World Series

The two best teams I watched this year were the Blue Jays and the Pirates, neither of whom are still around. The Blue Jays seems to get frustrated by the no-quit-ness of the Royals and even when it looked like the Jays had turned the corner and were about to come back on them, the Royals kept the hitting going and closed out the series. The tenacity of the Royals is their best attribute, the pitching is okay, the lineup is good but not great, the defense is solid, but they never quit, they make use of all 27 outs and that keeps them in games that they probably ought to lose.

The Pirates fell prey to the 1-game playoff for the 3rd straight year. Sucks, but that's the way it goes, anyone can win one game in baseball. The Cubs blasted through their division opponents with timely power hitting and shutdown pitching. But against the Mets, the weather turned cool and that alone seemed to finish off the Cubs. I thought the Mets played well but more than that the Cubs failed to play from behind, they were the un-Royals, watching games slip away rather than aggressively trying to win them back. The Mets pitching was really good and the bats showed up at the right time but I can't help thinking they've been overachieving all year long. They exposed the lack of depth of the Dodgers and caught the Cubs at a bad moment. Are the Mets really this good?

Looking forward to this Series, these are not two teams I would've thought we'd see at the end of the year but they're both playing well at the right time and here we are. This match-up is all about the Mets pitching against the Royals lineup. The Mets should be able to break through against the Royal staff but if the Royals can score on the Mets, they'll win. I'm betting they will. I'll take the Royals in 7.