REGIONAL #44:   This group had only two teams ranked in the top 1000, with most of the rest being middling teams of little distinction.  One of the two promising squads was a pennant winner and the World Series champ, the ‘90 Reds, but they weren’t the top ranked team in the NL that year and they weren’t the top seed here.   That honor belonged to the ‘91 Dodgers, who had won a pennant a few years previously and finished just one game behind the Braves in the NL, although the Dodgers had the better ELO rating.  

In the first round, a battle of mediocrities from the same season saw the 1982 Cubs squeeze past the 1982 Astros 5-4; the 1934 Senators and Earl Whitehill made short work of another version of the Cubs, the 1991 Cubs, with Heinie Manush driving in three runs in an 8-1 win; the 1990 Reds’ Jeff Reed hits a grand slam in the first inning off Larry Dierker and the 1970 Astros never recover, going down by a 7-3 margin; and a pitching duel between Tim Belcher of the 1991 Dodgers and John Henry Johnson of the 1978 A’s only ends with a walkoff single by Darryl Strawberry against A’s closer Elias Sosa in the bottom of the 9th.

The semifinal between the top two seeds in the regional, the 1990 Reds and 1991 Dodgers, is also a pitcher’s duel with Jose Rijo and Mike Morgan knotted 2-2 going into the bottom of the 9th.  This time, the walkoff heroics are provided by 35-year old Eddie Murray, who doubles in the winning run in the 3-2 win.  The other semifinal game is decided in similar fashion, as the 1982 Cubs take a 3-2 lead over the 1934 Senators into the bottom of the 9th and ace closer Lee Smith is given the job of wrapping up the win.   But the Cubs defense falls apart and the Nats put up two unearned runs to send the Cubs packing, earning the Senators a spot in the finals.

The final between the #1 seed 1991 Dodgers and the #3 seed 1934 Senators gets off to a rough start for LA starter Ramon Martinez, with Washington holding a 4-0 lead after two innings.  Meanwhile, the Dodgers can’t get to Monte Weaver until Kal Daniels singles home a run in the 5th.  At that point, Weaver’s bubble is burst and the Dodgers begin an offensive onslaught which subsequent Senators relievers aren’t able to stop, either.  A Juan Samuel 2-run double and a 2-run homer from Strawberry pace the deluge and by the time the fat lady sings, the Dodgers have won 9-4 to take the regional, with Darryl Strawberry being the main straw to stir the drink.  This was Strawberry’s first season with the Dodgers after signing as a free agent, as he decided to leave the Mets after manager Davey Johnson was fired.  In real life, the signing didn’t work out as well as the Dodgers hoped, but it worked like a charm as far as this regional was concerned.