dgalehouse

Absolutely. They were just two outs away in the ninth inning.

Considering the circumstances and what was at stake, last night was certainly one of the greatest, most exciting, drama packed, edge of your seat baseball games of all time. A game for the ages. And the Dodgers winning is by no means "killing baseball". It was baseball at its best. That can only be good for the sport.

If the Dodgers have an Achilles heel, it surely is their bullpen. They have spent plenty on it, but it has not worked out as they had hoped it would. Could it be their downfall ?

N.D. with a hard fought win against a pretty tough opponent. The remaining schedule looks pretty soft, but they can't get too complacent. Even the weaker teams have good athletes. You see ranked teams getting upset every week.

Ohtani with a game for the ages last night. Pitched the pennant clincher, with six shutout innings with ten strikeouts and just two hits , while slamming three big home runs. Has anyone ever had a better game than that ?

The Sox have apparently identified the culprit responsible for all of the strikeouts. It was assistant hitting coach , Ben Rosenthal. Not to be confused with the distinguished commentator, Ken Rosenthal. Ben Rosenthal has been relieved of his duties, whatever the duties of a second assistant hitting coach may be.

NBC/Comcast chose to put the Notre Dame game exclusively on it's pay subscription streaming service, Peacock , while NBC televised women's volleyball. I don't know if this was meant to disrespect Notre Dame football or just another stupid decision by NBC/ Comcast or maybe a cheap attempt to coerce people into subscribing to Peacock. Probably the latter, but either way it is another reason to despise these greedy scoundrels and think twice about giving them any more of your money.

The Mariners/Tigers marathon was reminiscent of the Sox/Dodgers 18 inning affair in the 2018 World Series. That game is memorable for the valiant effort by Nathan Eovaldi, finally ending with the walk-off home run by Max Muncy. The Sox would have won were it not for an uncharacteristic error by Ian Kinsler. As it is, that was the Dodger's only win in the Series as the Sox won it in five games. Now, the Mariners will play for a chance at their first ever A.L. pennant and first ever trip to the Fall Classic.

Have to feel bad for Orion Kerkering, who panicked in a critical moment and uncorked a wild throw in an attempt to get a force out at the plate. It ended the game and the Phillies season. Baseball can be cruel at times.

I saw the game. It was a good win over a fairly decent opponent. But the game was marred by a constant throwing of penalty flags by the officials. Made it hard to really get into it.

The expanded playoffs lead to some situations that are not fair to everyone. And they cheapen the long regular season and pennant races. But they keep more fans interested and are a moneymaker for MLB, so they are here to stay. Anyway, if you finish third in a five team division , do you really deserve another shot at the gold medal ?

Too much analysis. It's baseball. Things happen. Ground ball finds a hole. Long drive is caught on the warning track. Ball hooks foul by inches. Or not. Overall, the Yankees had at least a slightly better team plus the home field and crowd. And a tip of the cap to Cam Schlittler, who was absolutely lights out. But the playoffs are still a crapshoot. Sometimes you roll snake eyes.

The Sox called up and started the worst pitcher they had at AAA. Turns out, he pitched a decent game. They rested their top relievers . The second tier bullpen also did well. The Tigers were not cooperating. What more could they do ? You cannot reasonably expect them to tell the players to go out there and deliberately throw the game.

The Dodgers and Phillies are arguably the two best teams in baseball. But one of them is going to get knocked out in the best of five NLDS. That's how it goes sometimes.

At that time the Red Sox strategy was to focus on drafting the so called " best player available " . Evidently, that pretty much disqualified pitchers from consideration. I think they have changed that strategy in the past year or so. Unfortunately, too late for Schlittler.