and if their swing for the fences hitting style, every swing, every at bat (except for Ichiro and Jeter) is a direct result of how Girardi wants it and how Long teaches it?

Those two players for Farrell....are they completely and totally out of their minds?

It is a shame that the Yankees got to play the anemic Orioles in the division series. The Yanks should never have been anywhere near this year's AL Championship Series in spite of their regular season record. I think Detroit will have a better chance against the Giants than the Cards in spite of their relative records but regardless of which NL team gets in, I think either one will beat the Tigers and make it three straight WS for the NL.

Filling in more teams at the bottom of the bracket is making a mockery of the 162 though. Baseball is not like any of the other pro team sports in that none of the others have as many regular season games. The best team that the AL could have put up against the NL this year got knocked out in the one game play in...nice work Uncle Bud. The Rangers would likely have knocked the ridiculous Yanks out before getting to Detroit and turning the ALCS into Custer vs Guardians. It took the anemic Orioles to allow the Yanks to drift aimlessly into the ALCS. In the national league in spite of all the who-hah about setting this up so that the WC team had a harder time moving forward in the post season, once this year's WC play in winner got past the one game play in, the fact that they were hot still was more important than home field or pitching match ups or anything else. All this maneuvering did not change the one constant since the development of division series play and league championships before the WS. The hottest teams at playoff time move forward. I think it is dangerous for MLB to add even the one additional WC team and I think they should go back to what they had. It simply makes the 162 less and less meaningful, not more meaningful as Uncle Bud implied when this whole nonsense of another WC team got started.

Don't want Farrell either. What has happened to the Red Sox as an organization. This happens now with players.... now with a manager selection....seems like the Sox get it into their head that they want to go a certain direction and due diligence goes out the window, any semblance of a process goes out the window.....just suggests so many problems above the play on the field to even begin to count them. Certainly looks like they are going to make a big play for Farrell and I think he could show up for his interview in a trench coat flashing 5 year olds on the way to the front door and the Sox would still come out saying....yup...that's our guy!

Boy if the pukish AL Championship trophy does not say....you ain't done nothin' yet I don't know what does.

The way the Yankees are losing is heartless and gutless....about the way the Red Sox have played since September 2011...these are are sorts of collapses and surrenders I would not have expected to see from teams of "quality" in a decade. It's not like these are teams that are barely Major League. Teams that are supposed to be the flagships of MLB playing like this is embarrassing for baseball, not just the specific teams and players.

Yankees did nothing to support CC in this game....he bailed them out of at least two innings where the Yanks just kicked that ball around the infield. I am really really beginning to wonder though. This epic collapse by NY. Two seasons in a row of failure on a grand scale by the Red Sox....something has fundamentally gone sideways with the game. Players with heart that don't just fold their tents when things go wrong stick out like sore thumbs now...maybe its all the money.

If the Yankees win tonight because they play well then they might actually have a shot at this thing. I thought that in part the reason why the Sox were able to turn the trick on the Yankees was because everybody including the Yankees believed that Kevin Millar stuff about "don't let us win one". The Yankees never seemed to be the same team in that series after the Sox won game 4 . The Sox were very loose even going into elimination and they stayed that way after winning game 4. The Yankees just seemed to really tighten up while the Sox remained loose and played well the rest of the way. If the Yankees play well tonight, get some hits for a change, have some good at bats, maybe the same thing will happen. So far though it seems like the Yanks are the team that is tight although they are trying to stay loose...it all seems so forced. The Tigers so far seem to be the team that is loose and taking these games as they come. Yanks carry the baggage of being the Yankees into this thing which makes it hard for them to adopt the role that the Sox played as they came back from 0-3..

Actually I would prefer this series go seven with the Yanks faltering in the ninth by way of successive K's by Grandy, SwishSwish and ARoid restored to the lineup. That way I get as much baseball as I can get and still get to see the Yanks get stomped most painfully. Plus there is added benefit in that to get it to seven maybe SwishSwish and Special K Grandy restore themselves a bit convincing the Yanks to keep them.....if only....Be still my heart!!!!

One thing I am happy about is that the quality of the baseball has gotten better and better. Could hardly have been worse for post season during the division series but has gotten much better. That 9th inning sort of put an exclamation point on all the things that have been going wrong for the Yanks though. Can't wait till the 9th to start to think about what the hell you are doing at the plate. I am beginning to wonder if the lack of a DH made it easier for the NL teams to find their rhythm and get squared up as their series had fewer mental and physical errors while the AL series were still sort of kicking the ball around the field.

Actually Cano's last AB is a good example for how screwed up he is right now. Cano got a hit on a good piece of hitting (for a change) but he should have been looking for that 2-0 pitch exactly where it was thrown. Cano did not even offer at it which means he could not have been looking for it. There is no explanation for that other than Cano has got himself as screwed up now as Agons had himself at one point this year. That pitch should have been either bouncing around in the RF bleachers or way out in RF careening around the fence. Cano would have either been on 1st or 2nd and the runner would have either been on 3rd or home with the tying run! Yanks had the best shot they were ever going to have at Verlander at home in the post season and just did not have hitters able to take advantage. Ichiro continued to have good at bats, Nunez had a couple, Gardener had good at bats although that was a ridiculous situation for him to be in. Raul had a few good at bats. That rocket that Raul hit and Prince made a good play on would have had Ichiro on 3rd and Raul would have probably made it to 2nd. Yank's continue to widen the strike zone on themselves. So even in nights like tonight when they were generally more patient, swinging out of their shoelaces at pitches outside the strike zone made it more difficult to execute on the pitches that they should have been hitting.

Man there are so many decisions made for tonight's game that we get to see play out. At least it will be interesting to watch from afar.

CC would have to go on three days rest tonight. I think that combined with the very real possibility that CC could pitch a great game and lose tonight is what is keeping him out tonight. I think the Yanks want every shot at putting CC in a position to get them a win. To me, Gardener at the top of the order after so much time off is a bigger surprise. Easy to see how Gardener could turn into an o-fur tonight.

Well I don't think the league will do anything but if the Giants get up on the Cards enough not to worry about series consequences, the players will likely take care of it.

Well first I don't think anybody believes the Sox will start 2013 with the roster they finished with in 2012. Some of the young guys that the Sox believe will be part of their future may be here in 2013 but I believe the Sox will spend some of that money from "the trade". I would not be at all surprised if they biased their activities toward starting pitching but I am convinced the Sox will make moves both for ST and for everyday players. I do think they are likely to revise their vision of "elite". I think they are less likely to throw money at guys with injury history or that have just gotten off the operating table and will be more attracted to players that have proven durable or are younger and in the main healthy.